Christianity in India: The Early History
75
-Mahavir Sanglikar
You will be surprised to know that Christianity entered India in 52 A.D., and it was well established in 3rd Century A.D. So it were not the Europeans of 15th century to bring Christianity to India, as it was introduced to India long before the Europeans entered this country. This means, Christianity was established in India even before Christianization of Europe.
St. Thomas Comes to India
According to Christians of South India, St. Thomas Apostle, also known as Didymus or Doubting Thomas brought Christianity to India. St. Thomas was one of the great apostles of Jesus. It is believed that he traveled to India in 52 A.D. to spread the message of Jesus amongst the Jews of Kerala, South India. He went to India through Arabian see.
St. Thomas established Seven and Half Churches in Kerala.
The descendents of the Jews converted to Christianity at that time are known as Nasarani people.
Other Accounts
In 180-190 A.D., Church in Alexandria sent the most famous scholar Pantaenus to India to preach Christianity. This is known as 2nd Christian Mission to India.
At the beginning of 4th Century, Bishop David of Basra went to southern parts of India and converted many people to Christianity. In the middle of 4th century, many Christians, mainly merchants from Western Asia went to India and settled down there.
Jesus in India?
It is said that Jesus himself had traveled to India. There are two theories about Jesus' travel to India. First theory says that Jesus visited India when he was 12 years old, and studied their for years. According to second theory, Jesus did not die on the cross, but went to Kashmir, in Northern part of India. Although traveling to India was a common thing in those days, both the theories are considered as hoax. There are no historical references to Jesus' travel to India and both the theories are recent 'inventions'
All these early Christians in India, although they were Christians by religious values, had adopted local Indian traditions like dress code, food habits, language and other customs. The way shown by apostle Thomas was known as 'Way of Thomas', which was a mixture of Dravidic, Jain, Buddhist and Persian ways of life.
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Fascinating stuff. I took a class on Asian History in college, but it was a survey course, and didn't go into a great deal of depth on any of the countries or cultures that we learned about. There was no mention made of early Christianity in India, for example, so I definitely learned something new here.
Voted up and interesting, and I'll definitely be back to read your other history hubs!
Michele Travis Level 7 Commenter 3 months ago
This is a very interesting hub. Who knows, the bible never tells us what Jesus did between the age of 12 and 30.