Book 4  Continuation .....................
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24. Thomas's Second Mission Discussed — Acts II., III.,
IV., V., VI., VII

‘Act II. When Thomas the Apostle entered into India and built a palace for the King in Heaven.’

We are inclined to accept the story of the palace building as true, not because the Acts contain it, but because St.Ephraem accepts it, and Jacob of Sarug writes of it, entering into details; it must therefore have had ecclesiastical tradition to support it. It may interest the reader to read the imaginative description of the plan, traced for the Apostle by Jacob, on the ground selected for its erection.

Thomas accompanied the king to the place assigned for the building.

‘He measured with the measuring rod and left place for windows to give light and for windows to let the wind pass; he measured the rooms for summer and the chambers for winter; the house for the bakers[he traced out] towards the sun (south) and the spot for the reservoir of water. He marked out the place where the artificers of the royal palace should dwell, and the halls in which the weavers, the coiners in gold, and the silversmiths should carry on their trade. He measured off the house for the smiths and the house for carvers in wood, and the house for painters, and the stables for the horses and the mules. He measured the strong-room for the treasury, situated in the centre of the building plot on account of the danger to which it is exposed, leaving but few window openings for light and making them small.’ (From Vatican Codex 118. ‘ He measured thus upon earth in order to show his art, whilst he knew the Lord on high would lay the foundations of the palace.’) ‘The king saw all this and rejoiced.’

While we accept the story of the palace building, to our way of thinking the event could not have occurred at the court of King Gondophares in northern India, but elsewhere in India. And why? Because it could only have happened after the vision-dreams, and not before: and these latter, for the reason assigned above, would not belong to the first period of Thomas’s apostolate—which was to Parthia and the surrounding countries of Asia—as tradition handed down by Origen and Eusebius demands (see No. 20), supported as it is by the general tradition of the East recorded in Chapter IV., p. 145. The tale, or the figurative incident of the building of the palace in India, falls necessarily during the second period of his mission, when, after passing through Ethiopia and Socotra, he landed on the shores of India according to the tradition shown in Chapter IV., pp. 135-140.

The reader should be prepared for dislocations in the story owing to the circumstances under which the original facts were obtained, as he has been warned in our preliminary remarks; hence owing to the above incident being wrongly placed, it becomes impossible to locate the part of India to which the proposal to erect the building belongs. If the tenor of the narrative be any guide it would be in the second country visited by the Apostle. But we are on safer ground when we say that the sea voyage from Socotra would land the Apostle on the west coast of India, and would not take him to the borderland of Afghanistan, Gandhara.

‘Act III. Regarding the black snake.’ The Greek has the story, but neither Latin version contains it.

‘Act IV. The ass that spake.’ The Greek of this story was for the first time published by Bonnet; both Latin versions omit it. Both these incidents are not only fabulous but even ridiculous, and probably obtained the favour of insertion for love of the marvellous which has quite an attraction of its own for the ignorant.

It is as well to take note of the peculiar introduction to Act III. of the text: ‘And the Apostle went forth to go whither our Lord had told him.’ The Passio, which, from what St. Gregory tells us, is the older of the two Latin Acts, after giving the tale of the palace, mentions that the fame of the miraculous cures worked by the Apostle had gone forth(p. 143): ‘Cum exiisset fama apostoli per Indos quod esset in provincia eorum,’ &c., of his preaching to large gatherings of people, besides healing the sick and baptizing many; it adds (p.147): ‘Profectus est autem apostolus ad Indiam superiorem per revelationem.’ The text and Passio retain here clearly a detail of the ancient text, they are in fact insertions which no interpolator is likely to have made in such odd form. The Latin expression ‘superior,’ used above, is susceptible of various meanings, and can equally be applied whether the Apostle proceeded further to the north, or to the south, or to the east; it is a generic form of expression, therefore inconclusive for the purpose of indicating the direction taken. But the recital in the text, first given, is somewhat more definite—‘whither our Lord told him.’ This further corroborates the idea that up till then Thomas had not entered that particular section of India to which by revelation he had been directed to proceed.

‘Act V. The demon that dwelt in the woman.’ The Greek has it, as also the De Mir. It recites the cure or delivery of a woman possessed by an evil spirit. Casting aside the fictitious incidents given in the tale, all that can be said is that it may have occurred.

‘Act VI. The young man who killed the girl.’ The Greek has it as well as the De Mir. The substance of the story told consists of this :— The Apostle received or asked for bread to be brought to him, for the poor; this he blessed and distributed to the people. There was a young man in the crowd who also came forward to have his share; something then happened which drew the Apostle’s attention to him—possibly because of the crime he had committed, to be presently disclosed. It may be, as the text says, he was unable to reach the blessed bread to his mouth, or he may have been seized with sudden illness when attempting to eat of it. The Eucharist is here needlessly introduced by the Gnostic hand: it could never have been indiscriminately given, though bread blessed after a celebration was distributed to the people—a custom yet surviving in most of the Oriental rites and retained also by the Greek; or it might have been ordinary bread. Under the circumstances, the Apostle asked the young man under what weight of sin he lay, and this led to the disclosure of his crime. He acknowledged he had killed the woman with ‘whom he had lived,’ clearly not his wife. In self-justification, he added, he had heard the Apostle teach that no adulterer could enter the kingdom of heaven, and since she would not live a clean life with him, he had committed the deed. The circumstances, however, imply that he took her life through a motive of jealousy. The narrative tells us the Apostle went to the place where the woman was lying, and raised her to life. The opportunity was too good to be left unutilised by the Gnostic scribe for his purpose. The people are struck with admiration and wonder; multitudes believe, the report goes abroad, and from villages and the country ‘the sick, those under possession by a spirit, lunatics and paralytics, are brought and placed by the roadside: and the Apostle went healing them all by the power of Jesus.’

‘Act VII. How Judas Thomas was called by the General of King Mazdai to heal his wife and daughter.’ The Greek version of this Act as well as the rest of the book was published for the first time by Max Bonnet. The De Mir. has it and the rest of the story on the lines of the text. The Passio omits it altogether and passes to describe what is given in the following Act.

We hold Act VII. to be substantially historical, barring a romantic incident treated separately. A certain man of importance is introduced, called the General, whose name is not given in this, but only in the following act when, after a number of incidents, different persons are brought on the scene and names are assigned to all; then also the General bears a name. This shows plainly that this individual bore no name in the primitive text of the narrative; and discloses the fact that when the tale came to be dramatised, as we now find it, the necessity arose of assigning names to one and all the principal persons brought on the scene. A narrative of this description, coming from India to the valley of the Euphrates as an oral narrative, would have been told without personal names, except perhaps of one or two of the principal personages. It is well to remember that besides Hâbbân the messenger, Gondophares the king, Gad, his brother, Xanthippus the deacon, no names occur in the book till we come to the full dramatic effort produced in Act VIII., where the last scenes are described. The names occurring in the Acts are treated separately under No. 34.

25. Act VII. — Discussion Continued

We now return to the contents of Act VII. The General, having heard of Thomas’s preaching ‘throughout all India, came to him’ to ask him to his house. The text recites that the Apostle, after taking leave of his converts, whom he placed under the charge of Xanthippus the deacon, set out with the General, who had come in a cart drawn ‘by cattle,’ as the text expresses it, to seek the Apostle. It should be borne in mind that horses are not in use, rather, we should say, were not in common use in early times, and are not even now in Southern India; while in Upper, and Northern India especially, they have been in general use at all times. The country cart drawn by oxen is commonly employed throughout Southern India, not only for the transport of produce, but also for personal conveyance from place to place both in town and country even to this day, except where Europeans dwell in numbers. In Native States hardly any other vehicle is procurable, but the state of things must be now rapidly altering with the introduction of railways; and if even now it be still so, in ancient times it must have been the general, almost exclusive, means of conveyance. So the detail of the General travelling in a ‘bullock cart,’ as they call it in India, gives a touch of local colouring to the scene. Had the incident anything to do with Northern India, where Gondophares’ kingdom was situated, the horse would have been introduced on the scene, and the General would have been mounted on a steed. Gondophares on his coins is figured riding a horse, not seated in a cart drawn by oxen. The local colouring offered by this incident will be strengthened by other incidents which will be noticed in No. 33.

We return once again to the story. The General had a wife and daughter; both are said to be possessed by evil spirits. It was this misfortune which had induced him to seek the Apostle’s aid. The possession, it would appear, was of an impure form, as implied by what is narrated; this could but be the sequel, or the result of their having led an impure life. The Apostle, on arriving at the house, found the two women in a frightful condition; it is unnecessary to go into details, they would besides not be reliable. They were delivered, and must have been made to do penance in atonement for their conduct, and were placed under instruction. In such cases the conferring of baptism would be deferred for a considerable time. This in fact is what we find had been done in the case; they were only admitted to it shortly before the Apostle’s martyrdom.

26. A Romantic Interpolation

This Act offers a characteristic specimen of the embellishments introduced by foreign hands. On the drive the travellers meet a troop of wild asses, four of these allow themselves to be yoked to the cart, replacing the cattle, and thus the Apostle, the General, and the driver continue their romantic journey. The tale of this incident was not, most likely, carried from India to the Mesopotamian reviser of the text. The one place in India where the wild ass could exist, and where he is still found, is the great sandy expanse stretching from the east of the Indus below its junction with the Sutlej, to within a few miles of Delhi, and extending from the Rann of Kutch northwards to Ferozepore and Sirsa, known as the Indian or Bikaneer Desert. The writer was informed by a friend that in the cold season these wild, fleet denizens of those sandy plains visit the salt licks of the Rann; and when he was at Ferozepore in the Punjab, he possessed the skin of a wild ass shot a day’s journey from Fazilka, on the Sutlej, on the outer limb of this desert. The species, however, is well known in the sandy tracts of Persia; and Marco Polo mentions wild asses when on his homeward journey from China, en route from Yezd to Kerman. So we may take it that a Gnostic or other hand introduced the incident as an illustration from a scene near home to enhance the charms of the narrative to his Eastern readers.

It will be most opportune that we here point out to the reader, not to have to break the sequence of the narrative too often, that the Passio, after giving the substance of what is recited in the next Act, reproduces not only the first ordeal before his martyrdom to which Thomas is subjected, but also a second, and then narrates a striking scene at the temple when at the Apostle’s prayer the idol is suddenly destroyed. The reader is informed that after the first ordeal—de lanceis ignitis; the text omits entirely the second—de fornace, and the incident—de templo solis, with the destruction of the idol. Both the missing parts are reproduced verbatim in De Mir. from the Passio—a proof that the unnamed text from which Gregory took what he incorporated in De Miraculis was bereft of these scenes. This important subject will receive separate treatment under No.32.

27. Act VIII.—Narrative

‘Act VIII. — Mygdonia and Karish.’ The title covers only part of the story given in this Act. The Greek version, which closely follows the text, subdivides it: (1) the doings of the wife of Charisius; (2) the story of Mygdonia’s baptism; (3) the doings of the wife of Misdeus; (4) the doings of Uazanes, the son of Misdeus; (5) the martyrdom of the holy and blessed Apostle Thomas who suffered — en th ’India — in India. The text has a following but short section, with the sub-head — ‘The consummation of Judas Thomas.’ Wright’s text of the Acts is divided into eight, while Bedjan’s gives as many as sixteen acts. The summary here given shall be brief, as several of the details will demand separate treatment.

Karish is a kinsman of the king and Mygdonia is his wife. She hears of the arrival of a preacher of a new god and of a new religion: from what she learns from the General’s family, she is desirous of hearing the prophet of this new faith. She is conveyed in a palkî, or palanquin, to the house of the General, where the newly arrived preacher is staying; the palkî is lowered to the ground near to where he stands. At the close of Thomas’s discourse she comes out of the palanquin, approaches the Apostle, and addresses him. Her husband Karish is awaiting her at home. She, on her return, excuses herself for the evening. Early next morning Karish goes to see the king, and Mygdonia betakes herself to the Apostle and receives further instruction. Karish going home for the day meal [the midday repast] finds his wife absent; she also returns home, but only late in the evening; this gives rise to a difference between the husband and the wife; she denies herself to him. Early next morning the husband lodges a complaint with the king against the preaching of Thomas and the painful sequel it had developed in his home. The king then sends for the General — whose name is here introduced for the first time — and he is questioned about the new preacher. In reply, he informs the king of the great benefit Thomas had conferred on his family. The king orders a guard to be sent to fetch the Apostle; but they, on arrival, finding Mygdonia there and a great crowd, hesitate to execute the order and think it better to return and report how matters stand. On their informing the court of this, Karish, who was there awaiting the development of events, proposes to the king to go himself. He went with the guard,and, pulling off the turban of one of the servants, threw it round the Apostle’s neck, and caused him to be dragged into the king’s presence. The Apostle gives no reply to the questions put to him; he is ordered to be whipped, and one hundred and fifty lashes are inflicted, and he is led to prison. the text here very significantly reports what would seem in substance to be a relic of the primitive narrative (p.237) : ‘But Judas, when he went to prison, was glad and rejoiced, saying : "I thank Thee, my Lord Jesus the Messiah, that Thou hast deemed me worthy not only to believe in Thee, but also to bear many things for Thy sake," ’ &c.

After this Karish returned home rejoicing : but he finds his wife in great grief. During the night she goes to the prison, taking with her money to bribe the keepers and obtain admission. To her astonishment, on the way she meets the Apostle and takes him to her house. She awakens her nurse, Narkia, and tells her to fetch certain things which were necessary for baptism. This is administered to her by the Apostle; the nurse also, at her own request, is baptized. Thomas then returns to his prison.

Karish rising again early in the morning, goes to Mygdonia, whom he finds in prayer with her nurse and still opposed to his wishes. He starts at once for the court and lays his complaint once more before the king. The king in reply said : ‘Let us fetch and destroy him.’ But Karish thought it better to suggest that he should rather be utilised to influence Mygdonia to change her conduct. The king fell in with this view, and Thomas is sent for. The king sets him at liberty and tells him, ‘Lo, I let thee loose, go and persuade Mygdonia, the wife of Karish, not to part from him.’ Karish accompanies the Apostle to his house. Thomas is, by the Gnostic interpolator, made to say to her, ‘My daughter, Mygdonia, consent unto what thy brother Karish saith unto thee.’ At this she quotes his own words — put into the mouth of both by the Gnostic — against himself. Thomas leaves them and goes back to the house of the General. The latter asks for baptism for himself, wife, and daughter; they are instructed further, and then baptized.

Then follows the story of King Mazdai’s family and their conversion.

The king, after dismissing Thomas, communicated to Tertia, his wife, what had befallen Karish. Tertia goes next morning to visit Mygdonia; she finds her seated in penitential robes bemoaning her fate. Tertia expostulates with her at what she beholds. Mygdonia then discloses to her the new life, and she is at once fired with the desire to see and hear the prophet of the new faith. She goes to the Apostle at once and converses with him; she returns home full of the new ideas she has imbibed. The king inquires of her why she returned on foot — a thing beneath her dignity. Tertia passes the remark by and thanks him for sending her to Mygdonia. She adds, she had heard the new life and had seen the Apostle of the new God, and avowed her change of mind.

Her husband’s astonishment needs no description: he rushes out, meets Karish, upbraids him for dragging him also into ‘Sheõl,’ and says: ‘He had bewitched Tertia also.’ They go to the General’s house and assault the Apostle; he is ordered to be brought to the seat of judgment. While Thomas is detained there by the guard, the king’s son, Vizan, enters the hall. He takes Thomas aside and converses with him. Thomas, brought to judgment, is interrogated. The king becomes enraged and orders plates of iron to be heated, and the Apostle is made to stand on them barefooted. Whereupon a copious spring of water suddenly gushes out from the earth; the fire is extinguished, the plates are immersed, and the executioners fly in terror. The Apostle is then remanded to prison, and the General and the king’s son accompany him; the latter asks leave to go and bring his wife Manashar. Tertia, Mygdonia, and Narkia, having bribed the guard, also enter the prison, when each narrates the trials she had to endure.

On hearing all this Thomas offers thanks to God; Vizan is told to go and prepare what is needful for the service which is to follow. On the way he meets his wife Manashar; Thomas overtakes them, accompanied by Sifur, his wife and daughter, also Mygdonia with Tertia and Narkia. They all entered the house of Vizan; it was then night. After praying and addressing them, the Apostle asked Mygdonia to prepare the women for baptism. They are then baptized, and when they had come up from the water the Eucharist is celebrated, as is stated to have been done at the two preceding administrations of baptism. All received holy communion; the Apostle left them and returned of his own accord to be re-imprisoned; ‘they were grieved and were weeping because they knew that King Mazdai would kill him.’

28. Act VIII. Discussed — Gnostic Sects in Asia

We ought now to take up in succession various questions affecting some of the details of the narrative reproduced; but it will be advisable first to give a short sketch of Gnostic sects, to enable the reader to follow the leading features of the numerous interpolations introduced into the text.

Gnosticism and the sects that embraced it originated within Christian communities in certain parts of Asia, but at root it was a foreign error (see article, ‘Abrasax,’ Dict. d’ Archéol. Chret. et de Liturg., Paris, 1903, col. 132) which some early Christians in a spirit of false rigourism and affected severity had adopted.

(a) Tatian, born in Syria between a.d. 120 - 130, once a disciple of St.Justin, the Roman martyr, left Rome after the death of the latter between 172-173, and had already lapsed into heresy. Among other errors, he held marriage to be no better than an impure life. He settled in Mesopotamia (Epiphanius, Haeres., xlvi.n.1) where he composed The Diatessaron128 — ‘the four gospels in one.’ The use of this book was forbidden in the churches by Rabbula, Bishop of Edessa (a.d. 411-435); and by Theodoret, Bishop of Cyrus or Cyrrhus, near the Euphrates, in whose diocese over 200 copies were destroyed (a.d. 423-457). In support of his tenets, Tatian excluded from his compilation of the Diatessaron the genealogy of Christ, and opened with the words: ‘In the beginning was the Word.’ He became also the founder of a sect named the Encratitae (Ephiph., ut supr., and Jerome, Chron. of Eusebius, ‘Tatianus haereticus agnoscitur a quo Encratitae.’)

(b) Bar-Daisan of Edessa, a convert from heathenism, was born An. Gr. 465=a.d. 154129, and lapsed into Gnosticism. He and his son Harmonius composed in their native Syriac tongue many hymns tainted with their doctrinal errors. The father, as St. Ephraem (Oper. Syr., tom. ii. p. 553) says, composed also 150 psalms in imitation of those of David. To prevent the further use of their hymns by the faithful, Ephraem composed his hymns and set them to Harmonius’s tune. The name Bar-Daisan means ‘child of the river Daisan,’ which flows by Edessa, as his mother is said to have given birth to him on the banks of that river.130 Bar-Daisan was known to Julius Africanus, who met him on his visit to the court of Abgar IX. of Edessa (who reigned a.d. 179-214), and styled him ‘the Parthian,’ and to Porphyrius, who called him ‘the Babylonian.’ The Acts of Thomas, Syriac text, contain the Gnostic hymn by him, ‘The Hymn of the Soul’ (translation, pp. 238-245), of which Professor Burkitt has given an English rendering in verse. There are also German and French versions of the same. Bedjan’s edition does not contain this hymn.

(c) Marcion was the son of a bishop of Pontus, and had been excommunicated by his father for the seduction of a consecrated virgin. He went to Rome, c. 190, and sought re-admission to the communion of the church, but was refused until he first obtained release from the censure he had incurred. While there he came to be acquainted with and eventually joined Cardo, a Syrian Gnostic, with the object of inflicting a deadly blow on the Church. He became the founder of the sect named after him, the Marcionists: his followers were enjoined to abstain from marriage.

To the Gnostic, matter was essentially evil and the product of the demiurge: on this point the sect adopted the earlier error of the Docetae. In the celebration of the Eucharist they made use of water and abstained entirely from wine. See Alzog’s Hist. of the Church (American ed.) vol. i. chap. ii. p. 304; also Assemani, Bibl. Or., tom. i., ut supr.; Bardenhewer, Les Pères de l’ Eglise, vol. i. § 17, p. 167, ‘Tatien.’

These Syrian Gnostics who reprobated marriage were the heretics who corrupted the text of our Acts and made them a vehicle for the diffusion of their peculiar views in regard to the married state. This one concept permeates the entire Syriac text: that married life is debasing and sinful; that abstinence from it is the proper duty of a virtuous soul; and that those who happen to have contracted it should deny themselves. Every opportunity is taken to inculcate this; events in the story susceptible of a legitimate interpretation are purposely diverted to the cause that they upheld. Hence in and out of season exhortations and prayers are put in the mouth of the Apostle to forward this unnatural and unchristian tenet. The converts brought on the scene are shown to have a strong penchant for it, and develop into ardent and zealous promoters of the view. As the Syrian Gnostics manipulated the Acts of Thomas, so Marcion, the Pontic, made use of the gospel of Luke for a similar purpose. His edition of the text commenced with the opening words: ‘In the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius Caesar’—thus cutting off the entire first and second chapters of this gospel, containing the genealogy, the virgin-birth of Christ, and the birth of John the Baptist, &c. St. Epiphanius (Migne, P. Gr.-L., vol. xxiii., Haeres., xlii. cols. 359-419) gives a very full account, and almost the entire text of the altered sections by Marcion. An English translation of Marcion’s gospel was published by the Rev. J.H. Hill from a recently discovered MS, but no allusion whatever is made to the older text given by Epiphanius.

In regard to our Acts Epiphanius mentions two Gnostic sects which in his time, a.d. 315-403, made special use of them in their assemblies, to the exclusion of the Scriptures. One of these had its chief seat at Edessa. When treating of the Encratites who succeeded Tatian, he says (Haeres., xlvii.) that they added many more ridiculous errors to those they had imbibed from their master: they openly make the devil the author of marriage; in the celebration of the mysteries they make use only of water for they abhor wine and style it diabolical; ‘among their primary Scriptures they reckoned the Acts of Andrew and John as well as those of Thomas,’ &c. May not these have been the first to corrupt the text of the Acts of Thomas? In Haeres., lxi., dealing with the ‘Apostolici’ ‘who renounced all things and held fast to the principle of possessing no goods;’ these, he says, came from the followers of Tatian, as the Encratites and the Kathari; they hold different sacraments and mysteries from ours; they do not receive back the ‘lapsi,’ and as to marriages they hold the same views as those mentioned above.

What St.Epiphanius distinctly says of the Acts of Thomas, that they were used by Gnostic heretics, is confirmed in a general way by St.Ephraem, who further lays on them the distinct charge of falsifying the Acts of the Apostles. A commentary of his on the Epistles of St.Paul has been preserved in an Armenian version; this, together with a translation in Latin, has been issued by the Mechitarist monks of Venice.131 Referring to certain points of doctrine, he says (p.119): Nam putant discipuli Bardezani, quod haec a Bardezano magistro suo adinventa fuerint—‘the disciples of Bar-Daisan believe these things were discovered by their teacher, Bar-Daisan’; Atque ab ipsis omnino scriptae sunt Praxes Autvn [acta nimirum Apostolorum apocrypha] ut inter Apostolorum virtutes ac signa, quae conscripsere, scriberent in nomine Apostolorum iniquitatem quam prohibebant Apostoli—‘And by them have their acts been written, that among the signs and wonders of the Apostles which had been set down they might, in the name of the Apostles, write also vice and evil which the Apostles had forbidden.’ This is an open charge against the followers of Bar- Daisan of propagating through forged Acts of the Apostles their master’s errors. ‘It is not too great a leap,’ says Professor Burkitt (Journal of Theological Studies, vol. i., 1900), ‘to say that he has the Acts of Judas Thomas in view.’

29. Doctrinal Additions to Acts of Thecla and Thomas

We propose to produce parallel passages of the doctrinal insertions found in the Acta Theclae and in those of Thomas. This will enable the reader to form an exact idea of the nature, origin, and relative dependence of these doctrinal interpolations, and will show that while in the former the Gnostic principles are gradually introduced, and put in the mildest form they can assume, they are in the latter openly stated, but yet so that they become framed after the model of what is found in the earlier work—the Acta Theclae. Quotations of the latter as well are given from Dr.Wright’s translation (Apocryphal Acts).

The details contained in Act VIII., which had been reserved, now demand separate treatment. The chief questions concern—the baptisms conferred, whether they were by oil; the different celebrations of the Eucharist; the ordeals the Apostle was subjected to, and the destruction of the idol, omitted in the text, and why; such points, if any, as may disclose Indian usages; whether any of the names that occur in the narrative belong to India; the age or date to which the Acts belong; the martyrdom; and what data, if any, can be given as to when the removal took place of the Apostle’s Relics from India to Edessa.

30. Baptism, Whether by Oil

Baptism of Mygdonia (pp.257-258). She orders her nurse: ‘Fetch secretly for me a loaf of bread, and bring a mingled draught of wine, and have pity on me.’ Narkia the nurse answers, ‘I will fetch thee bread in plenty, and many flagons of wine, and I will do thy pleasure.’ Mygdonia rejoins, ‘Many flagons are of no use to me, but a mingled draught in a cup, and one whole loaf, and a little oil, even if it be in a lamp, bring unto me.’ The Greek has (p. 68, ll. 16-17), ‘Measures I don’t require, nor these many loaves, but only this (a cup of ) mixed water, one loaf, and oil.’ Text—‘And when Narkia had brought them, Mygdonia uncovered her head, and was standing before the holy Apostle. And he took oil and cast it on her head and said, "Holy oil which wast given to us for unction," &c. And he told her nurse to anoint her, and to put a cloth round her loins, and he fetched the basin of their conduit (the piscina). And Judas went up and stood over it and baptized Mygdonia in the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Spirit of Holiness; and when she had come out and put on her clothes,’ &c.

Baptism of Sifur’s family (p.267). Sifur asks for baptism for himself and family. Thomas before baptizing them, ‘cast oil on their heads.’ ‘And he spake and they brought a large vat, and he baptized them in the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Spirit of Holiness.’

Baptism of Vizan, Tertia, and Manashar (p.289). ‘After praying Thomas said to Mygdonia: "My daughter strip thy sisters." And she stripped them and put girdles on them and brought them near to him. And Vizan came near first. And Judas took oil and glorified God,’ &c.; then followed a prayer, at the close of which ‘he cast oil upon the head of Vizan and upon the heads of the others and said, In Thy name, Jesus the Messiah, let it be to these persons for the remission of offences and sins and for the destruction of the enemy and for the healing of their souls and bodies; and he commanded Mygdonia to anoint them, and he himself anointed Vizan. And after he had anointed them, he made them go down into the water in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Spirit of Holiness.’

There can be no doubt that in all these three instances the text recites a valid baptism by water and not by oil. The unction by oil preceding the baptismal ceremony may belong to an earlier rite, perhaps for catechumens, but the words used at the third baptism also give reason to suppose this unction was a Gnostic form, perhaps, of initiation to the sect; anyhow it does not supersede baptism. It has been obiter said by some writers, and was taken for granted, that the Acts supported baptism by oil, but the text clearly rejects such a supposition.

31. Eucharistic Celebrations

After describing a baptism the Acts generally mention the celebration of the Eucharist followed by communion given to the new converts (see pp.166-167; pp.188-190; pp.258, 267-268, and 290: in the second of the passages communion is indiscriminately administered to all present). On the three last occasions the blessed Eucharist may really have been administered as the Apostle was nearing the close of his career; on the last of these occasions he was, so to say, on the eve of his martyrdom. But in some of the other cases the text may be representing what was perhaps only the custom prevailing among the Gnostic sects, and not the common usage of the Apostolic Church. The Catholic Church never sanctioned, as an usage and a rule, the giving of communion to converts after baptism, more especially so when they came from heathenism; neither would it be the custom to confer it too early on converts.

On two occasions, which appear to be the more striking instances, viz., the baptism of Mygdonia (p.258), and at the general communion before the Apostle’s martyrdom (p.290), the wine used at the celebration is termed ‘the mingled draught’ in a cup, and ‘the mingled cup.’ We shall recur to these passages in No.35.

32. Incidents Omitted in Present Syriac Text

The reader has been warned that the text omits two important facts concerning the Apostle, of which the Greek version as well retains no trace, but which have survived in the old Latin Passio, and have thence been incorporated bodily, without any change, into the narrative De Miraculis. Max Bonnet treats this insertion as an interpolation, and is inclined to make light of the facts themselves. But it strikes us very forcibly that the learned Professor has not studied attentively their bearing on the text itself, nor searched for the reason why they came to be excluded from the Syriac text, and are, in consequence, found missing in the Greek, which closely follows the former, even to details and phraseology.

The text, after giving the first ordeal of the heated plates of iron (pp. 275-276), passes on to the king’s order, ‘Drag him to prison,’ to be followed up by the Apostle’s martyrdom. The Passio, after giving the first ordeal, recites also a second to which Thomas was subjected, and then gives the attempt made by the king to force the Apostle to adore the sun-god idol, which ends with its destruction at Thomas’s prayer. Are these two latter incidents so incompatible with the narrative of the story that they should be summarily dismissed? By no means. On the other hand, what is the result of their omission from the tale? What is the cause prompting the Apostle’s execution? If the incident of the idol and its destruction be omitted, the narrative would disclose that the execution of the Apostle was ordered and carried out because of his holding and inculcating ideas unnatural to married life: or in other words—according to the reading of the text and of the Greek version—the Apostle Thomas was condemned to death, not because he was the apostle of Christ, the God-man, the preacher of His gospel, and the upholder of His divinity, but because he had merged himself into a Gnostic teacher upholding unnatural ideas as to married life. There can be no doubt on this point. We have already shown that it was on this account he was condemned according to the text (see No.29, quotation 6); and in this the hand that manipulated the text for doctrinal purposes faithfully followed again, as has been shown, the lines of his prototype, the Acta Theclae, by making him a Gnostic martyr.

In addition to previous quotations we add one more to make the point perfectly clear why king Mazdai, always according to the present Syriac text, condemned Thomas to death. At pp. 263- 264, the king addresses him in these words: ‘Now, therefore, if thou choosest, thou art able to dissolve these former charms of thine and to make peace and concord between the husband and his wife; and in so doing thou wilt have pity on thyself,’ &c. ‘And know if thou dost not persuade her, I will destroy thee out of this life.’ The object, then, of the omission of the incident of the destruction of the idol becomes perfectly clear. The retaining of it would make him a Christian martyr, the omission an upholder of, and a martyr for, Gnostic principles. On the other hand, if the Apostle died a martyr, the incident of the destruction of the idol must form an integral part of the narrative of the acts.

We return to the two suppressed passages. Under the second ordeal the Apostle was forced into the furnace of the baths, or the steam bath, to be killed; he issues out of this trial on the second day unharmed. Finding that this attempt likewise failed, the Passio narrates that Caritius — this is the form the name Karish assumes — suggests that he should be robbed of the protection of his God by forcing him to adore and sacrifice to the idol in the temple — fac illum sacrificare deo soli et iram incurrit dei sui qui illum liberat (p. 156). The Apostle is made to follow a procession going to the temple with music and singing. Even at the present day the sacrificing (Brahman) priest is thrice daily accompanied by such a procession when he goes to sacrifice to the idol, early morning, noon, and evening. Arriving at the temple the king says to Thomas: Modo faciam tundi arteria tua si non adoraueris et sacrificaueris ei— ‘ I will cause thy bones to be broken if thou wilt not adore and sacrifice to him.’ The apostle answers: Ecce adoro sed non metallum; ecce adoro sed non idolum, &c. — ‘I adore not a block of metal, nor an idol’; adoro autem,. meum Dominum Jesum Christum —‘but I adore my Lord Jesus Christ;’ In cujus nomine impero tibi, daemon, qui hic in ipso lates, ut nullum hominum laedens, metalllum simulacri comminuas— ‘ In His name I command thee, O demon, who liest concealed in this idol, to injure no person but to destroy the metal of this image.’ Statim autem quasi cera juxta ignem posita ita liquefactum idolum resolutum est—‘The image of the idol is suddenly dissolved like wax before the fire.’ The priests raise a howl, the king runs away with (Karish) Caritius, and the high priest of the temple, seizing a sword, transfixes the Apostle, exclaiming, ‘ I will avenge my god!’

We may add that the idol was probably not that of the sun-god, but, as will seem likely, was probably an Indian idol seated on a car. The idea of the sun-god, likely enough, forms part of a textual error because of the Acts originating in Mesopotamia.

The above reproduction of the destruction of the idol upholds, we venture to think, both points contended for: the reason why it was omitted, and the necessity, on that very account, of considering it an integral portion of the narrative of the original Acts. This further proves that the text of the present Syriac by no means represents the original compilation or writing in its primitive form; and that the Passio represents an earlier text.

33. Acts Disclose Indian and Hindu Customs

We now pass to inquire whether the contents of the Acts offer any clue to fix the country where the scenes narrated were transacted, since, in spite of the Acts mentioning ‘the realm of India’ to which the Apostle had gone, there are yet many Thomases who will not have it that it was the India ‘of pearls and gems’ and ‘of the Brahmans’ of the ancients, but to some other India that Thomas is supposed to have gone, which they themselves are, of course, unable to designate or substantiate.

The reader will remember a small detail commented upon at an earlier stage when the General was described journeying in a cart drawn ‘by cattle’ to meet Thomas and invite him to his house. That detail being peculiar to Southern India, would fit in with that portion better than with the North-West of India. We now take up some other incidents disclosing local colouring, and will enquire how far they support the view of his martyrdom in the India of the Hindus.

(1) Text, p.218: ‘Mygdonia had come to see the new sight of the new god who was preached, and the new Apostle who was come to their country; and she was sitting in her palanquin and her servants were carrying her.’ In a footnote Dr. Wright adds, ‘Pâlkî, or palanquin, seems to be the best equivalent of the [Syriac word] in the passage.

In Southern India yet, to some extent, more so in the native states of Malabar, the pâlkî among natives is considered a more honourable means of personal conveyance than a carriage drawn by horses. It is used invariably at marriage ceremonies—indicating the older customs of the country; and in the States of Malabar the writer is aware that after the elephant the pâlkî was considered the conveyance next in dignity. This, or its equivalent the manchi, a lighter form of the former, more in the style of a stretcher, is yet the common means of conveyance over long distances, especially for native ladies.

(2) Text, p.227: ‘Karish came to dinner and did not find his wife at home.’ He was told, ‘She is gone to the strange man and there she is; he was very angry,’ &c. ‘And he went and bathed and came back whilst it was still light, and was sitting and waiting for Mygdonia.’ The Greek supports it, p.57, l. 19 ff.

We would ask the reader if he knows of any country, outside of India, where it is the custom to bathe before partaking of the evening meal, or of any principal meal. He may perhaps know that this is a religious rite enjoined upon all Hindus in India that they should purify themselves by such an ablution before a meal. Another circumstance, which will escape the notice of such as are unacquainted with Indian native habits, is implied in the words, ‘he went and bathed and came back whilst it was still light;’ this implies the bathing was outside the house and before the evening meal. Every Hindu of a respectable position— especially in Native States—has generally a tank in his compound to which he resorts for this ceremonial bath; and this is precisely what the wording of the text implies that Karish had done.

(3) A prior instance of such a bath is mentioned at p.223: ‘Now Karish, the kinsman of King Mazdai, had taken his bath and gone to supper.’ This further instance fully confirms what we have inferred; it is not a casual bath, but the religious bath prescribed by Hindu usage before the day’s meal. The instances adduced disclose that we are dealing with Hinduism; that Karish was a Hindu, and he, being related to the king, it is a proof, for those who understand India’s social life, that the king himself was no other than a Hindu Rajah. Both points will presently be further confirmed by what follows.

(4) The text, p.225, recites: ‘And when it was morning, Karish, the kinsman of King Mazdai, arose early and dressed,’ &c., ‘and went to salute King Mazdai.’ The reader has here placed before him the customs of a Hindu court of Southern India. Ministers, courtiers, and attendants are all waiting upon the Rajah at early dawn in court. Suitors and petitioners are waiting outside the court premises even from four o’clock in the morning to place their petitions and plaints before the Rajah. Court business in fact, in Hindu courts, is transacted from early morning until noon. The reason why Hindu Rajahs hold court so early in the day throughout the year is this—that they may have time to purify themselves with a bath before the midday meal. The above custom prevails to this day in the Hindu courts of Malabar, and must, more or less, be the same in other parts of India, where native Rajahs yet hold court. The writer is not personally acquainted with the exact customs of Hindu courts in Northern India, but believes they are much the same; and when he was present at an ordinary durbar at the court of Jammu, business was being transacted in the morning.

(5) A second similar occurrence in support of the court usage recurs at p.232 of the text: ‘Whilst Karish was meditating these things it became morning. And he rose early, dressed,’&c., ‘but he put on sorry garments, and his countenance was gloomy and he was very sad, and he went in to salute King Mazdai.’

Here the custom of going to the Rajah’s court the first thing in the morning is repeated. But a new detail is introduced — ‘he put on sorry garments.’ What can this mean? It indicates the Hindu custom that when a man is suddenly overtaken by a great misfortune, or by the death of a near relative, anxious to move to compassion and sympathy and to show his great distress to his superior, whether an official or his master, he appears before him in the garb of grief and with an unkempt appearance. The first question generally asked is, What has happened to you? Englishmen who have dwelt in India, and officials oftener, must have had experience of this usage in their private or official dealings with natives. This comprises the dress and the appearance, unkempt and distressed, which the person assumes, and which may be aptly termed that of grief. This is precisely what Karish has done; and in the king’s question of inquiry both the garment and the personal appearance are referred to. He says, ‘What is the matter that thou art come in this wretched plight? And why is thy aspect sad and thy countenance changed?’ The Greek supports the text. The reader acquainted with India will realise that the customs described are purely Hindu; the court is a Hindu court, Karish is a Hindu, and his wife must also be one. The latter point is confirmed by what follows.

(6) There is yet one last detail of custom mentioned in the Acts that has to be placed before the reader. This is given in the text, p.222. When Mygdonia first went to see the Apostle in her pâlkî, she ‘ sprang up and came out of the palanquin and fell down on the ground before the feet of the Apostle, and was begging him,’&c.

Let the reader remember that Mygdonia is a lady of the court, related to the king, or Rajah; she is consequently not a poor, humble woman, who through an act of self-abasement would seek to obtain a favour, and may prostrate herself before a great man. But being a lady of high position, how could she behave in such manner to an utter stranger? the more so as this was the first time she had come in contact with the preacher of this new doctrine. Nothing but Hindu custom will offer a full explanation. Any Hindu, man or woman, who approaches a Brahman priest, when not influenced by the presence of Europeans, before addressing him, performs the same act of prostration on the bare ground as Mygdonia had done, with hands joined forward over the head, prostrate on the ground, in an act not only of supplication but of semi-worship, imploring a blessing and showing the deepest veneration for the person. The writer is informed that in Malabar even the Hindu Rajah performs this religious act to the chief Brahman priest in the temple at his religious installation on the Guddee (coronation ceremony), and when he attends any great religious ceremony at the temple. But the act is now so performed as not to be visible to the public. It is this act that the Hindu wife of Karish instinctively, and as if to the usage quite accustomed, here performs on her first appearance before the Apostle. The act, as we see, is the natural outcome of the first impulse in a Hindu woman who comes before the high priest of a new religion which has struck her intelligence and won her heart.

(7) The text at p.265 gives a second instance of Mygdonia’s homage to the Apostle in the Hindu form — and this in the presence of her husband and at her home: ‘Whilst she was saying these things (to herself) Judas came in, and she sprang upright and prostrated herself to him.’ The description is clearly by a narrator who had seen similar acts done; she does not prostrate herself from the seated position in which she is, but stands up and completes the act, as those who have seen it performed, know. Then, again, how does her husband, with his intense animosity against Thomas, take her behaviour? Is he surprised? Does he rebuke her? Nothing of the sort; his approving remark to the Apostle is, ‘See, she feareth thee,’ hoping no doubt that the excess of veneration for Thomas he had witnessed would secure his own object.

(8) A third instance is also given at p.287, performed by Manashar: ‘And when Manashar the wife of Vizan (the king’s son) saw him [Thomas who had entered her house] she bowed down and worshipped him,’ no doubt according to Hindu religious usage.

34. Names Mentioned in the Acts

Another question reserved for separate treatment is that of the names found in the text of these Acts.

The first king whose name occurs in the narrative is Gondophares. This name was found on the coins belonging to the Indo-Parthian kings, who reigned over a large part of Afghanistan and some portion of North-Western India; and in the inscription of Takht- i-Bahi, situated on the present borders of India in the ancient Gandhâra. The latter fixed the date of the beginning of his reign a.d. 20-21; and the date of the inscription itself, the twenty-sixth regnal year of the King Gondophares, brought us to a.d. 45-46. The tokens on the coins of Gondophares, according to best numismatic authority, demand a date not later than the middle of the first century of the Christian era. As Gondophares is mentioned in the Acts, in close connection with the Apostle, and the former was reigning from a.d. 20-21 to a.d. 45-46, and for what further period is unknown, it is historically quite possible that the Apostle visited that portion of India during the reign of this king. And since no other document has retained the mention of the name Gondophares except, and solely, the Acts of Thomas, until the recent discoveries mentioned above, it is quite legitimate to conclude that the mention of these two names, coupled as we find them in the Acts of Thomas, imply a well-grounded historical connection. The reader will find the question treated in extenso in our Chapter I.

In Act VIII. of the story quite a large group of names is introduced, and the name of the country, where the events described took place, is mentioned earlier in the Acts. From the indications that have been already culled from the text, it has become clear we are dealing with what not only was occurring in India proper, as the text says, but also with events concerning and passing among Hindu people, and in a Hindu realm. Without being thought guilty of rashness, we may therefore be permitted to presume that the name of the king would, or ought to be, Indian — viz., Hindu — and not foreign, as in the previous case of Gondophares.

Having said this much, before entering into an examination of the names found in the text, it will be very advisable to submit a few observations. Should any of the voyages narrated by early travellers, say down to those of the early Arab travellers of the eighth or ninth centuries, or even later, be taken up, with hardly any exception that we can recall to mind, it will be found that they one and all scarcely ever introduce personal names in the narrative of peoples or events they describe. Even names of towns are constantly omitted, rarely in fact given, except they be of mercantile importance or of some principal place; they may, perhaps, give the name of the country.

With regard to rulers of countries travelled through, they, as a rule, are mentioned in a generic form, and if the name is introduced, it is either the popular form of the name or a name coined from the country, or the country is found named after the sovereign—instances of both can be found in the geographies; in the one by Ptolemy, and in that which goes under the name of the Periplus Maris Erythraei. Oftener a generic form of description is adopted: the ruler is styled the king, the khan, the prince, the great khan,&c. The names of ministers and courtiers with whom the traveller has come in contact are similarly omitted, and when indicated they are designated by their office.

Hardly ever does the personal name of an individual appear in the narrative. Should the reader entertain any doubt on the subject, we would refer him to Yule’s Cathay, where he will find quite a collection of early narratives of this description down to even those of Christian missionaries in the Far East. The only exceptions we would make to the above statement would be the great Venetian, Marco Polo, in some instances, and the case of Mahommedan writers when they have met a countryman holding high position in foreign lands.

It may be asked, why are personal names omitted by early travellers? Any one who has journeyed through foreign lands, the language of which is unknown to him—which generally is quite different to his own—may fall back on his own experience in support of what is said. The language being foreign, the sounds quite unfamiliar, to him mostly unpronounceable—unless he were to go about in the style of the modern reporter with notebook and pencil in hand—he is unable to fix the sound permanently in his memory; even should he chance to hear the name oftener than once, he is likely to forget it. Hence, when a traveller is compelled to refer to individuals of the country, he falls back on the office held, or the service rendered, to designate him.

This is the true reason why proper names, even of rulers, rarely occur in such narratives, while those of individuals hardly ever appear in the older travels. When the name of a sovereign is given, it is the popular form of the name that occurs oftenest, not his distinctive personal appellation; this renders it, not rarely, a matter of considerable historical difficulty to identify the ruler.

Coming to our Acts, as to the names of female persons given in these—Tertia, Mygdonia, Manashar, and Narkia—we are of opinion that they should be summarily dismissed as fictitious, and that they were inserted only for the purpose of dramatising the tale. These are neither Indian nor Hindu names, as they ought to be, if they were the proper names of the ladies designated. Any one familiar with Indian Hindu customs and prejudices is aware that, owing to social opinions of seclusion as the proper thing for women, held by the people, and because of the usage thence derived, the mention of a woman’s name—in the presence of foreigners more especially—never occurs, unless while she is a child. For that matter the case is largely the same throughout the East. But servants are, or may be, called by their proper names. When a girl becomes a wife, she is spoken of as the wife of A.(her husband by his name); as a mother, she is called the mother of B. (by her child’s name); and if adult and unmarried, she is styled the daughter of N.’s wife. It is only among the lowest classes in India that a woman’s name is heard pronounced in public. These are immemorial, unchangeable customs and social usages. The proper names of the Indian ladies so familiarly mentioned in the narrative, had they been their personal names, would never have been heard by a stranger.

On the general grounds stated above no importance should be attached to such names as Karish, Vizan, and Sifur, given in the text; they were introduced to give a scenic interest to the narrative, as the heading to each separate Act discloses. The text itself confirms this, as was suggested in the remarks on Act VII.; it gave the story of the General’s family, but neither his personal name nor those of his wife and daughter were introduced to the reader, the first was simply designated by his supposed office. It is only about the middle of the following Act, VIII., when several persons appear on the scene, that names are assigned to them. Then it occurs to the embellisher of the story that the General had no name, and so a name is found for him and he is called Sifur; but yet he overlooked inserting the name in the previous Act, and has similarly forgotten to give names to the wife and daughter when they take part in the scenes of the next Act, and they are allowed to retain their original designation as the wife and daughter of the General. Besides, the remark occurs again these are not Indian names as they ought to be. These and the previous batch of female names are foreign to India, some perhaps are Persian— of Mygdonia the reader knows the origin, leaving a general trace of the hand that inserted it.

But out of this collection of names there survives that of the King Mazdai. On general grounds the name of the king who ordered the execution of Thomas ought to appear in the Acts of his martyrdom, and it would seem most probable that his name was inserted in the original composition. But Mazdai is thoroughly a Persian name, was borne by a satrap of Babylon (died B.C. 328), and it cannot be the true form of the king’s name. This name appears under the following forms : Syriac text, Mazdai; Greek version MisdâioV; both Latin versions, Misdeus.

M.Sylvain Lévi in Notes sur les Indo-Scythes (No.1 of 1897, ninth series, tom. ix. p.27, Journal Asiatic), section iii.: ‘Saint Thomas, Gondophares et Mazdeo,’ has worked out with considerable research a theory for this name. He starts on the supposition that the Apostle Thomas could have paid but one visit to India, and finding that connected with Gondophares in the north, he takes it for granted that the sequence of events given in the Acts took place in that section of the country. In a certain way the idea would naturally suggest itself to one who does not look for any other evidence regarding the Apostle but what is contained in the narrative, and, further, reads the latter without the benefit of a minute knowledge of Indian habits and usages.(The reader is referred to the second part of Chapter IV.)

M. Lévi’s paper has appeared in an English translation by Mr. W.R. Philipps in the Indian Antiquary, vol.xxxii., 1903, pp.381 ff., 417 ff.; and vol. xxxiii., 1904, p.10 ff. where Supplementary Notes to the above will be found.

It will then be interesting to hear what M.Lévi has to say on the subject of the name Mazdai. The Ethiopian version happens to give the name of King Mazdai’s capital, which is there named Quantaria. This reminds him of Gandahâra, and after having made a further reference to the text as to the probable direction of the journey, he makes the ingenuous remark, ‘ la connaissance, exacte de I’Inde éclate dans les épisodes et les détails des Actes.’ The opportune arrival of wild asses to convey the Apostle on his journey with the General to King Mazdai’s capital which follows, lends zest to the view adopted.

Having so located himself, he takes up the name of Vasudeva, the Indian king (one, if not the last, of the dynasty established by Kanishka, who could not have been much posterior to the reign of Gondophares and this is the one good feature in M.Lévi’s discussion), whose legend-bearing coins have come down to us, and whose name in Sanscrit form appears in inscriptions as Vasudeva. The name in the Greek legends of his coins assumes the following forms (p.38) BAZOdHO, and BAZdHO = Bazodeo and Bazdeo. The name Bazdeo passing under Iranian influences would, he suggests, easily be transformed into Mazdeo, and the latter form is the one, he continues, around which the varying forms or changes of the king’s name are grouped. So the Mazdai of the text of the Acts is to him no other than King Vasudeva (ut supra, p.40, end) who reigned from Kashmir.

We have a couple of observations to offer on the conclusions here quoted. First, it is not surprising that the sound of the letter V in the name Vasudeva is, in Greek, represented by the letter b, for the Greek alphabet offers no better correlative sound; we need not enter into the question whether beta ( b ) had in ancient Greece the same sound as the modern Greek gives to it, making it the equivalent of our v; or whether the sound was rather that of b of the Latin alphabet. In either hypothesis, the name Vasudeva having to be reproduced in Greek letters, no other letter could replace the sound of the v than b . But when M. Lévi asks us to go further and to assume m as an equivalent for v=b, the name ‘Vasudeva,’ or his Bazdeo, becoming Mazdeo, the reader cannot fail to observe that quite a new name is substituted for the original. But, while demurring to accept this theory and substitution, we are glad to admit that there is an important point of historical evidence disclosed in the argument — viz., that Indian kings in and about the first century of the Christian era were in the habit of incorporating the epithet of the divinity with their own name, or of assuming it absolutely (if they did not already bear the name).

Apart from the evidence here produced, we can offer similar instances as to other kings of India. In fact, M. Lévi himself offers a sample of this sort in section i. of the same paper. This section will be found in the first part of the paper, and appeared in the preceding vol. viii. of 1896 (see pp.447, 452, 457, 469, and 472). He gives there translations from Chinese versions of Sanscrit writings or poems regarding King Kanishka — the Sanscrit text of which is now lost or at least has not been recovered. The Chinese translations belong respectively to the years A.D. 405, 472, and 473 (PP. 445-447). The poems introduce the Scythian Buddhist King, Kanishka, in these words : ‘The King Devaputra Kanishka.’ Devaputra signifies ‘the child of god,’ or ‘born of god.’ This denotes that, at an age prior to Christianity, the name of the divinity was coupled in some form with the name of Indian kings, indicating that this coupling of names was so deeply rooted in the Indian mind at that period that even the Buddhist Kanishka, a foreigner, is made to assume it; or, at all events, it is popularly done for him. It is relatively immaterial by which of the two above ways the appellation was adopted.

It must further appear singular that even the founder of the Parthian dynasty in India, the Maharaja Gondophares, who was certainly no Indian and probably had not embraced the religion prevailing in Upper India, should nevertheless find himself compelled to assimilate to the same Indian usage of appellation which we have seen attributed to Kanishka, and adopted certainly by a successor, Vasu-Deva; but it appears here in a modified form. If the reader will turn to the coin plate of this king (Chapter I.) and refer to the Indian legend reproduced in the text, coin 4, he will find that it reads : Maharaja, &c., dramia - devavrata Gudapharasa; Coin 8, apratihatasa devavratasa Gudapharasa; and Coin 9, a pratihatasa deva .... The term deva-vrata signifies ‘devoted to the gods.’ It is clear that, though Gondophares does not go to the extreme length, like Vasu-Deva, of styling himself a ‘Deva,’ he yet feels the necessity of introducing the term in a modified form and meaning on his legends. See E.J.Rapson’s Notes on Indian Coins and Seals, Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society, April 1903, pp. 285-286.

Other instances, for a later period of kings reigning over part of the former territories of Gondophares who adopt the same usage, are available. The information is given in General Sir A. Cunningham’s Coins of Mediaeval India from the Seventh Century down to the mahommedan conquests: London, B. Quaritch, 1894, p.55; ‘Coins of Gandhâra and Punjab,’ deals with those of the Brahman kings of Cabul. Among these occur kings bearing the following names: (1) Venka-Deva, A.D. 860; (2) Salapati-Deva, A.D. 875; (3) Samanta-Deva, A.D. 900; (4) Bhima-Deva, A.D. 945. In the list of coins of the Tomars of Delhi and Kanuj (p.85) ‘Deva’ is again found joined to rulers’ names: (5) Salakshana-Pala-Deva, a.d. 978-1003; (6) Ajaya-Pala-Deva, a.d. 1019-1049; (7) Ananga-Pala-Deva, a.d. 1049-1079; (8) Someswara-Deva, a.d. 1162-1166; (9) Prithri Raja-Deva, a.d. 1166-1192. Similar instances also occur in the list of the Tomars of Kanuj. The Sanscrit word Deva has the same meaning as Divus and Deus in Latin.

There is forthcoming also from quite a different part of India evidence of the prevalence of this Hindu custom even at a posterior age. Marco Polo (Yule’s 2nd ed., vol. ii. p. 348) writes of the Kingdom of Mutfili, which Yule says applies to Telingana, or the kingdom of which Warangol was the capital; Mutfili, a port of the same, was visited by the Venetian, and in the language probably of traders he names the kingdom after the port instead of as more commonly by its capital. ‘The kingdom,’ he says, ‘was formerly under the rule of a king, and from his death some forty years ago it has been under [the rule of] his queen, a lady of much discretion, who for the great love she bore him would never marry another husband.’ Yule adds that the king’s name was Kakateya Prataba Ganapati Rudra-Deva. The name Rudra-Deva means Sun-god. The queen’s grandson was prataba Vira Rudra-Deva, c. a.d. 1295, and he is called by Ferishta, the historian of Akbar the Great, Ludder-Deo. Here are two kings of the peninsula of India styled ‘Deva,’ of which the popular, or abbreviated form, is Deo, the same as was found to be the case in Upper India at a more remote period, in the case namely of Vasu-Deva, which name in its time was popularly rendered Bazdeo or Vasdeo, according to pronunciation.

Again, Wilson (Catalogue of Mackenzie’s Collection, Madras reprint, 1882, p.77) treating of the kings of the above line, writes: ‘Rudra-Deva, to expiate the crime of killing his father, built a vast number of temples, a thousand, it is said, chiefly to Siva,’ &c. ‘After some time his brother Mahadeva rebelled, defeated him in battle and slew him, and assumed the direction of affairs. He left to the son of Rudra the title Yuva Raja, heir and partner of the kingdom. Mahadeva lost his life in war with the Raja of Devagiri. Gunapati-Deva, the son of Rudra, succeeded, and gives the name to the family, who as Kakateya Rajahs, are often termed "Gunapati."’ We have here a plain and simple narrative of a dynasty of Rajahs bearing the name Deva in the southern portion of India, similar to what we have already seen was also the case in Cabul and elsewhere. This name ‘Deva’ becomes popularly abbreviated into Deo, and one of these Rajahs was also found named Mâhâ-Deva, whose name on the same grounds would be popularly contracted into Mahdeo.

Here the reader should be informed that Siva, a member of the Indian trinity, is the special divinity greatly venerated in Southern India, so that the majority of ancient shrines and temples are dedicated to Siva under one or another of his various titles. The worship, however, of Siva was by no means restricted to Southern India, for Gondophares’ coin (see plate), No.4, on reverse bears the image of Siva (see also E.J.Rapson ut supr., p. 285) . He is besides katà ántonomasían the Mâhâdeva, ‘the Great God’ in Southern India. this name is borne by Hindus, and it is not uncommonly heard in the streets as a personal appellation.

Now if the name Mâhâdeo be passed through Iranian mouths, it will probably assume the form of ‘Masdeo’; owing to similarity of sound with the Iranian name, Mazdai, the sibilant would be introduced, and the outcome of Mahadeo or Madeo would be Masdeo, and would appear in Syriac as Mazdai: the Greek version reads Misdaìoz, the older Latin Misdeus and Mesdeus, and from this De Miraculis would borrow it. These forms would represent, approximately, the name of the Indian king who condemned the Apostle to death, and so would reproduce the characteristic divine epithet deva as well, retained in the abbreviated Indian form, Mahdeo.

The point need not be forced, we will leave it to the reader to assimilate the idea and judge of its probability on the strength of the parallel evidence adduced.

35. Date of the Acts

When treating of the Eucharistic celebration (see Nos. 30 and 31) we produced two quotations from the text—‘a mingled draught in a cup,’ and ‘the mingled cup,’ we then said they were reserved for separate treatment; they were also found supported by the Greek version when neither of the Latin translations—both abbreviations—contained any trace of the same. Considerable importance, in our opinion, is to be attached to the use of the phraseology. In the first place, it indicates that the age of the writing takes us back to the period when the disciplina Arcani, or the lex Arcani, regarding the mention of Christian mysteries, and more especially the Holy Eucharist, prevailed. In the second place, the phrase is one that belongs to the sub- apostolic age, reserved to express and denote the celebration of the Eucharist, or the holy mass; yet so, that while understood by the faithful it was meaningless to the outsider. In proof of what we assert we shall introduce the reader to a safe authority, that of Abercius, Bishop of Hieropolis, in Phrygia Salutaris.

In the metric epitaph composed by the bishop—which belongs to the early date A.D. 180-191—an expression parallel to that quoted above is found employed to designate the Eucharistic celebration. The inscription itself was known long ago, for it is attached to a life of Saint Abercius in the Greek Passionales, and many MSS containing it are found in the Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris, and in the Vatican library. Tillemont, however, rejected it; and in our days every attempt has been made, by Ficker in 1894, by Harnack in 1895, and by Dieterich in 1896, to explain it away as anything but a Christian record, just as many another ecclesiastical document had been treated, under a cloud of misapplied scientific erudition, but the native truth of its authenticity enabled it to triumph over all attempts to suppress it. It now becomes evident that the writer of the Saint’s life had a fair copy of the inscription before him, if he did not write the life on the spot where the tomb stood. The copy that is attached to the life, though faulty in passages, yet in substance is now ascertained to be accurate, and has been confirmed by the discoveries of the original epitaph, and of one of Alexander, moulded on the former, of the year 216.

By good luck Professor W.M. Ramsay recovered in 1882 the epitaph of Alexander of Hieropolis, the son of Antony, which he published the same year. This attracted the attention of the late ecclesiastical archaeologist, De Rossi, and he suggested that the tomb of Abercius could not be far off, as the epitaph of Alexander closely imitated the lines of the known epitaph of Abercius. On a subsequent expedition of research, in 1883, Professor Ramsay alighted on two fragments of the original inscription of Abercius.

This had been engraved on three faces of a sepulchral cippus of white marble, the fourth bearing a crown and foliage. The cippus, according to the recital, stood over the tomb itself, and must have occupied the centre of a chamber, or open space. On the occasion of the Episcopal Jubilee of leo XIII., 1892, the Sultan of Turkey made a present of this most ancient relic of Christian epigraphy to the Pope. Later the Professor kindly sent over the smaller fragment as well which he had removed to Scotland. The whole is now set up in the ‘Christian Museum’ at the Lateran Palace, holding also those discovered in the Roman Catacombs.

The translation of the Syriac expression given by Dr. Wright agrees with that used by Abercius in his epitaph, as we said. The quotation we give was first taken from H. Maruchi’s L’ Eléments d’ Archéologie Chrétienne (General Notions), Paris, 1899, p. 296, but it has been compared with that given in the article, ‘ Abercius,’ by Dom H. Leclercq, Dictionnaire d’ Archéologie Chrétienne et de Liturgie, Paris 1893, edited by Dom Fernand Cabrol, of which the first six fasciculi are now published. The article reproduces the Greek original reconstructed on the text given by the fragments discovered, with a large plate reproducing the recovered fragments. The print shows distinctly what has been recovered from the fragments, and what is confirmed by Alexander’s epitaph; to this is added a Latin translation, which is quoted below. The article treats most elaborately all questions concerning this early epitaph, and supplies a complete list of literature on the subject.

Abercius, speaking in his own person, tells us he ordered his tomb, dictated the inscription, was a follower of the shepherd, visited Rome, passed through the cities of Syria, went beyond the Euphrates, saw Nisibis; then continues:—

Fides vero ubique mihi dux fuit

praebuitque ubique cibum, piscem e fonte

Ingentem, purum, quem prehendit virgo casta

Deditque amicis perpetuo edendum,

Vinum optimum habens ministrans mixtum cum pane.

Haec adstans dictavi Abercius heic conscribenda

Annum agens septuagesimum et (vere) secundum &c.

The expression mixtum reproduces the Greek kerasma (vinum aquae) of the original—the ‘mingled draught,’ or ‘mingled cup’ of the Acts, used in the celebration of the Eucharist. Etienne (Henricus Stephanus) in his thesaur. Gr. Linguae (ed. Dindorff, Paris, 1841) has ad voc.— kerasma ‘Mixtura; de mixtura vini Eustathius; item mixtura aquae frigidae et calidae.’

The entire epitaph is enigmatic, owing to the prevalence of the ‘lex Arcani.’ The reader may perhaps know that under the emblem piscis—the fish—Christ is symbolised, as shown by several mural paintings found in the Roman Catacombs. A similar allusion to Ichthys-piscis is found in the epitaph of Pectorius of Autun quoted by Leclercq, ibid., col. 83. The ‘mixed’ or ‘mingled cup’ denotes the consecrated element of wine slightly mixed with water, as is used to this day in the Catholic Church; and the panis, ‘ bread,’ represents the body.

The coincidence of the ancient expression found in the epitaph of Abercius and repeated in the Syriac of the Acts of Thomas justifies us in seeing therein a trace of an original remnant of the earlier text, sufficient to conclude on this ground what the writer of the article ‘Thomas’ says on his own account (Hastings’s Dictionary of the Bible, Edinburgh, 1902, vol. iv.) that ‘the Acta Thomae is a work probably going back to the second century.’ The writer speaks of it as of Gnostic origin, but the reader will have found sufficient evidence to consider it instead only subjected to very extensive interpolation and adaptation for Gnostic purposes, yet so that all trace of the original text has not disappeared. Fortunately a German scholar, who has made a special study of Gnostic writings and is considered a great authority on the subject, von Carl Schmidt (Die alten Petrusakten im Zusammenhang der Apocryphen Apostellitteratur, Leipzig, 1903)has arrived at the conclusion that of the Acts of Peter, Paul, John, Thomas, and Andrew, which in the time of Photius were attributed to Lucius Charinus, all, even those of John, are by more or less orthodox Catholics; certainly none are of Gnostic origin (p. 129): Der gnostiche Apostelroman, he says, ist für mich ein Phantom—‘In my opinion a Gnostic romance [Acts] of the Apostles is a phantom.’ It is satisfactory to find others coming to the views we hold.

The passages ‘a mingled draught in a cup’ (text, p. 258), and the ‘mingled cup’(p.290) we maintain are survivals of the primitive writing; for since the Gnostic sects abhorred wine and did not use it in their celebration ‘of the mysteries,’ it becomes undeniable that these expressions were not inserted by them. Besides the use of wine and bread on the above two occasions, the use is also mentioned at a third celebration on p.268; these offer ample evidence that the expressions have come down to us from the original text in which they stood before Gnostic manipulation took place—and this proof of itself would be sufficient to fix the date of the composition as anterior to the development which it now presents—to the latter portion, at least, of the second century.

Perhaps the reader would like to see a quotation of the oft- repeated phrase, as used half a century later, by another bishop, St.Cyprian of Carthage, A.D. 250-268. The extract we are going to give is taken from a lesson of the office for the octave of Corpus Christi; Epist. ad Caecilium:—

Ut ergo in Genesi per Melchisedech sacerdotem benedictio circa Abraham posset rite celebrari, praecedit ante imago sacrificii, in pane et vino scilicet constituta. Quam rem perficiens, et adimplens Dominus panem, et calicem mixtum vino obtulit: et qui est plenitudo, veritatem praefiguratae imaginis adimplevit.

36. The Martyrdom

We now pass on to the closing section of the Acts, the martyrdom.

The narrative of the Acts was interrupted at the point where the Apostle Thomas was remanded to prison after the one ordeal mentioned in the text. We found him administering baptism to the last of his converts while detained in prison.

The King ordered Thomas to be brought up for judgment. Mazdai questioned him whence he came and who was his master. The king hesitated what sentence he would pass, or rather how he should compass his death without causing popular excitement. The reason for his hesitation is given, ‘because he was afraid of the great multitude that was there; for many believed in our Lord, and even some of the nobles.’ So Mazdai took him out of town, to a distance of about half a mile, and delivered him to the guard under a prince with the order, ‘Go up on this mountain and stab him.’ On arriving at the spot the Apostle asked to be allowed to pray, and this was granted at the request of Vizan, the king’s son, one of the two last converts. Arising from his prayer, Thomas bid the soldiers approach and said, ‘Fulfil the will of him who sent you.’ ‘And the soldiers came and struck him all together, and he fell down and died.’

The burial is described in the following words: ‘And they brought goodly garments and many linen cloths, and buried Judas in the sepulchre in which the ancient kings were buried.’

The narrative also states that the grave was opened in the king’s lifetime and by his orders, when the bones were not found, ‘for one of the brethren had taken them away secretly and conveyed them to the West.’

The Greek version and the Latin De Miraculis generally agree with the text, but both say, as to the manner of death inflicted, ‘four soldiers pierced him with lances.’ As to the disappearance of the Apostle’s bones, the former says: ‘One of the brethren having stolen him, removed him to Mesopotamia.’ The latter is more explicit: ‘Quoniam reliquias sancti apostoli quidam de fratribus rapuerunt et in urbe Edissa a nostris sepultus est’—this tells us the removal was to Edessa, where the Apostle’s bones were again buried.

The Passio places the death at a different period, and assigns its occurrence to quite a different cause, as shown in No.32. The same is made to take place immediately after the miraculous destruction of the idol: ‘The priests raised a howl, and the chief priest of the temple seizing a sword transfixed the Apostle, exclaiming, "I will avenge the insults to my god." ’ As to the removal of the bones from India it also gives a different version: ‘The Syrians begged of the Roman emperor Alexander [Severus, A.D.222-235], then on his victorious return from the Persian war against Xerxes [Ardashir], and petitioned that instructions should be sent to the princes of India to hand over the remains of the deceased [Apostle] to the citizens. So it was done; and the body of the Apostle was transferred from India to the city of Edessa.’

37. The Removal of the Apostle's Relics from India

A few general remarks are demanded by the differences disclosed between the text and the Passio. The difference on two points is radical. The local tradition of Mylapore (see Chapter IV.) coincides with the text that the Apostle was put to death on the great Mount St. Thomas, while Passio makes it occur suddenly and inflicted by the hand of what would be a Brahman priest.

As to the removal of the relics to Edessa, the text and the versions agreeing with it, the Greek and De Miraculis, say it occurred during the lifetime of king Mazdai, while Passio distinctly asserts it to have taken place long after, viz., after the close of the first quarter of the third century. We shall find that the version given by Passio will demand acceptance, while that by the text is inadmissible.

The Apostle would probably have lived considerably past the middle of the first century before he could have completed the mission assigned to him. Keeping this in mind, we will place before the reader all the available historical data to show exactly on what basis the question can be solved.

According to historical data, Abgar V., surnamed Ukkama (the Black) King of Edessa—to whom the Apostle Thomas had deputed his colleague the Apostle Thaddeus (see No. 7), confirmed, as explained above, by Eusebius and the Doctrine of Addai (infr.), and whose conversion after the miraculous cure we uphold— reigned, during his second term, from A.D. 13 to A.D.50, which gives a period of thirty-seven years and one month (see Duval’s Edesse, pp.48-50). He was succeeded by his son Manu V., who reigned for seven years, to A.D.57; he again was succeeded by his brother Manu VI., who reigned for fourteen years, down to A.D.71. It is during this third reign that Aggai, mentioned in the Doctrine of Addai (Philipps, p.39), was put to death by the prince (pp. 48-49): ‘And years after the death of Abgar (Ukkama) the king, one of his rebellious sons who was not obedient to the truth, arose and sent word to Aggai,’ &c. ‘And when he saw that he did not obey him, he sent and broke his legs, as he was sitting in the church and expounding.’ This discloses that after the new faith had been followed by Abgar and his son Manu V., after the year 57, when Manu VI. obtained power, he not only rejected the faith—if he had ever accepted it—but started an open persecution against the nascent church, and killed the chief priest or bishop who then presided over it. As his reign was prolonged to fourteen years, and he was succeeded by his son Abgar VI., who reigned for twenty years, down to A.D. 91, and would have been a heathen like his father, the faith that had commenced to bud would in all probability have been crushed out under persecution, to revive at some later date.

Now, had the remains of the Apostle come to Edessa during the reign of Abgar Ukkama, or the short reign of his son Manu V. (whose conversion, together with that of his father is mentioned, see Addai, p.31 and note a), there is not the slightest doubt it would have been loudly proclaimed by Edessan scribes and by St. Ephraem. It not having taken place then, we may assume that the ground at Edessa would not again have been ready for such removal until Abgar iX. had ascended the throne, and had embraced the Christian faith. He reigned thirty-five years (A.D. 179-214). Besides this local improbability, there arises another objection. The route from India viâ the Euphrates was not open to dwellers within the circle or bounds of the Roman empire except after Trajan’s expedition, A.D. 114-116 (Mommsen, Römische Geschichte, vol. v. p. 395; see also Duval’s Edesse, p.53); and again after the victory of Alexander Severus (see date given above) over the Persians. So the removal, said to have taken place during the lifetime of Mazdai, must be summarily rejected as untenable.

Abgar Ix., mentioned above, styled on his coins Megaloz , after his return from Rome—which is by Gutschmidt (Untersuchungen iiber die Geschichte des Koenigsreichs Osrohoene) placed not earlier than 202—embraced the faith. This would be the second time that the ruler in Edessa submitted to the preaching of the Gospel. The details of this conversion have unfortunately not come down to us. This is the same Abgar of whom the compiler of the Chron. Edessen. (Guidi, Chronica Minora, p.3,l.15 f.), quoting from the city archives, says that he witnessed the great flood that destroyed the walls and a great part of the city in November, 201: ‘Abgarus rex stans in magna turri, quae Persarum vocatur, aquam (exundantem) collucentibus facibus conspexit’—the Chronicle includes among the buildings destroyed, the ‘temple of the Christians’—‘in templum aedis sacrae christianorum (aquae) irrupuerunt.’ The document from which the details of the great flood were taken is an attested notarial document which had been placed in the archives of the city of Edessa; the wording shows that at that period the State was still pagan although there existed a church within the city.

Eusebius (Hist. Eccl., lib. v. cap.xxiii. col.490-491, Migne, P.Gr.-L. tom.xx., Eusebii, tom.ii.), supplies an earlier date for the existence of churches in Osrhoena. Writing of the Synods which were held in the West and in the East in the days of Pope Victor, A.D. 192-202, regarding the celebration of Easter, he adds: There were also Synods held ‘in Osroene and in the cities of that country’ of which synodal letters exist. Mansi (Concilia, tom. i.col.727), in the Ex libello Synodico, which contains in brief a collection of principal synods held on this question, gives the following: Osroena. Synodus provincialis in Osroene, cui Edessa et Adiabenorum, regio subjacet, collecta episcopis octodecim, quorum praeses memoriae traditus non est: de sancto pascha idem statuens, Commodo imperante [A.D. 180-192]. A double entry of this Synod, differing slightly in wording, is given, and a comparison of the two will show them to have been the same and not separate Synods. M. Duval (Edesse, p.114, note) has arrived at a wrong conclusion on this point, based on the grounds that Mesopotamia was not divided into two provinces until 349, under Constantius, and rejects the synodical ruling as spurious. In reality the question of the division of Mesopotamia into two separate provinces has no bearing on the case; besides, the second province under Constantius had Amida for its capital and not Adiabene. There is no distinction implying two provinces in either of the synodical entries: one mentions the number of bishops, the other does not; one is spoken of as the provincial council of Mesopotamia, the other as of Osroene; both names were applicable to the same province. Even after the time of Constantius, Socrates, the Church historian, writes of Edessa as being in Mesopotamia (Hist. Eccl., lib. iv. cap. xviii., Migne, P. Gr.-L., tom. lxvii.; the quotation is given in Chapter IV. p.105). The data obtained from Eusebius and the Osroene Synod (A.D. 192-197) show that there were assembled bishops and rectors of churches to the number of eighteen before the close of the second century. But Christianity had not yet become the adopted religion of the country, neither had the court or the wealthier classes joined it. It would only be after the conversion of Abgar IX., after A.D. 202, when influence and wealth were at the command of the Church, that a merchant would be forthcoming who could have brought to his native city the relics of the Apostle. When a few years later, Alexander Severus reopened the door of Eastern commerce to the empire viâ the Euphrates, it is then that we have all the conditions required for such a transfer. Edessa was then thoroughly Christian, the trade route to India was opened, peace would facilitate commerce, and backed by wealth the citizen of Edessa, ‘Khabin,’ trading with India, was able to bring the precious Relics to Edessa (for evidence see Chapter II., note p.23). It is only then that this transfer was practicable.

Some writers have fixed upon the year 232 as that of the removal, Lipsius among others, but there are no further data available to fix the time with precision. The transfer would probably have been between the dates 222-235, or a little later; but it cannot be placed after 241, for in that year Ardashir (the Xerses of the Passio), accompanied by his son Sapor (Duval, Edesse, p. 70), invaded Mesopotamia and threatened Antioch, so the trade route to India by the Euphrates was once again closed to commerce, and continued so for a long subsequent period.

As to such details as that the body was buried in linen cloths and was interred in the tomb of the ancient kings, they are mere specimens of faulty information or incongruous ideas introduced into the narrative. In the India of those days linen cloths would not be readily forthcoming; and as to tombs of Hindu kings—for such they would have been were the details accurate—there never were any to receive the holy remains of the Apostle, for Hindu rite has rigorously prescribed from all time the cremation of the dead.

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