The Acts of Thomas

Other Apostolic Missions

The book of Acts creates the impression that Paul (with help from Barnabas and Silas) was the only apostle traveling abroad and spreading the gospel. It is a false impression. Luke was not attempting to create a chronicle of all the apostles and their various fields of labor. Luke wrote the book of Acts primarily as an apologetic work defending Paul's Gentile mission. He knew Paul personally and traveled with him on several of his journeys. That personal acquaintance gave him detailed information about Paul's work. Luke did not have the same first-hand knowledge about the work of other apostles, and even if he did know the story of their labors, he was not interested in recording those stories. For the most part, the other apostles enter Luke's narrative only if they intersect with Paul or if the story provides background material pertinent to Paul's mission to the Gentiles.

While Paul propagated the good news of the kingdom in Syria, Cilicia, Galatia, Phrygia, Macedonia, Achaia, and Asia Minor, other apostles were also at work broadcasting the gospel. Unnamed disciples planted the gospel in Syria. Jews like Priscilla and Aquila and Gentiles like Clement encountered the gospel early on in Rome. Paul mentions the Apostles Andronicus and Junias at work in that city. Apollos heard the gospel in Alexandria. The Apostle Thomas dispatched Thaddeus and Mar Mari to bring the good news to Edessa, Armenia, and Mesopotamia. The royal court of Adiabene may have first been exposed to Judaism through Ananias of Damascus. In his epistles to the Corinthians, Paul speaks broadly of other apostles and the brothers of the Master traveling on itinerant missions. He also mentions the work of eminent apostles in Corinth and some that he deems as false workers who disguise themselves as apostles of the Messiah.

The apostles dispersed the gospel as a firstfruits of the prophecy, "The Torah will go forth from Zion and the word of the LORD from Jerusalem" (Isaiah 2:3). The mother assembly in Jerusalem maintained contact with the communities of disciples that formed in remote locations, and those communities looked to the apostolic authority of Jerusalem for leadership and guidance.

References

This lesson is adapted from Daniel Lancaster's teachings in The Sent Ones, as presented by First Fruits of Zion for the Torah Club.

Casting Lots for the Nations

According to Apollonius of Ephesus (late second century), "It was handed down by tradition that our Savior commanded his disciples not to depart from Jerusalem for twelve years." They were to offer the nation of Israel twelve years to repent before they turned their attention to the rest of the world. According to that tradition, the Master said to the twelve, "If any man of Israel desires to repent and believe on God by my name, his sins shall be forgiven him. After twelve years, go forth into the world, so that no one may say, 'We have not heard" (Clement of Alexandria, Stromata 6.5).

Legend has it that the twelve apostles divvied up the ancient world by the casting of lots (Ecclesiastical History 3.I.I):

About that time all the apostles had come together to the same place, and shared among themselves the countries, casting lots, in order that each might go away into the part that had fallen to him. (Acts of Andrew and Matthias I)

At that time we the apostles were all in Jerusalem-Simon called Peter, and Andrew his brother, James the son of Zebedee, and John his brother, Philip and Bartholomew, Thomas, and Matthew the tax-collector, James of Alphaeus, and Simon the Cananaean, and Judas of James -and we portioned out the regions of the world, in order that each one of us might go into the region that fell to him, and to the nation to which the Master sent him. (Acts of Thomas I)

Their journeys probably followed the same type of pattern Paul employed. They traveled to distant cities of the Diaspora, announced the good news in the local Jewish communities, and then returned to Jerusalem for festivals and reunions with the brethren before setting out again. Church traditions, apocryphal books, martyrologies, histories, and local legends have the apostles crisscrossing all over the ancient world and going as far afield as Britain, Spain, Ethiopia, Afghanistan, and India. Eusebius (quoting Origen) offers a conservative report on the apostolic travels:

Thomas, according to tradition, received Parthia as his allotted region; Andrew received Scythia, and John, Asia, where, after continuing for some time, he died at Ephesus. Peter appears to have preached through Pontus, Galatia, Bithynia, Cappadocia, and Asia to the Jews who were scattered abroad; he finally came to Rome. (Ecclesiastical History 3.1.I)

Legends about apostolic destinations are dubious. Christian communities all over the world wanted to claim apostolic origin. They were motivated to fabricate stories about the apostles visiting their countries. In The Sent Ones, FFOZ attempts to present the strongest and most plausible of the myriad conflicting traditions about the travels of the apostles.

References

This lesson is adapted from Daniel Lancaster's teachings in The Sent Ones, as presented by First Fruits of Zion for the Torah Club.

Gospels of Matthew and Thomas

The Apostle Matthew Levi the tax-collector remained in Judea, teaching the disciples, at least until 45 CE. Then, he prepared to set out for his apostolate.

According to some legends, Matthew Levi received Ethiopia and the African nation of the man-eaters as his allotted region. Other legends place Matthew in Macedonia. Another tradition has him in Pontus, along the Black Sea. Yet another has him traveling to Persia and Parthia. According to some legends, Matthew died in a city in Africa sometime in the seventies of the first century. A more reliable line of inference points to work in Pontus, along the Black Sea, and martyrdom in the land of the barbarians to the east. Regardless of where or when Matthew went, the more significant thing is what he left behind. According to tradition, Matthew wrote the first gospel before leaving Jerusalem.

Church tradition holds that Matthew wrote the first gospel. According to Papias, "Matthew compiled the oracles of the Lord in the Hebrew language, and each [subsequent gospel writer] interpreted them as best he could." This implies that the original gospel written by Matthew may have been a sayings-gospel, consisting of a catalog of sayings attributed to Yeshua, completely disconnected from any narrative context, similar to the Gospel of Thomas.

Eusebius says that Matthew wrote his gospel in Hebrew just before leaving the Holy Land:

Matthew had begun by preaching to Hebrews; and when he made up his mind to go to others too, he committed his own gospel to writing in his native tongue, so that for those with whom he was no longer present the gap left by his departure was filled by what he wrote. (Ecclesiastical History 3.24.16)

According to this tradition, Matthew composed his Hebrew Gospel for the benefit of disciples he left behind in Judea. Since he could no longer be there to transmit the sayings of the Master orally, he committed those sayings to writing. The Jewish believers found the collection of Yeshua's teachings useful and began to copy it and distribute it among themselves.

Unfortunately, the original gospel Matthew composed has been lost. The Hebrew Gospel of Matthew mentioned by Papias and Eusebius is not the same as our canonical Matthew. Our Gospel of Matthew represents a somewhat later stage of development. Matthew's Hebrew Gospel started a process that ultimately resulted in the composition of our Canonical Gospels: Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John.

Likewise, the Gospel of Thomas we have today is not the original sayings gospel once attributed to the Apostle Thomas. Many scholars think that the original version of Gospel of Thomas was written in Hebrew or Aramaic in the first century, but the version that survives today is a Coptic translation of a Greek version from the second century. Moreover, the version we have today was embellished with dubious theological ideas from second-century Christianity. Underneath those embellishments and accretions, however, the original voice of Yeshua can often be detected.

References

This lesson is adapted from Daniel Lancaster's teachings in The Sent Ones, as presented by First Fruits of Zion for the Torah Club.

Toma

The Apostle Thomas may have left Jerusalem in the early forties, long before Paul and Barnabas began their first journey to Cyprus and Galatia.

The name Thomas is from the Aramaic תּוֹמָא (Toma), which means "twin." The Gospel of John often calls him Δίδυμος(Didymos), the Greek word for "twin." Sources about Thomas explain that his real name was יְהוּדָה (Yehudah), i.e., "Judas." As one of three men among the Twelve named Yehudah, the disciples referred to him by his nickname "The Twin" to avoid confusion.

We do not know the identity of his other twin, but Clementine Homilies identifies a disciple named Eliezer as his twin. A competing tradition reports that he was called "The Twin" because he bore a striking resemblance to the Master.

Thomas apparently worked as a builder, craftsman, and stone mason. Gospel readers remember Thomas for his pragmatic skepticism after the resurrection, so he has earned the appellation "Doubting Thomas."

The entire Syrian Church traces its origin to Thomas in much the same way that Western Christianity traces its origin to Peter. Despite that great fame, early Christianity has left us with no reliable documents about the work of Thomas. He had no chronicler like Luke to record his journeys. Fortunately, some of the adventures of Thomas can be pieced together from various traditions and sources. Any attempt to reconstruct the travel itinerary of the Apostle Thomas will be speculative at best. No two Thomas scholars agree on the matter, and many scholars dismiss the entire body of Thomas legends completely. The reconstruction in The Sent Ones attempts to harmonize several traditions, but other reconstructions are certainly possible.

The Acts of Thomas is not an authentic apostolic document, nor does it transmit a reliable, historical tradition about Thomas. The second- or third-century author seems to have combined popular legends about Thomas with gratuitous and bizarre embellishments and his own religious propaganda. Some scholars suggest that Acts of Thomas does preserve certain historical elements and core legends. Inquiries into the travels of Thomas and the reliability of the underlying traditions in Acts of Thomas have generated a vast library of religious and academic scholarship. For purposes of The Sent Ones, FFOZ extracts a few stories from the earlier chapters of Acts of Thomas, which seem to transmit a plausible description of Thomas' early mission, but don't feel as if you need to take them literally as historical truth. They read more like talmudic legends than sober history.

References

This lesson is adapted from Daniel Lancaster's teachings in The Sent Ones, as presented by First Fruits of Zion for the Torah Club.

The Reluctant Apostle

Acts of Thomas 1-2

When the apostles cast lots to divide the nations among them in order that each one of them might preach in the region that fell to him and in the place to which the Master sent him, India fell by lot and division to the Apostle Judas Thomas (the Twin). He was not willing to go. He said, "I do not have sufficient strength for this because I am weak." By then, he was already in his forties or early fifties. Thomas may have suffered some physical ailment.

He further objected, "I am a Hebrew! How can I teach the Indians?" He felt that, as a Jew, he had nothing to offer the people of India, nor did he have any notion of how to communicate the gospel to them. The Pauline mission to the Gentiles had not yet commenced, and the Jerusalem Council had not yet convened to rule on the status of Gentile believers.

When the apostles divided the nations, they imagined themselves going to the Jewish communities in the Diaspora and proclaiming the good news of the kingdom among their scattered countrymen. They had not yet reckoned with the idea of bringing the gospel directly to the pagans. Thomas was at a loss. While he was reasoning with himself this way, our Master appeared to him in a vision in the night and said to him, "Fear not, Thomas, for my grace is with you."

Nonetheless, Thomas was not persuaded. He replied, "Send me wherever you want, Master, but to India I will not go."

As Judas Thomas continued in this mindset, a certain merchant from India happened to come into the country on his travels. His name was Habban, and he was sent by Maharaja Gudnaphar that he might bring him a skillful builder. According to the coins and inscriptions he left behind, King Gudnaphar, the maharaja (high king), ruled a large region that included present-day Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Punjab.

Habban is called the merchant of King Gudnaphar, implying he was the commissioner in charge of the maharaja's trade. What circumstance might have brought the foreign trade commissioner to Jerusalem? One scholar points out that Habban (Chabban, חַבָּן) is not a Parthian name but Semitic. Perhaps Habban was a member of the Parthian Jewish community and used his business travels as an opportunity to visit the holy city.

On the other hand, legends about the magnificence of Herod the Great's architecture might have drawn him to Jerusalem to seek a builder. The Indo-Parthian King Gudnaphar wanted to build a palace such as one might find adorning the great cities of the west. He sought a builder with the type of skills employed by Herod the Great. Herod's three-towered palace at Jerusalem was probably the type of thing Gudnaphar had in mind for his own palace. Perhaps Gudnaphar sent Habban to the land of the Jews to seek a contractor skilled in Herodian-style construction.

In some form or another, our Master appeared to Habban in the streets of Jerusalem. He asked him, "Do you wish to buy a builder?" Habban replied, "Yes." Our Master said to him, "I have a slave, a builder, whom I will sell to you." He showed him Thomas at a distance and bargained with him for twenty pieces of silver as his price. He even wrote a bill of sale.

When He had completed the transaction, He brought Thomas to stand before Habban the merchant. Habban asked, "Is this your master?" Judas Thomas answered truthfully, "Yes, He is my Master." Habban said, "He has sold you to me outright." Then Thomas was silent.

References

This lesson is adapted from Daniel Lancaster's teachings in The Sent Ones, as presented by First Fruits of Zion for the Torah Club.

Toma Sold as a Slave

Acts of Thomas 3

In the morning, Thomas arose and prayed. He entreated the Lord and said, "Behold, Lord, let it be according to your will; let your will be done." He set out to join his new owner with nothing but a staff in his hand, the sandals on his feet, and the clothing he wore. This was in keeping with our Master's instructions. When Yeshua sent His apostles out in the Galilee, He told them not to bring an extra coat, sandals, or staff, "for the worker is worthy of his support" (Matthew 10:10). According to the Acts of Thomas, he also carried the price of his sale, which the Master had given to him, saying, "Let your worth also be with you wherever you go, along with my grace."

Thomas never owned more than one garment at a time, and he ate only bread and water. His austere diet reflects more than just asceticism. He used the diet to avoid complications with the dietary laws and food polluted by idolatry. When traveling in Gentile lands and in the company of non-Jews, the apostles probably adopted a policy similar to that of the Prophet Daniel in Babylon: "Daniel made up his mind that he would not defile himself with the king's choice food or with the wine which he drank" (Daniel 1:8). He said, "Let us be given some vegetables to eat and water to drink" (Daniel I:12).

Jewish dietary concerns may account for legends about the austere diets of other apostles as well. "The Apostle Matthew partook of seeds, and nuts, and vegetables, and did not eat meat" (Clement of Alexandria, Instructor 2:1). Simon Peter ate only "bread and olives, and rarely cooked vegetables" (Clementine Homilies 12.6). When captured by the Romans, John refused his captor's food and ate only dried dates while in captivity (Acts of The Holy Apostle and Evangelist John the Theologian).

Thomas found his new owner loading goods onto a ship. Habban was apparently a wealthy trader and had acquired cargo in Judea for the return journey. Thomas helped him load the cargo as a good slave would do.

On board the ship, Habban inquired, "What can you make in wood and stone?" Thomas replied, "In wood I have learned to make ploughs, and yokes, and ox-goads, and oars for ferry boats, and masts for ships. In stone I have made tombs, monuments, sanctuaries, and royal palaces for kings." Habban sought just such a craftsman.

No other source offers any tradition about the vocation of Judas Thomas. The list accurately reflects the type of work that a Galilean craftsman might have done. The scarcity of timber and abundance of stone dictated the building materials. Justin Martyr reports a tradition that Yeshua made agricultural implements in Nazareth: "For He was in the habit of working as a carpenter when among men, making ploughs and yokes" (Dialogue with Trypho 88). As a stoneworker, Thomas could have found employment in any number of the numerous first-century building projects in Judea and Galilee.

References

This lesson is adapted from Daniel Lancaster's teachings in The Sent Ones, as presented by First Fruits of Zion for the Torah Club.

The Jews of India

The Acts of Thomas says that after boarding the vessel, Thomas and Habban "began to sail because the wind was steady." The steady wind refers to the monsoon-season trade winds that pushed their boat across the Indian Ocean.

After forty days or more at sea since sailing out of Ocelis, the ship carrying Judas Thomas and the merchant Habban came to harbor on the Malabar Coast of India in the Kerala district. In the apocryphal Acts of Thomas, the merchant ship on which Thomas and Habban crossed the Indian Ocean put into harbor at a certain town, and Thomas and Habban disembarked. They disembarked for a short stopover before continuing on to the kingdom of Gondophares.

They might have arrived at any one of several ports on the West Coast of India. A tradition taught by the Mar Thoma Christians in Malabar suggests that Thomas disembarked at the city of Cranganore (modern Kodungallur), a leading port and commercial center five miles north of the Roman port at Muziris. The two ports were associated with one another. Both cities had large foreign populations of Yavanas: Greeks, Romans, and Egyptians. They also had Jewish communities.

The Jewish community of Malabar (Malabar Yehudan) had been in Cranganore for as long as anyone could remember, and the Jews on the Malabar Coast considered that city their capital. The earliest written evidence of their presence dates only to the eighth century CE, but there is no reason to suppose that they did not already have a strong presence in India in the days of the apostles. Local tradition says that the Malabar Jews were already well-established before Thomas arrived and that more waves of Jewish immigrants came after the fall of Jerusalem.

The "Black Jews" of Malabar claim that King Solomon planted them in India to hold a trading post for his kingdom. The Bene Israel Jews claim to be descendants of seven Galilean olive oil pressers who had been shipwrecked in the second century BCE. Many of the Jews of Cranganore probably arrived in India along with other merchant populations in the Roman Era. The Jewish population of Cranganore persisted there until the sixteenth century CE. Malabar Jews still trace their origins to Cranganore.

The traditions of the Mar-Thoma Christians in Malabar claim that Thomas' initial visit to Cranganore lasted only eight days. During those eight days, Thomas taught in the local Jewish community and raised several disciples among them.

References

This lesson is adapted from Daniel Lancaster's teachings in The Sent Ones, as presented by First Fruits of Zion for the Torah Club.

The Flute Girl at the Wedding

Acts of Thomas 4-9

According to the story in Acts of Thomas, when Thomas and Habban disembarked, the sounds of flute players and instruments and singing echoed around them. Thomas inquired among the locals, "What is the rejoicing in this city?" They told him that he should thank the gods for bringing him to their city on the wedding day of the king's daughter. In India, a monarch was called a raja.

The raja had arranged a wedding banquet and issued an open invitation to everyone: both poor and rich, slaves and freemen, strangers and citizens. "Everyone who does not come to the feast is in danger of angering the king" they told Thomas. Thomas and Habban agreed to attend the feast rather than risk offending the local ruler.

Being the master, Habban reclined at a higher place than Thomas. The apostle reclined at a lower table, surrounded by strangers. They all looked on him as a foreigner who had come from another place. Thomas must have wondered why the Master brought him forty days across the ocean to attend the wedding banquet of a pagan princess.

While everyone else ate and drank, Thomas tasted nothing at all. They asked him, "Why have you come here, since you are not able to eat or drink?" He replied, "For something that is better than eating or drinking ... and because the raja's heralds proclaimed that he who hears and does not come shall receive chastisement."

A certain flute-girl in the midst of the party went around to all the guests. The flute-girls (auletride) of Greek and Roman banquets were, as a rule, scantily dressed prostitutes. They were professionals. It was a lucrative job. The host providing the banquet hired them to entertain the guests. In Athens, the city limited the price that a flute-girl could charge for attending a banquet to two drachmas, that is twice a day's wages. Other sources tell of flute-girls charging as much as two talents for their additional services. Flute-girls combined unblushing debauchery with their musical talents. A flute-girl played a long, double-reed, wind instrument that sounded more like an oboe than a flute, and typically, she danced to her own music.

When the flute-girl came to Judas Thomas, she recognized him as a Jew, for she herself was Jewish. She stood over him playing for a long time, but Judas Thomas would not lift up his face to look at her but kept his eyes firmly on the ground the whole time. The presence of a flute-girl at the table seems to fit better in the Roman world than it does in India, but Roman historians relate that flute-girls were among the first imports the western world brought to India.

As the Jewish flute-girl hovered over Thomas, the apostle never lifted his eyes. The cupbearer considered the stranger's behavior insulting-a breach of etiquette. He struck Thomas on the cheek. Judas Thomas lifted his eyes to look at the man who had struck him. He uttered something incomprehensible to him, but the flute-girl recognized it as Hebrew. She heard him say, "My God will forgive you in the World to Come, but in this world He will show His wonders against the hand that smote me, and I shall see it dragged along by a dog." Although the Master taught His disciples to turn the other cheek, they sometimes did so with an imprecation attached. For example, when smitten by the high priest, Paul replied, "God is going to strike you, you whitewashed wall!" (Acts 23:3).

The other guests could not at all understand what Thomas said because he spoke in Hebrew, but the flute-girl heard everything, for she was a Hebrew, and she was watching him.

The flute-girl left Thomas to play for others, but she kept looking back at him. When she had finished playing, she sat down opposite him and continued to watch him, but he did not lift his eyes or look at anyone, but stared at the ground, waiting until he might arise and depart from the banquet room. Meanwhile, the cupbearer had gone down to the fountain to draw more water for the banquet and a lion happened to be there. It rent him and tore him limb from limb. Soon the dogs were carrying off his remains, and a black dog carried off his right hand, which he had raised against Judas Thomas, and brought it into the midst of the banquet room. When the guests saw it, they were astonished. The hand was found to be that of the cupbearer who had smitten Judas Thomas. (The Mar-Thoma Christians of India tell a local version of the same story.)

Persuaded by the supernatural incident, the flute-player broke her flutes and seated herself on the ground at the feet of the apostle (who still reclined at the table). She declared, "This man is either divine or sent from God, for I heard him say in Hebrew, 'I shall see a dog dragging about the hand that smote me." The flute-girl wept when Thomas and Habban departed with their ship, but when she learned that Thomas also made other disciples in Cranganore, she joined them and said, "I have found rest here."

The wedding story in Acts of Thomas also contains a bizarre lesson in the piety of a platonic marriage that reflects second-century anti-sexuality motifs of encratic Christianity. That material can be safely ignored. However, some elements in the story about the wedding banquet and the flute-girl suggest that the writer of Acts of Thomas might have incorporated an earlier tradition about Thomas into his narrative. That Thomas could not eat the food at the meal reminds us of Jewish dietary restrictions. The imprecation against the cupbearer sounds like an unlikely invention for a pious Christian writer since it reveals something close to a vindictive reaction and does not square well with Matthew 5:39. The story sounds more like a talmudic anecdote than a Christian narrative. That Thomas speaks the Hebrew tongue (probably Aramaic) indicates consciousness of the apostle's Jewishness.

The original source of this legend might have been focused on how God arranged circumstances and used the Apostle Thomas to bring about the repentance of a single lost sheep of Israel. By breaking her flute (the symbol and instrument of her sinful occupation), the woman indicated sincere repentance. By seating herself at the feet of the apostle, she indicated a commitment to discipleship. The story compares with that of the sinful woman in Luke 7:36-50. It can also be compared to similar Chasidic stories in which a Chasid visits an unknown village or foreign country and discovers that God has sent him there for the sake of a single sinner to be restored.

References

This lesson is adapted from Daniel Lancaster's teachings in The Sent Ones, as presented by First Fruits of Zion for the Torah Club.

Journey to Taksila

Acts of Thomas 16

The same spice route that brought ships to the Malabar Coast of India also extended north, up the coast to Pakistan before turning west toward the Persian Gulf. To reach Taxila, the capital city of King Gudnaphar, Thomas and Habban disembarked at Barygaza (modern Bharuch). Entrance into the narrow harbor presented hazards for ships. The local government employed fishermen in fishing boats to guide the large ocean vessels in and out of the harbor.

Barygaza was a hub city for traders. Trade flowed down a network of roads and caravan routes to converge at Barygaza. Habban and his crew would have unloaded his cargo and merchandise at this harbor. When the merchant had completed his transactions, he turned his attention to his errand for the king. He and Thomas and the other slaves may have set out at once for the capital, or they may have elected to wait until spring.

Gudnaphar's kingdom included present-day Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Punjab. His capital would have been at Taxila, an ancient city of north-western India renowned as a center of Buddhist learning and culture. It was a large, prosperous city situated in the fertile plains at the foothills of the mountains. Jewish communities of the eastern Diaspora were spread throughout Syria, Parthia, and Mesopotamia. They may have spread even as far as Taxila. The common language of Aramaic would have also made it agreeable to Thomas' efforts to proclaim the kingdom.

References

This lesson is adapted from Daniel Lancaster's teachings in The Sent Ones, as presented by First Fruits of Zion for the Torah Club.

The Plans for the Palace

Acts of Thomas 16-19

Many long weeks after setting out from Barygaza, the caravan arrived at Taxila. The maharaja was very glad to hear about Habban's acquisition. He ordered Judas Thomas to come into his presence. He asked him, "Will you build me a palace?" Thomas replied, "I will build it and finish it, for I have come to work at building and carpentry." The maharaja brought him outside the gate of the city, and as they walked, the maharaja talked with him about the construction of the palace and how its foundations should be laid. When he reached the place where the maharaja wished to build, he said, "Here I wish you to build for me a palace."

Thomas replied, "Yes, for this is a place which is suitable for building."

The maharaja said, "Build for me here."

Thomas replied, "I cannot build at this time, but I will begin in Tishrei and finish in Nisan."

The maharaja replied, "All other buildings are built in the summer! Will you build in the winter?"

Judas Thomas said, "This is the only way for the palace to be built."

At the maharaja's request, Thomas took a cane and began to measure and mark out the palace according to the way he would build it. He left doors toward the east for light and windows toward the west for air. He placed the baking-house to the south, and ran water pipes to service the house from the north. The maharaja was impressed. He said, "Truly, you are a good architect, worthy to serve a king." He entrusted Thomas with a large sum of money to carry out the construction and departed from him. Gudnaphar seems to have held court at several locations, including Taxila, Kabul, and Peshwar. He did not plan on returning until the following spring.

The maharaja continued to send Thomas silver and gold, from time to time, to keep the project going. Meanwhile, Judas Thomas traveled around the countryside, visiting the villages and cities, caring for the poor and comforting the afflicted. He was saying, "Whatever belongs to the king shall be given to the king, and many will have rest."

If there was a Jewish community in Taxila, Thomas certainly visited them and made his case for the Master, but he did not hesitate to bestow kindness on the Gentiles and to speak to them about the one God and His Messiah. The people under his influence referred to the God of Thomas as "the new God."

After a long time, the king dispatched messengers to Judas Thomas and said, "Send me a report about your progress and how much more you need." Thomas replied, "The palace is built, but it still lacks a roof." The maharaja gladly sent more silver and gold for the project's completion, but Thomas continued to apply the money to humanitarian purposes. He did not cease to teach and to relieve those who were afflicted, always saying, "May your Lord give you rest, to whom alone is the glory. For He is the one who feeds the orphans and provides for the widows, and He cares for all who are afflicted."

References

This lesson is adapted from Daniel Lancaster's teachings in The Sent Ones, as presented by First Fruits of Zion for the Torah Club.

The Invisible Palace

Acts of Thomas 20-24

When the maharaja came to the city, he inquired among his friends about the palace that Judas Thomas had built for him, but they said, "There is no palace, nor has he done anything at all. He goes around the cities and villages, giving to the poor and teaching them the new God. He also heals the sick, drives out demons, and does many things. We believe he is a sorcerer."

Some said, "He does kindnesses and heals many all without recompense. His asceticism and piety make us think he must be either a magus or he really is one sent from the new God. He fasts often and prays much. He eats bread and salt and drinks water. He wears one garment and takes nothing from any man, and whatever he has, he gives to others."

When the maharaja heard these things, he smote his face with his hands and shook his head. He called Judas Thomas and the merchant who brought him and said, "Have you built me the palace?" Thomas replied, "I have built you the palace." The maharaja asked, "When can we go and see it?"

Thomas answered, "You cannot see it now, but when you have departed from this world, then you will see it."

The maharaia became furious and commanded that both Thomas and the merchant Habban should be bound and placed in prison until Thomas could be questioned about the money-to whom he had given it -and then put to death. The maharaja comforted himself by thinking about what kind of death he could inflict on ludas Thomas and the merchant. He decided to burn them alive after he had flayed them.

That very night, the maharaja's brother Gad fell sick, near to death. The name Gad is of historical interest because the name Gadana appears on some Gondophares coins. It appears to have been a royal title associated with the maharaja's administration, not a proper name. Once again, the apocryphal Acts of Thomas seems to have preserved an authentic, Apostolic-era identity.

When Gad's soul left him, the angels bore it up to heaven and showed him each place, one at a time, asking him where he would like to reside. When they came to the palace that Judas Thomas had built for the maharaja, his brother saw it and said to the angels, "I beg of you, my lords, let me dwell in one of the lower chambers of this palace." The angels said, "You cannot dwell in this palace; this is the one that Thomas has built for your brother."

Gad said, "I beg of you, my lords, let me go to my brother and buy the palace from him, for he has not yet seen it, and he will sell it to me." The angels agreed to let the soul of Gad return. Those who had been preparing to enshroud Gad for burial told the maharaja that his brother had revived and was calling for him. Gudnaphar hurried to his brother's side.

Gad said, "I know, my brother, that if I had asked you for half of your kingdom, you would have given it to me. Now I beg of you that you would sell me the palace you have in heaven that Thomas has built for you. For I have seen it."

Gudnaphar realized that Thomas was sincere. He told his brother, "I cannot sell it to you, but I pray and beg of God that I may become worthy to enter it myself. But if you really want a palace for yourself, I will summon the same architect, and he will build one for you, which will be better than mine."

The maharaja brought out Judas Thomas and the merchant who was imprisoned with him. He said to him, "I beg of you, as a man who begs of a minister of God, that you would pray for me and beg for me from the God you worship that He would forgive what I have done to you and make me worthy to enter the palace you have built for me, and that I may become a worshiper of this God you preach."

The maharaja's brother Gad also arose and fell at the apostle's feet and said, "I beg of you, I too supplicate before your God, that I may become worthy to worship Him and may receive what he has shown me by the hand of the angels." Thomas immersed them both. He did not fail to preach and bring many in that place to faith in Yeshua, and to shun fornication, covetousness, and the service of demons.

The story of Thomas and the palace in heaven sounds more like a folktale than an authentic historical anecdote. It functions as a living parable to illustrate the Master's teaching: "Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth ... But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys, and where thieves do not break in or steal; for where your treasure is, there your heart will be also" (Matthew 6:19-21). The story has an authentic Jewish ring to it -so much so that the Jewish community borrowed it. Jewish folklore tells nearly an identical story about the Prophet Elijah.

References

This lesson is adapted from Daniel Lancaster's teachings in The Sent Ones, as presented by First Fruits of Zion for the Torah Club.

Leaving Partos

Acts of Thomas says that the apostle continued to work in the territory, healing the sick, casting out evil spirits, and even raising the dead. It narrates many fantastical stories, none of which have the same spirit or quality as the story of the flute-girl or the story of the king's palace. Many of the stories reflect the encratic obsession with sexuality and depict Thomas constantly exhorting his disciples to abstain. Marital relationships are prohibited.

As noted earlier, the campaign against sexuality reflects second-century Gnostic influence, but it may also be an embellishment on a historical memory of Thomas' real campaign against sexual immorality among the pagan populations where he ministered. Ebonite tradition in the Clementine Recognitions recounts Thomas rebuking sexual immorality in Parthia, Media, Persia, and Mesopotamia:

Among the Parthians (as Thomas, who is preaching the gospel amongst them, has written to us) not many are still practicing polygamy; nor among the Medes do many still throw their dead to dogs; nor are the Persians pleased [any longer] to engage in intercourse with their mothers or incestuous marriages with their daughters. (Clementine Recognitions 9.29)

According to the story in Acts of Thomas, when Thomas was ready to leave the realm of Gudnaphar, he gathered the disciples around him and entrusted them into the hands of his deacon Xanthippus. He announced his departure, laid hands on Xanthippus, and prayed over the community.

Historians believe that in 50 CE, a Kushan invasion swept down from China and overthrew the kingdom of Gudnaphar, but the new faith seems to have persisted for many years.

Thomas may have traveled further up into Parthia and visited Jewish communities in Persia and Media. If he had crossed into the regions of Armenia, he could have intersected Judas Thaddeus and Mar Mari, the two disciples he had sent there several years earlier. Wherever Thomas worked in those years, he probably did not do much outreach beyond the Jewish communities he encountered in the Diaspora. Unlike the Apostle Paul, Thomas and the eleven did not consider themselves "apostles to the Gentiles." They did testify before non-Jews and offer the good news of the kingdom to anyone willing to listen, but they directed their efforts toward the lost sheep of Israel.

Thomas probably wanted to return to the small community of Jewish disciples he had left behind in Cranganore, but many writers think that Thomas must have returned to Judea before making a second trip to the Malabar Coast. A trip back to Jerusalem places Thomas in Judea sometime around 50-5I CE, a year or so after the Jerusalem Council. The apostles would have filled him in on the details. Thomas listened to the decision with keen interest. He realized that the apostolic decree had important implications for his work in India. He no longer needed to confine his efforts within the Jewish community, nor did he need to lead his Gentile converts toward circumcision and conversion. Perhaps he began to think about taking the message of the kingdom directly to the Gentiles in India, just as he had done in the kingdom of Gudnaphar.

References

This lesson is adapted from Daniel Lancaster's teachings in The Sent Ones, as presented by First Fruits of Zion for the Torah Club.

Two Journeys

Sometime around the year so-st Cr, Thomas returned to Jerusalem. Most scholars who accept the reliability of the basic traditions about the Apostle Thomas' work in India divide his mission abroad into two phases: North India (Indo-Parthia) and South India. Historical evidence requires us to date Thomas' visit to Taxila no later than SI CE When the Kushans invaded and overturned Taxila and the kingdom of Gudnaphar. Any later than that, Thomas could not have had contact with a king by that name.

At the same time, a strong tradition among the Mar Thoma Christians of southern India maintains that Thomas arrived by ship from the Red Sea ports in 52 CE. That is possible only it Thomas made two separate voyages, one in the mid-forties, and a second in the early fifties.

Why did Thomas go back to Jerusalem? All the apostles regarded Jerusalem as their home base--the place from which they were sent. They considered their labors abroad merely extensions of the Jerusalem congrega-tion. Just as Paul continually returned to Jerusalem and reported to James and the elders, Thomas was eager to bring back news about his work in Indo-Parthia. Anyone who must travel far from home for long periods of time naturally longs to reconnect with family and with his brethren among the disciples. Thomas also longed to return to the Temple, as the psalmist says, "If I forget you, O Jerusalem ...

For the purposes of The Sent Ones, we have pieced together a plausible timeline, story, and sequence of events for a second voyage from a variety of sources.

References

This lesson is adapted from Daniel Lancaster's teachings in The Sent Ones, as presented by First Fruits of Zion for the Torah Club.

Toma in Yerushalayim

It may have been as much as ten years after leaving the city with Habban the merchant of Gudnaphar that Thomas returned to Jerusalem from India and Indo-Parthia. He may have been present in Jerusalem during the tumultuous uprising associated with the Samaritan murders under Procurator Cumanus (SI CE). If so, he could have crossed paths with Paul of Tarsus, who also attended the Festival of Sukkot in Jerusalem that year. Even if he did not meet Paul, he would have taken a keen interest in the new apostolic work among the Gentiles. He could compare his own work among the people of Taxila.

News about the apostolic decree of the Jerusalem Council only affirmed the work Thomas had already seen God doing among the Gentiles. Through the course of his labors, Thomas led dozens-perhaps hundreds-of Gentile pagans to embrace "the new God" and renounce idolatry and sexual immorality. He had seen Gudnaphar and his family renounce idols for the sake of the God of Israel and His Messiah. In Edessa, Thaddeus reported similar results in the court of King Abgar. From the work in Adiabene and Armenia, Mar Mari vouched for the gospel flourishing among God-fearers.

Thomas realized that the apostolic decree presented new opportunities for the good news in India. He did not need to lead his Gentile converts toward circumcision and conversion. He began to think about the potential of taking the gospel to Gentiles in southern India.

At the same time, he often thought about the small Jewish community he had visited in the Malabar cities of Muziris and Cranganore. He began making plans to return. By spring, he was rested, refreshed, and inspired by a new vision for bringing the message to the faraway land of India. No longer did he object, "I am a Hebrew! How can I teach the Indians?" This time, he set out willingly, of his own accord, not as a slave.

In keeping with apostolic tradition, he may have taken another apostle with him, but if so, the memory of his traveling partner has not survived. Tradition also does not tell us whether or not Thomas had a surviving wife, and if he did, whether or not she traveled with him on this second expedition. We only know that after Thomas set out the second time, he never returned to Judea again.

Thomas likely set out after Passover in the spring of 5I or 52 CE. He followed the same routes on which Habban the merchant had led him several years earlier. A ship at Caesarea brought him to the great Egyptian port of Alexandria, where he could find hospitality in the enormous Jewish community of that city. He did not linger there. By offering his services with a merchant caravan, he could obtain passage up the Nile to Coptos again and then overland by camel to the harbor at Berenice. Then, he had only the matter of finding a ship bound for Muziris and Cranganore on India's Malabar Coast.

References

This lesson is adapted from Daniel Lancaster's teachings in The Sent Ones, as presented by First Fruits of Zion for the Torah Club.

Shipwreck on Socotra

Freight vessels bound for India left the port of Berenice every day in June. They wanted to clear the Strait of Bab el-Mandeb, which led from the Red Sea into the Gulf of Aden, in time to catch the monsoon winds that could speed them across the Indian Ocean. Those monsoon winds, however, could be dangerous to mariners. They kicked up high seas and violent storms.

The ship carrying Thomas to India caught the winds as it left the Gulf of Aden. A powerful storm tossed the vessel wildly. The wind and thrashing waves drove the ship blindly until it broke up completely off the shore of an island. Thomas and the other survivors of the wreck found themselves marooned on the strange island of Socotra.

Socotra is a large island in the Arabian Sea off the tip of the Horn of Africa and across the Gulf of Aden from modern Yemen. It is approximately seventy-two miles long and twenty-two miles across. In the first century, merchants and traders used it as a trading base; navigators referred to the island as Dioskouridou. They visited Socotra to acquire rare frankincense, myrrh, aloes, black oblillnum, large quantities of tortoise shells, and the red, resinous sap of the strange umbrella-shaped, almost-mythical Dragon's Blood Tree. People used Dragon's Blood in dyes, medicines, and magical rituals.

The Dragon's Blood Tree is just one of the unusual species on the island. Visitors to the isolated island of Socotra describe it as the most alien-looking place on earth. Long isolated from the mainland, one-third of the plant life on the island is found nowhere else on the planet. It is the Galapagos of the Indian Ocean.

In the days of the apostles, people believed that the legendary Phoenix made its home on Socotra. A mariner's guide written around 6o CE, just eight years after Thomas had been there, describes the island as a large, marshy home to rivers, crocodiles, snakes, edible lizards, and huge tortoises. It produced no fruit, vine, or grain. Inhabitants, a mix of Arabs, Indians, and Greeks, resided on the northern coast for trade.

Thomas and the other survivors from the wreck quickly learned from the locals that, during monsoon season, no ships attempted to land at Socotra. Every year, from June to September, the high winds and rough seas made the island inaccessible to the outside world. For four months of the year, the island was completely isolated. Thomas wanted to get off of Socotra as soon as possible. It was hot, unpleasant, and battered by the ceaseless wind. There was not much for a Jew to eat there. Merchant vessels returning from India often stopped at the island: "They bring in rice and wheat and Indian cloth, and a few female slaves. They exchange their cargo for a great quantity of tortoise-shell" (Periplyus Maris Erythraei 30). Those vessels would not begin to arrive until spring, and they would be going in the wrong direction. In any case, no ships would arrive from any direction until the end of the monsoon season. Judas Thomas knew that if he had to wait until the end of the windy season, he would be better off postponing his trip to India until the winds began again the following year. Tradition does not tell us how long Thomas stayed on the island, only that he came first to Socotra, an island in the Arabian Sea, and then to Cranganore.

In the meantime, he began teaching. The Socotrans spoke their own Semitic dialect, but they also did tolerably well with Greek and other trade languages. According to the local legend on Socotra, Thomas used wreckage from his ship to construct a house of worship. The Christians of Socotra claimed that Thomas was the first to bring them the gospel, and they proudly traced their origins to him. In later centuries, missionaries from the Syrian Church brought them under their ecclesiastical administration. Christian-ity, in one form or another, had a long run on the island. According to Marco Polo, who visited the island in the thirteenth century, "The people are baptized Christians, and have an archbishop ... The archbishop has no connection with the See of Rome, but is subject to a bishop at Bagdad who appoints him." Marco Polo went on to complain that the Christians there in his day practiced magic:

I can tell you moreover, that these Christians are the most skillful enchanters in the world. The archbishop, indeed, forbids and even punishes this practice, but without any avail; for their ancestors, they say, followed it before them, and they will continue. For instance, if a ship is preceding full sail with a favorable wind, they raise a contrary one, and oblige it to return. They can make it blow from any quarter they please and cause either a dead calm or a violent tempest. (Travels of Marco Polo 3:34)

When the Portuguese conquered the island in the sixteenth century, they discovered many Christians living under Muslim rule. They noted that all the Christian men were named Thomas, and they reported, "The Socotrans revere the Gospel. They say that they were introduced to it by the blessed apostle St. Thomas." The Portuguese Catholics wrote,' "They are devotees of the Apostle St. Thomas and claim to be descendants of the Christians he converted in that part of the world." Islam eventually absorbed the Christian community of Socotra.

No Christians live there today who trace their origins to Thomas, but there are many Muslims who could trace their ancestry to Socotran Chris-tians. (Stephen Missik, "Socotra: The Mysterious Island of the Assyrian Church of the East.")

References

This lesson is adapted from Daniel Lancaster's teachings in The Sent Ones, as presented by First Fruits of Zion for the Torah Club.

Mar-Thoma Christians

Somehow, Thomas found his way back onto a ship heading east. The Mar-Thoma Christians of southern India claim that he arrived at Malabar, the southern west coast of India, in 52 CE.

An ancient body of Christians from the Indian state of Kerala trace their origins to the Apostle Thomas. The "Mar-Thomas Christians" (Master Thomas Christians) constitute a unique ethnic group in India. Although they have been part of the Syrian Church since the Byzantine Period, they still refer to themselves as Nazrani (Nazarenes) and retain some distinctive Jewish characteristics, such as eating unleavened bread at Passover and conducting weddings under a canopy. Many aspects of their mode of life, local customs, ecclesiastical structure, and other ceremonial functions are similar to Jewish communities. Unlike other Indian Christians, Mar-Thoma Christians also preferred biblical names.

The Mar Thoma Christians (hereafter referred to as Nazrani) are proud wardens of traditions about Thomas. For centuries, they have preserved and passed on a body of oral lore about the work of Thomas in India in the form of folk tales, songs, and sacred dances like the Veeradian, the songs of Ramban Thomas, and the Margom Kali songs. A special caste had the responsibility of preserving these song-histories.

The Thoma Parvom (Thomas Song) was written down for the Portuguese by Thomas Ramban in 16or after his family had been reciting it for more than a thousand years. According to their family lore, Thomas Malikiyal, one of the apostle's first Brahmin converts, wrote the song.

Nazrani sing other traditional epics about the deeds of Thomas accompanied by dance forms that are typical among Malabar Christians. Some of these are dance dramas that the Nazrani perform at church festivals. The following Thomas narratives draw heavily on Nazrani tradition as we attempt to reconstruct a brief history of the apostle's work in southern India. The modern reader will object that these ancient, oral traditions cannot transmit any reliable history about the work of Thomas due to embellishment and conflation over two thousand years and many generations. The objection is valid, but it is also true that the Nazrani traditions transmit the only history of Thomas' work in southern India-reliable or not.

References

This lesson is adapted from Daniel Lancaster's teachings in The Sent Ones, as presented by First Fruits of Zion for the Torah Club.

Among the Jews of Cranganore

Thomas reconnected with the few Jewish disciples he had left behind in the city of Cranganore. He resumed his teaching among the Jews of that city. Many Thomas scholars suggest that Thomas was drawn back to India because of the isolated Jewish communities he had found there. There were as many as seven or eight Jewish communities in Southern India that would have been of particular interest to Thomas. The Cranganore Jewish community was involved in the pepper-and-spice trade. The hinterland abounds with valuable spices like pepper, tamarind, cinnamon, cloves, nutmeg, cardamom, ginger, and turmeric, filling the city with their fragrance. As recent as the nineteenth century, Black Jews worked as small-scale traders and artisans, specializing in handling, drying, and grinding the spices, while White Jews thrived as merchants, shipowners, and financiers, serving as middlemen in the spice trade.

Thomas quickly became accustomed to the exotic flavors of the Indian spices. The Jewish community also introduced him to some new foods, such as mangoes, guava, tamarinds, and coconuts. The Malabar Yehudan (Jews) used coconut oil the way Galilean Jews like Thomas used olive oil. They even applied it to their skin as sunscreen.

Thomas had some success in the Jewish community at Cranganore. He raised several more disciples for the Master, including one of the rabbis over the community:

Among these converts there were forty members of the lewish community including Rabbi Paul of the Cranganore Synagogue where every Saturday the Apostle used to go and read and explain the Old Testament for the Jewish congregation. Though Rabbi Paul received baptism and became a Christian, a good number of the Cranganore Jewish community continued to stick fast to their ancestral religion and gave the Christians the name "Nazaranis," meaning followers of the man from Nazareth. (C.V. Cheriyan, A History of Christianity in Kerala [Kottayam, India: Kerala Historical Society, 1973])

In the course of time, one of the synagogues at Cranganore, as well as an entire Hindu temple, adopted the teaching of Thomas and confessed faith in our Master Yeshua.

References

This lesson is adapted from Daniel Lancaster's teachings in The Sent Ones, as presented by First Fruits of Zion for the Torah Club.

Thomas Maliyakal the Ramban

On his previous eight-day visit to Cranganore, Thomas had not spoken about the kingdom and the good news of Yeshua with anyone outside the Jewish community. Since then, his experience at Taxila in the kingdom of Gudnaphar had broadened his perspective, and the apostolic decree from Jerusalem had opened his mind to new possibilities.

He turned his attention to the indigenous people of Kerala on the Malabar Coast. The multicultural, multilingual character of a trade center like Cranganore made that type of outreach possible. His first contacts with Indian non-Jews would have happened naturally as extensions of his work in the Jewish community. Indians transacting business with the Jewish community and slaves in Jewish homes provided social avenues for Thomas to present the God of Israel and His Messiah outside of Jewish space. The language barrier was not insurmountable either. The Jewish community could readily provide him with translators and tutors who could teach him Tamil. To master that language with fluency would take considerable time, but it would not take Thomas (who already spoke several languages) long to acquire enough of the basic rudiments to enter simple conversations.

He also had the advantage of miracles. Miraculous healings communicate across languages and cultures. The Holy Spirit endorsed his apostolic credentials with the "signs of a true apostle ... by signs and wonders and miracles" (2 Corinthians 12:12), and Thomas quickly established a reputation as a holy man, miracle-worker, and healer.

The Mar-Thoma Christian tradition savs that the first Hindu convert Thomas won in Cranganore was a young Brahmin man from Niranam. He became a devout disciple and even took the name Thomas in honor of his teacher:

The first Brahmin convert was a young member of a Niranom Brahmin family that had settled down in Cranganore engaged in some business. The young man's conversion was not liked by his father, who decided to cast him away from the family. The Apostle called the young convert and asked him to live with him. The young man, who had received the Apostle's name in baptism agreed to live with him and came to be known as Thomas Maliyakal, in recognition of his Brahmin family name. (Cheriyan, A History of Christianity in Kerala)

The conversion was significant because it represented penetration into elite society. Even in Thomas' time, the people of India divided along the lines of the Hindu caste system. The caste system creates a cultural stratification that dictates vocations, occupation, property rights, marriage, and virtually all social interactions. The Hindus believed that the gods created all men from one man, but not all men came from the same part of the one man. The people of India divided into four main castes: Brahmins, Kshatriyas, Vaishyas, and Shudras. According to Hindu mythology, the elite, priestly Brahmin caste came from the primordial man's head. The warrior and monarchial Kshatriya came from his arms. The merchant and agriculturalists of the Vaishyas came from his thighs. The servile, blue-collar Shudras came from his feet, and beneath them were unclean people of even lower orders.

Thomas took young Thomas Maliyakal as a disciple and schooled him in the ways of the Master and the teaching of the Scriptures. The Brahmin disciple showed enormous potential and eventually became a sage and teacher over the community. Eventually, Thomas gave him the title Ramban, a Syriac title similar to "rabbi" or "rabban."

As mentioned above, the descendants of Thomas Maliyakal the Ramban preserved oral traditions about Thomas, generation after generation, in the form of the song Rabban Pattu, or "The Ramban Song."

With the Ramban's help and prestigious influence, Thomas brought the message of monotheism and faith in Yeshua to several more prominent Brahmins. The Ramban Song says, "Forty Jews and four hundred others in less than six months." In all, seventy-five Brahmin families turned to the new God and received immersion. Many Nazrani in Malabar still trace their ancestry back to those original Brahmin families.

References

This lesson is adapted from Daniel Lancaster's teachings in The Sent Ones, as presented by First Fruits of Zion for the Torah Club.

The Raja’s Son-in-law

The Ramban Song identifies another of Thomas' early converts as the local raja's son-in-law. This tradition should be compared with the story of the wedding banquet in Acts of Thomas. According to that story, when Thomas first arrived in India, he attended the wedding of the local king's only daughter. When the king realized that Thomas was a powerful holy man, he compelled him to bless the bridal couple. Assuming that the same royal family held sway in Cranganore when Thomas returned, the raja's son-in-law might have been the same man who had received Thomas' blessing several years earlier. Apparently, the blessing found a home. The raja's son-in-law became a believer.

References

This lesson is adapted from Daniel Lancaster's teachings in The Sent Ones, as presented by First Fruits of Zion for the Torah Club.

Mylapore

The Ramban Song indicates that, during his first year in India, Thomas shipped out of Cranganore, rounded the tip of India, and landed at Mylapore (Madras; modern Chennai) on the east coast, where he stayed, teaching the gospel for nearly five months. No Jews lived on the east coast of India. Thomas found the work much harder and the people more resistant.

The Ramban Song says that from Mylapore, he took a ship further east: "He took a ship for China. He stayed four and a half months in China." The possibility should not be ruled out. The same Roman merchant vessels connecting the west coast of India and the Red Sea were rounding the tip of India, landing at Sri Lanka, and then skirting north up India's east coast all the way to Burma. No tradition remains to tell us how far he went or what he did while he was there. After a brief stay, Thomas used the same shipping route to carry him back to Mylapore.

He had been back in Mylapore only about a month when the son-in-law of the raja came seeking him and begged him to return to the West.

References

This lesson is adapted from Daniel Lancaster's teachings in The Sent Ones, as presented by First Fruits of Zion for the Torah Club.

City of the Great God

An old tradition often retold by several Nazrani families preserves the story of the city of the Great God. The Hindu goddess Kali had a temple in Cranganore. Kali means "black one." She is often depicted as a four-armed goddess and is considered the fierce and bloodthirsty deity of time, change, and death itself. Her icons show her draped in a garland of human skulls, holding in one hand a human head by the hair, in the other hand brandishing a saber.

During those days, the priests of Kali in Cranganore annually cast lots to select a child for human sacrifice (Narabali) from one of the prominent families. The lot fell to a five-year-old named Kunjun, the nephew of the local raja. At that time, the raja was away on pilgrimage. No one dared defy the priests of Kali. The child's grandmother and other members of their family were greatly disturbed.

The Ramban Song says that the raja's son-in-law found Thomas in Mylapore and appealed to him to return to Cranganore. They took a ship and returned to the Malabar Coast.

"Thomas and his Jewish friends" promised the family that God could save the child if they would believe in the Master and trust in the power of the living God. The family resisted forsaking the old ways and casting allegiance to the new God, but the grandmother declared that she and her family would believe if the child was saved. Thomas ordered the child brought to him, and he immersed the five-year-old in the name of the Master.

On the appointed day, the Poojari priest of Kali took five-year-old Kunjun to the temple of Kali. Thomas and his Jewish friends went to witness the Narabali. Under ordinary circumstances, Jews would not enter an idolatrous temple. In this situation, Thomas made an exception. The priests of Kali gave the guests seats of honor at the temple.

The Narabali sacrifices were conducted in the innermost chamber of the temple where an idol of Kali was seated. The priest took Kunjun into the inner sanctuary and shut the heavy door. The family remained outside, silently waiting for the priest to emerge and announce the completion of the sacrifice. When a long time had passed, the people began to grow impatient. After a long time, they gathered courage and forced the door open. They found Kunjun standing inside, smiling. The Poojari priest was nowhere to be found.

As word about this miracle spread through the town, the holy man's reputation grew. The people of Cranganore turned away from their gods and embraced the living God of the Jews and His Messiah. When the raja returned and heard about all that had transpired, his anger burned against the priests. He renounced the gods and turned to the God of Thomas. The Narabali custom of human sacrifice came to an end in Cranganore. The city became known as the city of the Great God.

The Ramban Song says that Thomas took the raja's son-in-law as one of his personal disciples and gave him the name Kefa, the same name the Master had given to his chief disciple when he declared, "Upon this rock I will build My assembly; and the gates of Hades will not overpower it" (Matthew 16:18). In memory of the miracle, they gave the same name to the child: Kefa Kunjun.

References

This lesson is adapted from Daniel Lancaster's teachings in The Sent Ones, as presented by First Fruits of Zion for the Torah Club.

The Seven-and-a-half Assemblies

The local tradition claims that Thomas converted thousands in the vicinity of Cranganore. Even allowing for exaggeration, the numbers imply one of the most successful apostolic endeavors ever. Among the converts were many Brahmin families and other castes, such as Kshatriyas, Nairs, and Chettiars.

Encouraged by the success, Thomas expanded the scope of his endeavors. With the help of Thomas Maliyakal the Ramban and Prince Kefa, he began to visit other locations on the Malabar Coast.

The tradition says that he established seven and a half churches: Cran-ganore, Kollam, Nilackal, Niranam, Kokkathamangalam, Paravur, Palayur, and Thiruvithamcode-the half-church. Except for Nilackal and Thiru-vithamcode, all the locations were on the Malabar Coast, and most had Jewish colonies.

References

This lesson is adapted from Daniel Lancaster's teachings in The Sent Ones, as presented by First Fruits of Zion for the Torah Club.

Kollam

The Ramban Song says, "Accompanied by Kefa, he went to Kollam," a port city one hundred miles south of Cranganore. Thomas and Keta could have easily found passage on a merchant vessel between Muziris and Kollam. Kollam is a coastal city near Lake Ashtamudi. Today, modern Kollam is the fourth-largest city in Kerala. In the days of the apostles Kollam was a busy port city and commercial center.

It offered a gateway to the backwaters of Kerala. Trading ships from Alexandria arrived regularly in the late summer and fall. Pliny the Elder calls the port Becare. He recommends it as a safer port than Muziris, and he describes hollowed-out log canoes from the interior arriving by river laden with peppers (Natural History 6.26).

Thomas and Kefa settled in Kollam for a year. They began their work in the Jewish community and expanded from that base.

In the days of the Apostle Thomas, the majority of people in Kollam belonged to the Chettiar caste, the trading and merchant caste of the time. Attracted to the apostle's message and amazed at his miracles, many believed.

Others, however, hated the new religion and separated from the God-fearing Chettiars of Kollam.

Over the years, erosion from the sea destroyed the original port town and the traditional location of the Mar-Thoma church. Modern Kollam marks the general location, and a church established there more than a thousand years ago remembers the work of Thomas in the area.

References

This lesson is adapted from Daniel Lancaster's teachings in The Sent Ones, as presented by First Fruits of Zion for the Torah Club.

Nilkackal

After a year of teaching and proclaiming the good news, Thomas and Prince Kefa left the thriving congregation of disciples in Kollam and traveled northeast to Thrikapaleswaram, a village near Niranam. The village had several temples, but so far as we know, no Jewish community. Thomas established a place of prayer for the disciples that he and Kefa acquired in that place.

From there, he traveled inland. The Ramban Song says, "He went to Chayal (Nilackal) in the mountains, stayed there a whole year, as he had done in Kollam." Nilackal was a flourishing trade center connecting the west coast to Madurai, the capital of the Pandyan Kingdom. In the absence of a synagogue, the apostles established places of prayer near water. The modern Chayal Mar-Thoma Church commemorates Thomas' work in the Nilackal area, but the present church is some distance from the earlier place of prayer beside the Nilackal pond. The modern church is unique in that it is ecumenical-a joint project of Catholic, Jacobite, Eastern Orthodox, Mar-Thoma, and Protestant Churches.

References

This lesson is adapted from Daniel Lancaster's teachings in The Sent Ones, as presented by First Fruits of Zion for the Torah Club.

Niranam

During his year in the mountains and forest at Nilackal, two believers from Thrikapaleswaram came and begged him to return. They told him that, after he had left, the locals desecrated their place of prayer. The believers of Thrikapaleswaram asked Thomas to come back to their city and set matters aright.

Thomas returned to Thrikapaleswaram. He was disheartened to find that, under the pressure of local persecution, many of the believers of that place had renounced the new faith and returned to the old ways. Thomas cursed that place and warned the people that they should not return again to paganism and idolatry.

Following the principle, "whenever they persecute you in one city, flee to the next," Thomas relocated the remaining disciples to the coastal port city of Niranam (Matthew 10:23). Perhaps he hoped that the presence of a Jewish community in Niranam would help sustain the new God-fearing Nazranis.

Persecution arose in Niranam even before Thomas left. The local pagans resented the holy man and his followers. They attempted to frame Thomas for murder. They killed the son of a local barber and arranged matters to make it appear as if Thomas had murdered the child by spell-craft. Thomas did not try to defend himself. Instead, when his accusers placed the child before him, Thomas woke the boy from the sleep of death. The revived child exonerated the apostle. Another version of the same legend tells the story as follows, but sets it in Mylapore:

The (Brahmin) high priest was very angry .. And in envy and passion killed his own boy and complained to the king that the Apostle, having destroyed his house, had killed his boy. St. Thomas, in order to prove his innocence, brought the dead boy back to life and asked him to tell the truth. The boy testified that it was his own father who killed him and not the saint. The boy, when asked by the Apostle whether he would like to live in this world or in the other [from which he had just been retrieved], answered that he would, in the other. Immediately he having received baptism died. (Cheriyan, A History of Christianity in Kerala)

The Ramban Song says that Thomas immersed an additional two hundred people at Niranam. "Prominent among them were four Nambudiri-Brahmin families." The church at Niranam has been rebuilt four times, but it is perhaps the only Mar-Thoma church that still occupies the location of the early assembly established by Thomas.

The apostle left the Niranam community in the hands of his disciple Thomas Maliyakal the Ramban, a native of Niranam. The Ramban was one of the few leaders among the people there "who had remained true to his faith." Niranam is no longer on the coast. Geologists suggest that the sea has retracted from this area by some geographical changes. Even today, the soil at Niranam is sandy and resembles beaches.

References

This lesson is adapted from Daniel Lancaster's teachings in The Sent Ones, as presented by First Fruits of Zion for the Torah Club.

Kokkathamangalam

From Niranam, Thomas returned to the new community of Nilackal in the mountains. After completing his year in that remote place, he descended to the coast.

He came to Kokkathamangalam, a prosperous Hindu village on the western shore of Vembanadu Lake, south of Kochi. Thomas spent a year there, as he had done at Kollam and Nilackal. He encountered both Brahmins and Nairs. The Nair-caste worshiped serpents. They kept sacred serpent groves in their compounds.

Thomas challenged the domain of the old serpent, and he immersed hundreds in the name of the Master. He did not leave until he had "taught the people how they were to worship God." His year of labor at Kokkatha-mangalam left behind a strong community of God-fearing Nambudiri-Brahmins and Nairs.

References

This lesson is adapted from Daniel Lancaster's teachings in The Sent Ones, as presented by First Fruits of Zion for the Torah Club.

Paravur (Muziris)

From Kokkathamangalam, Thomas traveled to Paravur, which hosted a substantial Jewish community. The city is close to modern North Paravoor, next to Pattanam, where archaeologists believe they have discovered the remains of the ancient port of Muziris. Essentially, Paravur was a suburb of that great port and market city.

The Jewish population of Paravur received a boost when refugees from the Jewish War migrated there after 70 CE. The remnants of the old Jewish neighborhood can still be seen, and the church said to be founded by Thomas is only a short distance off the city's old Jewish Street. The ancient Paravur church was destroyed by invaders centuries ago, but some ruins still remain.

Thomas stayed in Paravur/Muziris for almost a year. His time in Paravur put him in the neighborhood of Cranganore, just a few miles to the north. Thomas was pleased to find the believing community of Jews and God-fearing Gentiles in that city still flourishing.

References

This lesson is adapted from Daniel Lancaster's teachings in The Sent Ones, as presented by First Fruits of Zion for the Torah Club.

Palayur

Through the Jews of Paravur, Muziris, and Cranganore, Thomas learned of another Jewish colony to the north in a place called Palayur. The apostle traveled by boat through the backwaters to reach the coastal city of Palayur, near modern Chavakkad. The Brahmin stronghold of Palayur had a small community of Jewish merchants who occupied a site called Judankunnu (Hill of the Jews). The hill is still called Hill of the Jews, even though no Jews have been there for centuries. The locals point out the remains of a synagogue.

The Nazrani tell a famous miracle story from Palayur. When Thomas landed at Palayur, he saw four Brahmins worshiping as they bathed in a sacred pool. The Nambudiri-Brahmins used to throw water skyward during their prayer. Thomas watched the men scoop handfuls of water from the pool and toss the water up into the air. He asked them to explain the ritual. They told him that by this method, they offered water to the spirits of their deceased ancestors.

Thomas replied that it seemed as if the spirits refused their offering since the water fell back to earth. He said, "If your ceremony is acceptable to the gods, they could keep the water suspended in the air without allowing it to fall again and again." The Brahmins replied that such a thing contradicted the laws of nature.

Thomas declared that there is only one true God, and he offered to prove it to them on the condition that they believe in Him. He said that the living God would show Himself by receiving the water he offered without letting it fall back to the ground. The Brahmins accepted the challenge and agreed to believe if he could do such a miracle. Thomas prayerfully filled his palms with water and tossed it into the air. The water did not fall back but rose to a height and hovered in the air, sparkling like diamonds. Looking down, the Brahmins could see a cavity left on the surface of the water where the apostle's hands had scooped it up. Subsequently, at the bidding of the apostle, the water fell down at his feet.

Swayed by the miracle, the Brahmins listened to Thomas' message and renounced the old gods. Many Jews and Brahmins became disciples in that place.

Others did not accept the new teaching. They abandoned Palayur and renamed it "The Cursed Place." Since then, Hindu Brahmins do not eat or drink in the vicinity of the "Cursed Place" (Cheriyan, A History of Christianity in Kerala).

References

This lesson is adapted from Daniel Lancaster's teachings in The Sent Ones, as presented by First Fruits of Zion for the Torah Club.

Leaving Malabar

Near the end of his life, Thomas returned to Niranam to follow up on the community that he had left there under the care of Thomas Maliyakal the Ramban. The Ramban Song says, "He was happy with the faith of the people and the exemplary life that they led." The seven communities of the Malabar Coast (west coast) were prospering, but Thomas continued to think about the Coromandel Coast (east coast). He wanted to return to Mylapore.

The Ramban Song narrates his departure: "He took his leave of the Naz-rani and told them that they would never see him again, and he set off for the land of the Tamils." Thomas Maliyakal and Prince Kefa, the son-in-law of the raja, escorted him for seven and a half miles, and then they said their farewells. During the years that Thomas established the seven assemblies on the west coast of India, he healed the sick, many of whom the doctors considered incurable. He raised dead men to life, expelled demons, healed lepers, and made the disabled whole. He gave sight to the blind, speech to the mute, and hearing to the deaf. He testified before governors and kings, and brought some to faith. He enlightened hundreds of Malabar Jews with the good news of the kingdom and the message about the Messiah, and he converted thousands of Gentiles from every caste. He trained strong leaders in the paths of discipleship and ordained elders over the seven-and-a-half assemblies he planted. Today's Nazrani-Mar-Thoma Christians-trace their origins back to those seven-and-a-half assemblies.

Although the south Indian Nazrani remained isolated from the rest of Christianity for several generations, they maintained some contact with the believers outside of India. Gnostic heretics came in the third century to spread their ideas. The Nazrani had contact with the Syrian Church and eventually adopted Syriac liturgy and other conventional elements of Eastern Christianity. In the fourth century, Bishop Thomas Cana came from Edessa with seventy-two Syrian Christian families to join the Nazrani of Malabar. The Bishop reconciled Nazrani practice to the norms of the Syrian Church. In later centuries, Syriac Christians fleeing from Muslims also found shelter on the Malabar Coast and joined the Mar-Thoma Christians, strengthening their identity in Syrian Christianity. In the sixteenth century the Portuguese introduced the Nazrani to Catholicism and the Inquisition. Since then, other denominations have entered. Nazrani today split into several varieties of Syrian-Eastern Orthodox, Roman Catholic, and various Protestant denominations.

References

This lesson is adapted from Daniel Lancaster's teachings in The Sent Ones, as presented by First Fruits of Zion for the Torah Club.

Thiruvithamcode

The apostolate of Thomas in Mylapore is debated. There was no significant Jewish presence on the east coast. Today, Mylapore is a neighborhood in the Tamil Nadu city of Chennai, i.e., ancient Madras. Mylapore means "Land of the Peacock." In the days of the apostles, Mylapore was a thriving port city and an important commercial center on the spice route.

The people of the land of the Tamils were less tolerant of the new reli-gion, and they persecuted the believers. Thomas began to look for a place where he might relocate families from the east. Thomas described the plight of the persecuted believers to the king of Venad, who ruled at Thiruvitham-code, a small city near the southern tip of India, not far from Nagercoil. The king was sympathetic to their plight. He agreed to shelter the refugees and grant them land for housing and cultivation. Thomas led sixty-four families from the Mylapore area, crossing the ghats (highlands bordering the coastal plain) through the Aruvamozhi Pass to Thiruvithamcode, where he established the "Arappally/half-church" of that place. The tradition does not explain why it is referred to as a "half-church."

References

This lesson is adapted from Daniel Lancaster's teachings in The Sent Ones, as presented by First Fruits of Zion for the Torah Club.

Death in Mylapore

There are several legends about Thomas in Malabar on the level of tall tales and folktales, including more than one version of his martyrdom. Most of them share a few common elements. The success of Thomas stirs the Brahmin priests of Mylapore to jealousy; they hunt him down and thrust a spear through his body. The Nazrani say that Thomas died in 72 CE, two decades after his return to Malabar. In remembrance of his martyrdom, Mar-Thoma churches observe December 21 as a holy day. Thomas may have been in his sixties or seventies by the time of his death. Today, the Basilica of St. Thomas (San Thome Church) stands over the site believed to be the tomb of Thomas. It continues to be a place of pilgrimage, and Christians revere it, even though the tomb is empty. The apostle's bones were allegedly retrieved by a Syrian merchant and brought to Edessa early in the third century.

References

This lesson is adapted from Daniel Lancaster's teachings in The Sent Ones, as presented by First Fruits of Zion for the Torah Club.