Page:Christianity in China, Tartary, and Thibet Volume I.djvu/31

 Gregorius Bar-Hebræsus expresses himself in these terms in his Syriac Chronicle (par. 3. chap, i.):—

"Thomas the Apostle, the first pontiff of the East. We learn by the book of the preaching of the holy apostles, that in the second year after the Ascension of our Lord, the Apostle Thomas announced the tidings of the Gospel in the East, and preached to the Indians."

Finally, we find these words in the Roman breviary:— "The Apostle Thomas, surnamed Didymus, by birth a Galilean, preached the Gospel of Christ in many provinces; he proclaimed the faith to the Parthians, Medes, Persians, Hircanians, and Bactrians. Finally, he went to the Indians, and instructed them in the Christian religion. The king of that nation having condemned him to death, he was pierced with arrows at Calamina, and thus glorified his apostleship by the crown of martyrdom."

These numerous testimonies from the most ancient liturgies afford assuredly a strong presumption in favour of the opinion that St. Thomas was really the Apostle of India; and this presumption is still further corroborated, when we see that opinion supported by traditions ascending to the very earliest period of Christianity.

In the Paschal Chronicle is a fragment of a work of Bishop Dorotheus (born 254), in which he relates the acts and journeyings of the Apostles, and this is what he says of St. Thomas:—

"The Apostle Thomas, after having preached the Gospel to the Parthians, Medes, Persians, Germanians, Bactrians, and Magi, suffered martyrdom at Calamina, a town of India."