Page:The Indian Antiquary, Vol. 4-1875.djvu/195

 182 THE INDIAN ANTIQUARY. [JU5£. and Pantaenus. Thanks to Dr. "Wright, we how possess the Acts of Judas Thomas in an old Syriac text which cannot be very far from the original form of the myth. Dr. Wright (vol. 3. p. sir.) attri- butes this text to some time cot later than the 4th century, and Dr. Haug connects the original text of this palpably Gnostic book with Bardesanes, who lived about the end of the second century. But this historically worthless composition (for it was written more than a hundred years after the events it relates), and which is the production of some ignorant and credulous man, even if it could be received as evidence, would only connect St. Thomas with the extreme north-west of India. Prof. Whitney and Dr. Haug,* with many others, look upon the pretended apostolic labours of St. Thomasf in India or China as a pious fiction, and, as there is no better evidence than wliat I have mentioned abore, it is impossible to do otherwise than assent to the conclusion at which they have arrived. Nobody nowadays believes in the visit of Brutus to Britain, yet it rests on as good evidence ag the mission of St. Thomas to South India, or even to India at all. Mr. Collins also refers to the story of Pantsanus in support of his " strong impression" that St. Thomas was " the apostle both of Edessa and Malabar." He says : " Pantaenus speaks in the second century of a gospel of St. Matthew being in India, and of the visit of an aposile." It would be difficult to misrepresent more completely the story of Pantaenus, which we know only by the iate hearsay recorded by Eusebius and St. Jerome, and not directly. Both expressly give the story as hearsay: "It is said 1 ' that Pan run us reached India, and found there a Gospel of St. Matthew (written in Hebrew characters) with some people "' to whom the apostle Bartholomew had preached." Mr. Collins makes out that we have the words of Pantamus, and that " an aposlh" (the italics are his own!) had preached in India,— thus leaving the reader to infer that it might have been St. Thomas, as no particular person is mentioned. The story is late hearsay, and therefore valueless for proof. But even if this eonld be got over, it says nothing about St. Thomas, and, as I have already men- tioned (in my paper), India waa in the early centuries a. d. the name of nearly the whole East including China, and thus the mention of India proves nothing. Probably Southern Arabia was intended.:}; It is not till after several centuries more had passed that we again come to legends which connect St. Thomas with South India, and it is obviously useless to refer to these. Mr. Collins • fa hk renew of my monograph (as originally printed) t Whitney, Oritntal and Linguistic Studies, vol. IL mentions Syriac documents ; it is to be regretted that he did not quote them with precision, and say by whom they Were written and whence they come. When he does so it will be time enough to consider their value. As I have said, Mr. Collins has a strong im- pression that St. Thomas was the apostle both of Edessaand Malabar. He grounds this, apparently, on a notion that the "Pahlavj language, according to Max Midler, originated in an Aramaean dialect of Assyria" I was much astonished at this, for I felt sure that that illustrious philologist conld not have said anything of the kind. What ho does Bay [Science of Language, 1st Series, 5th ed. p. 235) is as follows :— " We trace the subsequent history of the Persian language from Zend to the inscrip- tions of the Achaeraenian dynasty ; from thence to what is called Pehlem or Huzvaresh (better Hu- zuresh), the language of the Sassanian dynasty (226-651) .... this is considerably mixed with Semitic elements, probably imported from Syria," I might refer to the researches of Dr. Haug and others, and the views of the Parsi scholars, head- ed by their very learned Dastur Peshutun Beh- ramji Sanjana, as regards the nature of this Semitic element (which was written but not spoken), but Prof. Max Muller's actual words show how utterly wrong Mr. Collins is. Even if he were right, what he assumes (as above) would not support his " strong impression." From whatever point of view the question be considered, the result is the same,— there is no evidence at all that St. Thomas ever preached in India proper, and the story has every mark of being a vague fiction originally, but afterwards made more precise and retailed by interested parties. This being the case, the only safe conclusion is that asserted— that the earliest Christian mission to India was probably Gnostic or Hanicbmon. Leaving aside the first, I will only again point out that the account of Al Nadtm is an historical document based on original Bonrces. Perhaps I carried too far my doubts about Manes having preached in India; the word for 'preach' is ambiguous, but 1 see Spiegel {Eran. AUer- thumtk. II. p. 204) accepts his journey there as a fact. At all events, Maues was a most zealons missionary, and certainly sent disciples to India. As to the meaning of India, there can be no doubt in this case. The Arabs used it in a per- fectly defined sense. Thus the Manichacan mission to India in the 3rd century a.d. is the only historical fact that we know of in relation to J Aj the author of Supernatural T{ t li n (4th edition). •■ 1. I. i, 4,1 understand it. Where I am I can rS but to few books, 80 I taka hi, extracts from EaSiSand