The Archdeacon of All India was the chief of the hierarchy of native priests in the Church of the East in India and was the ethno-religious leader of Saint Thomas Christians. The archdeaconate served both as an ecclesiastical functionary second only to the metropolitan bishop and as the de-facto head of the Saint Thomas Christians.
The archdeacon held significant power among the Saint Thomas Christians as their bishops were mostly West-Asians with least knowledge of the regional dynamics in Malabar. The origin of the Archdeaconate of All India is traditionally stretched to the first century Apostolic missions of Thomas the Apostle in South India. However it is only since the beginning of the sixteenth century that any definite information related to individuals who held the rank of the archdeacon is available.
With the introduction of a Latinized ecclesiastical structure in Malabar in the 16th century under Portuguese colonial rule, the powers associated with the archdeaconate were significantly curtailed and became contested by the Latin prelates. In the mid-17th century, the last undisputed archdeacon Thoma Parambil led the native Christian revolt against the Portuguese, the most momentous of which was the Coonan Cross Oath, and was consequently declared as the native Metropolitan bishop.
Background Saint Thomas Christians constituted the East Syriac Metropolitan province of India which was headed by a Metropolitan bishop appointed by the East Syriac Catholicos-Patriarch. While the metropolitan and bishops were highly respected, the local church and community affairs were chiefly governed by a native priest, titled Archdeacon of All India.
The traditional East Syriac priestly hierarchy puts the archdeaconate as the highest of the presbyteral ranks within a diocese. The archdeacon is thus responsible for the administration of the diocese under the diocesan bishop and represents his will in his absence.
The Archdeaconate of All India, though an existing rank within the hierarchy of the Church of the East, simultaneously functioned as the indigenous political, religious and ethnic head of the Saint Thomas Christians. While the succession of bishops was often discontinuous due to the geographical isolation, the continuous governance of the diocese became the archdeacon's responsibility.
Existing tradition attributes the Malabar archdeaconate ancient origins, often extending up to the traditional accounts of Thomasine apostolic mission in the first century. These legends say that certain families such as Pakalomattam, Kalliyankal and Shankarapuri were selected for priesthood by the apostle and the chief priest from Pakalomattam lineage became the Jātikku kartavyan. The post of the Jātikku kartavyan is said to have been accommodated as the Archdeacon of All India by the Syriac missionaries who accompanied the Persian merchant missionary named Knai Thoma.
Modern academic historians ascribe the Malabar archdeaconate much later origin. Church historian Jacob Kollaparambil believes that the first historic account of an archdeacon in Malabar is from a letter by East Syriac Patriarch Timotheos I in the 9th century. The letter famously addressed to the "Arkn" or leader of the Christians in India permits the local clergy to select and enthrone their metropolitans from the suffragan bishops locally after having obtained the prior patriarchal approval. Meanwhile, Istvan Perczel disagrees with Kollaparambil by stating that the word Arkn imply a leader or a prince rather than an archdeacon. He instead theorizes that the Malabar archdeaconate is actually "an early 16th century development" and that "its existence" was retrospectively "projected" to claim "a very great antiquity". Perczel also raises the possibility that the 9th century "(quasi-) secular function" perhaps "evolved into the office of the Malabar archdeaconate".
Giwargis I Giwargis the First of Pakalomattam, or George Pakalomattam, was one among the three member delegation sent from Malabar to seek bishops from the East Syriac Catholicos-Patriarch in AG 1801 (AD 1489-1490). Mattai and Yawsep were the other members of this delegation. Giwargis and Yawsep reached Armenia after a long journey, while Mattai died on their way, and met the Patriarch Šem’on IV Basidi at the patriarchal residence in Gazarta. The patriarch ordained both of them as priests at the patriarchal church of Marrgis, noting that they were both well-trained deacons and eloquent in faith and the Syriac language. He also instructed them to select two worthy monks from the monastery of Mar Awgen. Accordingly, they selected two monks both named Yawsep. The Patriarch consecrated one of the monks, whom he named Yohannan, as the metropolitan, and the other as a bishop with the episcopal name Thoma.
The patriarch sent the two new bishops to India along with the two priests. Antonio de Gouvea, in his book Jornada of Menezis, attributes the reason for the existence of East Syriac books in Malabar, such as Parasman, to this delegation. Yohannan served in India as its metropolitan, while his companion, Thoma, after a short time, returned to the patriarch bringing with him presents from the Indian Church. Giwargis was elevated to the rank of archdeacon, while Yawsep sailed to Portugal in 1501 and then visited the Pope in Rome where he left an account of Indian Christianity. In AG 1814 (AD 1502–1503), three more bishops, namely Yahbalaha, Yaqov and Denha were consecrated in the Monastery of Yohannan the Egyptian in Gazarta by Patriarch Eliyah. Both Yahbalaha and Thoma were ordained metropolitans and all four of them were sent to India. These bishops, popularly called Marabbans, arrived in India the next year and divided the ecclesiastical province among themselves.
Giwargis II Giwargis the Second of Pakalomattam, also called Professor Giwargis or Giwargis the Elder, is historically attested to have occupied the archdeaconate under Mar Denha. He was a staunch defender of East Syriac orthodoxy and associated with Mar Denha, the youngest of the Marabbans who was unfriendly with the Portuguese. He is recorded to have accompanied Mar Denha in erecting the outdoor wooden cross at the Muttuchira Church in 1528. Mar Denha and Giwargis based their activities in Muttuchira and Kuravilangad, which was the archdeacon's homeland, located in the Vatakkumkūr Kingdom. The lithic Vatteluttu inscription from Muttuchira further states that both of them later moved to the 'Portuguese land', which Perczel interprets as the Kingdom of Cochin. Giwargis is later described as a great scholar, theologian and Syriacist who headed the Seminary (university in Carneiro's words) of Angamaly. Fransisco Dionysio and Melchior Carneiro have mentioned him, though anonymously, in their accounts. His name, however, appears in the letter of Patriarch Mar Abdisho IV Maron appointing Giwargis of Christ as the suffragan bishop to Metropolitan Abraham. The patriarch distinguishes Giwargis the Elder from his nephew by referring to him as 'Giwargis the great teacher (Malpan)'.
Previously, Giwargis had sent a letter addressed to the East Syriac patriarch, requesting the appointment of new bishops following the death of the Marabbans. Semon VII Ishoyahb Barmama, the orthodox East Syriac patriarch, responded to it by sending Mar Abraham of Gazira who arrived sometime before 1556. By 1555, the Chaldean patriarch Abdisho IV Maron had also responded by sending a metropolitan, in the person of Mar Yawsep Sulaqa, but he could not reach Malabar before 1558 as he was arrested and detained by the Portuguese at Goa. Giwargis the Elder probably died soon after or right before the arrival of Mar Abraham.
Yaqov Nadackal
The Muttuchira Epigraphs The Muttuchira epigraph also records the replacement and installation of two crosses at the Muttuchira church by Metropolitan Simeon and Priest Yaqov in 1581. Yaqov is described as the archdeacon and close associate of Mar Simeon by Portuguese accounts, such as the Jornada of Menezis. He hailed from the house of Nadackal, a branch of the Pakalomattam family, based in Muttuchira. Jacob maintained his influence from the Vatakkumkūr Kingdom, where the influence of the Portuguese was the least. The replacement of the wooden open air cross on 13 September, the date of the Feast of the Cross unique to the East Syriac tradition, demonstrates the traditionalism of these clerics in the Vatakkumkūr Kingdom.
Archdeacon under Mar Simeon Yaqov was a staunch defender of traditionalism and opposed the latinization of liturgy and Christian life enforced by the Portuguese Jesuits, under Mar Abraham and his archdeacon Giwargis of Christ. It was Mar Abraham's conversion to Catholicism that prompted the orthodox East Syriac patriarch to sent Mar Simeon to Malabar. Whether Yaqov was made archdeacon by Mar Simeon or whether he was the one who originally inherited the title from Giwargis the Elder is unclear. The presence of Mar Simeon and Yaqov, who resisted all attempts of latinisations, forced the Portuguese Jesuits to tolerate Mar Abraham at least temporarily until their Padroado ecclesiastical monopoly can be unchallengedly exercised in Malabar. Mar Simeon was taken by the Franciscans in 1584 and sent to Europe where his priestly orders were declared invalid and detained until his death in 1559. Nevertheless, Yaqov communicated with Mar Simeon through letters addressing the latter as the Metropolitan of India.
Anti-colonial stance Yaqov strongly opposed the latinization carried out by the Jesuits nominally under Mar Abraham and defended the continuation of the East Syriac calendar and feasts. Mar Abraham convened the First Synod of Angamaly which decreed a thorough latinization of the liturgy, replacement of the East Syriac calendar and feasts with Latin counterparts and prohibition of post-ordination clerical matrimony, under Jesuit compulsion. Yaqov expanded his disapproval to the Gregorian Calendar following its formal reception in the Latin rite in 1582. Archdeacon Yaqov taught his followers to recite the traditional Chaldean raza without the Latin interpolations. Alexis Menezes, the Archbishop of Goa and the mastermind of the later Synod of Diamper, wrote to him that Mar Simeon had been convicted and his orders were declared invalid by the pope in Rome, in attempt to force the archdeacon to submit to his authority and even offered him monetary and ecclesiastical rewards. Menezis finally resorted to declare Yaqov excommunicated after failing all attempts to lure him.
Giwargis of Christ
Chaldean Catholic Allegiance Archdeacon under Mar Yawsep Sulaqa (1558 - 1567) Giwargis of Christ was a nephew of Giwargis the Elder as recorded by Patriarch Mar Abdisho IV Maron in 1566. He was appointed archdeacon by Mar Yawsep, the first Chaldean Catholic metropolitan of India. Yawsep opposed Mar Abraham, who arrived in Malabar originally as an orthodox East Syriac metropolitan before 1556 much before his own arrival. Abraham had established himself in the Vatakkumkūr and later in the Thekkumkūr Kingdoms where the Portuguese influence was minimal. The Portuguese were completely reluctant to let Eastern bishops in Malabar and had initially detained Mar Yawsep for about 18 months in Goa. However in order to oppose Mar Abraham, they allowed Mar Yawsep to briefly occupy his see in Malabar. Giwargis initially served as the archdeacon under Mar Yawsep.