Christiaiui of St. Thomas. This name is now- applied only to a people residing on the Malabar coast, in the sontii of India. But in former centuries St. Thomas Christians were mentioned also in other East- em countries ; thus Cosmas Indicopleustes found them in Arabia before 585. The accounts of the Portu- guese navigators, who first visited the Thomas Chris- tians of India in the fifteenth century, represent them ss professing to be descendants of the proselytes of the apostle Thomas, who is believed by some to have car- ried Uie Gospel into India. Other accounts represent them as the descendants of a colony of Nestorians. It seems moat probabWthat they were origiDally an ofi-
' shoot of the ancient Christian churches in Persia. In the sixth century they were in regular connectiun with the Nestorian Church of Western Asia. Under the patriarch Timotheus (778 to 820) they received a metropolitan, and thenceforth, also, Uieir bishops were ordained by the Nestorian patriarch. The Indian princes conferred on them, especially at the beginning of the ninth century, many privileges, for which they were especially indebted to one Thomas Cananaius, also named Biar Thomas, who was probably not a bishop, but a rich and influential merchant. In consequence of the great increase of their number, they afterward formed an independent state, which, after the extinc- tion of the royal line, fell by inheritance to the rulers of Cochin. They greatly suflfbred from the many con- tests of the Indian princes among each other, which the Mohammedans skilfully turned to their advantage. The St. Thomas Christians, therefore, offered, in 1502, the cro¥m to Vasco de Gama. Their connection with the Nestorian patriarchate seems to have been early interrupted. Between 1120 and 1280 their ecclesias- tical head, John, is said to have gone to Constantino- ple to ask for the episcopal consecration, and fix>m there to Rome ; later the church and the clergy became altogether extinct, so that only one deacon was left. Hence, in 1490, two delegates were sent to the Nesto- rian patriarch to ask for a bishop. The patriarch or- dained the two delegates priests, and sent home widr them two bishops, Thomas and John. John remained in India, but Thomas soon returned. Patriarch Elias (t 1502) sent him again to India, with one metropo- lite Jaballaha, and two bishops, Jacobus and Denha. They reported that they found bishop John still alive, and 80,000 Christian fiunilies in twenty towns. Later Portuguese reports estimate the number of families at 16,000. On account of their poverty, and the oppres- sion which they suffered from many sides, they invoked the protection of the Portuguese. The Portuguese pro- tectorate was soon followed by the establishment of Jesuit missions among them. In 1599 the archbishop of Goa prevailed upon them to submit to the pope, and to accept the decrees of the S3mod held by him at Di- amper. Only a few congregations in the mountains kept aloof from this union. But in 1658 a large num- ber of them broke off the connection with Bome, and established the independence of the Church. In 1859 the number of (non-united) Thomas Christians was es- timated at 70,000 ; of those united with Rome, 155,000, of whom 96,000, with 97 churches, still follow theb: old Syrian rite, while the others have entirely identified themselves with the Latin rite. They are, under the British government, free from any ecclesiastical re- straint, and form among themselves a kind of spiritual republic, under a bishop chosen by themselves, and in which the priests and elders adndnister justice, using excommunication as a means of punishment. They are said still to acknowledge dependence on the patri- arch of Antioch. They call themselves Syrian Chris- tians, or the Syrian Church of Malagala, They stOl celebrate the agaps ; and their ideas respecting the Lord's Supper ^dlne to those of the Protestants, but in preparing the bread they are said to use salt and oil. They anoint with oil the body of the infimt at baptism. Their priests are distinguished by the ton- sure, and are allowed to marry. Their churches con- tain, except the cross, no symbols or pictures. Syriac is the language employed in their liturgies and other church-services, but the Scriptures are expounded in Malabar. See Herzog, Real- Encyklopddie, x, 279; Schem, Ecclesiastical Year-book for 1860.
Chriatie, William B., an eminent Methodist Episcopal minister, was bom in Clermont County, Ohio, 1803, studied at Augusta College, Kentucky, en- tered the itinerant ministry in 1825, and died in Cin- cinnati, March, 1842. During his term of service in the ministry he occupied the most important pulpits of the denomination with great honor and usefiilness.
CHRISTMAS
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. CHRISTMAS
Hifl statioiiB were, 1825, Union ; 18S6, l^na ; 1827-8, Zanesville ; 1829, Cincinnati ; 1880, Lebanon District ; 1884, Cincinnati; 188&-8, Cincinnati District; 1889- 40, Uri)ana. He was three times elected a member of the General Conference. His mind was of broad com- pass, and he was well versed in theology and ecclesi- astioal polity. In all discussions in the conferenoes he was an able and successful debater, and seldom £uled of his aim. In the pulpit he was pre-eminent. His preaching was logical and vigorous, and he poured forth a flood of fervii and passionate eloquence that carried his audiences with him, and brought very many to Christ. His death was triumphant. — MwiUe$ of ConfermceSf iii, 847 ; Sprague, ArmaU, vii, 708.