The Portuguese tried to bring us under the Pope and to latinise us. But we resisted and stuck to our nasrani syrian christian ways.
But with portuguese colonisation, we were subject to violent persecution and indoctrination by the portuguese and their jesuit priests. Syrian christian bishops from Persia and the Holy lands were denied entry to kerala by the portuguese who now controlled the seas.
We suffered for about 5 decades under almost complete portuguese domination.
In 1653,a syrian christian bishop called Ahattallah who came from west asia was captured by the portuguese and murdered.
Some say he was drowned in the cochin sea, some that he was burned at the stake in some Goan Inquisition chamber.
But when this news reached the martial nasrani race, they lost even fear for their life and 25,000 nasrani men from all over kerala proceeded towards cochin, the centre of portuguese naval activity.
They reached Cochin and revolted, smashing the gates of the portuguese forts and then assembling under a Cross.
They saddened and enraged by the murder of their syrian bishop, took an oath that day that neither of them nor their descendants would ever accept the Roman Pope or his roman church.
They also boycotted Jesuits and threw them out of nasrani dominated areas.
Soon after that Portuguese power waned from Kerala and the Dutch became the new colonial force on west coast of india.
With the loss of sea power of portuguese in kerala's coasts, the syrian christians brought a new Syriac Orthodox Bishop from the holy land--he was the Syriac Patriarch of Jerusalem and ordinated an indigenous nasrani bishop--Marthoma I.
Thus ending the 50 year portuguese atrocities and latin/jesuit domination of kerala nasranis.
We threw away western colonial yoke and re-affirmed our oriental orthodox faith. This being the first revolt of its kind in all of India.
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When St. Thomas visited Kerala and introduced Christianity .After St. Thomas other missionaries from Persia came to Kerala and converted many people.. The early converts in Kerala belonging to different grades in society on the basis of occupation were commonly called Christians But the name Christian was changed to Nasrani when the Arabs came to Kerala. Muslims used the word Nasrtani in a contemptuous and derogatory manner. Christians and Jews were hated by Muslims in the Middle East and so they used the word 'Nasrani' in a derogatory and spiteful manner, as the Greeks called others 'barbarians.' Muslims quote the Koran to call Christians andf Jews as 'Nasranis.'
ReplyDeleteThis is the basis of the verse.. " Jews say: 'Uzair is the son of God' and the Christians say: 'The Messiah, son of God'. Such is their saying with their mouths; they imitate the infidels saying earlier. Allah has cursed them, how are they to turn? "(Surat al-Tawbah: 30) By this interpretation, Muslims regard Christians and Jews infidels and collectively call them ‘Nasrani.’
Even today all Christians are contemptuously called Nasranis in the Middle East by the Arabs. In Kerala also, after the Arabs gave the derogatory name 'Nasranis' to Christians, Brahmins and Nairs also used that word in a derogatory and insulting manner till the arrival of colonial powers. Vrahnins and Nairs made Christians work as coolies, agricultural labourers in their farmlands and compulsory service called ‘oozhiyam.’ The true economic and social condition of the Christians who were ridiculously called Nasranis was recorded by a missionary when European powers were slowly establishing their authority; Abbe J.A. Dubois, a missionary in Mysore, in his letter dated August 7, 1815, writes: “The Jesuits, on their first arrival in India, hearing of them, in one way or other converted the greatest part to the Catholic faith. Their liturgy is to this day in the Syrian language, and in the performance of their religious ceremonies they use this ancient dead tongue. There remains still among them large congregations, consisting of 70 or 80,000 Christians, of whom two-thirds are Catholics, and a third Nestorians. They are all designated under the contemptuous name of Nazarany, and held by the pagans in still greater contempt than the Christians of this part of the country. The Nairs chiefly keep them at a greatest distance, and they form
When the Portuguese and the British educated these hapless Christians and appointed them as soldiers, businessmen and planters, Christians ascended to top position in the fields of education, business, plantations, and commerce making Brahmins and Nairs inferiors. Gradually the contemptuous name Nasrani was given up and the words, ‘Christians’ and ‘Syrian Christians’ became common usage. But in Arab countries Christians are even today called in a vulgar form, ‘Nasranis.” In a recent riot in Cairo, the Huffingtom Post dated August 17, 2013 reported an incident
“Naguib’s home supplies store on a main commercial street in the provincial capital, also called Minya, was torched this week and the flames consumed everything inside.
"A neighbor called me and said the store was on fire. When I arrived, three extremists with knifes approached me menacingly when they realized I was the owner," recounted Naguib. His father and brother pleaded with the men to spare him. Luckily, he said, someone shouted that a Christian boy was filming the proceedings using his cell phone, so the crowd rushed toward the boy shouting "Nusrani, Nusrani," the Quranic word for Christians which has become a derogatory way of referring to them in today's Egypt.”