Catholicos of the East and Malankara Metropolitan

Catholicos is the title used by head bishops of regions within the Patriarchate of Antioch having self ecclesiastical and autonomous status from the ancient period. The word "Catholicos" means "Universal" - the same word from which the name of the Catholic Church also derives.

The four ancient catholicates are:
1. Catholicate of Echmiadzin (Armenian Church)
2. Catholicate of East (Oriental Church)
3. Catholicate of Iberia (Georgian Church)
4. Catholicate of Caucasian Albania (Albanian-Udi Church)

'Catholicos of the East' was/is the head of the Syrian Church which comprised the region once formed Persian Empire and to the East of that empire. Syriac Churches which includes the Assyrian Churches of Persia, the Chaldean Church and the Orthodox Syrian Church of India, which is also known as the Malankara Orthodox Syrian Church or the Indian Orthodox Church claims the lineage of this Catholicate. These Churches believe that Apostle St. Thomas was first in the succession of Catholicoi of the East followed by Saint Mari and then Saint Addai. Later this bishopric was elevated as a Catholicate by the Patriarchate in 410 AD.

Christianity has had a presence in India since its inception in the early centuries. Church tradition holds that St. Thomas the Apostle initially brought Christianity to India in AD 52 and was martyred in Mylapore, now in the modern state of Tamil Nadu. Tradition holds that priests were ordained in seven localities. Pantaenus, the leader of the Alexander Theological school, visited India and found an active Christian Community there in 190 A.D.

In 431, the Council of Ephesus condemned the teachings of Nestorius, who was the Patriarch of Constantinople. After the council, a significant portion of the Church in Persia nevertheless adopted Nestorian teachings concerning the nature of Christ.

In 544, Theodosius, the Patriarch of Alexandria, ordained Bishop Mar Jacob Baradaeus for the expansion of a Syriac Church weakened by Byzantine persecution subsequent to the Council of Chalcedon. In 559, Mar Jacob visited the east and consecrated a Catholicos for Orthodox Christians who accepted the Council of Ephesus and rejected the Council of Chalcedon. Mar Jacob himself was ordained a general bishop by Patriarch Theodosius of Alexandria.

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