Mar Dinkha IV ܡܪܝ ܕܢܚܐ ܪܒܝܥܝܐ |
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His Holiness | |
Mar Dinkha IV presiding at the Assyrian Eucharist (or Raza) in a church near Chicago in June 2008.
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Church | Assyrian Church of the East |
Diocese | Patriarchal Diocese of the Eastern United States |
See | Holy Apostolic See of Seleucia-Ctesiphon (in exile in Chicago) |
Installed | 17 October 1976 |
Term ended | 26 March 2015 |
Predecessor | Mar Shimun XXIII Eshai (1920–1975) |
Successor | Mar Gewargis III |
Other posts | Deaconate at Mar Yokhanan Church, Harir (1950), Bishopric at Urmia (11 February 1962) |
Orders | |
Ordination | 15 August 1957 |
Consecration | 11 February 1962 (Bishop) by Mar Eshai Shimun XXIII |
Rank | Catholicos-Patriarch |
Personal details | |
Birth name | Dinkha Khananya (Khanania) |
Born | 15 September 1935 Darbandokeh, Iraq |
Died | 26 March 2015 Rochester, Minnesota, U.S. |
(aged 79)
Buried | Montrose Cemetery in Chicago, Illinois |
Nationality | Assyrian |
Denomination | Assyrian Church of the East |
Residence | Chicago, United States |
Parents | Andrews Khananya (father) and Panna Khananya (mother) |
Occupation | Cleric |
Mar Dinkha IV (Classical Syriac: ܡܪܝ ܕܢܚܐ ܪܒܝܥܝܐ and Arabic: مار دنخا الرابع), born Dinkha Khanania (15 September 1935 – 26 March 2015), was the Catholicos-Patriarch of the Assyrian Church of the East. He was born in the village of Darbandokeh (Derbendoki), Iraq.
Dinkha Khanania was born in Iraq and baptized in the Church of Mar Qaryaqos located in the village of his birth, Darbandokeh. Khanania (also written as "Denkha Kh'nanya") gained his elementary education under the tutorship of his grandfather, Benyamin Soro. In 1947—at the age of eleven—he was entrusted to the care of Mar Yousip Khnanisho, Metropolitan and the Patriarchal representative for all Iraq, the second-highest ranking ecclesiastic of the Assyrian Church of the East. After two years of study, he was ordained deacon in the church of Mar Youkhana in Harir by Mar Yousip on 12 September 1949. On 15 July 1957, he was ordained to the priesthood, and appointed to minister Urmia, Iran. He was the fourth in the line of succession to the Bishopric of Urmia.
Dinkha's priesthood as Metropolitan of Iran and Tehran reestablished a line of succession which had ceased to exist after the 1915 assassination of his predecessor. In 1962, Dinkha moved from northern Iraq to Tehran. During his tenure in Iran, he established a seminary and advocated for Assyrian nationalism and ecumenism. Responding to popular demand, Catholicos-Patriarch Mar Eshai Shimun XXIII consecrated Khananya as bishop on 11 February 1962, in the church of Martyr Mar Gewargis in Tehran.