Church of Saint Thomas, Mosul

The Church of Saint Thomas is a Syriac Orthodox church in Mosul, Iraq.

History

The church is dedicated to Saint Thomas the Apostle and is believed to have been constructed on the site of the house that the saint resided in during his stay in Mosul.[1] The church is first mentioned in 770 as part of a grievance to Caliph Al-Mahdi.[1] The current structure suggests it was built in the 13th century.[1] During restoration work in 1964, the finger bones of Saint Thomas were discovered in the church.[2][3] On 23 December 2009, a bomb damaged the church, killed two men and injured five people.[4]

After the Fall of Mosul, the relics of Saint Thomas were taken from the church by Nicodemus Daoud Sharaf, Syriac Orthodox Archbishop of Mosul,[2] and transferred to the Monastery of Saint Matthew on 17 June 2014.[5] The church was used as a prison by Islamic State insurgents until the city's liberation in 2017.[2]

References
  1. Hann, Dabrowska & Townsend Greaves (2015), p. 216.
  2. Arraf, Jane (31 March 2018). "Iraq's Christians Remain Displaced This Easter". NPR. Retrieved 18 May 2018.
  3. "Archived copy" من الأرشيف: اكتشاف ذخيرة الرسول توما بيد مطران الموصل مار سويريوس زكا عيواص. Syrian Orthodox Patriarchate (in Arabic). Archived from the original on 23 June 2017. Retrieved 18 May 2018.CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
  4. Ahmed, Hamed (23 December 2009). "Iraqi Police: Bomb targets church in Mosul". The Seattle Times. Retrieved 18 May 2018.
  5. "Holy Relics of Saint Thomas transferred to the Monastery of St Matthew in Nineveh". OCP. 9 July 2014. Retrieved 18 May 2018.

Bibliography


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