Dr. Xavier Tharamel, SJ
Introduction
The Society of Jesus became the most effective agent of the Catholic recovery. In the person and work of its founder, the fundamental principles of the Catholic Reform clearly emerge and obtain a new character, valid for centuries, and become of the greatest historical significance. The network of Jesuit colleges that became widespread between mid-sixteenth and seventeenth centuries proved to be enormously effective centres of the Catholic reform to maintain the relevance of the Catholic Church in increasingly Protestant communities. The Sampaloor Jesuit centre channelized the counter-reformation spirit, which has a crucial historical significance, with long-standing effect, in the Kerala Church of learning and research in the 17th and 18th centuries. The Jesuits at Sampaloor continued to impart Catholic education and carried out missionary work which was the foremost aspirations of the counter-reformation. Although its history is intertwined not only with the Kerala Church but also with the history of the entire Church, it has blanketed part of history for inexplicable reasons. This article attempts to situate the counter-reformation as the historical background to the Sampaloor Jesuit institutions.
The name of the village is Ambalakad, and the concentration of Jesuit residents in this village started in 1663 when the Jesuits had to flee Cochin after the Dutch asserted their supremacy over the Portuguese. The Jesuits relocated the St. Paul’s Seminary at Vaipincota to Ambalakad and called the place, sāo (n)-paualo (n) -ur meaning the land of São Paulo (St. Paul), in honour of the memory of St. Paul, one of the disciples of Jesus Christ. The Catholic saint, John De Britto SJ visited the place in 1673-74, followed by the great Tamil poet Constantine Joseph Beschi, also known as Vīramāmunivar, an Italian missionary and the author of Thembavani. It was to the St. Paul’s Seminary in this place that the German Jesuit priest and poet Johann Earnest Hanxleden SJ, better identified as Ārnos Pāthiri, came after his preliminary training in Goa. While continuing his priestly studies, Pāthiri obtained proficiency in Sanskrit and Malayalam. He was ordained a priest and on 2nd February 1714, Pāthiri pronounced his final profession at Sampaloor. Tipu Sultan destroyed the St. Francis Xavier church and the seminary buildings during his invasion in 1781, and a new church was constructed in its place by Bernadian Bechinelly, the then vicar apostolic of Varapuzha in 1862 which was renovated twice, in 1893 and 1970.
If the Portuguese record is taken into consideration, it is quite easy to focus on its more historically unacceptable facets while forgetting the better side and the changes, some of them undeniably good, which were brought to Kerala. It is an irrefutable fact that the Portuguese rule brought in a more scientific method of agriculture and trade links between Kerala and the western world. Francis Xavier, the Jesuit missionary, with his mass conversions among the fishermen of Travancore, struck the first blow in the long battle to stop the evils of untouchability. The Portuguese colleges established by the Jesuits at Cochin and Vaippicotta and the Franciscans at Cranganore were religious in intent, founded in order to increase Roman Catholic influence among the Syrian Christians, but they accomplished another purpose by teaching Portuguese and Latin to many hundreds of young Malayalis, and in this way they contributed to the beginning of the great educational movement which was later to make the state the most literate region in India. Apart from the local Christians, a majority of the Hindu families were influenced by this early Western education. In fact, till the formation of British supremacy in Kerala, Portuguese continued to be the diplomatic language of the rulers of the state.
Certainly, as compared to the changes which British domination brought in the ways of life of every section of the community, the impression of the Portuguese occupation was slight. But in another sense, they were accountable for all that came afterwards from the Western world, since it was the trade they instituted that linked the fate of Kerala with the life of Europe for almost three centuries after they had gone.
The Jesuit educational and missionary works in India and elsewhere continued the paradigm of the counter-reformation in Europe. When the Dutch took over Cochin, Fr. Francisco Barretto SJ, the then Provincial of Malabar Province, decided to construct a Jesuit House and institutions at Ambalakad. A quiet village, hardly eight kilometres from Chalakudy, in the present Thrissur district, it was a place beyond the reach of the Dutch and in the territory of Zamorin of Calicut. It is significant to note that Calvinism, the major branch of Protestantism, dominated the Dutch. Naturally, the Jesuits, the leaders of the counter- reformation, were seen as a threat not only to their religion but also to their new territory. D. Ferroli quotes the words of the Dutch General: “I would rather allow one thousand Portuguese to stay near Cochin than one single Jesuit.”
The new Jesuit centre had a systematic growth, and consisted of St. Paul’s seminary, St. Paul’s Press and St. Paul’s Jesuit house. Through the press which was established in 1663, many of the early publications of Jesuit priests in Malabar were printed. This includes the first text in Malayalam. The house of Vaippicota had founded in 1577. In 1581 a Seminary for the Thomas Christians was added to it. In 1584 Francisco Ros, the first Latin Archbishop of Cranganore, added a course of theology of Syro-Chaldaic, of which he himself was a professor. Most of the Cassanars (priests) had received their training at Vaipincota. The Jesuit students and the boys of Portuguese extraction who got their schooling were trained in Cochin. Provision for the education of Syrian Christian young men was made at Cranganore. After the Dutch conquest, the Seminary of Vaippincota was turned into an asylum for lepers, while the colleges of Cochin and Cranganore served other purposes.
The seminary for the Syrian Christians was different from the Jesuit house of studies though the rector was the same. At first the number of students was not more than twenty, but later the number increased to fifty. It is reported that the Jesuits in Ambalakad taught the Malabar youths all their sciences and languages for nothing. This was to infuse the local priests with Jesuit values.
A report dated 1667 says that, when the Dutch took over Cochin, all the Jesuits of the Mae De Dews were imprisoned, except four of them, who succeeded in making their escape to Ambalakad. We have seen how they established themselves there and how they were subsequently expelled. They returned in 1665. Ferroli describes: “No sooner had the Jesuits returned than the Dutch, and chiefly Henry Van Roney, tried to have them banished again. Of course, the Fathers had left Cochin and Cranganore long ago; but why should they be in Ambalakad? The Dutch invited to their place of Chanota the Rajas of Cochin and Cranganore, Magnate, and others, trying to put them up against us. Cranganore refused on account of his friendship for the Caymal.”
It is obvious that the Dutch destroyed the educational institutions and missionary works of the Jesuits in Cochin. One needs to see this approach against a background of counter-reformation carried out by the Jesuits in Europe. The Jesuits were instruments in propagating Catholic education and the missionary work in order to counter the Protestant Reformation. There is little surprise that the Dutch forced out the Jesuits and made them flee after establishing supremacy over Cochin in the early seventeenth century. The Caimals, the landlords of Koratty, offered refuge to the fleeing Jesuits at Sampaloor. Here, in Sampaloor, the Jesuit centre began to flourish, but the Dutch forced the Jesuits to leave their centre in Sampaloor. The Dutch continued to persecute the Jesuits, who subsequently returned to their place after eighteen months and resumed their work with the support of the local King. However, by the beginning of the 18th century, a seminary, church and a printing press prospered here. The Jesuits of Sampaloor went back when it was decided to send some Jesuits to Malabar to help out in the mission.
It was indicated by D. Ferroli that the return journey of the Jesuits from Goa to Sampaloor through the sea was dangerous because of the pirates and the Dutch. Later, the Jesuits took the forest route. On their way, they helped many Christians in the Mysore area. These people did not have a priest to serve them. Again, as Ferroli states, the Jesuits became aware of the situation of these people who badly needed a priest to support them. The Jesuits wrote to Fr. Provincial to send some help as well. Ferroli further states that it had taken two and a half months to reach Sampaloor. On 1st May, the Jesuits reached Sampaloor and they were well received by Bishop Chandy and the local landlord. The people around the area came for confession and the seminary was filled with many students. The Sampaloor seminary grew into one of the biggest centres of learning in Asia, attracting many scholars and saints. Among the many who came, studied and served here was Arnos Padiri. Thereafter, many Catholic families moved away from the Dutch occupied territories to Sampaloor.
The continuing spirit of counter-reformation is evident in the growth of the Sampaloor Jesuit centre. It was reported by D. Ferroli that the buildings at Cochin and at Cranganore were like the best Colleges in Europe. However, at its beginning, the Sampaloor Jesuit library was deprived of text books for its students. The plan of the Dutch plan to banish the Jesuits failed again due to the friendship of the Raja of Korati who refused to act against the Jesuits, and the Sampaloor institutions flourished under the leadership of Fr. Luis de Vasconcellos, the then rector. The Jesuits here constructed a good library, a press, a magnificent building with full facilities and soon it became a centre of learning in Kerala. Ferroli quotes from a letter by Fr. Bernard Biskoping, a German Jesuit, written 1732: Biskoping indicates that it was Fr. Luis de Vasconcellos, the then rector of Sampaloor, who took initiatives to put up buildings in the campus.
The report indicates that the number of Jesuits at Sampaloor in 1667 was five. Eventually, the number increased to fourteen in 1677 and declined to four in 1688. It indicates the decline in number was due to the persistent opposition from the Dutch. However, Ferroli mentions that the Italian and the Austrian Jesuits increased in number in the later years. Among the Italian Jesuits was Fr. Constantine Joseph Beschi, who is known as “Veramamunivar” in Tamil Nadu. Another famous Jesuit who studied at Sampaloor was Johann Ernest Hanxleden known as Ārnos Pāthiri, a German Jesuit priest. He completed his philosophical studies in his home town of Osnabruck and volunteered to serve in India. Pāthiri completed his spiritual formation or Novitiate in Goa. He joined the seminary at Sampaloor where he completed his theological studies and was ordained a priest in 1706. While Beschi, De Nobili, Ārnos Pāthiri and other Jesuits passionately followed up the Jesuit educational characteristic of counter-reformation, numerous other Jesuits excelled in their missionary works in the Malabar mission.
Although it is a blanketed history for unknown reasons, the present St. Francis Xavier church premises hold two museums; the Historicum Museum and the Anglo-Indian Cultural Museum, which demonstrate its great past. These museums contain several artefacts such as cannon balls used by Tipu Sultan during the conquest which stand as evidence of the extensive Jesuit institutions of Sampaloor. Moreover, St. Francis Xavier’s parish church, the remnants of the Jesuit seminary and printing press are evidence of the glorious history of the Jesuit educational and missionary works. When the Society of Jesus was suppressed by Pope Clement XIV, the Jesuit institutions at Sampaloor started to fall into ruin and were completely razed to the ground during Sultan Tipu’s invasion. Sampaloor suffered heavy destruction and the Jesuits were forced to abandon the village that they had adopted. Today, one can see a reconstructed church, parts of the wall and the foundations of the seminary. Had it remained a centre of learning, certainly the history of Kerala would have been a different one.
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