Portal:Nasrani

Nasrani

The Syrian Malabar Nasrani people are an ethnoreligious group from Kerala, India. It refers to those who became Christians in the Malabar coast in the earliest days of Christianity, including the natives and the Jewish diaspora in Kerala.^[1][2] It has been suggested that the term Nasrani derives from the name Nazarenes used by ancient Jewish Christians in the Near-East who believed in the divinity of Jesus but clung to many of the Mosaic ceremonies.^[3] They follow a unique Hebrew-Syriac Christian tradition which includes several Jewish elements although they have absorbed some Hindu customs. Their heritage is Syriac-Keralite, their culture South Indian, their faith St. Thomas Christian, and their language Malayalam.^[1] Much of their Jewish tradition has been forgotten, especially after the Portuguese invasion of Kerala in the early 1500s.^[1] They are popularly known as Syrian Christians in view of the Syriac (classical form of Aramaic) liturgy used in church services since the early days of Christianity in India.