You know what it is to be told good news secondhand and to hold back. Thomas would not pretend: not at the supper, where he admitted he did not know the way, and not on Easter, where he refused to say he believed until he had seen. The church has never held that against him; it canonized his honesty, and Gregory the Great taught that his disbelief did more for our faith than the faith of the others, because his demand secured what you now stand on. Notice, too, that his honesty was never the whole of him: the same man offered to die with his Lord, and the tradition says he finally did. When doubt comes to you, will you do what Thomas did with his: bring it into the room where Jesus is, and say it out loud?

The firm ground under this life is the New Testament, and it is narrow but solid. Thomas stands in every list of the Twelve (Matthew 10:3, Mark 3:18, Luke 6:15, Acts 1:13), and everything individual we know of him comes from the Gospel of John: the gloss "called Didymus," the three speeches (John 11:16; 14:5; 20:24-29), and his place among the seven at the Sea of Tiberias (John 21:2). After Acts 1:13 the New Testament never mentions him again. It is worth stating what John does and does not say: the text records Jesus's invitation to touch and Thomas's confession, but not the touch itself. Commentators have long divided on the question; the finger entering the wound belongs to the painters and the preachers, above all to Caravaggio's canvas of about 1601.

The earliest patristic assignment of a mission field comes from Origen, writing in the 230s, whose lost commentary on Genesis is quoted by Eusebius in the Church History: Parthia, "according to tradition," was allotted to Thomas. The India tradition rests on the Acts of Thomas, a Syriac romance composed at Edessa in the early third century (before 220 on Harnack's dating; before the middle of the century on Burkitt's). It opens with the apostles casting lots for the nations, India falling to "Judas Thomas, which is also the twin," and proceeds through the slave sale, the palace of King Gundaphorus, and the spearing at the order of King Misdeus. As history it is worthless; as evidence for what the Syriac church believed by around 200 it is first-rate. And it preserves one startling fact. King Gundaphorus was long assumed to be fiction, until nineteenth-century coins and the Takht-i-Bahi inscription established a real Indo-Parthian king, Gondophares, reigning about AD 19/20 to 46, exactly when the Acts requires (some scholars, following R. C. Senior, prefer a later Gondophares-Sases; a historical Gondophares stands either way). A third-century romancer could not have invented a chronologically correct northwest-Indian royal name; some first-century tradition evidently underlies the tale. The coins prove the setting, not the story.

Honesty requires the dissenting note. The earliest witness of any kind on the question of Thomas's death is the second-century teacher Heracleon, quoted by Clement of Alexandria in the Stromata, who lists Thomas among apostles who did not confess before magistrates; the earliest voice, that is, apparently did not know him as a martyr. And the earliest Greek notice of Christians in India, Eusebius's account of Pantaenus's journey, credits their evangelization to Bartholomew, not Thomas. The two mission traditions need not conflict, since Gondophares's realm was Indo-Parthian, but no ancient source performs that harmonization.

The Western church has kept December 21 since the feast entered the Roman calendar in the ninth century, and the Prayer Book tradition retains it as a red-letter day. The saint's own Indian church keeps July 3, the ancient Syriac commemoration tied to the translation of the relics to Edessa, and Rome moved to that date in 1969; the Byzantine East keeps October 6, and devotes the first Sunday after Pascha to the Gospel of his confession. Few saints own a Sunday of Easter every year.

In art Thomas carries the spear of his martyrdom, or the builder's square of the palace legend, which made him the patron of architects and builders. Medieval devotion added a gentler rhyme on his character: the story that he doubted the Virgin's Assumption until her girdle was dropped to him from heaven, a legend Jerome had already set aside, but one that gave Prato its treasured Sacra Cintola and Tuscan painting a whole genre. The reach of his veneration is remarkable: the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle records that in 883 Alfred the Great sent alms with his envoys Sighelm and Athelstan "in India to St. Thomas and to St. Bartholomew," an English king's offering toward a shrine at the far edge of the known world. Thomas Aquinas turned the apostle's demand into eucharistic devotion in the hymn Adoro te devote, rendered into English by John Mason Neale: "Though Thy Wounds, like Thomas, I behold not now, / Thee my Lord confessing, and my God, I bow." And St Thomas' Hospital in London, founded under Becket's patronage, was rededicated to the Apostle in 1551 and serves still.

Thomas is as much to say as abysm or double, which in Greek is said didimus; or else Thomas is said of Thomos, which is said division or parting. He was abysm or swallow because he deserved to pierce the deepness of divinity, when at his interrogation Jesu Christ answered to him: Ego sum via, veritas et vita: I am the way, truth, and life. He is said double because he knew Christ in his resurrection in double wise more than other knew, for they knew him but only in seeing, but Thomas knew him both seeing and feeling. He is said division or departing, for he departed his love from the love of the world, and was departed from the other apostles at the resurrection. Or Thomas is said as, appeared again, that is in the love of God by contemplation. He had there things in him of which Prosper says in the book of the Soul Contemplative, and demands what it is for to love nothing but to conceive the burning of him in his thought, and the talent of God, and the hate of sin, and to forsake the world. Or Thomas is as much to say as alway going in the love and contemplation of God. Or Thomas is as much as: My God, because he said, when he touched the side of our Lord: My God and my Lord.

S. Thomas, when he was in Cæsarea, our Lord appeared to him, and said: The King of India, Gundoferus, has sent his provost, Abbanes, for to seek men that can well the craft of masons, and I shall send you to him. And S. Thomas said: Sir, send me over all save to them of India. And our Lord said to him: Go your way thither surely, for I shall be your keeper, and when you have converted them of India, you shall come to me by the crown of martyrdom. And Thomas said to him: You are my lord, and I your servant; your will be fulfilled. And as the provost went through the market, our Lord said to him: Young man, what will you buy? and he said: My lord has sent me for to bring to him some that be learned in the science of masonry, that they might make for him a palace after the work of Rome. And then our Lord delivered to him S. Thomas the Apostle, and told to him that he was much expert in that work. And they departed and sailed till they came in a city, where the king made a wedding of his daughter, and had do cry that all the people should come to this feast of this marriage or else he would be angry. And it so happed that the provost and Thomas went thither, and an Hebrew maid had a pipe in her hand and praised ever each one with some laud or praising. And when she saw the apostle she knew that he was an Hebrew because he ate not, but had alway his eyes firm toward heaven. And as the maid sang tofore him in Hebrew, she said: The God of heaven is one only God, the which created all things and founded the seas. And the apostle made her to say these words again. And the butler beheld him, and saw that Thomas ate not ne drank not, but alway looked upward to heaven. And he came to the apostle and smote him on the cheek; and the apostle said to him, that in time to come it be pardoned to you, and that now a wound transitory be given to you, and said: I shall not arise from this place till the hand that has smitten me be eaten with dogs. And anon after, the butler went for to fetch water at a well, and there a lion came and slew him and drank his blood, and the hounds drew his body into pieces, in such wise that a black dog brought the right arm into the hall in the middle of the dinner. And when they saw this, all the company was abashed, and the maid remembered the words, and threw down her pipe or flute, and fell down at the feet of the apostle. And this vengeance blames S. Austin in his book of Faustius, and says that this was set in of some false prophets, for this thing might be suspicious unto many things. Whether it be true or no it appertains not to me, but I wot well that they should be like as our Lord teaches, which says: If any man smites you on that one cheek, show and offer to him that other, and certainly the apostle held within his courage the will of God and of dilection, and without forth he required example of correction. This says S. Austin. And then, at the request of the king, the apostle blessed them that were new married, and said: Lord God give to these children the blessing of your right hand, and set in their minds the seed of life. And when the apostle was gone, there was found, in the hand of the young man that was married, a branch of palm full of dates; and when he and his wife had eaten of the fruit they fell asleep, and they had one semblable dream. For them seemed that a king adorned with precious stones embraced them, and said: Mine apostle has blessed you in such wise that you shall be partakers of the glory perdurable. Then they awoke, and told to each other their dream. And then the apostle came to them and said: My king has appeared right now to you, and has brought me hither, the doors being shut, so that my blessing may be fruitful upon you, and that you may have the sureness of your flesh, the which is queen of all virtues and fruit of perpetual health, and above the angels' possessions of all good, victory of lechery, lord of the faith, discomfiture of devils, and surety of joys perdurable. Lechery is engendered of corruption, and of corruption comes pollution, and of pollution comes sin, and of sin is confusion engendered.

And he thus saying, two angels appeared to them and said: We be the two angels deputed for to keep you, and if you keep well all the admonestments of the apostle we shall offer to God all your desires. And then the apostle baptized them, and informed them diligently in the faith. And long time after the wife, named Pelagia, was sacred with a veil, and suffered martyrdom, and the husband named Denis was sacred bishop of that city. And after this, the apostle and Abbanes came unto the King of India, and the king devised to the apostle a marvellous palace, and delivered to him great treasure. And the king went into another province, and the apostle gave all the treasure to poor people, and the apostle was alway in predications two years or thereabout ere the king came, and converted much people without number to the faith. And when the king came and knew what he had done, he put him and Abbanes in the most deepest of his prisons, and purposed fully to slay them and burn. And in the meanwhile Gad, brother of the king, died, and there was made for him a rich sepulchre, and the fourth day he that had been dead arose from death to life, and all men were abashed and fled. And he said to his brother: This man that you intend to slay and burn is the friend of God, and the angels of God serve him, and they brought me in to paradise, and have showed me a palace of gold and silver and of precious stones, and it is marvellously ordained. And when I marvelled of the great beauty thereof, they said to me: This is the palace that Thomas has made for your brother. And when I said that I would be thereof porter, they said to me: Your brother is made unworthy to have it; if you will dwell therein, we shall pray God to raise you so that you may go buy it of your brother, in giving to him the money that he supposed he had lost. And when he had said this he ran to the prison and required of the apostle that he would pardon his brother that he had done to him, and then delivered him out of prison, and prayed the apostle that he would take and do on him a precious vesture. And the apostle said to him: Knowest thou not that they which ween to have power in things celestial set nought in nothing fleshly ne earthly? And when the apostle issued out of prison, the king came against him and fell down at his feet, and required of him pardon. Then the apostle said to him: God has given to you much great grace when he has showed to you his secrets; now believe in Jesu Christ and be you baptized, to the end that you be prince in the realm perdurable. And then the brother of the king said: I have seen the palace that you have do make to my brother, and I am come for to buy it. And the apostle said to him: If it be the will of your brother it shall be done. And the king said: Sith it pleases God, this shall be mine, and the apostle shall make to you another; and if peradventure he may not, this same shall be common to you and to me. And the apostle answered and said: Many palaces be there in heaven which be made ready sith the beginning of the world, that be bought by price of the faith and by alms of your riches, which may well go tofore you to these palaces, but they may not follow you.

And after this, at the end of a month, the apostle made to assemble all them of the province, and when they were assembled he commanded that the feeble and sick should be set apart by themselves. Then he prayed for them, and they that were well enseigned and taught said Amen. And forthwith came a clear light from heaven which descended upon them, and smote down all the people and the apostle to the earth; and they supposed they had been smitten with thunder, and so lay by the space of half an hour. After, the apostle rose and said: Arise you up for my lord is come as thunder, and has healed us; and anon they arose all whole and glorified God and the apostle. Then began the apostle to teach them, and to show to them the degrees of virtue. The first is that they should believe in God which is one essence, and treble or three in persons, and showed to them examples sensible, how three persons be in one essence. The first example in a man is wisdom, and thereof comes understanding, memory, and cunning. Cunning is of that you have learned the memory or mind, and retain that you should forget. And the understanding is that you understand this that is taught to you and showed. The second example is that, in a vine be three things, the stock, the leaf, and the fruit. The third example is that three things be in the head of a man, hearing, seeing, and tasting or smelling. The second degree that they receive baptism. The third, that they keep them from fornication. The fourth, that they keep them from avarice. The fifth, that they restrain them from gluttony. The sixth, that they keep their penance. The seventh, that they persevere and abide in these things. The eighth, that they love hospitality. The ninth, that in things to be done they require the will of God, and that they require such things by works. The tenth, that they eschew those things that be not for to be done. The eleventh, that they do charity to their enemies and to their friends. The twelfth, that they keep charity, and do work by diligence to keep these things. And after his predication, forty thousand men were baptized, without women and small children.

And incontinent he went into the great India where he shone by miracles innumerable, for he enlumined and made to see Syntice, the friend of Migdonia, which was wife of Carisius, cousin of the king of India. And Migdonia said to Syntice: Weenest thou that I may see him? Then Migdonia changed her habit by the counsel of Syntice, and put herself among the poor women, and came whereas the apostle preached. And he began to preach of the maleurte and unhappiness of this life, and said that this life is unhappy, wretched and subject to adventures, and is so slippery and fleeting, that when one weens to hold it, it flees away. And after, he began to show to them by four reasons that they should gladly hear the word of God, and likens it to four manner of things: first, unto a colour which lights the eye of our understanding; secondly, to a syrup or a purgation, for the word of God purges our affection from all fleshly love; thirdly, unto an emplaister, because it heals the wounds of our sins; and fourthly, unto meat, because the word of God nourishes us, and delights in heavenly love. And in like manner, like as all these things avail not to the sick man but if he take and receive them, in like wise the word of God profits nothing to a languishing sick man, if he hear it not devoutly. And as the apostle thus preached, Migdonia believed in God, and refused the bed of her husband. Then Carisius did so much that he made the apostle to be set in prison. And Migdonia went to him and asked him forgiveness, because he was set in prison for her sake. And he comforted her sweetly, and said he would suffer it debonairly. And then Carisius prayed the king that he would send the queen his wife's sister unto her, for to essay if she might turn her, and call her again from the christian faith. And the queen was sent thither, and when she saw her, and knew of so many miracles as the apostle did, she said: They be accursed of God that believe not in his works. Then the apostle taught them shortly that were there, four things; first, that they should love the church, honour and worship the priests, assemble them often in prayers, and often to hear the word of God. And when the king saw the queen, he said to her: Why have you abided there so long? And she then answered: I had supposed that Migdonia had been a fool, but she is right wise, for she has brought me to the apostle, which has made me to know the way of truth, and they be overmuch fools that believe not the way of truth, that is to say, that they believe in Jesu Christ. And never after would the queen lie with the king. And then the king was abashed, and said to his cousin: When I would have recovered your wife I have lost mine, and my wife is worse to me than yours is to you. Then the king commanded that the apostle should be brought tofore him, his hands and feet bound; and was commanded that he should reconcile the wives to their husbands. And then the apostle said to the king, in showing to him by three examples that, as long as he should be in the error of the faith they ought not to obey them. That is to wit, by the example of the king, by example of the tower, and by example of the fountain, and said to him: You that are king will have no services soiled ne foul, but you have cleanly servants and neat chamberers. And what weenest thou God loves? Chastity and clean services. Am I then to blame if I preach to you to love God and his servants whom he loves? I have made them clean servants to him; I have founded a tower; and you sayst to me that I should destroy it. Also I have dolven in the deep earth, and have brought forth a fountain out of the abysm, and you sayst I should stop it. Then the king was angry, and commanded to bring forth pieces of iron burning, and made to set the apostle on them all naked, his feet bound. And anon by the will of our Lord, a fountain of water sourded and sprang up, and quenched it all. And then the king, by the counsel of his cousin, made him to be set in a burning furnace, which was made so cold that the next day he issued out all safe, without harm. And then thereto, he said: king, you are nothing more noble, ne more mighty than be your painters, said Carisius to the king: Make him to offer sacrifice to one of the gods only, in such wise that he fall in the ire of his God that thus delivers him. And as they constrained him and how despisest thou very God and worship a painting whom you ween to be your God? Like as Carisius has said to you, that my God should be angry when that I worshipped your god. And if he be angered, it should be more to your god than to me, for when you should ween that I worshipped your God, I should worship mine. And the king said: Why speakest thou to me such words? And then the apostle commanded in Hebrew the devil that was within the idol that, as soon as he kneeled tofore the idol, he should anon break it in pieces. And the apostle kneeled and said: Lo! see you that I worship, but not the idol; I adore, but not the metal; I worship, but not the false image, but I honour and worship my Lord Jesu Christ in the name of whom I command you, devil, which are hid within this image, that you break this false idol. And anon he molt it as wax. And then the priests came lowing as beasts, and the bishop of the temple lift up a glaive and run the apostle through and said: I shall avenge the injury of my god. And the king and Carisius fled away, for they saw that the people would avenge the apostle and burn the bishop all quick. And the christian men bare away the body of the apostle and buried it worshipfully. Long time after, about the year of our Lord two hundred and thirty, the body of the apostle was borne into Edessa, the city which sometime was said Rages, city of Media; and Alexander the Emperor bare it thither at the request of the Syrians. And in this city no man might harbor Jew, ne paynim, ne tyrant, that should live. After this Abagar, king of this city, desired to have an epistle written with the hand of our Lord, for if any men moved war against this city, they took a christian child, and set him on the gate, and he should there read the epistle, and the same day, what for the virtue of the writing of our Saviour, as for the merits of the apostle, the enemies fled or else made peace.

Isidore, in the book of the Life of the Saints, says thus of this apostle: Thomas, apostle and disciple of our Lord Jesu Christ, and like unto our Saviour, preached the Gospel unto miscreants, to them of Persia and of Media, to the Hircanians and Bactrians, and he entering into the parts of the orient, pierced through the entrails of the people. There demened his predication unto the title of his passion, and there was he pierced with a glaive and so died. And Chrysostom says that when Thomas came in to the parts of the three kings which came to worship our Lord he baptized them, and they were made helpers and aiders of our Lord and of christian faith. Pray we then to this holy apostle, S. Thomas, that he will be moyen unto our Lord that we may have grace of him to amend us in this present life, that we may come into his everlasting bliss. Amen.

Everliving God, you strengthened your apostle Thomas with firm and certain faith in your Son's resurrection: Grant us so perfectly and without doubt to believe in Jesus Christ, our Lord and our God, that our faith may never be found wanting in your sight; through him who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.

Saint Thomas

• Δίδυμος (Didymus, DID-ih-mus)/ˈdɪdɪməs/

Habakkuk 2:1–4 · Psalm 126 · Hebrews 10:35–11:1 · John 20:19–29