Person · Catholic missionary
Joseph Vaz
A Goan Konkani priest who entered Dutch-ruled Ceylon in disguise as a labourer in 1687, when Catholic practice there was banned, rebuilt the church from Kandy, learned Sinhala and Tamil, and wrote Christian works in both. Canonised in Colombo in 2015.
- Date
- 1651–1711
- Function
- Religious institution & practice
- Confidence
- Not assessed
Connections (3)
- Life routeOld Goa
Vaz was a Konkani priest of the Goan church who left Portuguese territory precisely to work outside it, crossing into Dutch Ceylon in 1687 disguised as a labourer at a time when Catholic priesthood there carried a death sentence. He represents the point at which Indian clergy, trained under the Padroado at Goa, began running missions on their own account rather than serving European ones — which is why the Oratory he came from mattered.
- Life routeTemple of the Tooth, Kandy
Vaz worked eastward into the Kandyan kingdom, the one part of Ceylon the Dutch did not hold, and was eventually protected by the Buddhist king Vimaladharmasurya II and his successor, who let him build churches and move freely after he had impressed the court during a drought and an epidemic. He learned Sinhala and Tamil and wrote devotional works in both; his canonisation took place in Colombo in 2015.
- AnalogueDevasahayam Pillai
The two southern cases of the same half-century run opposite ways. Vaz, a priest, walked into a territory where his office was capital and was eventually protected by a Buddhist king who found him useful in a drought and an epidemic. Devasahayam, a layman, stayed where he was and was executed by a Hindu court that read his baptism as a transfer of loyalty to Goa. Tolerance and persecution were questions of state, not of doctrine.
On these journeys
Sources
Wikipedia, “Joseph Vaz”. Vatican canonisation records, 2015; the Oratory of Goa archives and the Dutch Ceylon records.
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