Elias Mellus

Yohannan Elias Mellus
Bishop ofMardin
Church	Chaldean Catholic Church
Installed	1890
Term ended	February 16, 1908
Predecessor	Peter Timothy Attar
Successor	Israel Audo
Orders
Ordination	September 21, 1856
Consecration	June 5, 1864
Personal details
Born	September 19, 1831 Mardin
Died	February 16, 1908 Mardin

MarYohannan Elias Mellus(orMilos,Milus) (1831–1908) was a Turkish prelate of theChaldean Catholic Church.

Biography

Elias Mellus was born on September 19, 1831, inMardin.He entered in the monastery ofRabban HormizdinAlqosh.On September 21, 1856, he was ordained a priestand on June 5, 1864, he was ordained a bishop inAqraby PatriarchJoseph VI Audo.

Mellus worked from 1874 to 1882 in the Indian city ofThrissur.On behalf of theChaldean CatholicpatriarchJoseph VI Audo,he looked in vain for the reunification of the Catholic faction ofThomas ChristianscalledSyro-Malabarwith their sister church, namely the "Patriarchate of Babylon",as the Catholic successor to the ancientcatholicateofSeleucia-Ctesiphon.

The experiment resulted in a schism: some of the followers of Mellus left the Chaldean Catholic Church and joined theChaldean Syrian Churchin 1894/1909. This group gained more than regional significance. In 1968 their metropolitan, MarThomas Darmo,opposed Assyrian Patriarch MarShimun XXI Eshaiand formed theAncient Church of the East.

In 1882 Mar Elias Mellus was suspended from his office of bishop and returned toMosul.After some hesitation he fully reentered in the Chaldean Catholic Church in 1890 and was appointed Bishop of Mardin, the position in which he died on February 16, 1908.

Literature

• Eugène Tisserant:Eastern Christianity in India.Longmans, Green and Co., London 1957, 112-119.
• Georg Graf:History of Christian Arabic literature.4th Bd Apost Bibl. Vaticana, Città del Vaticano 1951, 112f.
• Joseph Habbi:Les Chaldéens et les Malabar au 19e siècle.In: Oriens Christianus 64 (1980) 82-107.
• Wilmshurst, David (2000).The Ecclesiastical Organisation of the Church of the East, 1318–1913.Louvain: Peeters Publishers.ISBN9789042908765.