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[[Mar]] '''Shimun VIII Yohannan Sulaqa''' ({{lang-syc|ܫܡܥܘܢ ܬܡܝܢܝܐ ܝܘܚܢܢ ܣܘܠܩܐ}}; also '''John Soulaqa''', '''Sulaka''' or '''Sulacha''', circa 1510–1555) was the first [[List of Chaldean Catholic Patriarchs of Babylon|Patriarch]] of what was to become the [[Chaldean Catholic Church]], from 1553 to 1555, after it broke from rejoining the Assyrian universal Catholic Church.

Yohannan Sulaqa's ascension as Patriarch was part of the [[Schism of 1552|1552 schism]] in the [[Assyrian Chaldean Church of the East]] which resulted in the establishment of rival patriarchates and ultimately a permanent rift in the Assyrian Church. He was elected by those who Chaldean people that opposed the hereditary patriarchal succession within the [[Abuna]] family, and he took an unprecedented the unification step in the Church of the East: he traveled to [[Rome]], accepted the [[Catholic Church|Catholic]] creed and was consecrated as Patriarch in 1553, after at first failing in an attempt to join the [[Syriac Orthodox Church]].<ref name="Baum">{{cite book|first1=Wilhelm|last1=Baum|first2=Dietmar W.|last2=Winkler |title=The Church of the East: A Concise History|year=2003|publisher=[[Routledge]]|isbn=978-0-415-29770-7 |url=http://books.google.com/?id=yt0X840SjpEC|accessdate=2009-02-05|page=113}}</ref><ref>''Cambridge History'', p. 521</ref> His reign did not last long though: Upon his return, due to strong opposition by the opposing patriarch, Sulaqa was imprisoned by the [[Ottoman Empire|Ottoman]] leader of [[Amadiyah]], tortured, and executed in January 1555.<ref name=Frazee/> He is considered a martyr of the Catholic Church.<ref>{{cite book|editor=Angold, Michael|title=The Cambridge History of Christianity|volume=Volume 5, Eastern Christianity|year=2006|publisher=Cambridge University Press|isbn=978-0-521-81113-2|page=527}}</ref>

Up to Yohannan Sulaqa, the Assyrian Chaldean Church of the East was united in a single patriarchate and the [[Episcopal see]] was located in the ancient Assyrian Chaldean city of [[Alqosh]]. In the 15th century the Patriarch Mar [[Shimun IV Basidi]] (1437&ndash;1493) made the office hereditary in his own family,<ref name="newCath Encyclopedia">{{cite encyclopedia |title =Chaldean Catholic Church (Eastern Catholic) | encyclopedia =The new Catholic Encyclopedia| volume=3| pages =366| publisher =The Catholic University of America |year =2003}}</ref> whose name was known as ''Bar Mama'' or ''Abuna'' family.

Yohannan Sulaqa was born c. 1510 to Daniel Bit-Bellu, a member of an ethnic [[Assyrian Chaldean people|AssyrianChaldean]] family in the [[Mosul]] region of northern Mesopotamia. Around 1540 Sulaqa became [[abbot]] of the monastery of [[Rabban Hormizd Monastery|Rabban Hormizd]] in [[Alqosh]] (or, according to an alternative account, of the monastery of Beth Qoqa near [[Erbil]]). The literal translation of Sulaqa in English is [[Ascension of Jesus|Ascension]].

Widespread complaints emerged against Shimun VII's consecration of his younger nephew as his designated successor. This led to three non-related Assyrian Chaldean bishops of Shimun VII (the bishops of [[Arbil]], [[Urmia]] and [[Salmas]]) to call an assembly in Mosul of clergy, monks, and members from ten regions, to elect the hesitant Yohannan Sulaqa as the new patriarch. A bishop of metropolitan rank was needed at the ceremony in order to consecrate Sulaqa as patriarch. Opposition from members of the patriarchal Abuna family, and the doctrinal differences with the [[Syrian Orthodox Church]], led to the decision of asking [[Pope Julius III]] of Rome to celebrate the consecration.

Yohannan Sulaqa, along with seventy delegates, traveled to [[Jerusalem]] to meet the [[Custodian of the Holy Land]]. The group persuaded the [[Franciscan]] friars that they agreed with the faith professed by the [[Papacy]] and expressed the desire to have Sulaqa confirmed as Chaldean patriarch by the pope.<ref>{{cite book|last=Frazee|first=Charles A. |title=Catholics and Sultans: The Church and the Ottoman Empire 1453&ndash;1923 |year=2006 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |isbn=978-0-521-02700-7|page=56}}</ref> The Friars gave them a letter of presentation to the pope, and Sulaqa with a noble traveled to Rome, where [[Andreas Masius]] gave him assistance as a translator in the court of pope Julius III.

Yohannan Sulaqa requested the pope consecrate him as Chaldean patriarch. He justified this request by informing the papacy that after Mar Shimun VII Ishuyau's death in 1551, his nephew (also to be named the traditional Shimun) would succeed him as the head of the church, but this nephew was not qualified to be consecrated as bishop because the restrictions pronounced in the Canonical Law regarding age were violated. Moreover it was understood that the young nephew had died.<ref name="Becchetti">{{cite book |last=Becchetti |first=Filippo Angelico |title=Istoria degli ultimo quattro secoli della Chiesa, Vol. 10|year=1796 |location=Rome|url=http://books.google.com/?id=LU4TAAAAQAAJ&pg=PA155|accessdate=2009-02-06|pages=155&ndash;157}}</ref> For this reason many historians such as Tisserant, Tfinkdji, and Fiey postulate the existence of one Shimun (VIII) who reigned in Alqosh from 1552 to 1558. More recently scholars such as Habbi and Lampart, as well as Becchetti in the 18th century,<ref name="Becchetti"/> suggest on the contrary that Shimun VII did not die in 1551 but reigned till 1558,<ref name="Murre">{{cite web|url=http://syrcom.cua.edu/Hugoye/Vol2No2/HV2N2Murre.html |title=The Patriarchs of the Church of the East from the Fifteenth to Eighteenth Centuries |publisher=Hugoye: Journal of Syriac Studies |accessdate=2009-02-04 |author=Heleen H.L. Murre}}</ref> thus Sulaqa had lied to the pope.

On February 20, 1553, Yohannan Sulaqa made a profession of faith in front of the Pope. On April 9, 1553, he was consecrated as Chaldean bishop in [[St. Peter's Basilica]] in Rome by Cardinal [[John Álvarez y Alva de Toledo]], [[Dominican Order|OP]] (1488&ndash;1557) (or by the pope himself according other sources).<ref name="Angold">{{cite book|last=O’Mahony |first=Anthony |editor=Angold, Michael |title=Eastern Christianity|series=Cambridge History of Christianity|volume=5|year=2006|publisher=[[Cambridge University Press]] |isbn=978-0-521-81113-2 |chapter=Syriac Christianity in the modern Middle East|page=527}}</ref> Sulaqa's appointment as patriarch was ratified by the [[papal bull]] entitled ''"Divina disponente clementia."'' In the course of the [[Papal Consistory|consistory]] held on April 28, 1553 Sulaqa received the [[pallium]], i.e. the sign of his patriarchal authority, from the hands of the pope. He took the traditional Assyrian Chaldean Christian name of ''Shimun'' VIII.

Yohannan Sulaqa traveled land via to [[Constantinople]] and from there to the northern Assyrian Chaldean town of [[Amid]] where he arrived on November 12, 1553 and where he fixed his [[episcopal see|See]]. He was accompanied by the bishop [[Ambrose Buttigeg]], OP († 1558), a powerful [[Maltese people|Maltese]] clergyman, who was specially appointed as "Nuncio for Mosul."

In January 1555 he was summoned, imprisoned for many months, tortured and executed, probably by drowning, by the local [[Pasha]] of [[Amadiyah]] instigated by the partisans of Shimun VII,<ref name="Frazee">{{cite book|last=Frazee|first=Charles A. |title=Catholics and Sultans: The Church and the Ottoman Empire 1453&ndash;1923 |year=2006 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |isbn=978-0-521-02700-7|page=57}}</ref> shortly after ordaining five metropolitans. For [[Catholics]] he is considered a Chaldean martyr.

Yohannan Sulaqa was pointedly given the title of "Patriarch of Mosul and Athur" ([[AssyriaMesopotamia]]) in Rome,<ref>{{cite book |last=Koodapuzha |first=Xavier |title=Faith and Communion in the Indian Church of Saint Thomas Christians|location=Kerala, India|publisher=Oriental Institute of Religious Studies|page=59}}</ref> not in a restrictive sense, but meaning ''of the Church of the East.'', which was founded in Assyria, and at that time, Kerala aside, was exclusive to northern Mesopotamia, the former Assyria. The Chronicle of the Carmelites states that Sulaqa was proclaimed ''Patriarch of the Eastern AssyriansChaldeans'' but on April 19, 1553 the title was changed to ''Patriarch of the Chaldeans,''<ref>{{cite journal |last=Yana (Bebla) |first=George V. |title=Myth vs. Reality|journal=JAA Studies|volume=14|issue=1|page=80|year=2000}}</ref> perhaps in reference to the [[Old Testament]], which gives Abraham's birthplace as "Ur of Chaldees" at a time long before the Chaldeans entered Mesopotamia (and which many modern scholars now believe was actually in [[Assyria]] or [[Asia MinorChaldea]]), rather than to any ethnic or geographic link with the long extinct [[Chaldea]]ns of the south eastern extremities of Iraq.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Genesis%2011:28-31;&version=9; |title=Genesis 11:28-31; KJV; - And Haran died before his father Terah |publisher=Bible Gateway |date= |accessdate=2012-08-17}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?book_id=16&chapter=9&verse=7&version=9&context=verse |title=Nehemiah 9:7 KJV - Thou art the LORD the God, who didst |publisher=Bible Gateway |date= |accessdate=2012-08-17}}</ref>

The term identity of ''Chaldeans'' had a history of being used in an ethnically and geographically inaccurate sense by Rome, having been previously officially used by the [[Council of Florence]] in 1445 as a new native name for a group of [[Greek people|Greek]] [[Nestorianism|Nestorian]]s of [[Cyprus]] who entered in [[Full Communion]] with the [[Catholic Church]].<ref>Council of Florence, ''Bull of union with the Chaldeans and the Maronites of Cyprus'' Session 14, 7 August 1445 [http://www.papalencyclicals.net/Councils/ecum17.htm]</ref> Rome followed to use the term ''Chaldeans'' to indicate the members of the Church of the East in Communion with Rome (mainly and not to use the term ''Nestorian'' that was theologically unacceptable) also in 1681 for [[Joseph I (Chaldean Patriarch)|Joseph I]] and later in 1830 when [[Yohannan Hormizd]], of the line of Alqosh, became the first ''"Patriarch of Babylon of the Chaldeans"'' of the modern Chaldean Catholic Church.

Shimun VIII Yohannan Sulaqa was the first incumbent of the ''Shimun'' line of the Assyrian Chaldean Church of the East. This patriarchal See was initially located in Amid, but very soon moved to [[Siirt]], then to [[Urmia]], then to [[Khosrowa]] (near [[Salmas]]) and from the second half of 17th century to [[Qochanis]]. Also the area of influence moved from the North West of the [[Assyrian Chaldean homeland]] to the North Eastern mountains.

The last patriarch of this line recognized by the Pope was [[Shimun IX Dinkha]] (died 1600) and later there were only few correspondences thought missionaries. This See reintroduced in 1600 the traditional heredity system for patriarchs' succession, a practice unacceptable to Rome. In 1692, patriarch [[Mar Shimun XIII Dinkha]]<ref name="Angold"/> broke formally the communion with Rome and returned his members to the Assyrian Nestorian Church. The patriarchate of the present-day [[Assyrian Nestorian Church of the East]], with its See in [[Chicago]], forms the continuation of this line.<ref name="Murre"/Murray>

[[Category:Iraqi Assyrian Chaldean people]]