Page 22 - Demo

18Brief Biography of Prof. Abdulahad DawudProf. Abdulahad Dawud is the former Rev David Benjamin Keldani, B.D., a Roman Catholic priest of the Uniate-Chaldean sect. He was born in 1867 at Urmia in Persia, and was educated from his early years in the same town. From 1886 to 1889, he was on the teaching staff of the Archbishop of Canterbury’s Mission to the Assyrian (Nestorian) Christians at Urmia. In 1892, he was sent by Cardinal Vaughan to Rome, where he underwent a course of philosophical and theologicalstudies at the Propaganda Fide College, and in 1895 was ordained Priest. In 1892, Professor Dawud contributed a series of articles to the tablet on “Assyria, Rome and Canterbury”; and to theIrish Record on the “Authenticity of the Pentateuch.” He has several translations of the Ave Maria in different languages, published in the Illustrated Catholic Missions. While in Constantinople on his way to Persia in 1895,he contributed a long series of articles in English and French to the daily paper, published there under the name of The Levant Herald, on “Eastern Churches.” In 1895, he joined the French Lazarist Mission at Urmia, and published for the first time in the history of that Mission a periodical in the vernacular Syriac called QalaLa Shárá, i.e. “The Voice of Truth.”In 1897, he was delegated by two Uniate-Chaldean ArchbishopsofUrmiaandofSalmastorepresenttheEastern Catholics at the Eucharistic Congress held at Paray-leMonialinFranceunderthepresidencyofCardinalPerraud. This was, of course an official invitation. The paperread at the Congress by “Father Benjamin” was published in the Annals of the Eucharistic Congress, called “Le Pellerin” of that year. In this paper, the Chaldean Archpriest (that being his official title) deplored the Catholic system of educationamongtheNestorians, andforetoldtheimminent appearance of the Russian priests inUrmia.