Zareh I Payaslian ( ) ( 14 February 1915 , Marash – 18 February 1963 , Beirut , Lebanon ) was Catholicos of Cilicia of the Armenian Apostolic Church from 1956 to 1963 . Zareh I was born in 1915 , in Marash , Ottoman Empire as Simon Payaslian . Escaping the events of the Armenian Genocide , his family moved to Syria , residing in the city of Hama , then in Aleppo . He received his primary education in Mesrobian and Haygazian schools in Aleppo . He received his secondary education in the Jesuit Seminary in Aleppo . Later , he became a graduate of the Antelias Seminary of the Armenian Catholicosate of the Great House of Cilicia . In 1935 , he was ordained as a priest and took the name Zareh . He continued his higher education in Belgium between 1937 – 1940 . Starting in 1940 , he served in the Armenian prelacy of Aleppo . He became Primate of Aleppo , Syria in 1943 until 1956 . in 1946 , he founded the Karen Jeppe Armenian College of Aleppo
Armenian Genocide
Armenian Genocide
Zareh I