Jesus’ Siblings in scripture

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Gorgias said:
So, hang on a second. IIRC, the identity of “the Beloved Disciple” is contested, and not clearly known. But you’re asserting that he was definitively one of the “Sons of Thunder”?
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Hi Gorgias,
I am trying to better understand your position.
Are you saying that it cannot be know that the Beloved Disciple was one of the Sons of Thunder, because scholars dispute this ?
 
“There were also many women there, looking on from afar, who had followed Jesus from Galilee, ministering to him; among who were Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother of James and Joseph, and the mother of the sons of Zebedee.” (Matt. 27:56; see also Mark 15:40)
clearly cousins and it is thought Mary was a sister of St Joseph.
 
Hi
Of the four “brethren” who are named in the Gospels, consider, for the sake of argument, only James. Similar reasoning can be used for the other three. We know that James the younger’s mother was named Mary. Look at the descriptions of the women standing beneath the cross: “among whom were Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother of James and Joseph, and the mother of the sons of Zebedee” (Matt. 27:56); “There were also women looking on from afar, among whom were Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother of James the younger and of Joses, and Salome” (Mark 15:40).

Then look at what John says: “But standing by the cross of Jesus were his mother, and his mother’s sister, Mary the wife of Clopas, and Mary Magdalene” (John 19:25). If we compare these parallel accounts of the scene of the crucifixion, we see that the mother of James and Joseph must be the wife of Clopas. So far, so good.

An argument against this, though, is that James is elsewhere (Matt. 10:3) described as the son of Alphaeus, which would mean this Mary, whoever she was, was the wife of both Clopas and Alphaeus. But Alphaeus and Clopas are the same person, since the Aramaic name for Alphaeus could be rendered in Greek either as Alphaeus or as Clopas. Another possibility is that Alphaeus took a Greek name similar to his Jewish name, the way that Saul took the name Paul.

So it’s probable that James the younger is the son of Mary and Clopas. The second-century historian Hegesippus explains that Clopas was the brother of Joseph, the foster-father of Jesus. James would thus be Joseph’s nephew and a cousin of Jesus, who was Joseph’s putative son.
Hope this helps, I’m a bit busy so have to hurry with my answer, let me know if this is clear.
 
The word in Hebrew for brother was the same word as kinsman or cousin. If one wanted to specify a full biological brother or sister you would say, my mother’s son or my mother’s daughter to differentiate half siblings or cousins. If these kinsmen and kinswomen had been full sisters or brothers of Christ, the scripture would have said Mary’s daughters and Mary’s sons.
 
Except that the NT Scriptures were written in Greek. The word for cousin in Greek is used to describe the relationship between Barnabas and John Mark. So they must have been stepbrothers.
 
Joseph aka Barnabas was originally from Cyprus – in other words, he was a Jew who had always lived in the Greek world. (In fact, on Aphrodite’s home temple island.) He only moved to Jerusalem in later life, and of course he spent a lot of his Christian life roaming around the Greek and Roman world.

So if you’re talking about your down-home cousins with other people from down home, you would probably talk the way an Aramaic or Hebrew speaker would talk, and call them your brothers.

But with Barnabas, living in the Greek world and speaking Greek most of the time, it would be natural to say that John Mark was his nephew. And since the nephew relationship was very important to Greeks, and implied stuff like “I’m my nephew’s mentor, and as his uncle I will always try to get him good jobs,” it told a lot of the story of the conflict between Barnabas and Paul over John Mark’s role in their ministry.
 
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Mintaka said:
Joseph aka Barnabas was originally from Cyprus – in other words, he was a Jew who had always lived in the Greek world. (In fact, on Aphrodite’s home temple island.) He only moved to Jerusalem in later life, and of course he spent a lot of his Christian life roaming around the Greek and Roman world.

So if you’re talking about your down-home cousins with other people from down home, you would probably talk the way an Aramaic or Hebrew speaker would talk, and call them your brothers.
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Sources for the bolded please.
 
JohnR77 said:
Are you saying that it cannot be know that the Beloved Disciple was one of the Sons of Thunder, because scholars dispute this ?
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No – I’m asking how you can claim to be certain, when a not insignificant number of scholars don’t agree that we know with certainty. How can you make this claim, in contradiction to some reasonable scholarship to the contray?
 
There are many expressions and turns of phrase in the Greek New Testament that point to a Hebrew or Aramaic origin. One example:

And do not presume to say to yourselves, “We have Abraham as our father,” for I tell you, God is able from these stones to raise up children for Abraham.
John the Baptist’s warning to the Pharisees and Sadducees in Matt 3:9 and Luke 3:8 is a pun in Hebrew: abanim, stones, followed by banim, sons or children.

The whole question has been studied in great depth, though unfortunately it’s not easy to read about it online because the interesting articles all seem to be behind paywalls.

http://referenceworks.brillonline.c...raisms-in-the-new-testament-EHLL_COM_00000110
 
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Gorgias said:
JohnR77
Are you saying that it cannot be know that the Beloved Disciple was one of the Sons of Thunder, because scholars dispute this ?

No – I’m asking how you can claim to be certain, when a not insignificant number of scholars don’t agree that we know with certainty. How can you make this claim, in contradiction to some reasonable scholarship to the contray?
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.

The following are two possible positions, amongst many others.

Position A
My claim that I can know with reasonable certainty that the beloved disciple is John the Apostle.

Position B
We cannot know who the beloved disciple is because many scholars disagree on that identification.

It is obvious, Gorgias, that you do not hold position A. And if I understand you correctly, you do not hold position B either. So, is it correct to say that you take no position on this one way or the other?

I hope to have the time to explain my position in a future post.
John
 
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JohnR77 said:
Position A
My claim that I can know with reasonable certainty that the beloved disciple is John the Apostle.

Position B
We cannot know who the beloved disciple is because many scholars disagree on that identification.

It is obvious, Gorgias, that you do not hold position A. And if I understand you correctly, you do not hold position B either. So, is it correct to say that you take no position on this one way or the other?
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It would be interesting to see how you “can know with reasonable certainty” the identity of John the Apostle, when “scholars disagree on that identification”… 😉
 
Excuse me for butting in, but cutting the number of questions down to two is already an oversimplification, as I see it. In reality, there are three separate questions to be answered:
  • Is John the Apostle the beloved disciple?
  • Is John the Apostle the author of the Fourth Gospel?
  • Is the beloved disciple the author of the Fourth Gospel?
@JohnR77 would evidently answer “Yes” to all three questions. But there would be no logical inconsistency in answering Yes-No-No, or No-Yes-No, or possibly even No-No-Yes. And many people, of course, including some Catholics, would answer No-No-No.
 
BartholomewB said:
xcuse me for butting in, but cutting the number of questions down to two is already an oversimplification, as I see it. In reality, there are three separate questions to be answered:
  • Is John the Apostle the beloved disciple?
  • Is John the Apostle the author of the Fourth Gospel?
  • Is the beloved disciple the author of the Fourth Gospel?
@JohnR77 would evidently answer “Yes” to all three questions.
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I would too but I’d say it’s more a matter of evidence than certainty. It’s not dogma.
 
This is the Hebrew word for brother: 'ach. In Hebrew: אָח.

It means full blood brother, half brother, stepbrother, kinsman, man from the same tribe, countryman, etc.

So, it’s impossible to know exactly what was meant.
 
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ConstantLearner said:
This is the Hebrew word for brother: 'ach. In Hebrew: אָח.

It means full blood brother, half brother, stepbrother, kinsman, man from the same tribe, countryman, etc.

So, it’s impossible to know exactly what was meant.
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If they were speaking or writing in Hebrew. But they weren’t: Jesus would have spoken Aramaic, and the Gospels (with one possible exception) would have been written originally in Greek. 🤷‍♂️
 
Gorgias said:
If they were speaking or writing in Hebrew. But they weren’t: Jesus would have spoken Aramaic, and the Gospels (with one possible exception) would have been written originally in Greek. 🤷‍♂️
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Of course. :roll_eyes: I’m too used to Hebrew!
 
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