Unearthing the Family of Yahshua of Nazareth

Spiritual Gifts Revelation 1: Charismata Theory, Assessment, Problem-solving
Spiritual Gifts Revelation 2: Miracles by the Book Both by Jack Snyder 2008

II. DEBRIS MUST BE GATHERED TOGETHER

The Names of the Brothers, Part 1 - James

Mark 6:3. Is not this the carpenter, the son of Mary, the brother of James, and Joses, and of Juda, and Simon? and are not his sisters here with us?

Matthew 13:55. Is not this the carpenter's son? is not his mother called Mary? and his brethren, James, and Joses, and Simon, and Judas? 56. And are not all his sisters with us?

Mark 15:40. There were also women looking on afar off: among whom was Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother of James the less and of Joses, and Salome … 47. And Mary Magdalene and Mary the mother of Joses beheld where he was laid.

Matthew 27:56. Among which was Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother of James and Joses, and the mother of Zebedee's children.

Luke 24:10. It was Mary Magdalene and Joanna, and Mary the mother of James….

(Do you remember what italics signify in the KJV?)

Acts 1:13. … Matthew, James the son of Alphaeus, and Simon Zelotes, and Judas the brother of James.

1 Corinthians 9:5. Do we not have the right to be accompanied by a wife, as the other apostles and the brothers of the Master and Cephas?

Galatians 1:18. Then after three years I went up to Jerusalem to visit Cephas, and remained with him fifteen days. 19. But I saw none of the other apostles except James the Lord's brother.

Jude 1. Jude, A servant of Jesus Christ and brother of James …

Bible savants tell us that Mark is the earliest of the canonical gospels, dating before 70 AD. Matthew and Luke are dated after, because they speak of the fall of Jerusalem, which was happening 68 – 70 AD. They also date the Gospel of Thomas, which is not found in the New Testament but was used by the early Egyptian church, to about 50 AD. IN this section we will sort out the names of Yahshua’s brothers using the Biblical Gospel records, Acts, the writings of Paul, the Gospel of Thomas and other very early Christian writers.

The order of brothers in Mark is: James, Joses, Juda, Simon. In Matthew they are James, Joses, Simon and Judah. We will examine each brother mentioned in Mark’s order, with the exception of Joses, because Joses is exceptional among these brothers. We leave him until the end of the brothers section.

James: We gather the debris around the name James to try to make sense of who he was and what he did from a biblical standpoint. Here are various surnames and their meanings. We gather them together into piles to make sense of their contents.

Matthew 4:21., 10:2.: “of the Zebedee” (Zebedai)

This notice seems to refer to a different James, the brother of John, and we’ll treat this at a later time.

Matthew 10:3. Mark 3:18., Luke 6:15. “of the Alphaeus” (‘Alfai)

The tradition reading is that James was the son of Alphaeus. “Levi” is also considered a son of Alphaeus (Mark 2:14). There is no other mention of a person names Alphaeus in the Scripture. The actual word transliterated from Greek is “Alfai” or “Halfai.” (Stern, in The Jewish Bible, has Chalfai.) Suppose Alfai isn’t a person, since the Scripture only says Jacob the Alfai and Levi the Alfai. (The word “son” is not actually in the text.) What might an Alfai be?

(1) In Hebrew, the first letter of the alphabet is Aleph; in Greek it’s Alpha. In English, Alpha would actually be transliterated Alfa (no “ph” in Greek). In both Greek and Hebrew, “A” has the value of “1.” This designates either (a) a firstborn of a mother or (b) the firstborn of twins.

In our culture we are used to using Roman numerals to designate generations. My birth certificate reads Jack Snyder II to distinguish me from my father, who has the same name. On account of me being the second, he become the first.

In Greek and Hebrew cultures, “A” was used in a like fashion, to distinguish either a first-born, a first of a set of twins, or the elder of two in a family with the same name. James the Alfai would mean “James the First,” which also was the designation of the King James of Bible fame. Although he was James the IV of Scotland, when he became King of England, he was James I. Check the introduction of your King James Bible.

Regardless, we might deduce that James was a firstborn, the first of twins, or had a nephew with the same name. If he was a firstborn, then, in a religious family, he would be set aside and consecrated to Yahweh a priest (especially if he had a mother or father who was a Levite, or if he were a Nazarean Essene.

(2) Here’s a more esoteric explanation:

The Golden Bough (1922) by Sir James George Frazer, Chapter 8. Departmental Kings of Nature (excerpt): “The priesthood of the Alfai, as he is called by [Western Hindis] is a remarkable one; he is believed to be able to make rain. … His office passes by inheritance to his brother or sister’s son. He is supposed to conjure down rain and to drive away the locusts. But if … the Alfai is stoned to death, and his nearest relations are obliged to cast the first stone at him.” There is more to this description. (This is from The Golden Bough, available as a download from Project Gutenberg [catalog of ebooks].)

We’re interesting in this Alfai because: (a) it was a kind of priesthood that (b) existed until at least 1922 from India to Africa (b) consisting of rain-makers (those who purported to control weather) and was (c) dynastic – passed down to relatives. If the Alfai is unsuccessful (the tale goes), he is (d) stoned by his (e) closest relatives.

We know from early sources that James was a firstborn – a priest. One historian tells us James entered the Holy of Holies on the day of atonement. We also understand that he was involved in rainmaking (as we will see later), and that his priesthood was also a family dynasty. We earlier learned from both Hegesippus and Josephus that James was pushed from the parapet of the Temple and stoned by Sadducees in 62 AD, and that his brother and successor was with him as he died.

(3) Some scholars theorize that Alphaeus was a surname of Joseph the father of Jesus or that Alphaeus was the brother of Joseph married to the sister of Mary, whose name was also Mary. Though there’s not much evidence of either, such is the majority opinion at this time.

Mark 15:40. “the less” (Iakobou tou mikrou)

We get the idea from the KJV that this James was “less” than some other, maybe less than James the Zebedai. “tou mikrou,” which is translated in the KJV as “the less” is genitive singular, literally, “of the mikrou.” What is this mikrou of which James was?

(a) Mikrou can mean “of the less” – to which I would add – “of the lesser priests.” The letter to the Hebrews makes it clear that there was a priesthood in competition with the priests who had been appointed by Herod or the Romans – a pure priesthood of the order of Melchizedek (Melchi the Just). Here is what Josephus the historian says of these: “the impudence and boldness of the High Priests, who actually dared to send their assistants to the threshing floors, to take away those tithes that were due to the Priests, with the result that ‘the Poor’ among the Priests starved to death” (Ant. XX,8). “This James of the less” may be the same as “James of the Poor,” which was another name for the Nazarean Essenes.

(b) Or it could be much simpler than that. Mikrou also means “short of stature” or “little James,” lesser of age than someone else, not as important as another. Yet if he’s less important than someone else, we wonder why Paul hold him in such high esteem in the next passages.

Acts 21:18. “and all the elders were present”

The writer of Acts already shows James as being the the final decision-maker in the Jerusalem Assembly (15:13). In chapter 21, Paul makes another appearance with Titus and others before the Jerusalem Assembly and there Luke has the elders of the assembly mentioned collectively, and James mentioned personally. This goes along with what the historians tell us about the Assembly in that city after the crucifixion of Jesus – that James, his brother, took charge of it. Wasn’t Peter supposed to take charge? You may remember that Peter had to get out of Jerusalem because the authorities were after him. Besides, there is another early witness, the Gospel of Thomas, that records this discourse commending James:

Gospel of Thomas 12. The disciples said to Jesus, “We know that you are going to leave us. Who will be our leader?” Jesus said to them, “No matter where you are you are to go to James the Just, for whose sake heaven and earth came into being.”

end part 2.