brothers. But of James, the son of Alphaeus, nothing else is known; and he also can have had no connection with this letter.
(3) There is the James who is called James the younger and is mentioned in Mark 15:40 (cf. Matthew 27:56; John 19:25). Again nothing is known of him, and he cannot have had any connection with this letter.
(4) There is James, the brother of John, and the son of Zebedee, a member of the Twelve (Matthew 10:2; Mark 3:17; Luke 6:14; Acts 1:13 ). In the gospel story, James never appears independently of his brother John (Matthew 4:21, 17:1; Mark 1:19, 1:29, 5:37, 9:2, 10:35, 10:41, 13:3, 14:33; Luke 5:10, 8:51, 9:28, 9:54). He was the first of the apostolic band to be martyred, for he was beheaded on the orders of Herod Agrippa I in the year AD 44. He has been connected with the letter. The fourth-century Latin Codex Corbeiensis, at the end of the epistle, has a note quite definitely attributing it to James the son of Zebedee. The only place where this view on the authorship was taken seriously was in the Spanish church, in which, down to the end of the seventeenth century, he was often held to be the author. This was due to the fact that St James of Compostella, the patron saint of Spain, is identified with James the son of Zebedee; and it was natural that the Spanish church should be predisposed to wish that their country’s patron saint should be the author of a New Testament letter. But the martyrdom of James came too early for him to have written the letter, and in any case there is nothing beyond the Codex Corbeiensis to connect him with it.
(5) Finally, there is James, who is called the brother of Jesus. Although the first definite connection of him with this letter does not emerge until Origen in the first half of the third century, it is to him that it has always been traditionally attributed. The Roman Catholic Church agrees with this view, for in 1546 the Council of Trent laid it down that James is canonical and is written by an apostle.
Let us then collect the evidence about this James. From the New Testament, we learn that he was one of the brothers of Jesus (Mark 6:3; Matthew 13:55). We shall later discuss in what sense the word ‘brother’ is to be taken. During Jesus’ ministry, it is clear that his family did not understand or sympathize with him and would have wished to restrain him (Matthew 12:46–50; Mark 3:21, 3:31–5; John 7:3–9). John says bluntly: ‘For not even his brothers believed in him’ (John 7:5). So, during Jesus’ earthly ministry, James was numbered among his opponents.
With the Acts of the Apostles, there comes a sudden and unexplained change. When Acts opens, Jesus’ mother and his brothers are there with the little group of Christians (Acts 1:14). From there onwards, it becomes clear that James has become the leader of the Jerusalem church, although how that came about is never explained. It is to James that Peter sends the news of his escape from prison (Acts 12:17). James presides over the Council of Jerusalem, which agreed to the entry of the Gentiles into the Christian Church (Acts 15). It is James and Peter whom Paul meets when he first goes to Jerusalem, and it is with Peter, James and John, the pillars of the Church, that he discusses and settles his sphere of work (Galatians 1:19, 2:9). It is to James that Paul comes with his collection from the Gentile churches on the visit to Jerusalem which is destined to be his last and which leads to his imprisonment (Acts 21:18–25). This last episode is important, for it shows James very sympathetic to the Jews who still observe the Jewish law, and so eager that their scruples should not be offended that he actually persuades Paul to demonstrate his loyalty to the law by assuming responsibility for the expenses of certain Jews who are fulfilling a Nazirite vow, a vow taken in gratitude for some special blessing from God.
Plainly, then, James was the leader of the Jerusalem church. As might be expected, this was something which tradition greatly developed. Hegesippus, the second-century Church historian, says that James was the first bishop of the church at Jerusalem. The early Christian theologian Clement of Alexandria goes further and says that he was chosen for that office by Peter and John. Jerome, in his book On Famous Men, says: ‘After the passion of the Lord, James was immediately ordained bishop of Jerusalem by the apostles . . . He ruled the church of Jerusalem for thirty years, that is, until the seventh year of the reign of Nero.’ The Clementine Recognitions take the final step in the development of the legend, for they say that James was ordained Bishop of Jerusalem by none other than Jesus himself. Clement of Alexandria relates a strange tradition: ‘To James the Just, and John and Peter, after the resurrection, the Lord committed knowledge; they committed it to the other apostles; and the other apostles to the seventy.’ The later developments are not to be accepted, but the basic fact remains that James was the undisputed head of the church at Jerusalem.
James and Jesus
Such a change must have some explanation. It may well be that we have it in a brief sentence in the New Testament itself. In 1 Corinthians 15, Paul gives us a list of the resurrection appearances of Jesus and includes the words: ‘Then he appeared to James’ (1 Corinthians 15:7). It so happens that there is a strange reference to James in the Gospel according to the Hebrews, which was one of the early gospels which did not gain admittance to the New Testament but which, to judge from its surviving fragments, had much of value in it. The following passage from it is handed down by Jerome:
Now the Lord, when he had given the linen cloth unto the servant of the high priest, went unto James and appeared to him (for James had sworn that he would not eat bread from that hour, wherein he had drunk the Lord’s cup, until he should see him risen again from among them that sleep). And again after a little, ‘Bring ye’, saith the Lord, ‘a table and bread’, and immediately it is added: ‘He took bread and blessed and brake it and gave it unto James the Just and said unto him: “My brother, eat thy bread, for the Son of Man is risen from among them that sleep.”’
That passage is not without its difficulties. The beginning seems to mean that Jesus, when he rose from the dead and emerged from the tomb, handed the linen shroud, which he had been wearing in death, to the servant of the high priest and went to meet his brother James. It also seems to imply that James was present at the Last Supper. But although the passage has its obscurities, one thing is clear. Something about Jesus in the last days and hours had fastened on James’ heart, and he had vowed that he would not eat until Jesus had risen again; and so Jesus came to him and gave him the assurance for which he waited. That there was a meeting of James and the risen Christ is certain. What happened at that moment we shall never know. But we do know this, that after it the James who had been hostile and unsympathetic to Jesus became his servant for life and his martyr in death.
James the Martyr of Christ
That James died a martyr’s death is the consistent statement of early tradition. The accounts of the circumstances vary, but the fact that he was martyred remains constant. The Jewish historian Josephus’ account is very brief (Antiquities, 20:9:1):
So Ananus, being that kind of man, and thinking that he had got a good opportunity because Festus was dead and Albinus not yet arrived, holds a judicial council; and he brought before it the brother of Jesus, who was called Christ – James was his name – and some others, and on the charge of violating the law he gave them over to be stoned.
Ananus was a Jewish high priest; Festus and Albinus were procurators of Palestine, holding the same position as Pilate had held. The point of the story is that Ananus took advantage of the interregnum, the period between the death of one procurator and the arrival of his successor, to eliminate James and other leaders of the Christian Church. This, in fact, fits well with the character of Ananus as it is known to us, and would mean that James was martyred in AD 62.
A much longer account is given in the history of Hegesippus. Hegesippus’ history is itself lost, but his account of the death of James has been preserved in full by the Church historian Eusebius, who wrote early in the fourth century (Ecclesiastical History, 2:23). It is lengthy, but it is of such interest that it must be quoted in its entirety.
To the government of the Church in conjunction with the apostles succeeded the Lord’s brother,
