Archangel Radio

St. James, Apostle of Our Lord, is known by many names, most commonly James the Less.  He is also known as James the Just, James the Younger, James the Brother of Our Lord, and James of Alpheus.   Little is known of his life prior to his becoming a Disciple of Christ.  He is believed to be the son of Alpheus and of Mary, who was referred to as a relative of the Virgin Mary, thus giving us the designation “brother of the Lord”. 

This Mary is also known as Mary Clopas, Clopas perhaps being the name of her father, and she was present at Our Lord’s crucifixion.  In the ancient Greek and Aramaic languages, there was no word corresponding to cousin or nephew, so male relatives were referred to as brothers.  St. Jude Thaddeus is widely believed to be the blood brother of James the Less.  The name James the Less is given to distinguish him from another Apostle, St. James the Greater, the brother of John and son of Zebedee, who was likely either taller or older than James the Less, or called to the apostleship at an earlier date.  The name James the Just is given due to his widely renowned sanctity.  Sts. James and Jude were called to the apostleship in the year 31, the second year of Christ’s public life.

Saints Jerome and Epiphanius, writing in the fifth century, tell us that just before His Ascension, Jesus entrusted the Church of Jerusalem to St. James the Less, and the Apostles consecrated him Bishop of the Church there before they radiated out to spread the Gospel to other peoples.  In about the year 42, St. Peter, the recognized leader of the Apostolic group, was put in prison by King Herod Agrippa, and even though he escaped by a miracle, he left Jerusalem in the care of James. 

Since the Church at Rome had not yet become pre-eminent, James, as the head of the Jerusalem Church was consulted about disputed matters, and hosted the Apostolic meeting around the year 51, where he supported St. Peter’s position in more clearly defining Jewish and Christian practices and customs.  James was known to be a remarkably holy man, with people seeking to touch his garments to obtain healing.  A very early account of his life describes him as a Nazarite, or a virgin consecrated to God, and having spent such a great amount of time prostrated in prayer, the skin of his knees and forehead was recorded as being thick and hard.  Even the Jewish people who had not converted to “The Way” considered him “the just man”, and he was allowed entrance to the Sanctum of the Temple, which access Jewish law restricted to their priests alone. 

St. James wrote the Biblical Epistle that bears his name, where he names himself the “brother” of the Lord.  This letter, which was not written to any particular Church like those of St. Paul, but rather to all the converted Jews of the known world, was written sometime after the year 58.  The letter was written to put a stop to fraudulent and unsound teaching based on distortions of St. Paul’s letters.  James made the clear assertion that faith alone without a holy life lived with works of charity was insufficient for salvation.  His letter contains wonderful guidelines for how to live a holy life. 

When St. James had headed the Jerusalem Church for thirty years, the Jewish persecution of St. Paul came to a climax.  Paul’s conviction was appealed to the Roman Emperor, leaving the frustrated Jews to take their fury out on the visible Christian head in Jerusalem, James.  The Jewish historian Josephus records James’ demise, eerily similar to that of Our Lord.  Ananus, the son of Annas of the notorious Sanhedrin of the Gospels, assembled the Sanhedrin in the year 62, accusing James of breaking the law.  James was turned over to the people to be stoned. 

 Another historian, Hegesippus, tells that James was carried to the pinnacle of the Temple, where he loudly and clearly refused to renounce his faith, and was thrown off, but did not die of his injuries.  James got to his knees while being stoned, asking God to forgive his persecutors, and was finally clubbed to death.  He was buried near the Temple, and his relics were transferred to Constantinople in the year 572.  The Greek historian Eusebius, as well as Origen, Josephus, and St. Jerome attribute the subsequent destruction of Jerusalem to the martyrdom of the great holy man, James.  St. James shares his feast day, May 3, with fellow Apostle St. Philip, and is a patron of the dying because of his forgiveness of his murderers.