James, the Brother of the Lord

James, who is called the brother of the Lord, was surnamed the Just. Some think he was the son of Joseph by another wife; but as it appears to me, he was the son of Mary, the sister of our Lord’s mother, whom John mentions in his book. Immediately after our Lord’s passion he was ordained by the apostles as bishop of Jerusalem. He wrote a single letter, which is counted among the seven catholic letters. Some claim that even this one was published by someone else under his name and only gradually, as time went on, gained authority. [a]

Hegesippus, who lived near the age of the apostles, writes this about James in the fifth book of his Commentaries: “After the apostles, James the brother of the Lord, surnamed the Just, was made head of the church at Jerusalem. Many indeed are called James. This one was holy from his mother’s womb. He drank neither wine nor strong drink, ate no meat, never shaved, never anointed himself with ointment, and never bathed. He alone had the privilege of entering the Holy of Holies, since he did not wear woolen clothes but linen. He went into the temple alone and prayed for the people, so much so that his knees were said to have grown as hard as a camel’s knees.” He says many other things too, more than can be mentioned here.

Josephus also, in the twentieth book of his Antiquities, and Clement, in the seventh book of his Outlines, mention that when Festus, who governed Judea, died, Nero sent Albinus to succeed him. Before Albinus reached his province, Ananias the high priest, the young son of Ananus, of the priestly class, took advantage of the lawless state of things. He assembled a council and tried publicly to force James to deny that Christ is the Son of God. When James refused, Ananias ordered him to be stoned. He was thrown down from a pinnacle of the temple, and his legs were broken. But while he was still half alive, he raised his hands to heaven and said, “Lord, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing.” Then he was struck on the head with a fuller’s club, the kind of club fullers use to wring out clothes, and he died. This same Josephus records the tradition that James was so holy and so highly regarded among the people that the fall of Jerusalem was believed to have come because of his death. He is the one of whom the apostle Paul writes to the Galatians, “I saw none of the other apostles except James the brother of the Lord.” And soon after that event the Acts of the Apostles also bear witness to the matter.

The gospel called the Gospel according to the Hebrews, which I have recently translated into Greek and Latin, and which Origen also often uses, says after the account of the Savior’s resurrection: “But the Lord, after he had given his grave clothes to the servant of the priest, appeared to James (for James had sworn that he would not eat bread from the hour in which he drank the cup of the Lord until he should see him rising again from among those who sleep).” And again, a little later, it says: “‘Bring a table and bread,’ said the Lord.” And immediately it adds: “He brought bread and blessed it and broke it, and gave it to James the Just and said to him, ‘My brother, eat your bread, for the Son of Man has risen from among those who sleep.’”

And so he ruled the church of Jerusalem for thirty years, that is, until the seventh year of Nero. He was buried near the temple from which he had been thrown down. His tombstone with its inscription was well known until the siege of Titus and the end of Hadrian’s reign. Some of our writers think he was buried on the Mount of Olives, but they are mistaken.