Historicity of the Apostles Story
The word “Apostle“, from the Greek apostello “to send forth”, “to dispatch”, has etymologically a very general sense. Apostolos (Apostle) means one who is sent forth, dispatched–in other words, who is entrusted with a mission, rather, a foreign mission. It has, however, a stronger sense than the word messenger, and means as much as a delegate. In the classical writers the word is not frequent. In the Greek version of the Hebrew Bible it occurs once, in 3 Kings, 14, 6 (cf. ibid., 12, 24). In the New Testament, on the contrary, it occurs, according to Bruder’s Concordance, about eighty times, and denotes often not all the disciples of the Jesus, but some of them specially called. It is obvious that our Lord, who spoke an Aramaic dialect, gave to some of his disciples an Aramaic title, the Greek equivalent of which was “Apostle”. It seems to us that there is no reasonable doubt about the Aramaic word being sheliah, by which also the later Jews, and probably already the Jews before Christ, denoted “those who were dispatched from the mother city by the rulers of the race on any foreign mission, especially such as were charged with collecting the tribute paid to the temple service” (Lightfoot, “Galatians”, London). The word apostle would be an exact rendering of the root of the word sheliah = apostello.
- It is at once evident that in a Christian sense, everyone who had received a mission from Jesus, to man could be called “Apostle”. In fact, however, it was reserved to those of the disciples who received this title from Christ. At the same time, like other honorable titles, it was occasionally applied to those who in some way realized the fundamental idea of the name. The word also has various meanings.
- The name Apostle denotes principally one of the twelve disciples who, on a solemn occasion, were called by Christ to a special mission. In the Gospels, however, those disciples are often designated by the expressions of mathetai (the disciples) or dodeka (the Twelve) and, after the treason and death of Judas, even of hendeka (the Eleven). In the Synoptics the name Apostle occurs but seldom with this meaning; only once in Matthew and Mark. But in other books of the New Testament, chiefly in the Epistles of St. Paul and in the Acts, this use of the word is current. Saul of Tarsus, being miraculously converted, and called to preach the Gospel to the heathens, claimed with much insistence this title and its rights.
- In the Epistle to the Hebrews (3, 1) the name is applied even to Christ, in the original meaning of a delegate sent from God to preach revealed truth to the world. The word Apostle has also in the New Testament a larger meaning, and denotes some inferior disciples who, under the direction of the Apostles, preached the Gospel, or contributed to its diffusion; thus Barnabas (Acts, 14, 4, 14), probably Andronicus and Junias (Rom., 16, 7), Epaphroditus (Phil., 2, 25), two unknown Christians who were delegated for the collection in Corinth (II Cor., 7, 23). We know not why the honorable name of Apostle is not given to such illustrious missionaries as Timothy, Titus, and others who would equally merit it.
There are some passages in which the extension of the word Apostle is doubtful, as Luke, 11, 49; John, 13, 16; 2 Cor., 13; 1 Thes., 2, 7; Ephes., 3, 5; Jude, 17, and perhaps the well-known expression “Apostles and Prophets”. Even in an ironical meaning the word occurs (2 Cor., 11, 5; 12, 11) to denote pseudo-apostles. There is but little to add on the use of the word in the old Christian literature. The first and third meanings are the only ones, which occur frequently, and even in the oldest literature the larger meaning is seldom found.
Critical View
In the gospel accounts of Jesus’ life, we find two main categories of questions with the accounts regarding the apostles of Jesus:
1. Questions with the Names of the Apostles:
- There are fifteen names for twelve slots. A problem not easily reconcilable.
- We do not even know if Matthew and Levi is the same person.
2. Questions with the Subsequent History of the Apostles:
- Even in the New Testament, most of the apostles appear as merely names on the list of apostles
- The additional details about some of the apostles given in John are unhistorical.
- Subsequent Christian tradition had very little of historical value to add.
Fifteen Names for Twelve Slots - According to all the four gospels and the Acts of the Apostles, Jesus selected a band, twelve in number, of disciples to help him to preach his message. Each of the synoptic supplied a list of the twelve apostles while Acts listed the eleven lefts after Judas committed suicide. In all other respects, the list in Acts is identical to that in Luke, which is to be expected, since they were both penned by the same author. In the gospel of John the names of nine apostles can be found interspersed in the narrative. The table below gives a summary of the four lists:
A glance at the table above will show that the four lists (I count the lists in Luke-Acts as one) are by no means harmonious. The only two lists that tally each other are those of Mark and Matthew. Luke’s list differs from these by including a second Judas (son of James) among the twelve. His list excluded the name Thaddeus found in Mark and Matthew. John’s list agrees with Luke in including a second Judas but compounds the problem by including yet another apostle not found in any of the three earlier lists: Nathaniel.
The apologists had tried to reconcile these discrepancies. First they claimed that Bartholomew is actually bar Talmai (son of Talmai) and that his name is Nathaniel. (It is amazing that this explanation, if true, was first mentioned only in the ninth century CE) And then they claimed that Thaddeus is the surname of Judas son of James. These reconstructions , of course (the avid will reader would have already gotten used to the method of the apologists by now), have no support whatsoever for it. In other words we do not know if Bartholomew is Bar Talmai, and we definitely do not know that Nathaniel was the son of one Talmai. We definitely have no reason whatsoever to even believe that Thaddeus was the surname of Judas son of James. These reconstructions are proposed solely to reconcile the four lists to one another and save the doctrine of New Testament inerrancy (exemption from error -
Cadoux, The Life of Jesus: p105; Craveri, The Life of Jesus: p150-151; Nineham, Saint Mark: p117; Riedel et.al., The Book of the Bible: p437) . This is not all. In ancient manuscripts of Mark and Matthew the name of the tenth apostle are rendered in two different ways: Lebbaeus and Thaddeus. These names are not interchangeable and represent two distinct names. The balance of evidence from these manuscripts point to Lebbaeus being the original reading in Matthew and Thaddeus in Mark. [See also note (a)]
The Missing Part in the New Testament – Coupled with this uncertainty as to who exactly constituted the original twelve apostles, we are even more uncertain about what their subsequent histories were. In the New Testament, our knowledge of the apostles is mainly limited to Peter and the sons of Zebedee (John and James). According to the gospels Peter, John and James formed the inner circle of Jesus disciples. They were the only ones present to witness the raising of Jairus’ daughter (Mark 5:37; Luke 8:51), the Transfiguration (Matthew 17:1; Mark 9:2; Luke 9:28) and the prayers in the garden of Gethsemane (Matthew 26:37; Mark 14:33) . Outside the gospel and Acts we have the genuine epistles of Paul attesting to Peter and John as the “Jerusalem Pillars” (Galatians 2:9). We also know from Paul that Peter was married (I Corinthians 9:5), he was the first to see the risen Jesus (1 Corinthians 15:5) and that he traveled outside Jerusalem (Galatians 2:11). Matthew, surprisingly, is mentioned only once outside the list of apostles given above, in the short passage in the gospel of Matthew 9:9-10. This passage narrates his calling as an apostle followed by Jesus having dinner at his house. Two apostolic deaths are narrated in the New Testament. Judas Iscariot was the first apostle to have died (Matthew 27:9; Acts 1:18) by committing suicide after the crucifixion of Jesus around 30 CE. The next disciple to have suffered martyrdom was James son of Zebedee (Acts 12:2); he was beheaded by Herod Antipas around 44 CE . With no exaggeration, the above represents the sum total of (somewhat) reliable information about the apostles in the New Testament. The information about the rest of the apostles is either nonexistent or unreliable. The apostles Thaddeus, Simon the Zelot, James son of Alphaeus [see note (b)] and Bartholomew appear only in the list of apostles given above. Nothing else is written about them in all of the New Testament ! Added to these there are two other apostles that appear only as names in the Synoptic gospels and Acts: Thomas and Philip [(see note (c)]. Thus as far as the synoptic gospels and Acts are concerned, these two are merely names, just like the other four above. Indeed the case with Thomas is even worse: it was not even a name! “Thomas” comes from the Hebrew Te’hom, which means, “twin”. The seemingly additional surname in John 11:16 translated in the King James as “Thomas who is called Didymus” adds nothing new, for “didymus” is simply Greek for “the Twin”! Modern translations now give this passage as “Thomas who is called ‘the Twin’”. There is no evidence in contemporary literature that either Thomas or Didymus was ever used as names during that period . Andrew is mentioned, in the synoptics, only a little bit more than the other six we have seen above. We are told of his calling (Mark 1:16; Matthew 4:18) and his questioning Jesus at the Mount of Olives (Mark 13:3). [See note (d)] Thus in the New Testament, except in the gospel of John which we will examine immediately below, we are told nothing more about six of the apostles – Thaddeus, Simon the Zelot, James son of Alphaeus, Bartholomew, Thomas, Philip – except their names! Even Matthew and Andrew barely get any mention beyond their names in the list of the twelve apostles. Indeed these eight apostles are vaguely characters-we know nothing much beyond their names.
Conclusions
We thus know nothing about the subsequent careers of the apostles except for Peter, James and John. Even as early as the end of the first century, when the gospels and Acts were first composed, we have clear evidence that information regarding the apostles was already hard to receive. We find fifteen names for the list of twelve apostles. Even if we confined ourselves to the twelve names given in Mark and Matthew the problem is not resolved. For at least six of these names are nothing more than names; we know nothing about Thaddeus, Simon the Zelot, James son of Alphaeus, Bartholomew, Thomas and Philip. With Matthew and Andrew we know only slightly more: that Matthew was a tax collector when he was called and that Andrew was Peter’s brother. With Judas, there are problems with the whole story of his betrayal. Subsequent traditions have no more to add to these. The early apocryphal acts of Peter, John, Andrew and Thomas contain very little that is historically reliable. The later ones were even worse and are merely fanciful expansions of these earlier works. Even the ecclesiastical historian Eusebius, could do no more than repeat the four names of the apocryphal acts when recounting what he knows about the subsequent careers of the apostles. Two possibilities present themselves. The number twelve as we have noted has rich symbolic value in Judaism being equal to the tribes of Israel. This means that the number twelve could be one that tradition assumed the number of disciples to be. [See note (f)] The other possibility, more damning, I think, to Christian belief, is that the mission of the twelve was a failure. We know today that a large part of Christian theology has its roots in the epistles of Paul who was not one of the original twelve apostles. The original apostles, the ones actually hand-picked by Jesus, made no impact on Christian history whatsoever .
Notes List
Note (a) - The editors of the UBS Greek New Testament decided to leave Thaddeus as the reading for both Mark 3:18 and Matthew 10:3. However as one of the editors explained the issue was not that simple. While they rated the Thaddeus reading in Mark as “A”, meaning they are certain that this was the original reading here, the issue was “more difficult” with the reading in Matthew. There were four different types of reading here: “Thaddeus”, “Lebbaeus”, and “Lebbaeus who was called Thaddeus” and “Thaddeus who was called Lebbaeus”. Finally the editors opted for “Thaddeus” but rated the reading a “B”
Note (b) - The identification of James the son of Alphaeus with James the Less (Mark 15:40) or with James the brother of Jesus (Mark 6:3) is pure conjecture. -Goodspeed, The Twelve: p19, 41-44 ; Riedel et.al., op. cit: p437-438
Note (c) – Not to be confused with Philip, one of the seven Hellenist deacons in Acts (6:5; 8-4-50; 21:8).
Note (d) – Even this meager information is considered suspect by scholars. The Jesus Seminar called the whole backdrop of the thirteen chapter of Mark (at the Temple and then at the Mount of Olives) a “fictive setting” and the verses containing the question of Andrew of Peter (Mark 13:3-4) as a continuation of the fictitious narrative framework. – Funk, et.al., The Acts of Jesus: p133-134
Note (e) – We will not be discussing the Acts of Paul here as he was not one of the twelve apostles.
Note (f) – Sources hostile to Christianity preserved different numbers of apostles. The second century critic of Christianity, Celsus, mentioned that there were ten (or eleven) apostles. (See Origen Against Heresies 2:46 & 1:62) The Babylonian Talmud listed only five apostles: Matthai, Nagai, Nezer, Buni and Thoda (Sanhedrin 43a). Scneemelcher, op. cit.: p17
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