Alberic Jacovone OSB
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YEAR B
FOURTEENTH SUNDAY - 9.7.06
Ezek 2,2-5; 2 Cor 12,7-10; Mk 6,1-6
Haven’t my teachers read this?...
Brothers
& Sisters:
In today’s story, Mark tells us about Jesus’ family & the home-town
where he grew-up. In his catechetical & concentric lesson-plan, he says that
his family & his town failed to accept him, indeed they felt He had gone
mad. Mark builds the story in such a way, that at the centre of his lesson-plan
rests a very important topic: amazing as it may seem, we -the believers of all
time-, are Jesus’ brothers & sisters. Yes, we are part of Jesus’ real family. While
Jesus’ family & town people, repeatedly & totally rejected &
belittled him, as none other than ‘the ‘carpenter & the son of Mary’,
Jesus let it be clearly known, that from now on, he has no other family than us,
the believers of all time. So, we now rest assured, that Jesus is: Son of God
& loves us as his brothers & sisters. But this is not all: as scholars
& readers of all ages have read today’s story, they (like us today!) got
hopelessly side-trekked into the controversy, whether Jesus had ‘blood’
brothers & sisters, or not. I for one, have never forgotten the time when
-at 13-, I read this story in the Gospels, for the first time. When I got to the
words: ‘isn’t he a brother to Joses & Judas & Simeon? & are not
his sisters here with us?’, I felt as if my brain was exploding. I stopped
reading. I felt betrayed & said: ‘Haven’t my ignorant priests read
this?... How can they teach me that Mary had no other children but Jesus!’. At
the time, I knew nothing about Mark’s ‘lesson plan’ & that Jesus loves
me as his own brother. I too, got hopelessly side-tracked into the century-old
controversy, which has nothing to do with Mark’s story. Like me as a teenager,
people today, get deeply affected
when we are faced with striking assertions, implying that Jesus may have had
brothers & sisters. So, while rejoicing as Jesus’ brothers & sisters,
let’s be challenged by this sensitive topic.
The
brothers & sisters of Jesus. When I reacted violently against the ‘ignorant priests’, I did not
know that Christianity across the centuries has in fact debated the question of
the Brothers & Sisters of Jesus since its earliest years. The Gospels name 4
‘brothers’ of Jesus: James, Joses, Judas & Simeon. Hegesippus (AD 150)
writes that James was the 1st Bishop of Jerusalem & his brother Simeon
succeeded him. ‘First Gospel of James’ (2nd Cent) says that Jesus brothers
were from a previous marriage to Joseph & Mary remained a virgin after the
birth of Jesus. The same is implied in the codices from Nag-Hammadi library.
James & Thomas are ‘brothers of Jesus’, but from different fathers,
presumably from Joseph. Interestingly, the ancient Basilica of Haghia Sophia in
Istanbul (Ancient ‘Constantinople’) still today at its entrance (or narthex)
a striking mosaic, which goes back to the 5th Century, & represent the
flight into Egypt. In it, there is Mary sitting on a donkey & holding Baby
Jesus; a young teenager, walking ahead of the donkey & a rather ‘old’ St. Joseph walking behind the donkey. The
presumption is that the teenager is one of the ‘brothers’ of Jesus but from
Joseph’s previous marriage. Early Church writers were divided into 3
interpretations: ‘brothers’ of Jesus were blood brothers (Tertullian &
Eividius); or children of Joseph by a previous marriage (Origen, Eusebius, &
Gregory of Nyssa); or simply cousins of Jesus (Jerome who held the perpetual
virginity of Mary & argued that the word ‘adelphos’ means both brother
& cousin. Today, many Protestants follow the first interpretation, while all
Orthodox & Catholics follow the third. Lately, an ecumenical task-force has
concluded that by NT alone, the question can’t be resolved beyond doubt
(Brown, Fitzmyer, Donfried, Reumann). We Catholics hold that ‘brothers of Jesus’ here means ‘
cousins’, as is still the case in all Middle-Eastern countries.
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