The evangelist Luke also mentions them, although he does not identify them and Paul, in his letters – which are the oldest documents we have of Christianity – also speaks of the ‘brothers of the Lord’ . And not only that, but one of his brothers, James, was the leader of the Jerusalem church after the execution of Jesus.
Why is it a problem that Jesus had brothers ? Due to the catholic doctrine of the perpetual virginity of Maria, exposed for the first time in the treatise Against Helvidio written by Jerónimo towards 383 d. C. His defenders rely on Matthew when he says that Joseph did not have sexual relations with Mary ‘until she gave birth to a son’ – suspiciously the ‘official’ Catholic translation cleverly avoids this indeterminacy by rearranging the phrase. And it is that ‘until’ that separates Catholics from Protestants. For the latter, the brothers and sisters of Jesus are the fruit of the union of Joseph and Mary , who only remained a virgin until the birth of Jesus (doctrine of virginitas ante partum ). For Catholics, the ‘until’ does not imply a change in the state of virginity, as when it is said ‘behave well until I arrive’ ( virginitas post partum ).
How do you solvecatholicthe problem? The official position of the Church is the so-called ‘Jerome solution’ which interprets the word brothers as cousins and, therefore,Mary and Joseph were perpetually virgins. This fourth century ‘solution’ lacks scriptural support. Strict Catholic theologians argue that the Aramaic word for brother (‘ah) is also used for cousins and nephews, and that is why its use in Greek – which does distinguish between brother and cousin – is a translation problem. Now theNew Testamentit was not translated but was written directly in Greek: if the author said brother it is because he meant brother. The most evident case is that of Paul and his letters to the Corinthians, where he speaks of James ‘the brother of the Lord’ and in a global way of‘the Lord’s brothers’Those he met personally! If Pablo had meant cousin, he would have written it.
Faced with these objections, some modern theologians opt for the ‘Epiphanius solution’ – accepted by the Eastern Church – according to which they arechildren of José from a previous marriage.According to the Catholic priest and one of the most relevant confessional biblical researchers, John P. Meier, ‘neither Matthew nor Luke lend support to this idea. The obvious impression from both accounts is that the marriage to Mary is Joseph’s first. ‘ Furthermore, the New Testament does not offer any example of the word ‘brother’ meaning ‘stepbrother’: it is always used literally as a consanguineous brother or, in a metaphorical sense, when referring to early Church Christians or followers. of Jesus. “In the 343 cases of the wordbrotherthat appear in theNew Testament, the persistence of literal use is overwhelming. “Meier says. There is no reason to think about so-called stepbrothers except for the desire to turn dogma into history.
