Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers: Series II/Volume I/Church History of Eusebius/Book II/Chapter 23

The Martyrdom of James, who was called the Brother of the Lord.

1. after Paul, in consequence of his appeal to C&#230;sar, had been sent to Rome by Festus, the Jews, being frustrated in their hope of entrapping him by the snares which they had laid for him, turned against James, the brother of the Lord, to whom the episcopal seat at Jerusalem had been entrusted by the apostles. The following daring measures were undertaken by them against him.

2. Leading him into their midst they demanded of him that he should renounce faith in Christ in the presence of all the people. But, contrary to the opinion of all, with a clear voice, and with greater boldness than they had anticipated, he spoke out before the whole multitude and confessed that our Saviour and Lord Jesus is the Son of God. But they were unable to bear longer the testimony of the man who, on account of the excellence of ascetic virtue and of piety which he exhibited in his life, was esteemed by all as the most just of men, and consequently they slew him. Opportunity for this deed of violence was furnished by the prevailing anarchy, which was caused by the fact that Festus had died just at this time in Judea, and that the province was thus without a governor and head.

3. The manner of James&#8217; death has been already indicated by the above-quoted words of Clement, who records that he was thrown from the pinnacle of the temple, and was beaten to death with a club. But Hegesippus, who lived immediately after the apostles, gives the most accurate account in the fifth book of his Memoirs. He writes as follows:

4. &#8220;James, the brother of the Lord, succeeded to the government of the Church in conjunction with the apostles. He has been called the Just by all from the time of our Saviour to the present day; for there were many that bore the name of James.

5. He was holy from his mother&#8217;s womb; and he drank no wine nor strong drink, nor did he eat flesh. No razor came upon his head; he did not anoint himself with oil, and he did not use the bath.

6. He alone was permitted to enter into the holy place; for he wore not woolen but linen garments. And he was in the habit of entering alone into the temple, and was frequently found upon his knees begging forgiveness for the people, so that his knees became hard like those of a camel, in consequence of his constantly bending them in his worship of God, and asking forgiveness for the people.

7. Because of his exceeding great justice he was called the Just, and Oblias, which signifies in Greek, &#8216;Bulwark of the people&#8217; and &#8216;Justice,&#8217; in accordance with what the prophets declare concerning him.

8. Now some of the seven sects, which existed among the people and which have been mentioned by me in the Memoirs, asked him, &#8216;What is the gate of Jesus?&#8217; and he replied that he was the Saviour.

9. On account of these words some believed that Jesus is the Christ. But the sects mentioned above did not believe either in a resurrection or in one&#8217;s coming to give to every man according to his works. But as many as believed did so on account of James.

10. Therefore when many even of the rulers believed, there was a commotion among the Jews and Scribes and Pharisees, who said that there was danger that the whole people would be looking for Jesus as the Christ. Coming therefore in a body to James they said, &#8216;We entreat thee, restrain the people; for they are gone astray in regard to Jesus, as if he were the Christ. We entreat thee to persuade all that have come to the feast of the Passover concerning Jesus; for we all have confidence in thee. For we bear thee witness, as do all the people, that thou art just, and dost not respect persons.

11. Do thou therefore persuade the multitude not to be led astray concerning Jesus. For the whole people, and all of us also, have confidence in thee. Stand therefore upon the pinnacle of the temple, that from that high position thou mayest be clearly seen, and that thy words may be readily heard by all the people. For all the tribes, with the Gentiles also, are come together on account of the Passover.&#8217;

12. The aforesaid Scribes and Pharisees therefore placed James upon the pinnacle of the temple, and cried out to him and said: &#8216;Thou just one, in whom we ought all to have confidence, forasmuch as the people are led astray after Jesus, the crucified one, declare to us, what is the gate of Jesus.&#8217;

13. And he answered with a loud voice, &#8216;Why do ye ask me concerning Jesus, the Son of Man? He himself sitteth in heaven at the right hand of the great Power, and is about to come upon the clouds of heaven.&#8217;

14. And when many were fully convinced and gloried in the testimony of James, and said, &#8216;Hosanna to the Son of David,&#8217; these same Scribes and Pharisees said again to one another, &#8216;We have done badly in supplying such testimony to Jesus. But let us go up and throw him down, in order that they may be afraid to believe him.&#8217;

15. And they cried out, saying, &#8216;Oh! oh! the just man is also in error.&#8217; And they fulfilled the Scripture written in Isaiah, &#8216;Let us take away the just man, because he is troublesome to us: therefore they shall eat the fruit of their doings.&#8217;

16. So they went up and threw down the just man, and said to each other, &#8216;Let us stone James the Just.&#8217; And they began to stone him, for he was not killed by the fall; but he turned and knelt down and said, &#8216;I entreat thee, Lord God our Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.&#8217;

17. And while they were thus stoning him one of the priests of the sons of Rechab, the son of the Rechabites, &#8190;&#929;&#945;&#967;&#945;&#946;&#949;&#8055;&#956;, which is simply the reproduction in Greek letters of the Hebrew plural, and is equivalent to &#8220;the Rechabites.&#8221; But Hegesippus uses it without any article as if it were the name of an individual, just as he uses the name &#8190;&#929;&#951;&#967;&#8364;&#946; which immediately precedes. The Rechabites were a tribe who took their origin from Jehonadab, the son of Rechab, who appears from 1 Chron. ii. 55 to have belonged to a branch of the Kenites, the Arabian tribe which came into Palestine with the Israelites. Jehonadab enjoined upon his descendants a nomadic and ascetic mode of life, which they observed with great strictness for centuries, and received a blessing from God on account of their steadfastness (Jer. xxxv. 19). That a Rechabite, who did not belong to the tribe of Judah, nor even to the genuine people of Israel, should have been a priest seems at first sight inexplicable. Different solutions have been offered. Some think that Hegesippus was mistaken,&#8212;the source from which he took his account having confounded this ascetic Rechabite with a priest,&#8212;but this is hardly probable. Plumptre, in Smith&#8217;s ''Bib. Dict.'' art. Rechabites (which see for a full account of the tribe), thinks that the blessing pronounced upon them by God (Jer. xxxv. 19) included their solemn adoption among the people of Israel, and their incorporation into the tribe of Levi, and therefore into the number of the priests. Others (e.g. Tillemont, H. E. I. p. 633) have supposed that many Jews, including also priests, embraced the practices and the institutions of the Rechabites and were therefore identified with them. The language here, however, seems to imply a native Rechabite, and it is probable that Hegesippus at least believed this person to be such, whether his belief was correct or not. See Routh, I. p. 243 sq. who are mentioned by Jeremiah the prophet, cried out, saying, &#8216;Cease, what do ye? The just one prayeth for you.&#8217;

18. And one of them, who was a fuller, took the club with which he beat out clothes and struck the just man on the head. And thus he suffered martyrdom. And they buried him on the spot, by the temple, and his monument still remains by the temple. He became a true witness, both to Jews and Greeks, that Jesus is the Christ. And immediately Vespasian besieged them.&#8221;

19. These things are related at length by Hegesippus, who is in agreement with Clement. James was so admirable a man and so celebrated among all for his justice, that the more sensible even of the Jews were of the opinion that this was the cause of the siege of Jerusalem, which happened to them immediately after his martyrdom for no other reason than their daring act against him.

20. Josephus, at least, has not hesitated to testify this in his writings, where he says, &#8220;These things happened to the Jews to avenge James the Just, who was a brother of Jesus, that is called the Christ. For the Jews slew him, although he was a most just man.&#8221;

21. And the same writer records his death also in the twentieth book of his Antiquities in the following words: &#8220;But the emperor, when he learned of the death of Festus, sent Albinus to be procurator of Judea. But the younger Ananus, who, as we have already said, had obtained the high priesthood, was of an exceedingly bold and reckless disposition. He belonged, moreover, to the sect of the Sadducees, who are the most cruel of all the Jews in the execution of judgment, as we have already shown.

22. Ananus, therefore, being of this character, and supposing that he had a favorable opportunity on account of the fact that Festus was dead, and Albinus was still on the way, called together the Sanhedrim, and brought before them the brother of Jesus, the so-called Christ, James by name, together with some others, and accused them of violating the law, and condemned them to be stoned. The date of the martyrdom of James, given here by Josephus, is 61 or 62 (at the time of the Passover, according to Hegesippus, &#167;10, above). There is no reason for doubting this date which is given with such exactness by Josephus, and it is further confirmed by Eusebius in his Chron., who puts James&#8217;s martyrdom in the seventh year of Nero, i.e. 61, while Jerome puts it in the eighth year of Nero. The Clementines and the Chronicon Paschale, which state that James survived Peter, and are therefore cited in support of a later date, are too late to be of any weight over against such an exact statement as that of Josephus, especially since Peter and James died at such a distance from one another. Hegesippus has been cited over and over again by historians as assigning the date of the martyrdom to 69, and as thus being in direct conflict with Josephus; as a consequence some follow his supposed date, others that of Josephus. But I can find no reason for asserting that Hegesippus assigns the martyrdom to 69. Certainly his words in this chapter, which are referred to, by no means necessitate such an assumption. He concludes his account with the words &#954;&#945;&#8054; &#949;&#8016;&#952;&#8058;&#962; &#927;&#8016;&#949;&#963;&#960;&#945;&#963;&#953;&#945;&#957;&#8056;&#962; &#960;&#959;&#955;&#953;&#959;&#961;&#954;&#949;&#8150; &#945;&#8016;&#964;&#959;&#8059;&#962;. The &#960;&#959;&#955;&#953;&#959;&#961;&#954;&#949;&#8150; &#945;&#8016;&#964;&#959;&#8059;&#962; is certainly to be referred to the commencement of the war (not to the siege of the city of Jerusalem, which was undertaken by Titus, not by Vespasian), i.e. to the year 67, and in such an account as this, in which the overthrow of the Jews is designedly presented in connection with the death of James, it is hyper-criticism to insist that the word &#949;&#8016;&#952;&#8059;&#962; must indicate a space of time of only a few months&#8217; duration. It is a very indefinite word, and the most we can draw from Hegesippus&#8217; account is that not long before Vespasian&#8217;s invasion of Judea, James was slain. The same may be said in regard to Eusebius&#8217; report in Bk. III. chap. 11, &#167;1, which certainly is not definite enough to be cited as a contradiction of his express statement in his Chronicle. But however it may be with this report and that of Hegesippus, the date given by Josephus is undoubtedly to be accepted as correct.

23. But those in the city who seemed most moderate and skilled in the law were very angry at this, and sent secretly to the king, requesting him to order Ananus to cease such proceedings. For he had not done right even this first time. And certain of them also went to meet Albinus, who was journeying from Alexandria, and reminded him that it was not lawful for Ananus to summon the Sanhedrim without his knowledge.

24. And Albinus, being persuaded by their representations, wrote in anger to Ananus, threatening him with punishment. And the king, Agrippa, in consequence, deprived him of the high priesthood, which he had held three months, and appointed Jesus, the son of Damn&#230;us.&#8221;

25. These things are recorded in regard to James, who is said to be the author of the first of the so-called catholic epistles. But it is to be observed that it is disputed; &#957;&#959;&#952;&#949;&#8059;&#949;&#964;&#945;&#953;. It is common to translate the word &#957;&#8057;&#952;&#959;&#962;, &#8220;spurious&#8221; (and the kindred verb, &#8220;to be spurious&#8221;); but it is plain enough from this passage, as also from others that Eusebius did not employ the word in that sense. He commonly used it in fact, in a loose way, to mean &#8220;disputed,&#8221; in the same sense in which he often employed the word &#7936;&#957;&#964;&#953;&#955;&#949;&#947;&#8057;&#956;&#949;&#957;&#959;&#962;. L&#252;cke, indeed, maintained that Eusebius always used the words &#957;&#8057;&#952;&#959;&#962; and &#7936;&#957;&#964;&#953;&#955;&#949;&#947;&#8057;&#956;&#949;&#957;&#959;&#962; as synonymous; but in Bk. III. chap. 25, as pointed out in note 1 on that chapter, he employed the words as respective designations of two distinct classes of books.

The Epistle of James is classed by Eusebius (in Bk. III. chap. 25) among the antilegomena. The ancient testimonies for its authenticity are very few. It was used by no one, except Hermas, down to the end of the second century. Iren&#230;us seems to have known the epistle (his works exhibit some apparent reminiscences of it), but he nowhere directly cites it. The Muratorian Fragment omits it, but the Syriac Peshito contains it, and Clement of Alexandria shows a few faint reminiscences of it in his extant works, and according to Eusebius VI. 14, wrote commentaries upon &#8220;Jude and the other catholic epistles.&#8221; It is quoted frequently by Origen, who first connects it with the &#8220;Brother of the Lord,&#8221; but does not express himself with decision as to its authenticity. From his time on it was commonly accepted as the work of &#8220;James, the Lord&#8217;s brother.&#8221; Eusebius throws it among the antilegomena; not necessarily because he considered it unauthentic, but because the early testimonies for it are too few to raise it to the dignity of one of the homologoumena (see Bk. III. chap. 25, note 1). Luther rejected the epistle upon purely dogmatic grounds. The advanced critical school are unanimous in considering it a post-apostolic work, and many conservative scholars agree with them. See Holtzmann&#8217;s Einleitung, p. 475 sqq. and Weiss&#8217; Einleitung, p. 396 sqq. The latter defends its authenticity (i.e. the authorship of James, the brother of the Lord), and, in agreement with many other scholars of conservative tendencies, throws its origin back into the early part of the fifties. at least, not many of the ancients have mentioned it, as is the case likewise with the epistle that bears the name of Jude, which is also one of the seven so-called catholic epistles. Nevertheless we know that these also, with the rest, have been read publicly in very many churches.