[Salvation]

Do we know the name of the other disciples who was on his way to Emmaus when Christ joined them and explained the Holy Scriptures to them?

One of my dreams would be to walk with Jesus like these two men did!

[Salvation]

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^{5 6} Now that very day two of them were going to a village seven miles from Jerusalem called Emmaus,

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and they were conversing about all the things that had occurred.

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And it happened that while they were conversing and debating, Jesus himself drew near and walked with them,

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⁷ but their eyes were prevented from recognizing him.

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He asked them, "What are you discussing as you walk along?" They stopped, looking downcast.

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One of them, named Cleopas, said to him in reply, "Are you the only visitor to Jerusalem who does not know of the things that have taken place there in these days?"

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And he replied to them, "What sort of things?" They said to him, "The things that happened to Jesus the Nazarene, who was a prophet mighty in deed and word before God and all the people,

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how our chief priests and rulers both handed him over to a sentence of death and crucified him.

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But we were hoping that he would be the one to redeem Israel; and besides all this, it is now the third day since this took place.

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Some women from our group, however, have astounded us: they were at the tomb early in the morning

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and did not find his body; they came back and reported that they had indeed seen a vision of angels who announced that he was alive.

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Then some of those with us went to the tomb and found things just as the women had described, but him they did not see."

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And he said to them, "Oh, how foolish you are! How slow of heart to believe all that the prophets spoke!

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Was it not necessary that the Messiah should suffer ⁸ these things and enter into his glory?"

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Then beginning with Moses and all the prophets, he interpreted to them what referred to him in all the scriptures.

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As they approached the village to which they were going, he gave the impression that he was going on farther.

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But they urged him, "Stay with us, for it is nearly evening and the day is almost over." So he went in to stay with them.

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And it happened that, while he was with them at table, he took bread, said the blessing, broke it, and gave it to them.

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With that their eyes were opened and they recognized him, but he vanished from their sight.

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Then they said to each other, "Were not our hearts burning (within us) while he spoke to us on the way and opened the scriptures to us?"

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So they set out at once and returned to Jerusalem where they found gathered together the eleven and those with them

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who were saying, "The Lord has truly been raised and has appeared to Simon!"

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Then the two recounted what had taken place on the way and how he was made known to them in the breaking of the bread.

 

Footnotes:

 

⁶ [13] Seven miles: literally, "sixty stades." A stade was 607 feet. Some manuscripts read "160 stades" or more than eighteen miles. The exact location of Emmaus is disputed.

⁷ [16] A consistent feature of the resurrection stories is that the risen Jesus was different and initially unrecognizable (Luke 24:37; Mark 16:12; John 20:14; 21:4).

⁸ [26] That the Messiah should suffer . . . : Luke is the only New Testament writer to speak explicitly of a suffering Messiah (Luke 24:26, 46; Acts 3:18; 17:3; 26:23). The idea of a suffering Messiah is not found in the Old Testament or in other Jewish literature prior to the New Testament period, although the idea is hinted at in Mark 8:31-33. See the notes on Matthew 26:63 and 26:67-68.

[annalex]

Mary of Cleophas, Cleopas, or Clopas is the mother of James the Less, the bishop of Jerusalem known as the "brother of the Lord" and son of Alpheus. Alpheus is probably yet another spelling of the same name,

Mary of Cleophas

This title occurs only in John 19:25. A comparison of the lists of those who stood at the foot of the cross would seem to identify her with Mary, the mother of James the Less and Joseph (Mark 15:40; cf. Matthew 27:56). Some have indeed tried to identify her with the Salome of Mark 15:40, but St. John's reticence concerning himself and his relatives seems conclusive against this (cf. John 21:2). In the narratives of the Resurrection she is named "Mary of James"; (Mark 16:1; Luke 24:10) and "the other Mary" (Matthew 27:61; 28:1). The title of "Mary of James" is obscure. If it stood alone, we should feel inclined to render it "wife of (or sister of) James", but the recurrence of the expression "Mary the mother of James and Joseph" compels us to render it in the same way when we only read "Mary of James". Her relationship to the Blessed Virgin is obscure. James is termed "of Alpheus", i.e. presumably "son of Alpheus". St. Jerome would identify this Alpheus with Cleophas who, according to Hegesippus, was brother to St. Joseph (Hist. eccl., III, xi). In this case Mary of Cleophas, or Alpheus, would be the sister-in-law of the Blessed Virgin, and the term "sister", adelphe, in John 19:25, would cover this. But there are grave difficulties in the way of this identification of Alpheus and Cleophas. In the first place, St. Luke, who speaks of Cleophas (24:18), also speaks of Alpheus (6:15; Acts 1:13). We may question whether he would have been guilty of such a confused use of names, had they both referred to the same person. Again, while Alphas is the equivalent of the Aramaic, it is not easy to see how the Greek form of this became Cleophas, or more correctly Clopas. More probably it is a shortened form of Cleopatros.

Mary of Cleophas

This author sounds quite certain Alpheus is Cleophas:

The identity of James, Jude and Simon

James is without doubt the Bishop of Jerusalem (Acts 12:17, 15:13, 21:18; Galatians 1:19; 2:9-12) and the author of the first Catholic Epistle. His identity with James the Less (Mark 15:40) and the Apostle James, the son of Alpheus (Matthew 10:3; Mark 3:18), although contested by many Protestant critics, may also be considered as certain. There is no reasonable doubt that in Galatians 1:19: "But other of the apostles [besides Cephas] I saw none, saving James the brother of the Lord", St. Paul represents James as a member of the Apostolic college. The purpose for which the statement is made, makes it clear that the "apostles" is to be taken strictly to designate the Twelve, and its truthfulness demands that the clause "saving James" be understood to mean, that in addition to Cephas, St. Paul saw another Apostle, "James the brother of the Lord" (cf. Acts 9:27). Besides, the prominence and authority of James among the Apostles (Acts 15:13; Galatians 2:9; in the latter text he is even named before Cephas) could have belonged only to one of their number. Now there were only two Apostles named James: James the son of Zebedee, and James the son of Alpheus (Matthew 10:3; Mark 3:18; Luke 6:16; Acts 1:13). The former is out of the question, since he was dead at the time of the events to which Acts 15:6 ssq., and Galatians 2:9-12 refer (cf. Acts 12:2). James "the brother of the Lord" is therefore one with James the son of Alpheus, and consequently with James the Less, the identity of these two being generally conceded. Again, on comparing John 19:25 with Matthew 27:56, and Mark 15:40 (cf. Mark 15:47; 16:1), we find that Mary of Cleophas, or more correctly Clopas (Klopas), the sister of Mary the Mother of Christ, is the same as Mary the mother of James the Less and of Joseph, or Joses. As married women are not distinguished by the addition of their father's name, Mary of Clopas must be the wife of Clopas, and not his daughter, as has been maintained. Moreover, the names of her sons and the order in which they are given, no doubt the order of seniority, warrant us in identifying these sons with James and Joseph, or Joses, the "brethren" of the Lord. The existence among the early followers of Christ of two sets of brothers having the same names in the order of age, is not likely, and cannot be assumed without proof. Once this identity is conceded, the conclusion cannot well be avoided that Clopas and Alpheus are one person, even if the two names are quite distinct. It is, however, highly probable, and commonly admitted, that Clopas and Alpheus are merely different transcriptions of the same Aramaic word Halphai. James and Joseph the "brethren" of the Lord are thus the sons of Alpheus.

The Brethren of the Lord