[ealgeone]

"Is not this the carpenter's son? Is not His mother called Mary, and His brothers, James and Joseph and Simon and Judas? Matthew 13:55 NASB

But I did not see any other of the apostles except James, the Lord's brother. Galatians 1:19 NASB

And let's not play the brother means game either. The Greek has other words for cousins which are not used in these or the other passages dealing with this topic.

[metmom]

Strong's Concordance

http://biblehub.com/greek/80.htm

adelphos: a brother

Original Word: ἀδελφός, οῦ, ὁ

Part of Speech: Noun, Masculine

Transliteration: adelphos

Phonetic Spelling: (ad-el-fos')

Short Definition: a brother

Definition: a brother, member of the same religious community, especially a fellow-Christian.

Here is a link to the occurrences of the Greek word *adelphos*.

http://biblehub.com/greek/80.htm

The word *sister* (adelphe) in the Greek is the same.

http://biblehub.com/greek/79.htm

The word used is *brother* not *cousin*.

It can't mean a member of the same religious community in the context in which they occur, because then that would mean every man in Israel could be identified as Jesus' brother. So that would not identify Jesus as anyone in particular's brother.

It's not going to mean *brother in Christ* as that concept was not yet in place and the Jews, who knew Jesus as a Jew and knew His brothers as Jews, would not even begin to understand the new birth and what being in Christ meant.

They didn't even understand who JESUS was, much less being a *brother in Christ*.

The only definition left then, is to mean physical brother.

And it would not be *cousin*.

The word for *relative* that is used for Elizabeth is *suggenes*, not *adelphe*.

http://biblehub.com/greek/4773.htm

Strong's Concordance

suggenes: akin, a relative

Original Word: συγγενής, ές

Part of Speech: Adjective

Transliteration: suggenes

Phonetic Spelling: (soong-ghen-ace')

Short Definition: akin, a relative

Definition: akin to, related; subst: fellow countryman, kinsman.

[metmom]

Of course their usage of brother was the normal sense of the word.

They thought Jesus was the son of Mary and Joseph. They had not reason not to. So they had no reason to try to fudge words to make something look like the case that wasn’t.

[ravenwolf]

The Greek has other words for cousins which are not used in these or the other passages dealing with this topic.

---

Writing the Bible in greek did not change the circumstances, they were cousins.

-— James and Joseph and Simon and Judas——

At least two of these were the sons of another Mary and Clopas or Cleaopas.

Mary was a virgin.

Luke
28 And he came to her and said, “Greetings, O favored one, the Lord is with you!” 29 But she was greatly troubled at the saying, and tried to discern what sort of greeting this might be. 30 And the angel said to her, “Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God.

Mary was favored by God, i doubt if any one could really believe he would trash her after her baring his son.

She was not like the average woman, people today try to compare her to their mother but there is nothing to compare.