Posted on 05/31/2014 4:33:21 PM PDT by narses
In my previous article, I wrote about the “Hebraic” use of the Greek adelphos: as applying to cousins, fellow countrymen, and a wide array of uses beyond the meaning of “sibling.” Yet it is unanimously translated as “brother” in the King James Version (KJV): 246 times. The cognate adelphe is translated 24 times only as “sister”. This is because it reflects Hebrew usage, translated into Greek. Briefly put, in Jesus’ Hebrew culture (and Middle Eastern culture even today), cousins were called “brothers”.
Brothers or Cousins?
Now, it’s true that sungenis (Greek for “cousin”) and its cognate sungenia appear in the New Testament fifteen times (sungenia: Lk 1:61; Acts 7:3, 14; sungenis: Mk 6:4; Lk 1:36, 58; 2:44; 14:12; 21:16; Jn 18:26; Acts 10:24; Rom 9:3; 16:7, 11, 21). But they are usually translated kinsmen, kinsfolk, or kindred in KJV: that is, in a sense wider than cousin: often referring to the entire nation of Hebrews. Thus, the eminent Protestant linguist W. E. Vine, in his Expository Dictionary of New Testament Words, lists sungenis not only under “Cousin” but also under “Kin, Kinsfolk, Kinsman, Kinswoman.”
In all but two of these occurrences, the authors were either Luke or Paul. Luke was a Greek Gentile. Paul, though Jewish, was raised in the very cosmopolitan, culturally Greek town of Tarsus. But even so, both still clearly used adelphos many times with the meaning of non-sibling (Lk 10:29; Acts 3:17; 7:23-26; Rom 1:7, 13; 9:3; 1 Thess 1:4). They understood what all these words meant, yet they continued to use adelphos even in those instances that had a non-sibling application.
Strikingly, it looks like every time St. Paul uses adelphos (unless I missed one or two), he means it as something other than blood brother or sibling. He uses the word or related cognates no less than 138 times in this way. Yet we often hear about Galatians 1:19: “James the Lord’s brother.” 137 other times, Paul means non-sibling, yet amazingly enough, here he must mean sibling, because (so we are told) he uses the word adelphos? That doesn’t make any sense.
Some folks think it is a compelling argument that sungenis isn’t used to describe the brothers of Jesus. But they need to examine Mark 6:4 (RSV), where sungenis appears:
And Jesus said to them, “A prophet is not without honor, except in his own country, and among his own kin, and in his own house.” (cf. Jn 7:5: “For even his brothers did not believe in him”)
What is the context? Let’s look at the preceding verse, where the people in “his own country” (6:1) exclaimed: “Is not this the carpenter, the son of Mary and brother of James and Joses and Judas and Simon, and are not his sisters here with us?” And they took offense at him. It can plausibly be argued, then, that Jesus’ reference to kin (sungenis) refers (at least in part) back to this mention of His “brothers” and “sisters”: His relatives. Since we know that sungenis means cousins or more distant relatives, that would be an indication of the status of those called Jesus’ “brothers”.
What about Jude and James?
Jude is called the Lord’s “brother” in Matthew 13:55 and Mark 6:3. If this is the same Jude who wrote the epistle bearing that name (as many think), he calls himself “a servant of Jesus Christ and brother of James” (Jude 1:1). Now, suppose for a moment that he was Jesus’ blood brother. In that case, he refrains from referring to himself as the Lord’s own sibling (while we are told that such a phraseology occurs several times in the New Testament, referring to a sibling relationship) and chooses instead to identify himself as James‘ brother. This is far too strange and implausible to believe.
Moreover, James also refrains from calling himself Jesus’ brother, in his epistle (James 1:1: “servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ”): even though St. Paul calls him “the Lord’s brother” (Gal 1:19: dealt with above). It’s true that Scripture doesn’t come right out and explicitly state that Mary was a perpetual virgin. But nothing in Scripture contradicts that notion, and (to say the same thing another way) nothing in the perpetual virginity doctrine contradicts Scripture. Moreover, no Scripture can be produced that absolutely, undeniably, compellingly defeats the perpetual virginity of Mary. Human Tradition
The alleged disproofs utterly fail in their purpose. The attempted linguistic argument against Mary’s perpetual virginity from the mere use of the word “brothers” in English translations (and from sungenis) falls flat at every turn, as we have seen.
If there is any purely “human” tradition here, then, it is the denial of the perpetual virginity of Mary, since it originated (mostly) some 1700 years after the initial apostolic deposit: just as all heresies are much later corruptions. The earliest Church fathers know of no such thing. To a person, they all testify that Mary was perpetually a virgin, and indeed, thought that this protected the doctrine of the Incarnation, as a miraculous birth from a mother who was a virgin before, during and after the birth.
Does the RCC believe that sex within a marriage covenant makes you unrighteous?
Break out your Bibles and study the messianic Psalms.
The words of Jesus prophesized 1,000 years before Christ
Psalm 69 8
I am become a stranger unto my brethren, and an alien unto my mother’s children.
What a coincidence! That was the exact same aeon and a half where the Church prevented the Bible from getting into the hands of the common Christian.
Psalms 69:8
“I am become a stranger unto my brethren, (His fellow Jews) and an alien unto my mother’s children.” Now there’s one group of people that don’t like that verse. And who are they?
Well, the Roman Catholics are just exercised by the thought that Jesus had physical brothers. Yes, Mary and Joseph had sons beyond Christ. She was just a human mother. She wasn’t the mother of God. She was the mother of human beings. So here is a good verse to show these people. That He is “an alien unto my mother’s (Mary’s) children.”
Now stop and think. When did the family of Joseph and Mary recognize and believe who Jesus was? Not until after, I think, His crucifixion. Hey, they detested Him just as much as anybody else in Nazareth for the longest time. But I think they finally came to believe that He was who He said He was. So it’s evident that Joseph and Mary had other children after Christ was born (Matthew 13:55-56). All right, read it again.
Psalms 69:8-9
“I am become a stranger unto my brethren, (His fellow Jews. His family) and an alien (He was a castoff.) unto my mother’s children. (Who would have been His physical brothers. Half brothers!) 9. For the zeal of thine house hath eaten me up; and the reproaches of them that reproached thee are fallen upon me.” In other words, all the anger of Israel in rebellion against the Grace of God—they heaped on Him with their scorn and their ridicule and their demand in that He be crucified.
Psalms 69:10-11
“When I wept, and chastened my soul with fasting, that was to my reproach. 11. I made sackcloth also my garment; and I became a proverb to them.” Now what’s He referring to? Did He walk up and down the streets and highways of Israel in the apparel of the kings and queens? NO! But what? As almost one who had nothing.
And I think He put it best when He said that birds have nests and animals have dens but He does not have a place to lay His head. See, He was absolutely the poorest of the poor from the physical aspect, so that no one could use that as an excuse for rejecting Him. He was right on their level, and yet, they hated Him. Verse 11 again:
http://lesfeldick.org/lesbk79.html
> “Maybe First-Born has a rather expanded meaning.” <
Someone else alluded to ‘firstborn’. I haven’t investigated that. My comments concerned a different part of the passage.
“How does that question pop into the discussion?”
Mary and Joseph were married, but hew never copulated with her? That is a bunch of baldersash!
Concur, that is scriptural evidence
“Strikingly, it looks like every time St. Paul uses adelphos (unless I missed one or two), he means it as something other than blood brother or sibling. He uses the word or related cognates no less than 138 times in this way.”
This is a deliberately deceptive statement. Paul normally uses ‘brother’ to mean the spiritual brother, and that in turn does not mean the spiritual cousin. Here is a sample of his use of brother:
Rom 14:10
But you, why do you judge your brother? Or you again, why do you regard your brother with contempt? For we will all stand before the judgment seat of God.
Rom 14:15
For if because of food your brother is hurt, you are no longer walking according to love. Do not destroy with your food him for whom Christ died.
Rom 14:21
It is good not to eat meat or to drink wine, or to do anything by which your brother stumbles.
Rom 16:23
Gaius, host to me and to the whole church, greets you. Erastus, the city treasurer greets you, and Quartus, the brother.
1Co 1:1
Paul, called as an apostle of Jesus Christ by the will of God, and Sosthenes our brother,
When discussing our brothers in Christ, Paul was a monotheist. In John we read, “ But to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God...”
It is in this sense Paul usually uses “brother”. If we have ONE father, then we are “brothers”. If we have multiple fathers but are related, we are “cousins”. Thus Paul’s use is that of brother, not cousin - the sons of one father!
Dave Armstrong’s statement is deliberately misleading. If you want to know the truth, seek it in scripture rather than getting it second hand from someone who does not honor the truth.
Since Psalm 69:5 reads:
“5 O God, thou knowest my foolishness; and my sins are not hid from thee”
Are you also contending that Jesus sinned?
So it wasn’t a big deal that Mary bore the Sacred Son of God and Salvation to all mankind?
From the article:
Jude is called the Lord’s “brother” in Matthew 13:55 and Mark 6:3. If this is the same Jude who wrote the epistle bearing that name (as many think), he calls himself “a servant of Jesus Christ and brother of James” (Jude 1:1). Now, suppose for a moment that he was Jesus’ blood brother. In that case, he refrains from referring to himself as the Lord’s own sibling (while we are told that such a phraseology occurs several times in the New Testament, referring to a sibling relationship) and chooses instead to identify himself as James‘ brother. This is far too strange and implausible to believe.
Moreover, James also refrains from calling himself Jesus’ brother, in his epistle (James 1:1: “servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ”)...
Of course not. He took the sins of humanity upon himself to free us from the curse of sin that Adam subjected us to.
Come on now...you know you can't read and understand the clear teachings of the Bible without someone to tell you what it means....:)
24 Then Joseph being raised from sleep did as the angel of the Lord had bidden him, and took unto him his wife: 25 And knew her not till she had brought forth her firstborn son: and he called his name JESUS.
She "knew" her husband after Jesus was born. "Know" is a euphemism for carnal knowledge/sexual intercourse.
Totally unrelated, but I have a friend whose first exposure to the Bible was reading the Song of Solomon. Obviously it worked, because today he is a very strong Christian.
Come on now...you know you can't just rely on the Bible for these things. I mean, surely, some saint somewhere down the road heard this from someone else who thought that it meant something and so on and so on.
What the hell does your post supposed to mean? And no, she was definitely a virgin when she was ‘implanted’ by the Holy Spirit with God’s seed to bear Jesus, the Christ, the Son of God.
Perpeually a virgin? All who espouse that are smoking something funny.
I don't know if it's ignorance or deceit that compels these authors to try to trash the scriptures...
No one ever claimed adelphos only meant brother from the same womb...No one...
Adelphos means a brother, literally or figuratively...
If two men are Christians they are brothers in Christ...If a man belongs to a union he is a union brother...If a male is your blood brother??? Adelphos...
What adelphos does NOT mean is kin, kinfolk, cousin, relative, in-law or out-law...It means 'only' brother...
Doesn't matter what brother means in Hebrew or Aramaic...Doesn't matter if Jesus only spoke Aramaic...Jesus had the bible written to the entire world in Greek...And maybe it was because Greek had the language where brother and kinfolk could be distinguished from each other...
You have nothing to espouse but ad hominem attacks, you are 2000 years and 2 continents separated from the Israel Christ lived in. Thank you.
An argument that appears to be based on ignorance of scripture...It could be that Jesus' brother were all too you to care for his mother...One thing we do know is that none of them believed in Jesus at the time and Jesus would have wanted his mother to be cared for by a believer...
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