If you grew up in the same house as Jesus then you would not be under such a misaprehension.If you were convinced that your eldest brother was clearly insane and delusional how would you treat him?
Is that your impression from the beginning of John 7?If you were convinced that your eldest brother was clearly insane and delusional how would you treat him?
If you grew up in the same house as Jesus then you would not be under such a misaprehension.
You know people who grew up in the same house as JesusI have sadly known some instances where this has been the case even though the eldest sibling was not clinically insane.
You know people who grew up in the same house as Jesus
You must be a lot older than your profile states.
If you grew up in the same house as Jesus then you would not be under such a misaprehension.
I have sadly known some instances where this has been the case even though the eldest sibling was not clinically insane.
At least we may rule out that the brothers are not cousins because there is a Greek word for cousin.
Whether they were sons of Joseph/previous wife or sons of Joseph/Mary depends simply on whether one prefers to use scripture or PoJames (see Origen).
Joseph was an aging widower who had children by his first wife when he married Mary, who had only one child, Jesus.
Clearly the relationship shown in scripture of Jesus with His (half)siblings indicates He is the youngest, not the oldest, or they'd have had much more respect for Him. Mary's angst over His missing at age 12 also suggests He did not have younger siblings (who would have been babes in her arms) but was the youngest Himself. There is also the fact that it was Jesus who had to make the arrangement with John to care for Mary, again suggesting that Mary was His mother, not the mother of the other siblings.
That's the story I'm going with for now, until the Lord makes the truth clear, in which case I'll drop that theory and any other like a handful of waspnest.
Not true at all. I believe scripture demonstrates that Jesus' brothers were older than Jesus because they did not treat him as they would have if Jesus was their eldest brother, quite the opposite is apparent.
Just because there is a Greek word for cousin doesn't mean you can rule out that the "brothers" of Jesus were his cousins.
-snip-
Sure it does. In the NT:
Lk. 1:36 And, behold, thy cousin Elisabeth, she hath also conceived a son in her old age: and this is the sixth month with her, who was called barren.
"cousin" is syggenes.
So, if the brothers of Christ were cousins, the gospel writers would have used that word. They didn't. Therefore, we can rule out that the brothers were cousins.
On a different note, clearly the townspeople who knew the family would know their relationship. They thought the brothers were sons of Joseph/Mary. Just like they doubted Jesus born of a virgin.
If you were convinced that your eldest brother was clearly insane and delusional how would you treat him?
They did not believe (see John).
Had they grown up in the shadow of the incarnate God, I dare say they would have.They did not believe (see John).
Had they grown up in the shadow of the incarnate God, I dare say they would have.
Both would have been irrelevant points in that time and place. Not even delusion and insanity removed the obligation of respect to the head of the household, which is what Jesus would have been if He were the elder brother. That's true among Middle Easterners even today.
The definition in Strong's Concordance for that word is "akin to, related; subst: fellow countryman, kinsman.". It's used multiple times in the NT, and it's rarely translated as "cousin" and more often translated as relative or kinsman. Even in the verse you cite, in most translations it is not translated as "cousin". Only about a fourth of the translations on Biblegateway.com render it as "cousin". Without knowing the parentage of those involved, is it as generic as "adelphos". And I provided a Septuagint example where based on the parentage the relationship is clearly a cousin, yet it is translated into Greek as "adelphos".
The most definitive and honest approach from a Scripture alone perspective is that there's not enough information to know the exact relationship of these people to Christ. That's a perfectly legitimate answer. To profess more than that leaps beyond the text of Scripture and tries to use words that have been proven to indicate only a relationship of some type, to now mean something specific that they in no way can be said to conclusively state. They're relatives. That's all we really know, from Scripture. To assert more is to go beyond what Scripture says.
How does any of this impact what I have posted? Is there a point you are trying to make?You may dare, but Jn. 7:5 says otherwise. "For neither did his brethren believe in him."
After He was resurrected and He appeared to them, they believed. But at the cross, they were not there. John, son of Zebedee, was given the role of Mary's guardian.
Keep in mind it was prophesied that they wouldn't believe (Isaiah).
So if we go with Elizabeth was a kinswoman, we may put Mary into the house of David, like Joseph. IOW, they married within their tribe.
On the brother issue, we may agree to disagree.
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