The “brothers” of Jesus
A friend recently sent me a Facebook message asking about a passage from the Bible she had heard at Mass:
“Can you shed light on the “brothers” of Jesus in the gospel today for me? James, Joseph, Simon and Judas…”
The passage referred to was from Matthew’s Gospel:
They were astonished [at Jesus] and said, “Where did this man get such wisdom and mighty deeds? Is he not the carpenter’s son? Is not his mother named Mary and his brothers James, Joseph, Simon, and Judas? Are not his sisters all with us? …” – Matthew 13:54-58
So what do we make of these guys, these “brothers” of Jesus?
Mary, Mary, quite contrary…
The Catholic Church teaches that Mary was not only a virgin at the time of Jesus’ birth, but also that she remained a virgin for the rest of her life. However, doesn’t the above passage mention the “brothers…[and]…sisters” of Jesus? Doesn’t that prove that Mary had other children after Christ?
As you can imagine this issue is often raised in Catholic-Protestant dialogue, since the doctrine of the Perpetual Virginity of Mary found in Sacred Tradition seems to many Protestants to obviously contradict Sacred Scripture.
There’s a lot which could be said on this subject, but in this post I would like to offer a brief response and explain how Catholics understand the mention of Jesus’ “brothers”.
