Joseph Barsabbas
Catholicism | |
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Feast | 20 July |
In the
- 21Wherefore of these men who have companied with us, all the time that the Lord Jesus came in and went out among us,
- 22Beginning from the baptism of John, until the day wherein he was taken up from us, one of these must be made a witness with us of his resurrection.
- 23And they appointed two, Joseph, called Barsabas, who was surnamed Justus, and Matthias.
- 24And praying, they said: Thou, Lord, who knowest the heart of all men, shew whether of these two thou hast chosen,
- 25To take the place of this ministry and apostleship, from which Judas hath by transgression fallen, that he might go to his own place.
- 26And they gave them lot, and the lot fell upon Matthias, and he was numbered with the eleven apostles.
- —Acts 1:21–26 D–R
The English
Both Joseph and Matthias had been followers of Jesus from the beginning of Jesus' public ministry after the baptism he received from John. He had continued as a member of the larger company of disciples even to the time that Jesus was taken up from them.
Further identification of Joseph is uncertain. In Christian tradition he is numbered among the Seventy disciples mentioned in Luke 10:1–24, although the biblical text mentions no names. "After these things the Lord appointed other seventy also, and sent them two and two before his face into every city and place, whither he himself would come." (10:1)
Biblical scholar
The fourth-century church historian Eusebius reports a story he attributed to Papias from very early in the second century, which he had, in turn, learned in Hierapolis from the daughters of Philip the Evangelist. It was said "he drank poison but by the Lord's grace suffered no harm."[4] Whether this story might have inspired one feature in the secondary longer ending of Mark's Gospel - "These signs will accompany those who believe:...they will pick up snakes with their hands; and when they drink deadly poison, it will not hurt them at all"[5] - is possible but unproved.
In Christian tradition, this Justus went on to become
References
- ^ "Ioustos: Matthew 1:19 and Colossians 4:11". Biblehub.
- ^ "Occurrences of the Greek word "dikaios" in the Bible". Bible hub.
- ^ "Robert Eisenman's "James the Brother of Jesus": A Higher-Critical Review". www.depts.drew.edu.
- ^ eusebius, Ecclessiastical History III.39.9
- ^ Mark 16.18
- ^ Josephus, Wars of the Jews, Book 4, chapter 8, section 1
- ^ Bishop Demetri Khoury, A Cloud of Witnesses: Saints and Martyrs from the Holy Land, page 628