Both Catholics and Protestants believe that Jesus has more brothers, but each side understands something very different by this. Catholics profess that all Christians are brothers of Jesus by virtue of our baptism. At the same time, we profess that Jesus had no natural brothers. The Blessed Virgin Mary was EVER VIRGIN.

Protestants (not all of them) believe that Mary Most Holy had more natural children. They think that she was a virgin only until the birth of Jesus and that afterward she had children with Saint Joseph. They base this on biblical passages that mention the “brothers” of Jesus:

  • Matthew 12:46: “While he was still speaking to the crowds, his mother and his brothers stood outside, seeking to speak to him.”
  • Mark 6:3: “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.
  • John 7:5: “For even his brothers did not believe in him.”
  • Acts 1:14: “All these with one accord devoted themselves to prayer, together with some women, and Mary the mother of Jesus, and his brothers.”
  • 1 Corinthians 9:5: “Do we not have the right to be accompanied by a Christian wife, as do the other apostles and the brothers of the Lord and Cephas?”

The use of the word “brothers”

To understand the passages above, it is essential to understand how words were used according to the Hebrew culture of the New Testament authors. Both Hebrew and Aramaic (the language of Jesus and his disciples) use the same word to designate brothers, cousins, and members of the same clan.

The New Testament was written in Greek, but its authors belonged to Hebrew culture. The Hebrew word meaning “brothers” or “cousins” was translated into the original Greek text of the Bible as “adelphos.” Unlike Hebrew or Aramaic, Greek has a specific word for cousins: “anepsios”; but the translators of the New Testament, being of Hebrew culture, preferred to use “adelphos” to translate the Aramaic word “brothers,” which, as we have said, includes cousins and other relationships. In other words, they used the Greek word, but in the original sense of the language of Jesus.

The same use of “adelphos” occurs in the Septuagint, the translation of the Sacred Scriptures (O.T.) into Greek, made by the Jews shortly before the coming of Christ. This translation is important because it is the one used by the N.T. authors for most of their references to the O.T.

Some examples of “brother” used to designate other relationships in the Old Testament:

  • Lot is called Abraham’s “brother” in Gen. 14:14, but we know from the same Bible that he was his nephew (Gen. 11:26-28).
  • Jacob is called the “brother” of Laban, who is in fact his uncle (Gen. 29:15).
  • 1 Chronicles 23:21-22: “The sons of Mahli: Eleazar and Kish. Eleazar died having no sons, but daughters only; and their brothers, the sons of Kish, took them as wives.” — Here it is cousins who marry, but they are called “brothers,” according to Hebrew custom.
  • See also: 1 Sam. 9:13; 20:32; 2 Sam. 1:26; Amos 1:9.

“Brothers” did not have to be close relatives.

  • Deuteronomy 23:8: “You shall not abhor an Edomite, for he is your brother.”
  • The 42 “brothers” of King Ahaziah who were going down to greet the sons of the same king and of the queen. Cf. 2 Kings 10:13-14.
  • Nehemiah 5:8: “and I said to them: ‘We, as far as we are able, have bought back our Jewish brothers who had been sold to the nations. But now you are selling your brothers!'”
  • Jeremiah 34:9: “that everyone should set free his Hebrew male or female slave, so that no Jew should be enslaved to his brother.”

“Brothers of Jesus” could refer — if we had only the biblical text — to sons of Saint Joseph, by a first wife, if he was a widower. But the great master of Sacred Scripture in the first centuries (the fourth century), Saint Jerome, argued instead that they were cousins, which fits perfectly, as we have seen, within the sense of “brothers” held by the Jews of that time. Saint Jerome, like the other Fathers of the Church, defended the perpetual virginity of Mary Most Holy.

There is not a single suggestion in the Bible that the Virgin had other children. When the Holy Family flees to Egypt, when the Child is lost in Jerusalem (Luke 2:41-51), the reference is always to one only Son. The people of Nazareth, even when they speak of Jesus’ “brothers,” refer to him as “the son of Mary,” not as “a son of Mary” (Mk 6:3). This use of words would be very strange if those other “brothers” were in fact Mary’s children.

There are also other cultural reasons indicating that Jesus’ “brothers” were not blood brothers. Among the Jews, younger brothers could not advise older ones. Therefore, when in a passage one brother advises another, it is understood that the one giving advice is the elder. Yet Jesus’ “brothers” advise him to go to Judea (John 7:3-4). On another occasion they try to take him away (Mark 3:21). These brothers, then, cannot be blood brothers, since Jesus is the firstborn (he had no older brothers — cf. Luke 2:7).

The fraud of the “James ossuary.”

In 2002 an ossuary came to light with the inscription: “James, son of Joseph, brother of Jesus.” Many thought that this “discovery” cast doubt on the Catholic doctrine of Mary’s perpetual virginity. However, it turned out to be a fraud. This was determined by the director of the Israel Antiquities Authority, Shuka Dorfman, who announced (June 18, 2003): “The ossuary is real. But the inscription is fake. What this means is that someone took a real box and carved writing on it, probably to give it religious importance.” Sadly, the media that spread the deception so widely did almost nothing to correct it.

Let us see what happened when Jesus was dying on the cross.

John 19:26-27: “When Jesus saw his mother, and the disciple whom he loved standing near, he said to his mother, ‘Woman, behold, your son!’ Then he said to the disciple, ‘Behold, your mother!’ And from that hour the disciple took her into his own home.”

The Gospel gives us the names of four of Jesus’ “brothers”: James, Joses, Simon, and Judas. If they were his blood brothers, they would be Mary’s sons. Why, then, did Jesus entrust her to John?

—Hilary of Poitiers, Father of the Church: “If they (the brothers of the Lord) had been sons of Mary, and not those of Joseph’s first marriage, she would never have been entrusted at the moment of the Passion to the apostle John as his mother.” (Commentary on Matthew 1.4 — A.D. 354)

Brothers by grace

Jesus establishes a mother-son relationship that is not by nature but by grace. Like John, all the baptized are children of Mary; she is our Mother, and we are brothers of Jesus.

In Revelation we see, in fact, who Mary’s other children are.

Revelation 12:17: “Then, angry with the Woman, he went off to make war on the rest of her children, those who keep the commandments of God and bear testimony to Jesus.”

It is therefore a pity that some Christians renounce the Mother whom Jesus himself has given to those who must remain faithful in the battle.

Finally, is it not true that Protestants, like us, commonly greet one another as “brothers” and that their preachers address the people with the words “dear brothers”? Would it be logical to understand that they are blood brothers? Then why not also use the good judgment God gives us to understand the Sacred Scriptures? Why not humbly accept the wise interpretation Christians have had since the first centuries, which is the teaching of the Church? Let us pray, then, that hearts may be softened and that one day we may all live in peace, as brothers in Christ and with our mother, Mary Most Holy.

Source: Corazones.org