The Brothers of Jesus

The Gospels speak several times of the “brothers of Jesus.” Some have seen in this an objection to the perpetual virginity of Mary: if Jesus had brothers, his mother would have had other children. Scripture itself dispels the difficulty.

A word that means wide kinship

In the language of the Bible, the word “brother” extends beyond mere siblinghood. Hebrew, like the Aramaic that Jesus spoke, has no distinct term for cousin or nephew: a single word covers all close kinship. Thus Abraham calls Lot his brother, though Lot is his nephew: “For we are brothers.” Genesis 13:8 The Gospels, written in Greek on this Semitic ground, keep this usage: they designate the “brothers” of Jesus by the word adelphos (ἀδελφός), which extends to cousins as to more distant relatives.

The sons of another Mary

Scripture confirms it by a cross-reference. It names among the “brothers” of Jesus James and Joseph: “Are not his brothers called James, Joseph, Simon and Jude?” Matthew 13:55 Now these two have for mother another Mary, distinct from the mother of Jesus and present like her at the foot of the Cross: “Among them Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother of James and Joseph.” Matthew 27:56 James and Joseph are therefore not the sons of the Virgin, but of this other Mary.

Mary entrusted to the disciple

The Cross itself confirms it. At the hour of his death, Jesus entrusts his mother to the disciple whom he loved: “Behold your mother. And from that hour the disciple took her into his home.” John 19:26-27 In the custom of Israel, the care of a mother left alone fell to her sons. Had Mary had others than Jesus, it is to them that he would have committed her, and not to a disciple who was not of her family. By entrusting her to John, Christ shows that she has no other son to take her in.

A kinship, not a siblinghood

The “brethren of the Lord” thus belong to his wider family, his close relatives, taking nothing away from the virginity of his mother. Mary had but one Son, Jesus, and she remained ever-virgin.