———— Epilogue ————
The Tipping Point
James: the Lynchpin of Our Faith
After Paul gives his mission report before James and the elders in Acts 21, one of the elders (possibly James) makes a statement that hints at the growing power and influence of the church in Jerusalem:
When they heard this, they praised God. Then they said to Paul: “You see, brother, how many thousands of Jews have believed, and all of them are zealous for the law.” (Acts 21:20)
Scholars are divided about the size and influence of the Jewish church prior to the sacking of Jerusalem and the destruction of the temple by the Romans in AD 70. In addition to Luke’s account in Acts, there is a growing body of evidence from the historical record that suggests the Jewish church was reaching a cultural or religious tipping point. That would mean the growth in the numbers of adherents was so significant it was possible to imagine Christianity becoming the dominant belief system right in heart of Judaism.
Historically, the possibility of an outbreak of persecution increases significantly when the rapid growth of Christianity approaches a tipping point within a previously homogeneous culture. This was the case in Japan when the warrior general Toyotomi Hideyoshi unleashed a wave of persecution. On February 5, 1597, he ordered the crucifixion of twenty-six Christians in Nagasaki to discourage conversions, which were becoming increasingly common. By the late 1500s Christianity in Japan was reaching a tipping point. Martyrdom and slaughter stopped the spread of Christianity in its tracks.
The triumphal entry into Jerusalem
Currently, much of Boko Haram’s persecution of Christians in northern Nigeria can be seen as a backlash against the rapid growth of the faith in that predominantly Muslim region during recent decades.
For the church in Jerusalem, severe persecution after the martyrdom of Stephen was followed by a period of relative peace due to the conversion of their chief antagonist Saul of Tarsus. For roughly two decades there was an uneasy peace between the two camps. But the growth of Christianity among the Jewish diaspora did not sit well with Jewish religious authorities. Similarly, the churches’ inclusion of Gentile converts in the faith raised the ire of Jewish religious purists. The riot surrounding Paul’s arrest in the temple courts was proof of that.
High taxes and unrest with Rome only compounded the religious tension. Religious zealots resisted paying taxes since Roman coinage was offensive to them.
Roman coins had pictures of their goddess Roma or their divine emperor, which broke Jewish religious strictures against graven images and paying tribute to other gods. To make matters worse, the procurators who collected these impossible sums (Pontius Pilate was one) were in the main corrupt men who despised Jews. (1)
It appears that a tipping point was reached with the election of the new high priest Ananus. Ananus found an ideal opportunity to act against James, this troubling thorn in his side.
According to the Jewish historian Josephus, writing ca. 94, James with “certain others” was stoned in 62 at the instigation of the Sadducee high priest Ananus, as one of his first acts as high priest. Ananus was able to carry out the execution because the newly appointed Roman procurator, Albinius, had not arrived yet in Palestine. (2)
Give me oil in my lamp — Matthew 25:1-13
There is no scriptural account of the death of James. What knowledge we have comes from church tradition and relies heavily on two sources, the writings of Josephus noted above and Hegesippus. Hegesippus provides more of a plot line to this story.
According to Hegesippus, James met his death after being presented to the people at Passover to give his impartial judgment about Jesus. When he proclaimed Jesus as the Son of man, seated at God’ right hand, he was cast down from the temple, stoned and clubbed to death. (3)
There is something darkly fitting about the death of James. He died as his brother died:
• at the Passover
• with great brutality
• at the instigation of the high priest
• giving testimony to the divinity of Christ
• and according Hegesippus, asking for the forgiveness of his murderers.
The plot hatched by Ananus seems fitting as well. The plan was to lure James to the pinnacle of the temple so he could address the Passover crowd below. Surely the high priest knew that rather than deny his brother’s Messianic call, James would endorse him. He surely knew that James would find it difficult to resist an opportunity to testify to all gathered there that Jesus was the Christ.
All Ananus needed to do was to ensure that he had some conveniently placed henchmen in place to throw James off the wall and others of like persuasion below to guarantee his death. All proceeded exactly as planned—except the victim survived the fall. Those below made sure death came quickly.
The plot as described here bears some resemblance to an earlier plot hatched in co-operation with the Sanhedrin to have Paul murdered before he could provide a second round of testimony. This occurred after his arrest in the temple.
The next morning some Jews formed a conspiracy and bound them- selves with an oath not to eat or drink until they had killed Paul. More than forty men were involved in this plot. They went to the chief priests and the elders and said, “We have taken a solemn oath not to eat anything until we have killed Paul. Now then, you and the Sanhedrin petition the com-mander to bring him before you on the pretext of wanting more accurate information about his case. We are ready to kill him before he gets here.” (Acts 23:12–15)
In Paul’s case the plot was discovered in advance. The commander of the Roman garrison intervened by sending Paul at night and under heavy guard to Caesarea. Thanks to this Roman intervention, Paul’s life was spared.
But for James, whether by a stroke of good luck or through strategic planning, Ananus was able to ensure that the Roman authorities could not intervene in this bit of dirty business—since, as Josephus points out, the procurator Albinius had not yet arrived.
On this earlier occasion Paul’s life was spared, but four years later James was not so fortunate.
So, what became of the body of James? Again, from Hegesippus we read:
And so he suffered martyrdom; and they buried him on the spot, and the pillar erected to his memory still remains, close by the temple. This man was a true witness to both Jews and Greeks that Jesus is the Christ. (4)
If this report is to be believed (and there are grounds for doubt) then it brings into question the legitimacy of the stone ossuary discovered in 2002. With the destruction of Jerusalem and the temple in AD 70, the location of this burial spot and the memorial pillar are impossible to verify.
Roman Catholics would have us believe that the bones of James are buried at the cathedral in Santiago de Compostela in northern Spain. According to one Catholic tradition, his bones were brought there by boat after his death. Despite the popularity of the pilgrimage route known as Camino de Santiago, or the Way of James, the evidence of the historic James having any actual connection to this site is scant to nonexistent. The con-nection of James to Spain appears to belong to the realm of medieval myth and superstition.
If Christian believers collected James’ body after he was stoned, his bones may have ended up in a stone ossuary, since this was the burial practice during this historic period. Was it the stone ossuary currently belonging to Oded Golan? The verdict on that matter remains uncertain.
In 2012, after a trial lasting seven years, Oded Golan was acquitted of forging biblical artifacts. According to the trial judge’s verdict, as reported in the Times of Israel, there was insufficient scientific evidence to validate or disprove the authenticity of the ossuary.
In his ruling Wednesday, the judge went out of his way to say that the fact Golan had been found not guilty did not mean the artifacts were real.
His decision to clear Golan of forging the inscription on the James ossuary, he wrote, “does not mean that the inscription on the ossuary is authentic or that it was written 2,000 years ago. This will continue to be studied by scientists and archaeologists, and time will tell.
“Moreover,” he wrote, “it was not proven in any way that the words ‘the brother of Jesus’ necessarily refer to the ‘Jesus’ who appears in Christian writings.”
This applies to all of the artifacts in question, he added several hundred pages later in the lengthy text of his decision: “All that has been established is that the tools and the science currently at the disposal of the experts who testified were not sufficient to prove the alleged forgeries beyond a reasonable doubt as is
required by criminal law.” (5)
Time photo of the James Ossuary
What is clear from the verdict is that uncertainty remains. This line from the judge’s ruling is particularly revealing: “This will continue to be studied by scientists and archaeologists, and time will tell.”
In other words, further developments or research may yet confirm that the ossuary is linked to James the brother of Jesus. Of course, just the opposite may also occur. In short, the mystery remains.
What time has told us over the centuries is that James, whether in life or death, can generate a great deal of controversy and debate. We can be certain he will continue to inspire debate.
As for the legacy of James, after centuries of neglect there has been a revival of interest in this prominent New Testament figure. The life of James—the saint, the apostle, and the hinge to the Gentile world—is being studied and re-examined as never before. New books on his life and commentaries on his epistle are appear-ing. The church and the world are discovering the prominent—even preeminent—role that he played in the first century church.
Some of this interest comes from a renewed interest in discovering the Jewish roots of Christianity. At the same time, there has been a resurgence of Messianic Judaism in recent decades. As the first leader of the Jewish church, James quite naturally is a subject of great interest.
Finally, many scholars are discovering a deeper understanding of the Epistle of James. After centuries of de-nominational dogmatism, present-day theologians are discovering how James contributes to our under-standing of faith and salvation. They are seeing direct links between this epistle and the central teachings of Jesus from the Sermon on the Mount.
Yet one question remains: How is James, the brother of Jesus, the lynchpin of our faith?
For the answer to that question, we need to turn to a present-day farmer with a ninety-thousand-dollar tractor. That farmer knows everything on that new tractor can work perfectly, but the tractor is useless without a lynchpin. This is because the tractor is specifically designed to pull a myriad of farm implements—such as a seeder, a plow, a hay baler, and a variety of harvest equipment. A single lynchpin is needed to hitch the tractor to all those machines. A lynchpin is not optional. It’s essential.
The gospel message is like that powerful tractor. The gospel can accomplish great thing —but the soil needs to be cultivated, the seed needs to be planted, and the harvest needs to be brought in. Jesus used similar agricultural analogies in many of his kingdom parables. In the first-century church, James was the lynchpin in our faith that made all this possible.
How so you ask?
First, James verifies the truth of the resurrection far more effectively than anyone else. This brother—this close family member—had publicly opposed Jesus and his message. Then suddenly, after Jesus’ humiliating death as a blasphemous criminal, James flips. He testifies that Jesus is alive. He confesses his error and joins the apostles. This is an astonishing reversal that signals a transformative encounter with the resurrected Christ.
Second, James validates the truth of the born-again experience. This man who thought Christ was a lunatic suddenly changes. He embraces the faith he once mocked, joins the fellowship of believers, and is transformed by the gracious work of the Holy Spirit.
Third, James fully exemplifies the forgiveness and reconciliation embedded in the gospel message. After years of tension and animosity two brothers are fully reconciled. Where there was hate, love reigns.
Fourth—and most importantly—James throws open the door to the Gentile world for the gospel message. Intuitively he knows that this is what Jesus wants and what the scriptures predicted would happen.
Fifth, in his epistle, James declares a gospel message that works—a message that affirms the grace of God and challenges every believer to live a life of humility and service to others. James has a faith that is more than mental assent to a set of beliefs. It’s a call to practical love and action.
In all these ways James acts as the lynchpin for the gospel message. He secures the message so it can penetrate the hard soil of human hearts. He releases the seed of the word into the Gentile world, and he sees an abundant harvest through men like Paul. He ensures that the message preached is balanced, practical, and a true reflection of Jesus’ teaching. He was the sound leader the church needed. James was and is the essential lynchpin of our faith, who jumpstarted the first-century church.
After nearly two millennia of misinformation and neglect, James may finally be getting the respect he is due.
The stone box is empty. There are no bones in the ossuary, just as there are no bones in Jesus’ tomb. When the women came to the empty tomb at the dawning of the first Sunday of a new age, they were greeted by two angels who said, “Why do you look for the living among the dead? He is not here; he has risen!” (See Luke 24:5-6).
When we go looking for James, we too may discover that he is not among the dead. The Christian believer knows that along with Jesus, his brother James is smiling down from glory as he enjoys all the fuss an ancient stone box has stirred up.
(1) Joseph Cummins, Why Some Wars Never End: The Stories of the Longest Conflicts in History (Fair Winds, 2010), p. 85.
(2) W. A. Beardslee, James, The Interpreter’s Dictionary of the Bible, Volume 2, Edited by George Arthur Buttrick (Abingdon, 1984), p. 793.
(3) Beardslee, James, The Interpreter’s Dictionary of the Bible, Volume 2, pp. 793–794.
(4) Fragments from the Acts of the Church; Concerning the Martyrdom of James, the Brother of the Lord, from Book 5.
(5) Matti Friedman, “Oded Golan is not guilty of Forgery. So is the ‘James Ossuary’ for real?” The Times of Israel, (March 14, 2012).
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