The Mysterious Disappearance of St. James, brother of St. John

James, the brother of John, one of the esteemed three top leaders in Jesus’ band of disciples is barely mentioned in the book of Acts. He is listed in the first chapter along with the names of the other Apostles and then no mention whatsoever until thirteen chapters later when it says that Herod beheaded James. No explanation, no story is given beyond Herod wanting to persecute the church. And why James, when we have seen nothing to have provoked the authorities during this whole period? The absence of his name throughout Acts is especially noticeable when Peter and John are mentioned together several times, but no James, the brother of John, the one who helped form Jesus’s top trio: Peter, James and John. When Stephen was stoned, background information to his death was given, including his last sermon that he preached which caused his listeners to stone him. James’ death gets one sentence, with nothing else about James in the whole book, except for one perfunctory mention in the first chapter, along with 10 other names of Jesus’s living disciples. Wow!

I have wondered about this silence regarding James for years. In the Gospels it had always been Peter, James and John, the special top three. Then, recently while reading a book about the lives of Jesus’s apostles and what had become of each of them, the author pointed out another fascinating fact, namely that James, the brother of John, is never mentioned by name in the whole book of John.* All the stories in which Peter, James and John do something special with Jesus are missing from John. That in itself is very odd, but it is especially puzzling that John would leave out the story about the “Mount of Transfiguration” in which Jesus takes Peter, James and John with him up a mountain and there Jesus is visually transformed, while with him appear Moses and Elijah. The three disciples hear a voice saying, “This is my beloved Son, hear him!”** While this omission is not necessarily proof of anything, one would think that John, who is the Gospel writer who seems to want to emphasize the divinity of Jesus the most, would definitely have wanted to include this piece of affirmation that Jesus is God’s Son. So, why the continued omissions of James?

Interestingly, there is a strong tradition in the church in Spain, that James had evangelized Spain before he was beheaded. Could this provide the explanation for why he was not active in Judea following the Day of Pentecost? However, is this a tradition that is reliable? When we examine everything we can learn about it, it does become plausible. First, the tradition goes back many centuries. One researcher found written material from the early 400s AD, referring to James as the founder . There are several writings from later periods to the same effect. Also, the claims that James’ body was taken there and buried after his death are strong.

Many experts believe that when there has been a very strong tradition, that there is likely at least some truth to that tradition. Although, some scholars are of the opinion that James did not have time to go to Spain and evangelize there, I strongly disagree. He had 14 years to get there and back. I know of a modern day missionary to the jungles of Columbia who thought it took him a long time to gain any followers of Jesus because it took him five years to find a way to communicate the gospel in terms that they would understand. If James left soon after the Day of Pentecost, to go to Spain, he would have had plenty of time. We see in the book of Acts that Paul and others found it quite easy to get on board ships and travel around the Mediterranean Sea. James probably would have had to go to Rome first, and it might have taken a whole year, but that still leaves at least twelve years (giving him a year to get back), for him to have preached and lead people to faith in Jesus.

There is another interesting piece of history that gives a possible motive for James to have been inspired first to go to Sardinia, and from there go on to Spain, which is not far from Sardinia. A well known Roman historian, Tacitus, wrote about an incident in the year A.D.19, in which 4,000 Jews, “affected by the Jewish and Egyptian superstitions” were forced to go to Sardinia, and forced to fight for Rome. Josephus also wrote about this incident. It is hypothesized by scholars, that these were likely some of the rebels who had followed Judas, the Galilean, a Jew who tried to foster a rebellion against the Romans’ census tax in A.D.6. He was apprehended and lost his life. Many of his followers were captured and taken to Rome.

This incident of the 4,000 Jews would likely have happened when James was in his early teen years. While the news might have taken a while to get to his town in Galilee, it’s quite possible that many of those fellows in Rome were men from Galilee, some of whom might have even been relatives of James. Considering that James was something of a hot head, feeling things passionately, for instance, during Jesus ministry, he and John wanted to call down fire from Heaven to destroy the Samaritans who had rejected Jesus’ teaching, he might have heard about those young Jews around the time they were forced to go to another country and fight for Rome. As a youth he likely would have felt extremely upset about it, especially if some were relatives.

So my theory is that after the Day of Pentecost, when the Holy Spirit fell on all the disciples, James immediately wanted to go to Sardinia and let those fellow Jews know about Jesus’ death and resurrection. He would have wanted to pass on the good news that their Messiah had finally come!

Then, 13 years later, after he had success in spreading the gospel there, and after going further into Spain where the Gospel was also possibly well received, he possibly wanted to come back for a feast day to share the good news of his success. If this message had created a big stir in the area, Herod likely would have been quite upset. Here was this follower of Jesus, bragging about helping those unfortunate Jews who had been forced by Rome to go to Sardinia and fight for Rome. It certainly would have provoked Herod that people were talking about a story which made Rome look bad.

Historically, Herod probably would have been alive when the earlier rebellion initially had happened and even might have been involved with the incident of sending the 4,000 Jews away. That whole incident might have been an attempt by Rome to get rid of potential trouble makers, and Herod might have been involved with the decision. As a puppet ruler under Caesar, Herod was loyal to the ruling party in Rome, so it’s not surprising that he would want to quiet the mouth of this potential trouble maker.

But still, why the silence in the book of Acts about James’s life during those years? Surely the early Christian leaders knew what James had been doing all those years. It’s possible that John and the other apostles did not want James to leave in the first place, causing some dissension, something the apostles might not have wanted to talk about. In that case, Luke, the author of Acts, would not have heard anything about James’ work and ministry. Hence the lack of mention about anything that James had been doing.

Because I have found this whole mystery so interesting, I am hoping to write a novel about it. This would certainly be a great opportunity for creative writing, since so little is known about this whole chapter of James’s life. There are some stories that have been passed down through the years through the church in Spain, but some of them are rather fantastic and not very believable. I will consider them, but probably I’ll only use my own ideas. This will be a biblical novel, so I will not change anything written in the Bible. However, with very little written in the book of Acts, I will be able to create a lot of scenarios, as well as my own opinion as to why John leaves James out of his book. There could be some interesting psychological conflict and confused feelings involved. That is real life!

* “The Search for the Twelve Apostles” by William S. McBirnie, Ph.D.

** Matthew 17:1-9; Mark 9:2-9; Luke 9:28-36; 2 Peter 1:16-18