James the Son of Alphaeus: The Apostle Named and Nothing More

An apostle known by his father's name

James the son of Alphaeus was an apostle, active AD 29 to AD 62 according to Ussher, Annals of the World (1650). Everything Scripture records about him fits in five verses spread across four passages in Matthew, Mark, Luke and Acts, and in every one of them he appears in a list. He is never quoted. No act of his is reported. He is identified by one relationship only: he is the son of Alphaeus. That patronymic is not decoration. Within the lists themselves the name James belongs to more than one man, and without his father's name he would blur into the others.

Named in every list

The first mention comes in Matthew 10:3: "Philip; Bartholomew; Thomas; Matthew the tax collector; James the son of Alphaeus; Lebbaeus, who was also called Thaddaeus;". He stands between a tax collector and a man carrying two names. The list does not rank these men. It simply names them.

Mark 3:18 gives the same man in nearly the same company: "Andrew; Philip; Bartholomew; Matthew; Thomas; James, the son of Alphaeus; Thaddaeus; Simon the Zealot;". Again he is one name among many, set down without comment, without a trade attached to him as Matthew has, without a byname as Simon has.

Luke 6:15-16 places him in a slightly different neighbourhood: "Matthew; Thomas; James, the son of Alphaeus; Simon, who was called the Zealot; Judas the son of James; and Judas Iscariot, who also became a traitor." Here the value of the patronymic becomes visible. The same short span of text names James the son of Alphaeus and Judas the son of James. Two men called James stand close together in the memory of the early church, and Luke keeps them apart by naming fathers.

The last mention is Acts 1:13: "When they had come in, they went up into the upper room where they were staying; that is Peter, John, James, Andrew, Philip, Thomas, Bartholomew, Matthew, James the son of Alphaeus, Simon the Zealot, and Judas the son of James." Two men named James are in that room. One needs no further description. The other is still, at the end as at the beginning, the son of Alphaeus.

A man with no scene

It has to be said plainly: no scene is told about this person. Every mention is a list, a genealogy or a passing note. He asks no question. He makes no confession. He is not praised and he is not rebuked. The whole footprint runs from Matthew 10:3 to Acts 1:13, and it is all roll call.

That silence is not so much a gap in the record as the shape of the record. Scripture does not tell us that James the son of Alphaeus did nothing; it tells us his name belonged among the apostles, and it tells us four times. He is counted in Matthew 10:3, in Mark 3:18, in Luke 6:15-16, and again in the upper room in Acts 1:13. Being named is itself the testimony.

No failure recorded

Where Scripture reports the sins of a man, an honest study reports them. Here there are none to report. The four texts that name him record no fault, no denial, no flight. The only failure named anywhere in these passages belongs to another man in the same list: Judas Iscariot, "who also became a traitor" (Luke 6:16). Nor is James the son of Alphaeus credited with any virtue. He is simply still there in Acts 1:13, in the room, after the list has lost one of its number.

What we do not know

We do not know his tribe or his people; none is given. No children of his are named. Nothing is said of his home, his work before he was called, or what became of him after Acts 1:13. Of his family only Alphaeus, his father, is recorded. Whatever stories may circulate about this man, the text supplies none of them, and it is better to leave the blank open than to fill it.

The line to Christ

The line runs through the lists themselves. In Matthew 10:3, Mark 3:18 and Luke 6:15-16 he is set among the apostles, named alongside Peter, John, Andrew, Philip, Bartholomew, Thomas, Matthew and the rest. In Acts 1:13 he is in the upper room with them, still counted, still named. Christ's claim on him is not measured by the number of his recorded words, of which there are none, but by the fact that the list that belongs to Christ carries his name. For a reader who has done little worth recording, that is no small mercy.