James of Jerusalem
- James Collazo
- May 15, 2020
- 4 min read
Updated: Jul 12
Introduction
James son of Joseph (Hebrew: Yaakov ben Yosef / Greek: Iakōbos ho tou Iōsēph) was born around AD 3 in the Roman client kingdom of Judea. The apostle Paul called him "the Lord's brother." He wrote about meeting him in Jerusalem after Paul's conversion near Damascus (Gal. 1:19). James was one of Jesus' younger brothers, sharing the same mother, Mary, along with at least three other brothers—Joseph, Simon, and Jude—and an unknown number of sisters (Matt. 13:55–56; Mark 6:3). At first, James and his siblings did not believe Jesus was the Messiah (John 7:5). In fact, the family thought Jesus was out of his mind (Mark 3:21). James came to believe after the resurrection, following Jesus' appearance to him (1 Cor. 15:7; cf. Acts 12:17). Unlike James Alphaeus or James Zebedee, James of Jerusalem was not one of the twelve apostles (Acts 1:13–14; 1 Cor. 9:5, 15:7).
After seeing the risen Jesus (1 Cor. 15:7), James believed and became the leader of the Jerusalem church (Gal. 1:18–19). Following the death of James son of Zebedee in AD 44 and Peter's departure from Jerusalem, James emerged as the leading figure in the Jerusalem church (Acts 12:17). He presided over the Council of Jerusalem in AD 50, creating a middle path for Jewish and Gentile believers based on the Law of Moses for foreigners (Lev. 17–18; Acts 15:13–21).
James welcomed Paul during his final visit to Jerusalem (Acts 21:18) and wrote the Letter of James (James 1:1), which warns against favoritism (James 2:1–13), hypocrisy, judgmentalism, pride (James 2:4), and harmful speech (James 3:1–12). He urges believers to hear and do the Word (James 1:19–27), value God's wisdom over worldly knowledge (James 3:13–18), and pray constantly (James 5:13–18). Perhaps because of his close family ties, James gave more attention to Jesus' teachings than to his death, resurrection, or divinity. Yet, he still called Jesus "our glorious Lord" (James 2:1), affirming his faith in Christ's divine nature.
Martyrdom of James of Jerusalem
James was stoned to death in Jerusalem by the Sanhedrin in AD 62. In his Antiquities of the Jews, the first-century Jewish historian Josephus recorded this event:
Festus was now dead, and Albinus was but upon the road; so he assembled the Sanhedrin of judges, and brought before them the brother of Jesus, who was called Christ, whose name was James, and some others, [or, some of his companions]; and when he had formed an accusation against them as breakers of the law, he delivered them to be stoned (Ant. 20.9.1).
Ossuary of James
Historians know little about James beyond the New Testament and Josephus' Antiquities of the Jews. Yet in 2002, an ossuary—a small limestone burial box—drew worldwide attention because of its Aramaic inscription: "James son of Joseph, brother of Jesus" (יעקוב בר יוסף אחי די ישוע, Yaakov bar Yosef akhui diYeshua). Scholars and the Israeli government still debate whether the inscription is authentic. In 2012, a court acquitted Israeli antiquities dealer Oded Golan of forgery. The verdict showed he had not fabricated the artifact, but did not confirm that the inscription was authentic. The ossuary is about twenty inches long and dates to between the first century BC and AD 70, when Jews often collected a person's bones and reburied them in such limestone boxes. The container itself is ancient, but the authorship of the inscription remains uncertain. If the inscription is authentic, it would be the earliest known archaeological artifact to explicitly name Jesus in connection with his family.
Bibliography
Primary Sources
Josephus. Antiquities of the Jews. Translated by William Whiston. Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 1987.
Commentaries
Moo, Douglas J. The Pillar New Testament Commentary—The Letter of James. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2000.
Monographs
Eddy, Paul Rhodes, and Gregory A. Boyd. The Jesus Legend: A Case for the Historical Reliability of the Synoptic Jesus Tradition. Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2007.
Evans, Craig A. Jesus, and the Ossuaries. Waco, TX: Baylor University Press, 2003.
Friedman, David, and B. D. Friedman. James the Just Presents Applications of Torah: A Messianic Commentary. Clarksville, MD: Messianic Jewish Publications, 2012.
Johnson, Luke Timothy. The Letter of James. Anchor Yale Bible. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1995.
Shanks, Hershel, and Ben Witherington III. The Brother of Jesus: The Dramatic Story and Meaning of the First Archaeological Link to Jesus and His Family. San Francisco: HarperOne, 2003.
Strauss, Mark L. Four Portraits, One Jesus: A Survey of Jesus and the Gospels. 2nd ed. Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2020.
Tabor, James D. Paul and Jesus: How the Apostle Transformed Christianity. New York: Simon & Schuster, 2012.
Wright, N. T., and Michael F. Bird. The New Testament in Its World: An Introduction to the History, Literature, and Theology of the First Christians. Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2019.
Journal Articles
Kushiner, James M. "James the Just of Jerusalem."↗ Touchstone: A Journal of Mere Christianity 1, no. 1 (1986).
Online Articles
Corbett, Glenn J., ed. "Is the 'Brother of Jesus' Inscription on the James Ossuary a Forgery?"↗ Biblical Archaeology Society. November 18, 2025.
Friedman, Matti. "Oded Golan Is Not Guilty of Forgery. So Is the 'James Ossuary' for Real?"↗ The Times of Israel. March 14, 2012.
Windle, Bryan. "Weighing the Evidence: Is the James Ossuary Authentic?"↗ Bible Archaeology Report (blog). April 20, 2023.