The selection by Jesus of the twelve from the
band of disciples who had gradually gathered around His person is an important
landmark in the Gospel history. It divides the ministry of our Lord into two
portions, nearly equal, probably, as to duration, but unequal as to the extent
and importance of the work done in each respectively. In the earlier period
Jesus labored single-handed; His miraculous deeds were confined for the most
part to a limited area, and His teaching was in the main of an elementary
character. But by the time when the twelve were chosen, the work of the kingdom
had assumed such dimensions as to require organization and division of labor;
and the teaching of Jesus was beginning to be of a deeper and more elaborate
nature, and His gracious activities were taking on ever-widening range.
It is probable that the selection of a limited
number to be His close and constant companions had become a necessity to
Christ, in consequence of His very success in gaining disciples. His followers,
we imagine, had grown so numerous as to be an incumbrance and an impediment to
his movements, especially in the long journeys which mark the later part of His
ministry. It was impossible that all who believed could continue henceforth to
follow Him, in the literal sense, whithersoever He might go: the greater number
could now only be occasional followers. But it was His wish that certain
selected men should be with Him at all times and in all places,--His travelling
companions in all His wanderings, witnessing all His work, and ministering to
His daily needs. And so, in the quaint words of Mark, "Jesus calleth unto Him
whom He would, and they came unto Him, and He made twelve, that they should be
with Him."
These twelve, however, as we know, were to be
something more than travelling companions or menial servants of the Lord Jesus
Christ. They were to be, in the mean time, students of Christian doctrine, and
occasional fellow-laborers in the work of the kingdom, and eventually Christ's
chosen trained agents for propagating the faith after He Himself had left the
earth. From the time of their being chosen, indeed, the twelve entered on a
regular apprenticeship for the great office of apostleship, in the course of
which they were to learn, in the privacy of an intimate daily fellowship with
their Master, what they should be, do, believe, and teach, as His witnesses and
ambassadors to the world. Henceforth the training of these men was to be a
constant and prominent part of Christ's personal work. He was to make it His
business to tell them in darkness what they should afterwards speak in the
daylight, and to whisper in their ear what in after years they should preach
upon the housetops.[4.2]
The time when this election was made, though not
absolutely determined, is fixed in relation to certain leading events in the
Gospel history. John speaks of the twelve as an organized company at the period
of the feeding of the five thousand, and of the discourse on the bread of life
in the synagogue of Capernaum, delivered shortly after that miracle. From this
fact we learn that the twelve were chosen at least one year before the
crucifixion; for the miracle of the feeding took place, according to the fourth
evangelist, shortly before a Passover season.[4.3] From the words spoken by
Jesus to the men whom He had chosen, in justification of His seeming doubt of
their fidelity after the multitude had deserted Him, "Did I not choose you the
twelve, and one of you is a devil?" [4.4we conclude that the choice was then
not quite a recent event. The twelve had been long enough together to give the
false disciple opportunity to show his real character.
Turning now to the synoptical evangelists, we
find them fixing the position of the election with reference to two other most
important events. Matthew speaks for the first time of the twelve as a distinct
body in connection with their mission in Galilee. He does not, however, say
that they were chosen immediately before, and with direct reference to, that
mission. He speaks rather as if the apostolic fraternity had been previously in
existence, his words being, "When He had called unto Him His twelve disciples."
Luke, on the other hand, gives a formal record of the election, as a preface to
his account of the Sermon on the Mount, so speaking as to create the impression
that the one event immediately preceded the other.[4.5] Finally, Mark's
narrative confirms the view suggested by these observations on Matthew and
Luke, viz. that the twelve were called just before the Sermon the Mount was
delivered, and some considerable time before they were sent forth on their
preaching and healing mission. There we read: "Jesus goeth up into the mountain
(to oro"),[4.6] and calleth unto Him whom He would"--the ascent referred to
evidently being that which Jesus made just before preaching His great
discourse. Mark continues: "And He ordained twelve, that they should be with
Him, and that He might send them forth to preach, and to have power to heal
sicknesses and to cast out devils." Here allusion is made to an intention on
Christ's part to send forth His disciples on a mission, but the intention is
not represented as immediately realized. Nor can it be said that immediate
realization is implied, though not expressed; for the evangelist gives an
account of the mission as actually carried out several chapters further on in
his Gospel, commencing with the words, "And He calleth unto Him the twelve, and
began to send them forth."[4.7]
It may be regarded, then, as tolerably certain,
that the calling of the twelve was a prelude to the preaching of the great
sermon on the kingdom, in the founding of which they were afterwards to take so
distinguished a part. At what precise period in the ministry of our Lord the
sermon itself is to be placed, we cannot so confidently determine. Our opinion,
however, is, that the Sermon on the Mount was delivered towards the close of
Christ's first lengthened ministry in Galilee, during the time which intervened
between the two visits to Jerusalem on festive occasions mentioned in the
second and fifth chapters of John's Gospel.[4.8]
The number of the apostolic company is
significant, and was doubtless a matter of choice, not less than was the
composition of the selected band. A larger number of eligible men could easily
have been found in a circle of disciples which afterwards supplied not fewer
than seventy auxiliaries for evangelistic work;[4.9] and a smaller number might
have served all the present or prospective purposes of the apostleship. The
number twelve was recommended by obvious symbolic reasons. It happily expressed
in figures what Jesus claimed to be, and what He had come to do, and thus
furnished a support to the faith and a stimulus to the devotion of His
followers. It significantly hinted that Jesus was the divine Messianic King of
Israel, come to set up the kingdom whose advent was foretold by prophets in
glowing language, suggested by the palmy days of Israel's history, when the
theocratic community existed in its integrity, and all the tribes of the chosen
nation were united under the royal house of David. That the number twelve was
designed to bear such a mystic meaning, we know from Christ's own words to the
apostles on a later occasion, when, describing to them the rewards awaiting
them in the kingdom for past services and sacrifices, He said, "Verily I say
unto you, that ye which have followed me, in the regeneration, when the Son of
man shall sit in the throne of His glory, ye also shall sit upon twelve
thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel."[4.10]
It is possible that the apostles were only too
well aware of the mystic significance of their number, and found in it an
encouragement to the fond delusive hope that the coming kingdom should be not
only a spiritual realization of the promises, but a literal restoration of
Israel to political integrity and independence. The risk of such
misapprehension was one of the drawbacks connected with the particular number
twelve, but it was not deemed by Jesus a sufficient reason for fixing on
another. His method of procedure in this, as in all things, was to abide by
that which in itself was true and right, and then to correct misapprehensions
as they arose.
From the number of the apostolic band, we pass to
the persons composing it. Seven of the twelve--the first seven in the
catalogues of Mark and Luke, assuming the identity of Bartholomew and
Nathanael--are persons already known to us. With two of the remaining five--the
first and the last--we shall become well acquainted as we proceed in the
history. Thomas called Didymus, or the Twin, will come before us as a man of
warm heart but melancholy temperament, ready to die with his Lord, but slow to
believe in His resurrection. Judas Iscariot is known to all the world as the
Traitor. He appears for the first time, in these catalogues of the apostles,
with the infamous title branded on his brow, "Judas Iscariot, who also betrayed
Him." The presence of a man capable of treachery among the elect disciples is a
mystery which we shall not now attempt to penetrate. We merely make this
historical remark about Judas here, that he seems to have been the only one
among the twelve who was not a Galilean. He is surnamed, from his native place
apparently, the man of Kerioth; and from the Book of Joshua we learn that there
was a town of that name in the southern border of the tribe of Judah.[4.11]
The three names which remain are exceedingly
obscure. On grounds familiar to Bible scholars, it has often been attempted to
identify James of Alpheus with James the brother or kinsman of the Lord. The
next on the lists of Matthew and Mark has been supposed by many to have been a
brother of this James, and therefore another brother of Jesus. This opinion is
based on the fact, that in place of the Lebbeus or Thaddeus of the two first
Gospels, we find in Luke's catalogues the name Judas "of James." The ellipsis
in this designation has been filled up with the word brother, and it is assumed
that the James alluded to is James the son of Alpheus. However tempting these
results may be, we can scarcely regard them as ascertained, and must content
ourselves with stating that among the twelve was a second James, besides the
brother of John and son of Zebedee, and also a second Judas, who appears again
as an interlocutor in the farewell conversation between Jesus and His disciples
on the night before His crucifixion, carefully distinguished by the evangelist
from the traitor by the parenthetical remark "not Iscariot."[4.12] This Judas,
being the same with Lebbeus Thaddeus, has been called the three-named
disciple.[4.13]
The disciple whom we have reserved to the last
place, like the one who stands at the head of all the lists, was a Simon. This
second Simon is as obscure as the first is celebrated, for he is nowhere
mentioned in the Gospel history, except in the catalogues; yet, little known as
he is, the epithet attached to his name conveys a piece of curious and
interesting information. He is called the Kananite (not Canaanite), which is a
political, not a geographical designation, as appears from the Greek work
substituted in the place of this Hebrew one by Luke, who calls the disciple we
now speak of Simon Zelotes; that is, in English, Simon the Zealot. This epithet
Zelotes connects Simon unmistakably with the famous party which rose in
rebellion under Judas in the days of the taxing,[4.14] some twenty years before
Christ's ministry began, when Judea and Samaria were brought under the direct
government of Rome, and the census of the population was taken with a view to
subsequent taxation. How singular a phenomenon is this ex-zealot among the
disciples of Jesus! No two men could differ more widely in their spirit, ends,
and means, than Judas of Galilee and Jesus of Nazareth. The one was a political
malcontent; the other would have the conquered bow to the yoke, and give to
Cesar Cesar's due. The former aimed at restoring the kingdom to Israel,
adopting for his watchword, "We have no Lord or Master but God;" the latter
aimed at founding a kingdom not national, but universal, not "of this world,"
but purely spiritual. The means employed by the two actors were as diverse as
their ends. One had recourse to the carnal weapons of war, the sword and the
dagger; the other relied solely on the gentle but omnipotent force of truth.
What led Simon to leave Judas for Jesus we know
not; but he made a happy exchange for himself, as the party he forsook were
destined in after years to bring ruin on themselves and on their country by
their fanatical, reckless, and unavailing patriotism. Though the insurrection
of Judas was crushed, the fire of discontent still smouldered in the breasts of
his adherents; and at length it burst out into the blaze of a new rebellion,
which brought on a death-struggle with the gigantic power of Rome, and ended in
the destruction of the Jewish capital, and the dispersion of the Jewish
people.
The choice of this disciple to be an apostle
supplies another illustration of Christ's disregard of prudential wisdom. An
ex-zealot was not a safe man to make an apostle of, for he might be the means
of rendering Jesus and His followers objects of political suspicion. But the
Author of our faith was willing to take the risk. He expected to gain many
disciples from the dangerous classes as well as from the despised, and He would
have them, too, represented among the twelve.
It gives one a pleasant surprise to think of
Simon the zealot and Matthew the publican, men coming from so opposite
quarters, meeting together in close fellowship in the little band of twelve. In
the persons of these two disciples extremes meet--the tax-gatherer and the
tax-hater: the unpatriotic Jew, who degraded himself by becoming a servant of
the alien ruler; and the Jewish patriot, who chafed under the foreign yoke, and
sighed for emancipation. This union of opposites was not accidental, but was
designed by Jesus as a prophecy of the future. He wished the twelve to be the
church in miniature or germ; and therefore He chose them so as to intimate
that, as among them distinctions of publican and zealot were unknown, so in the
church of the future there should be neither Greek nor Jew, circumcision nor
uncircumcision, bond nor free, but only Christ--all to each, and in each of the
all.
These were the names of the twelve as given in
the catalogues. As to the order in which they are arranged, on closely
inspecting the lists we observe that they contain three groups of four, in each
of which the same names are always found, though the order of arrangement
varies. The first group includes those best known, the second the next best,
and the third those least known of all, or, in the case of the traitor, known
only too well. Peter, the most prominent character among the twelve, stands at
the head of all the lists, and Judas Iscariot at the foot, carefully
designated, as already observed, the traitor. The apostolic roll, taking the
order given in Matthew, and borrowing characteristic epithets from the Gospel
history at large, is as follows:--
FIRST
GROUP
Simon Peter . . . . The man of rock.
Andrew . . . . Peter's brother.
James and John . . . . Sons of Zebedee, and sons of thunder.
SECOND GROUP
Philip . . . . The earnest inquirer.
Bartholomew, or Nathanael . . . . The guileless Israelite.
Thomas . . . . The melancholy.
Matthew . . . . The publican (so called by himself only).
THIRD GROUP
James (the son) of Alpheus . . . . (James the Less? Mark xv. 40.)
Lebbeus, Thaddeus, Judas of James, . . . . The three-named disciple.
Simon . . . . The Zealot.
Judas, the man of Kerioth . . . . The
Traitor.
Such were the men whom Jesus chose to be with Him
while He was on this earth, and to carry on His work after He left it. Such
were the men whom the church celebrates as the "glorious company of the
apostles." The praise is merited; but the glory of the twelve was not of this
world. In a worldly point of view they were a very insignificant company
indeed,--a band of poor illiterate Galilean provincials, utterly devoid of
social consequence, not likely to be chosen by one having supreme regard to
prudential considerations. Why did Jesus choose such men? Was He guided by
feelings of antagonism to those possessing social advantages, or of partiality
for men of His own class? No; His choice was made in true wisdom. If He chose
Galileans mainly, it was not from provincial prejudice against those of the
south; if, as some think, He chose two or even four[4.15] of his own kindred,
it was not from nepotism; if He chose rude, unlearned, humble men, it was not
because He was animated by any petty jealousy of knowledge, culture, or good
birth. If any rabbi, rich man, or ruler had been willing to yield himself
unreservedly to the service of the kingdom, no objection would have been taken
to him on account of his acquirements, possessions, or titles. The case of Saul
of Tarsus, the pupil of Gamaliel, proves the truth of this statement. Even
Gamaliel himself would not have been objected to, could he have stooped to
become a disciple of the unlearned Nazarene. But, alas! neither he nor any of
his order would condescend so far, and therefore the despised One did not get
an opportunity of showing His willingness to accept as disciples and choose for
apostles such as they were.
The truth is, that Jesus was obliged to be
content with fishermen, and publicans, and quondam zealots, for apostles. They
were the best that could be had. Those who deemed themselves better were too
proud to become disciples, and thereby they excluded themselves from what all
the world now sees to be the high honor of being the chosen princes of the
kingdom. The civil and religious aristocracy boasted of their unbelief.[4.16]
The citizens of Jerusalem did feel for a moment interested in the zealous youth
who had purged the temple with a whip of small cords; but their faith was
superficial, and their attitude patronizing, and therefore Jesus did not commit
Himself unto them, because He knew what was in them.[4.17] A few of good
position were sincere sympathizers, but they were not so decided in their
attachment as to be eligible for apostles. Nicodemus was barely able to speak a
timid apologetic word in Christ's behalf, and Joseph of Arimathea was a
disciple "secretly," for fear of the Jews. These were hardly the persons to
send forth as missionaries of the cross--men so fettered by social ties and
party connections, and so enslaved by the fear of man. The apostles of
Christianity must be made of sterner stuff.
And so Jesus was obliged to fall back on the
rustic, but simple, sincere, and energetic men of Galilee. And He was quite
content with His choice, and devoutly thanked His Father for giving Him even
such as they. Learning, rank, wealth, refinement, freely given up to his
service, He would not have despised; but He preferred devoted men who had none
of these advantages to undevoted men who had them all. And with good reason;
for it mattered little, except in the eyes of contemporary prejudice, what the
social position or even the previous history of the twelve had been, provided
they were spiritually qualified for the work to which they were called. What
tells ultimately is, not what is without a man, but what is within. John Bunyan
was a man of low birth, low occupation, and, up till his conversion, of low
habits; but he was by nature a man of genius, and by grace a man of God, and he
would have made--he was, in fact--a most effective apostle.
But it may be objected that all the twelve were
by no means gifted like Bunyan; some of them, if one may judge from the
obscurity which envelops their names, and the silence of history regarding
them, having been undistinguished either by high endowment or by a great
career, and in fact, to speak plainly, all but useless. As this objection
virtually impugns the wisdom of Christ's choice, it is necessary to examine how
far it is according to truth.[4.18] We submit the following considerations with
this view:--
I. That some of the apostles were comparatively
obscure, inferior men, cannot be denied; but even the obscurest of them may
have been most useful as witnesses for Him with whom they had companied from
the beginning. It does not take a great man to make a good witness, and to be
witnesses of Christian facts was the main business of the apostles. That even
the humblest of them rendered important service in that capacity we need not
doubt, though nothing is said of them in the apostolic annals. It was not to be
expected that a history so fragmentary and so brief as that given by Luke
should mention any but the principal actors, especially when we reflect how few
of the characters that appear on the stage at any particular crisis in human
affairs are prominently noticed even in histories which go elaborately into
detail. The purpose of history is served by recording the words and deeds of
the representative men, and many are allowed to drop into oblivion who did
nobly in their day. The less distinguished members of the apostolic band are
entitled to the benefit of this reflection.
2. Three eminent men, or even two (Peter and
John), out of twelve, is a good proportion; there being few societies in which
superior excellence bears such a high ratio to respectable mediocrity. Perhaps
the number of "Pillars"[4.19] was as great as was desirable. Far from
regretting that all were not Peters and Johns, it is rather a matter to be
thankful for, that there were diversities of gifts among the first preachers of
the gospel. As a general rule, it is not good when all are leaders. Little men
are needed as well as great men; for human nature is one-sided, and little men
have their peculiar virtues and gifts, and can do some things better than their
more celebrated brethren.
3. We must remember how little we know concerning
any of the apostles. It is the fashion of biographers in our day, writing for a
morbidly or idly curious public, to enter into the minutest particulars of
outward event or personal peculiarity regarding their heroes. Of this fond
idolatrous minuteness there is no trace in the evangelic histories. The writers
of the Gospels were not afflicted with the biographic mania. Moreover, the
apostles were not their theme. Christ was their hero; and their sole desire was
to tell what they knew of Him. They gazed steadfastly at the Sun of
Righteousness, and in His effulgence they lost sight of the attendant stars.
Whether they were stars of the first magnitude, or of the second, or of the
third, made little difference.