Did Jesus Choose his Brother as his Successor? (The Gospel of Thomas)

Today I look at the twelfth saying in the Gospel of Thomas. This saying is different from all the previous ones in that it deals with leadership in the early church. But it also contains some spiritual truth, which we will see in a moment. It reads: “The disciples said to Jesus, ‘We know that you are going to leave us. Who will be our leader?’ Jesus said to them, ‘No matter where you are you are to go to James the Just, for whose sake heaven and earth came into being.’"

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Transcript

Today I look at the twelfth saying in the Gospel of Thomas. This saying is different from all the previous ones in that it deals with leadership in the early church. But it also contains some spiritual truth, which we will see in a moment. It reads: “The disciples said to Jesus, ‘We know that you are going to leave us. Who will be our leader?’ Jesus said to them, ‘No matter where you are you are to go to James the Just, for whose sake heaven and earth came into being.’"

To understand this saying, first I need to explain who this James was. The name James is an Anglicized form of the Hebrew name Jacob, which was a very common name. There are several men named James in the gospels. Who is this James the Just or James the Righteous?  

He is not James the son of Zebedee, one of the top three disciples in the canonical gospels – Peter, James and John. Also known as James the Great or Greater, he died very early in the Book of Acts. He is not James, son of Alphaeus, another of the original Twelve Apostles, also known as James the Less.  James the Just is almost always identified as James, the brother of Jesus.

He was a younger, biological sibling of Jesus of Nazareth. This is true despite the Roman Catholic tradition that denies that Mary had any other children. That was an idea invented by the Church in order to preserve the doctrine of the perpetual virginity of Mary. Mary and Joseph had a bunch of kids. Jesus had brothers and sisters. The brothers are mentioned by name in the canonical gospels. His sisters are also mentioned, but not by name, in keeping with the generally anonymous status of most women. 

Now back to the saying in the Gospel of Thomas. “The disciples said to Jesus, ‘We know that you are going to leave us. Who will be our leader?’ Jesus said to them, ‘No matter where you are you are to go to James the Just, for whose sake heaven and earth came into being.’” It is a strange saying. It does not fit with the of the other sayings in this gospel.

Instead of perennial wisdom, it has to do with the leadership of the earliest Christian movement after Jesus’ death. Jesus is appointing his successor. It reminds me of the words of Jesus to Peter after his famous confession of faith. Jesus says in the Gospel of Matthew, “I tell you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not overcome it.” 

That saying is identified by biblical scholars as a later addition put into the mouth of Jesus because of the use of the word church, and because he seems to be appointing his heir. The same thing can be said of this saying about James in the Gospel of Thomas. For one thing, the disciples say they know he is going away; but he never says in the Gospel of Thomas that he is going away. That is one clue.

Jesus calls James is called “the Just” in this saying. That was an honorary title given to James much later, not during Jesus’ lifetime. This all points to the probability that this saying is a later addition to the Gospel of Thomas. It was added by someone who saw James as the legitimate heir of Jesus, rather than Peter or Paul. 

So this is not an authentic saying of Jesus. Of course we cannot be absolutely certain of this. There are so few manuscripts of the Gospel of Thomas – only one complete Coptic text and three fragmentary Greek texts - that we cannot be sure what the original manuscript included. But this saying certainly looks like a redaction. 

Even though this saying was not spoken by Jesus, it still has something to teach us. For one thing it confirms the antiquity of the Gospel of Thomas. James was considered the head of the church and the successor of Jesus in the earliest Christian community in Jerusalem, before the fall of Jerusalem. If this saying was added to the Gospel of Thomas it was added very early before the primacy of Peter became established.

That means that Thomas represents an older tradition than the canonical gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. Those New Testament gospels make Peter the head of the church. And very quickly Paul was seen as the authority on theological matters above James. The Gospel of Thomas points us to an earlier tradition than the books in our present New Testament.

The Roman church followed that tradition of the primacy of Peter by claiming Peter as the first pope of Rome. And it was this Roman church under the emperor Constantine that decided in the fourth century which gospels would be included in the New Testament and which ones banned. 

It is no surprise that they would include the gospels that give Peter – and therefore the successors of Peter in Rome - the primary role. It is also no surprise that they banned books like the Gospel of Thomas that said that someone else besides Peter - someone like James - was Jesus’ choice to succeed him.

Yet they could not take out all the evidence of the early leadership of James in the Bible. The earliest New Testament writings are the letters of the apostle Paul. His epistles give us insight into Christianity before the canonical gospels were written. In Galatians, which I consider to be the earliest of Paul’s letters and therefore the earliest book in the New Testament, Paul mentions James with Cephas (Peter) and John as the three Pillars of the Church, and he lists James first! 

There were disagreements in the early church as to who was the true successor of Jesus as leader of the church. The gospels say it was Peter. Paul seems to point to James. The Acts of the Apostles elevates Paul above Peter or James, beginning with his conversion on the Damascus Road, which Paul claims as a resurrection appearance, thus qualifying him as an apostle. 

Gospel of Thomas is part of this discussion about leadership in the early church. According to this saying the disciples came to Jesus and asked who they should look to after Jesus is gone, Jesus said to them, "No matter where you are you are to go to James the Just, for whose sake heaven and earth came into being." But as I have said, I doubt Jesus actually said this. 

Therefore we should not look to the teachings of James, as much as we can discern them from the Book of Acts and the canonical Letter of James. In the Book of Acts James sounds like a xenophobe and a legalist. The Letter of James is better, but it does not have the central spiritual message of Jesus, which was the Kingdom of God. Most biblical scholars do not think that the biblical letter of James was written by James anyway.

Even if this saying was not spoken by Jesus, it is still interesting in what it says about James. Jesus is reported to have said of his brother: "No matter where you are you are to go to James the Just, for whose sake heaven and earth came into being." That is a remarkable statement to make about James – that heaven and earth came into being for his sake! It is the type of thing Christians might say about Jesus, but not James! Yet Jesus says this about his brother! 

It is possible that the early church in Jerusalem was starting to deify James, the way they deified Jesus. The same way that kings and Caesar were deified, and the way that religions tend to deify their founders. Some political movements – even today - seem to almost deify their leaders. Perhaps that is what is happening here.  

Or maybe there is a deeper truth peeking through. The early church apparently thought that Jesus was not the only one “for whose sake heaven and earth came into being.” If these words are true of James, who was an ordinary man, then perhaps it is true of others. Maybe it is true of everyone. 

Perhaps this saying is pointing to the divine nature and origin of everyone and everything. That we are all children of God. That we are all connected to each other and Christ in God. That our true nature is not these mortal frames and mushy minds, but the eternal nature of the universe. 

In that case James represents all of us – ordinary humans - who share the human and divine nature of Jesus. That would be heresy to most Christians today and then. Maybe that is why this Gospel of Thomas was banned and why traditional Christians cannot accept the Gospel of Thomas. And that is why I accept it.