Steven Carr

If James had been the brother of Jesus, why does no Christian know any stories about the life of Jesus from the age of 12 to 30?

Surely the brother of Jesus would have had his brains picked clean by Christians eager to know what Jesus had been like.

rickP

He apparently had brothers and sisters, yet when he is found teaching in the temple, it doesn't appear there are any siblings mentioned in the story. He was 11 or 12 at that time, so it would seem unlikely that his parents had no other children until after that event.

Archaeopath

I'm glad you posted this - I was toying with the idea of posting the same/similar thread a day or two ago.

I wonder why he had to be around 30 before being baptised, considering he was 'known' at his birth?

bacht

The myth evolved:

Epistles - Jesus given the "name above every name" after death & resurrection in heaven
gMark - Jesus adopted Son of God at baptism
gMatthew & gLuke - Jesus sired Son of God by human mother
gJohn - Christ is pre-existent Logos
Nicene creed - Christ consubstantial with God

Revelation - Christ is Lamb of God/messiah crushing the dragon/Satan (his real brother?)

gdeering

Judging from Paul, these early Christians they were most uncurious people ever to walk the Earth.

Or....

Answer number 2: They did have all the answers they wanted in the detailed biographies of Jesus written shortly after his death/resurrection. Unfortunately they were stored in a library adjacent to the Temple walls and were buried during the destruction of the Temple.

This also explains why so little was remembered, these early Christians relied too heavily on the written word and had terrible memories. This is verified by the difficulties encountered with later attempts to piece together the story of their savior.

One wonders how much of the recent (and forthcoming) works of entertainment and information centered around Michael Jackson will survive in to the next millennium?


But in any case - it's all true!


Gregg

omega2040

Why are there no stories from James about Jesus' life between ages 12 and 30?

Possibly, the accounts of those years have been lost to history.

Possibly, there were no, or few, stories to tell.

Most likely, the relationship between Jesus and James was strained, the stories not consistent with Jesus-as-Messiah. So, James preferred not recount any.

The gospels hint as much:

John 7:5: "For even his brothers did not believe in Him."

Matt:13:57: "So they were offended at Him, But Jesus said to them, 'A prophet is not without honor except in his own country and in his own house'."

Apparently, it took the "resurrection" to make James a believer.

Toto

If you let your imagination run wild, you can think of a number of alternative scenarios, including the popular "Jesus traveled to India in those years."

James Tabor has his own version in the Jesus Dynasty (or via: amazon.co.uk), and claims that James was the natural heir to Jesus' position after the crucifixion, but was later written out of history by a competing faction after Paul took over the movement. Tabor has a PhD and tenure. I don't know of any other tenured PhD's who take his thesis seriously - but it makes as much sense as any other explanation.

Montgomery Scott

I liked that story when Jesus was 12.

He and the family were in Jerusalem for Passover, and after the party, Jesus' family made the trip back home. When they realize that Jesus was not among them, they were frantic, as all parents would be.

Mary: "Hi, Ehud, this is Mary, you haven't seen my son, have you?"

Well, they backtracked all the way back to Jerusalem. After checking out all the places where 12 year old kids would hang out, they decided to check out the temple, where they found Jesus talking to the holy men (called Doctors for some reason).

Mary: Why have you treated us this way? Your father and I have been worried sick looking for you everywhere.

Jesus: How is it that you were looking for me? Didn’t you know that I must be in my Father’s house?

Mary probably replied, "Well no, I did not. Ever heard, honor thy father and mother, i.e., I am your mother and you did not respect me for not coming back with us! Never do that again!"

I always thought Jesus was something of a brat doing that, and if he was God, he would have known that. Mary could not beat his ass, but probably he was sent outside to clean the stables and whatnot.

ApostateAbe

I figure it is probably because the adult life of Jesus is far more interesting than the childhood of Jesus. There would have been much that the family of Jesus, the associates of Jesus, and Jesus himself talked about, but only a slim minority of the information was written down and preserved through the centuries. Chances are that James didn't say anything miraculous about the childhood of Jesus, so Christians didn't pay much attention to his accounts or care to repeat them. Plenty of myth of the childhood of Jesus was developed, including the miraculous birth of Jesus and the escape from Herod per the Gospels of Matthew and Luke, the Boy Jesus in the Temple story at the age of 12 per the Gospel of Luke, but also the Infancy Gospel of Thomas, where Jesus is both miraculous and mischievous. Those myths remained because they appealed to Christians in a way that reality doesn't.

lpetrich

It's usually hard to find out about anyone's childhood, though it is usually easier to find about their young adulthood.

But what's especially interesting is that he had experienced some dramatic events around his birth, and that's something that Lord Raglan and others have noted is very common for legendary heroes. Especially the dramatic event of someone trying to kill the baby hero.

That's very rare among well-documented heroes. There wasn't some Southern plantation owner who tried to kill the baby Abraham Lincoln, some fundamentalist pastor who tried to kill the baby Charles Darwin, some rabbi who tried to kill the baby Adolf Hitler, ...

If it is hard to find out about someone's childhood, it is even harder to find out about their infancy.


As to that childhood-prodigy story in Luke, it makes Jesus Christ seem more snotty than compassionate. and certainly not supremely compassionate -- he did not show any regrets about making his parents get all worried about him.