Levirate Marriage of Mariam:
It is required in the Torah in Deut. 25:5-10, were the oldest surviving unmarried brother or relative was obligated to marry his deceased brother’s widow and bear a male child in his name so that his dead brother’s ‘name’ or lineage would not perish. To honor a man who died without an heir and thus assure his posterity was one of the most sacred and holy things a family could do. Remember Tamer and Ruth had Levirate marriages.
Mary’s Jewish name was Mariam, and she became pregnant while engaged, by the Holy Spirit; Joseph married her anyway, and adopted Y’Shua as his own.
The last we hear of Joseph was when Y’Shua was twelve years old, it is a good reason to suppose that Joseph died early, whether because he was substantially older than Mariam was or for some other unknown cause. It comes up in a discussion in the Gospels where Y’Shua is asked about a case in which a woman is widowed no less than seven times and each time successively marries a brother of her first husband in Mark 12:19-22.
Mariam being as young as fifteen or sixteen when she had Y’Shua B.C. 5, then in her twenties she had James the Just A.D. 5, Simon, Joseph nicknamed Jose or Joses, Jude. Salome only mentioned by Mark 15:40 is possibly Y’Shua’s sister.
Mark 15:47; 16:1 identifies the ‘other Mariam’ two times as the mother of the two fishermen James and John, who were part of the Twelve. We do know Mariam the mother of Y’Shua also had two sons named James and Joses, (Mk. 6:3), and it was assumed they were sisters. Is it likelihood that two sisters in the same family would have the same name, and then have children with the same name also? Some translated it as sisters-in-law.
John 19:25 calls the second Mariam as the wife of Cleophas. Something seems to be going on here. John knows something that either he, or those who later edited his gospel, chose to veil. Could it be the one in the same woman – in order to disguise the fact that Y’Shua’s mother Mariam, after the death of Joseph, married his brother Cleophas? A decrypted version of John would read: ‘Standing by the cross of Y’Shua was His mother Mariam wife of Cleophas and Mariam of Magdalene, and Salome the sister of Y’Shua.’ This would agree perfectly with Mark and not create the absurdity of sisters-in-law of the same name having identically named children, including the nickname “Joses,” in the same order of birth.
Joseph’s brother, Cleophas, though seldom recognized, is mentioned in the New Testament in John 19:25. Cleophas’ name comes from the Hebrew root chalaph and means to ‘change or to replace.’ It is an ancestor of the English term ‘caliphate,’ referring to a dynastic succession of rulers. So this is likely not his given name, but a type of nickname. He is the one who replaced his brother Joseph, who died childless. Cleophas is mentioned elsewhere by the Greek form of the same name – Alphaeus. His firstborn son was regularly known as ‘James son of Alphaeus or James the younger’ to distinguish him from James son of Zebedee the fisherman, brother of the apostle John.
According to Jewish Law ‘Cleophas or Alphaeus’ became his ‘replacer,’ and married his widow, Mariam, mother of Y’Shua. His firstborn son, James, the brother who succeeded Y’Shua, legally became known as the ‘son of Joseph’ after his deceased brother in order to carry on his name. This would mean that Y’Shua had four half-brothers and at least two half sisters, all born of His mother Mariam but from a different father.
In Mark 2:14, Matthew is described as ‘Levi son of Alphaeus’ that would also make him a brother to Y’Shua. But why would he be called Matthew or Levi rather than Joseph? It is possible that he was known by both names, one was his and the other was given to him in honor of Joseph, the deceased husband of Mariam and brother of Cleophas. This combination of names was quite common in the period, especially among those connected to a priestly lineage, as was Mariam. Remember in her line alone are listed half a dozen ‘Matthews.’ Y’Shua’s grandfather was Levi. The 1st century Jewish historian, Josephus was named Joseph and he had a father and brother named Matthew and a grandfather named Joseph. His family was the same priestly lineage, descended from the Maccabees.
It is indicated in the gospel of John 19:25 when Y’Shua, the eldest son in the family, just before His death, handed His mother over to the care of a mysterious ‘beloved disciple’ that John prefers not to name. We assumed John was talking about himself, ‘whom He loved is mentioned in 19:26; 21:7; and 21:20. This person is most likely James, His brother, the next eldest in the family to take care of His mother who was widowed again, and became His successor. We have to remember that the gospels are primarily theological accounts of the Y’Shua story written a generation or more after His death. When it comes to Y’Shua’s’ family there is much they do not spell out, and there are things they appear to deliberately suppress. The reasons for these tendencies are a tangled tale of political conspiracy and religious power plays with stakes destined to shape the future of the world’s largest religion. And that they do not take into account Jewish history and tradition The Blessed Virgin Mary, they say, only had one husband (Joseph) and remained a virgin and had no other children, making the New Testament more ‘Gentile’ in form and origin by changing the translations to fit their purpose. The other names were considered ‘cousins.’ One may find this on the net from the Catholic sights. The message is simple, especially for those who literally interpret the Scripture to attack Mary's virginity: ‘don't play name games with the Word!’
Many have the mistake impression that our New Testament gospels offer us four fairly complete biographies of His life. The facts are otherwise. Mark and John begins their story with Y’Shua at age thirty, Matthew and Luke add birth stories and they include more of the teachings of Y’Shua but basically they follow Mark’s lead. The vital role Y’Shua’s brothers played was in process of being painted out of the picture. We are missing any historical record of the first thirty years of Y’Shua’s life. We know that His family grew up poor for they could only afford two young doves for sacrifice (Lev. 12:8 and Lk. 2:24).
Eight days after the birth, at the circumcision, the child was given the legal name ‘Y’Shua bar Yosef,’ or Y’Shua son of Joseph. Joseph was known as a carpenter. The Greek word tekton is a more generic term referring to a ‘builder.’ It can include one who works with wood, but in its 1st century Galilean context it more likely refers to a stoneworker. The 2nd century Proto-evangelism of James refers to Joseph as a ‘builder of buildings.’ Houses and buildings were built of stone. Wood was used sparingly, mostly for roof and beams and doors, since wood was a scarce building material in the rocky terrain of Palestine. In one of Y’Shua’s well known stories He speaks of the wise man who is building a house digs a deep foundation and lays the solid stone foundation of the building upon bedrock in Luke 6:48. He appears to have been exposed to the building trades, and stonework of some type was most likely His trade.
In the Roman culture the artisan trades were regarded as akin to slave labor. They were viewed as the toilsome, backbreaking work of the lower classes and anyone who said his father was a tekton would demean his social class.
I could not find anything out about Cleophas/ Alphaeus trade.
Paul’s connection to Y’Shua was based on his own visionary experiences in which he claimed to have ‘seen’ Y’Shua several years after His crucifixion. He states he had received his authority and his commission directly from the heavenly Messiah and needed no earthly human approval or authorization. Paul developed his views on Christology based on his own mystical experiences but he would have been able to draw upon a complex set of speculative Jewish traditions as well. He referred to his message of the exalted Messiah and the gift of forgiveness and eternal life made available by His death as ‘my gospel.’ He seldom mentioned anything that Y’Shua taught and said little about His life other than His death. No one in the Y’Shua movement was thinking about a ‘new religion’ but rather a restoration and fulfillment of the promises that G-d had anciently made to Israel. Paul was called to the Gentiles, and his implications are clear. G-d’s covenant with Israel has been nullified by ‘faith in Messiah,’ so that ‘being Jewish and following the commandments of G-d set forth in the Torah had become obsolete. That is why Peter and many others did not agree with his teachings; the issue was raised directly in A.D. 58 when Paul was called to appear before the elders. He tacitly allowed them to assume he was dedicated to the Torah but then he wrote to 1 Cor. 9:20-21 the contrary. Presumably, among Gentiles he was willing to live as a Gentile, which certainly no Jew observant of the Law could ever do. He thought he was a apostle and in no way inferior to any of the Twelve, though they did not accept all his teachings. (1 Cor. 15:10). He broke from James and the Jerusalem leaders. Paul’s legacy is a alarming one, since his version of the gospels was gradually accepted by more and more Christians scattered throughout the Roman world. After 70 A.D. the message of the original Twelve Apostles began to diminish. His letters and the influence of his ideas as embedded in the New Testament writings, including the gospels, became so persuasive that they came to constitute what was viewed as the only authentic Christianity, losing its Jewish roots. The New Testament itself is primarily a literary legacy of the apostle Paul, for he is the author of thirteen of twenty-seven books. Paul was the hero of Mark, and the other gospels spun off of what Mark said, each adding their own twist.
There is something about the myth of the Messiah that taints otherwise honest people, turning them into liars and confidence tricksters. The prejudices of the great historian and Christian defender in general are inexcusable. They believe the gospels are G-d-given, with no proof other than what they have always been led to understand, and that therefore suffices. Not understanding that there have been many translations down through the years, and changes have been made. It does not suffice for anyone who is properly scholarly. Christians cannot be scholarly and simply believe their childish fairy stories with no conclusive proof they should have the respect they give them. They believe the preachers and do not take the time to study to show thyself approved rightly dividing the word of truth. It does not matter that their parents believed it and so do millions of their friends. They all suffer from the same lack of discernment. They just believe what they are told. No historian could make such offhand assessments of competing texts. The fact that the texts they prefer are religious texts is an excellent reason for treating them with suspicion. People will give them excessive credence simply because they have been accepted as authoritative in the past, irrespective of their validity. Once the canon of acceptable books had been decided by the Church, other books that were historically more valid, were forgotten, or even deliberately destroyed in the Church’s timeless war against unorthodoxy and heresy. So it is that a book like the Protevangelium, long ignored, might contain genuine tradition quite contrary to the beliefs of the dogmatized.
Now let's do serious Bible Study, and go to Strong's and the KJV (both Protestant, by the way).
http://www.khouse.org/blueletter/ Go to that link, and search for these two passages, one at a time: Matt 10:3 and John 19:25.
In the first, click the 'C' icon for the Strong's Concordance, then click the Strong's number for the name Alphaeus.
Comes up 'father of James the Less'.
We knew that. Now hit the back button to start again with John 19:25. Go to the Concordance ('C' icon), then hit the number for Cleophas, and gosh: it comes up father of James the less!
In other words, Alphaeus and Cleophas are simply two forms of the same name, It is not only NOT being held up that these brothers 'may' be Our L-rd's siblings, but that idea is being REFUTED by the Scripture, when one harmonizes the Gospels! We should also point out that the Scripture nowhere calls them Mariam's children.
During the North African Campaign, a bunch of soldier boys had been on a long hike. They arrived in a little town called Casino. The next morning being Sunday, several of the boys went to church. A sergeant commanded the boys in church.
