An Israelite Without Guile

The Gospel for the feast of Saint Bartholomew, August 24, is from Saint John’s account of the first meeting of Our Lord with Nathanael, whom he also names near the end of his Gospel as being with Peter, Thomas, James, John and some other disciples at the apparition of the risen Christ to them on the shore of the Sea of Tiberias. Saint John tells us here that Nathanael was from Cana, where Jesus worked his first miracle. Also from Cana was another Apostle, Simon the Zealot.

Why, however, is the story of Saint Philip bringing Nathanael to see Christ read on the feast of Saint Bartholomew? It is because, according to the Latin tradition, Nathanael and Bartholomew are the same person.

Bartholomew is not a proper name, but a title. It means “son of Ptolemy.” Ptolemy was a general of the Greek Macedonian conqueror, Alexander the Great. Ptolemy was the first of the Greek Ptolemaic line of kings who ruled Egypt after Alexander’s early death in 323 BC. Was it unusual for a Jew to be called the son of a Greek king? I do not know. Perhaps not, if his family was of nobility. Simon Bar Jona was Saint Peter’s name before Our Lord changed it. Jona, of course, being the name of the great Hebrew prophet who brought Nineveh to repentance. Other Apostles who had Greek names were Andrew and Philip.

In the lists of the Apostles as given in the three synoptic Gospels, Matthew, Luke, and Mark, the order is nearly the same. Peter and Andrew, brothers, are always given first, then James and John, also brothers. The other eight vary a little in order, but Philip and Bartholomew are always coupled together even though they are not brothers.

Saint Bartholomew was the first to proclaim Jesus in His public life as “Son of God” and “King of Israel” (John 1: 49). Our Lord must have particularly loved him for His first words to him were of praise: “Behold an Israelite, indeed, in whom there is no guile” (John 1: 47). Then, when Jesus said that He saw him “sitting under the fig tree” before Philip called him, that sign was enough to win his faith. “Because I said unto thee, I saw thee under the fig tree, thou believest: greater things than these shalt thou see” Jesus assured him. (John 1:50).

After Pentecost, Saint Bartholomew preached the Faith as far away as India. He returned to Asian Minor and brought the gospel to Armenia. Here, thirty-nine years after Christ’s Ascension, is where he was flayed alive and martyred. His major relics found a final home in Rome in the Church dedicated to him on a tiny island in the Tiber.

Saint Bartholomew, pray for us.