Sts. Simeon and Jude, Apostles (Remembrance Day October 28)

"Now, therefore, you are....fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, having been built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ Himself being the chief cornerstone, in whom the whole building, being joined together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord, in whom you also are being built together for a habitation of God in the Spirit." Ephesians 2:19-22

Let us make no mistake about it, the world and the Kingdom of God are at war with each other, and it is a war to the death. No quarter can be given for eternity hangs in the balance. Such a struggle is inevitable, for the world holds a philosophy which is anathema to the Kingdom, and it moves with means and methods that are not worthy of the high calling of the gospel. It's easy to spot worldliness, but the opposite, that it should also be easy to spot kingdom-ness, is not always true. We would expect the kingdom to stand out with a luster and shine that would draw all men to its revelation. But consider what Paul states simply in II Corinthians 4:7 that "we have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellence of the power may be of God and not of us." We know what men of power and ambition look like, our entire society is filled with such movers and shakers. But we have so very poor an understanding of what spiritual men of power are, most would not even attract a second glance from us. Paul describes the apostles in I Corinthians 4:9-13, and it is upon this "offscouring of all things" that Christ chose to found His Kingdom. The world would see no sense in such an action, but Paul explains in I Corinthians 1:27-31 that "God has chosen the foolish things of the world to put to shame the wise, and God has chosen the weak things of the world to put to shame the things of the mighty....and the things which are not, to bring to nothing the things that are..." I'm afraid that in our world today, if Jesus Christ advertised in the classifieds for apostles using Paul's job description, very few would vie for the position. Let us be thankful, however, that in an age when apostate religion and military might held tenuous sway over the empire, and when spiritual darkness bound men's hearts in chains that none could break, that twelve men came forward to answer that call. Two such men were Simon the zealot, and Jude, the brother of James.

The scriptural and historical records of the Church are sketchy at best concerning these two men, but let's piece together what is available so that we can at least become acquainted with these foundation stones of the Church. Simon is referred to as the Cananites in Matthew 10:4 and Mark 3:18, and as Zealotes in Luke 6:16 and Acts 1:13 to distinguish him from Simon Peter, and from St. Symeon, the brother of James, the Lesser. These surnames are both translations of a Hebrew word which means "the zealous" and refers to the attitude of his heart before the Lord and His law. It does not indicate the place of his residence or his political affiliation as some early interpreters were quick to conclude. Beyond this little else is known. Traditions claim that he preached in Egypt and was later joined by St. Jude who was preaching in the Mesopotamian area. Together they traveled to Persia where they were martyred for their faithful witness of Jesus Christ. The symbol of St. Simon is the saw, for tradition ascribes his martyrdom to being sawn apart.

We know that St. Jude was also called Lebbaeus whose surname was Thaddeus (from Matthew 10:3 and Mark 3:18) and that he was also called Judas, identified as the brother of James (Luke 6:16 and Acts 1:13). From these scriptures we can draw some other conclusions. The first is that this is the same Jude who wrote the short epistle and who identifies himself in Jude 1 simply as "as servant of Jesus Christ, and brother of James." The second is that the brother James whom he refers to is none other than James, the bishop of the Church at Jerusalem (Acts 15:13) whom Paul refers to as "the Lord's brother" in Galatians 1:19. This would lead us to conclude that James and Jude are mentioned in Matthew 13:55 when the crowd wonders aloud of Jesus "Is not this the carpenter's son? Is not His mother called Mary? And his brothers James, Joseph, Simon and Judas?" The whole question of exactly how he was related to the Lord is difficult to sort out and not without complications. Eusebius, in his History of the Church, Book III, Sections 19, 20 and 22 quotes Hegessipus as declaring that Jude "was said to have been the brother of the Lord according to the flesh." We will take his statement at its face value and not try to interpret it any further. Jude's name is associated with preaching in Judea, Samaria, Idumaea, Syria and Mesopotamia. According to Eusebius' record, he returned to Jerusalem in 62 A.D. after the martyrdom of James (his brother) at the hand of the Jewish party, and helped to elect another brother, Symeon, as the second bishop of the Church at Jerusalem. The internal evidence of the epistle of Jude suggests that it was written around this time, probably from Jerusalem, and was addressed primarily to Hebrew converts in the Palestine region. Tradition then tells us that Jude joined St. Simon in a mission to Persia and there suffered martyrdom in Armenia.

By the world's standard, these two men were hardly worth any attention. They are only indirectly mentioned in the writings of antiquity, and even in the scriptures of the Church of which they were apostles very little is recorded of them. The world would classify them as foolish, weak, of no repute. And yet it is precisely upon men such as these that Christ placed the entire weight of His Church, the very visible manifestation of the Kingdom upon earth. And because of their persevering spirit to "go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them....teaching them to observe all that I commanded you..." (Matthew 28:18-20), we who read this brief account of their lives have been born again by faith in the same Lord of which they were servants and apostles. Bernard of Chartres writing in the 12th century said "We are like dwarfs seated on the shoulders of giants; we see more things than the ancients and things more distance, but this is due neither to the sharpness of our own sight, nor to the greatness of our own stature, but because we are raised and borne aloft on that giant mass." The Church is that giant, and such men as Simon and Jude are Christ's chosen foundation upon which that giant stands. We may know very little of them this side of the Jordan, but may we ever be thankful to the God whom we together serve that they took seriously their apostolic charge when the whole world was arrayed against them and have made the way of salvation evident even to us today.