Apostle

The designation “Apostle” is a title rather than the proper name of a single historical individual. In the Christian New Testament, written in the latter half of the first century CE, the term (Greek apostolos, “envoy” or “one sent”) is applied first to the twelve men whom Jesus of Nazareth is said to have chosen from among his Galilean followers during his public ministry in Roman Palestine, conventionally dated by historians to the late 20s or early 30s of the first century. The lists given in the Synoptic Gospels and Acts name Simon Peter, Andrew, James and John the sons of Zebedee, Philip, Bartholomew, Thomas, Matthew the tax collector, James son of Alphaeus, Thaddaeus (also called Judas son of James), Simon the Cananaean or Zealot, and Judas Iscariot. After Judas’s death, Matthias was chosen by lot to restore the number to twelve. These men were Jewish, spoke Aramaic, and came from ordinary occupations such as fishing and tax collection in the towns around the Sea of Galilee.

The Gospels portray the Twelve as companions of Jesus who received instruction, witnessed healings and exorcisms, and were sent out on preaching missions. After the crucifixion of Jesus, which most scholars place around 30 CE, the Book of Acts describes the apostles remaining in Jerusalem, receiving the Holy Spirit at the feast of Pentecost, and beginning to preach publicly. Peter emerges as a leading spokesman. The same book and the letters attributed to Paul record the spread of the movement beyond Judea into Syria, Asia Minor, Greece, and eventually Rome. Paul of Tarsus, a Pharisee who had persecuted the early community, claimed an independent apostolic commission after a visionary experience on the road to Damascus; later Christian tradition frequently refers to him simply as “the Apostle.” His letters, the earliest surviving Christian documents, date from the 50s CE and show him founding and corresponding with congregations of both Jewish and Gentile believers.

Reliable contemporary evidence for the later careers and deaths of most of the Twelve is lacking. Extra-canonical Acts of the Apostles, composed from the second century onward, assign missionary territories and martyrdoms: Peter and Paul in Rome under Nero, Andrew in Achaia, Thomas in India, and so forth. These narratives are generally regarded by historians as legendary or at best as preserving faint local traditions. Archaeological and literary corroboration outside Christian sources is virtually nonexistent for any apostle except, arguably, the existence of a Petrine presence in Rome by the later first century. Consequently no verified year of birth, precise birthplace, or exact date of death can be given for “the Apostle” as an unspecified figure.

Because the subject of this entry is identified only by the generic title “Apostle,” personal particulars such as a birth year, spouse, children, or specific burial place cannot be supplied without inventing an identity. The apostles as a group were adult males of the first century; at least Peter is recorded in the Gospels as having a mother-in-law and therefore a wife, while later tradition often presents the others as celibate. They were not members of a religious order in the later monastic sense, nor did they hold the later offices of pope or patriarch, although Peter is regarded in Catholic tradition as the first Bishop of Rome. Feast days and patronages developed over subsequent centuries for individual apostles and for the college of apostles collectively; without a named individual, no single feast day or list of patronages can be assigned. The apostles remain foundational figures in Christian memory, commemorated as the original witnesses to Jesus and the first missionaries of the Church.