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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.com | DownloadGreater Men and Women of the Bible by James Hastings: 532. Nathanael
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Literature
Brent, C. H., The Consolations of the Cross (1904), 81.
Carpenter, W. B., The Son of Man among the Sons of Men (1893), 165.
Cox, S., Biblical Expositions (1884), 204.
Davies, J. A., Seven Words of Love (1895), 98.
Edwards, F., These Twelve (1895), 25.
Greenhough, J. G., The Apostles of Our Lord (1904), 74.
Hull, E. L., Sermons Preached at King's Lynn, ii. (1869) 167.
Huntington, F. D., Christ in the Christian Year: Trinity to Advent (1882), 196.
Jones, J. D., The Glorious Company of the Apostles (1904), 130.
Jones, J. D., The Hope of the Gospel (1911), 139.
Jowett, J. H., The Silver Lining (1907), 1.
Knight, G. H., The Master's Questions to His Disciples (1903), 101.
Liddon, H. P., Sermons Preached before the University of Oxford, ii. (1879) 1.
Lilley, J. P., Four Apostles (1912), 51.
Lovell, R. H., First Types of the Christian Life (1895), 70.
Lucas, B., Conversations with Christ (1905), 1.
McDougall, J., The Ascension of Christ (1884), 171.
Maclaren, A., A Year's Ministry, ii. (1888) 169.
Matheson, G., The Representative Men of the New Testament (1905), 71.
Newman, J. H., Parochial and Plain Sermons, ii. (1868) 333.
Parker, J., City Temple Pulpit, iii. (1900) 252.
Rattenbury, J. E., The Twelve (1914), 175.
Rix, H., Sermons, Addresses and Essays (1907), 40.
Rowland, A., in Men of the New Testament: Matthew to Timothy (1905), 95.
Skrine, J. H., Saints and Worthies (1901), 52.
Thom, J. H., Laws of Life after the Mind of Christ, i. (1901) 43.
Trench, R. C., Studies in the Gospels (1867), 66.
Wilberforce, A. B., The Trinity of Evil (1888), 3.
Woodhouse, F. C., The Life of the Soul in the World (1914), 131.
Expositor, 5th Ser., viii. (1898) 336 (W. D. Ridley).
Expository Times, xiii. (1902) 432 (E. Nestle).
Journal of Biblical Literature, xvii. (1898) 21 (R. Rhees).
Behold, an Israelite indeed, in whom is no guile!- Joh_1:47.
The name of Nathanael occurs in two separate parts of John's Gospel, but it does not occur at all in the other Gospels. He is introduced to us at the beginning and at the close of our Lord's ministry. We may reject as improbable the tradition that he was the bridegroom at the marriage in Cana of Galilee, as well as the other one, that he was one of the two disciples who journeyed towards Emmaus. All that we know positively about him is found in these two references to him by John. The question naturally arises, Was he an Apostle? He had the highest praise given him by the Lord; did it end there? Against that idea is the fact that the earliest of our Lord's disciples became Apostles, and that in the second reference to him he is found in company with those who are known to have been Apostles. The question, however, is a legitimate one: How is it, if Nathanael was an Apostle, that his name does not occur either in the Gospels or in the Acts, where the Apostles are enumerated? The explanation may be that he bore a double name, and that he is referred to in them as Bartholomew.
The identifying of the two, which, when once suggested, carries so much probability with it, and which in modern times has found favour with so many, was quite unknown to the Early Church. Indeed Augustine more than once enters at large into the question, why Nathanael, to whom his Lord bore such honourable testimony, whom He welcomed so gladly, was not elected into the number of the Twelve. The reason he gives is curious. He sees evidence in Nathanael's question, “Can any good thing come out of Nazareth?” that this disciple was a Rabbi, learned in the wisdom of the Jewish schools (that he should be numbered among fishermen [Joh_21:2] makes this unlikely, yet not impossible); and such the Lord would in no case choose to lay the foundations of His Church (cf. 1Co_1:26), lest that Church might even seem to stand in the wisdom of man rather than in the power of God. The arguments for the identity of the two, which identity was first suggested by Rupert of Deutz in the twelfth century, are very strong. They are mainly these: that Nathanael's vocation here is co-ordinated with that of Apostles, as of equal significance; that on a later occasion we meet him in the midst of apostles, some named before him, some after (Joh_21:1-2); that the three earlier Evangelists never mention Nathanael, the fourth never Bartholomew; that Philip and Bartholomew in the catalogue of the Apostles are grouped together, as a pair of friends, but with Philip first, even as he is here the earlier in Christ (Mat_10:30; Mar_3:18); that the custom of double names seems to have been almost universal at that time in Judæa, so that all or well-nigh all the Apostles bore more than one; to all which may be added that Bartholomew, signifying “son of Tolmai,” is of itself no proper name. All these arguments in favour of the identity, with nothing against it, bring it very nearly to a certainty that he to whom the promise of the vision of an opened heaven, with angels ascending and descending on the Son of man, was vouchsafed, was no other than Bartholomew the Apostle.
Christina Rossetti devotes two little poems in “Some Feasts and Fasts” to St. Bartholomew. The shorter, relating to his martyrdom, is as follows:-
He bore an agony whereof the name
Hath turned his fellows pale:
But what if God should call us to the same,
Should call, and we should fail?
Nor earth nor sea could swallow up our shame.
Nor darkness draw a veil:
For he endured that agony whose name
Hath made his fellows quail.1 [Note: Christina G. Rossetti, Poetical Works, 177.]