The Life
Bartholomew was born at Cana of Galilee. The Fathers identify him with Nathanael, the disciple whom Philip brought to the Lord at the very beginning of the public ministry. The Lord saw him coming and said: “Behold an Israelite indeed, in whom is no guile” (John 1:47). After Pentecost he was sent with Saint Philip to preach in Syria and Asia Minor. They worked together at Hierapolis in Phrygia, where they destroyed the great pagan serpent that the city worshiped. They were both crucified there, but Bartholomew was taken down still alive when an earthquake struck. He went on to preach in Armenia, where he was finally martyred — by tradition crucified upside down, flayed alive, and beheaded — around the year 70. His relics rest today at the Church of Saint Bartholomew on the Tiber Island in Rome.
When Nathanael came to meet the Lord, the Lord greeted him with a strange and beautiful phrase: “Before that Philip called thee, when thou wast under the fig tree, I saw thee.” Nathanael had been doing something under that fig tree that he had not told anyone about. The Lord had seen him. The Lord knew him. From that moment Nathanael recognized that he was speaking with the Messiah. The Fathers have variously interpreted what Nathanael was doing under the fig tree — praying for the coming of the Messiah, studying the Scriptures, mourning over the suffering of Israel — but the point is that he was doing something secret that only God could have seen. The Lord saw it. The Lord saw him. The deep mystery of being known before being called runs through the entire scene.
After Pentecost, the apostles cast lots for where each would preach. Bartholomew received the regions of Syria and Asia Minor, with Saint Philip as his apostolic partner. Saint Mariamne, Philip’s sister, often accompanied them. The three traveled together extensively. They preached in many cities. They were stoned, beaten, and imprisoned. In one village they met Saint John the Theologian, and the four of them traveled together for a time to Phrygia. Their apostolic friendship lasted for many years. The Orthodox Church still keeps Philip’s feast on November 14 and Bartholomew’s on June 11 as the two great apostolic remembrances of the partnership that brought the Gospel to so much of the eastern Mediterranean.
The great pagan city of Hierapolis in Phrygia worshiped an enormous serpent in its central temple. Philip and Bartholomew, with Mariamne and (for a time) John the Theologian, came to the city and preached the Gospel openly. They worked many miracles. They healed Stachys, a man who had been blind for forty years. They cast out demons. By the power of their prayer, the great serpent itself was destroyed. The wife of the city prefect was healed and came to faith. The prefect, enraged at his wife’s conversion, ordered the apostles arrested. He had Philip and Bartholomew condemned to crucifixion. As they hung on their crosses, an earthquake struck. The earth opened and swallowed the prefect, the pagan priests, and many of the persecutors. The terrified people rushed to take down the apostles. Philip had already given up his soul. Bartholomew was hung lower and was still alive. He was taken down. He baptized many of those who had come to faith and ordained Saint Stachys as the first bishop of Hierapolis.
After leaving Hierapolis, Bartholomew preached in many other regions. The tradition records that he traveled to “India” — most likely the lands of Arabia and southern Persia, called India in the geography of the time — carrying with him a Hebrew copy of the Gospel of Saint Matthew. The historian Eusebius records that the philosopher Pantaenus, founder of the Catechetical School of Alexandria, visited the region in the late second century and found a Hebrew copy of Matthew that the Christians said had been brought to them by Bartholomew himself. His final mission was to Greater Armenia, where he preached the Gospel and converted many, including the king’s brother. The king’s envious brother eventually had him arrested. He was tortured cruelly. By tradition, he was crucified upside down, flayed alive — his skin stripped from his body — and finally beheaded. His martyrdom took place at Albanopolis in Armenia, around the year 70.
The Christians of Albanopolis buried Bartholomew’s body in a stone coffin. The pagans, alarmed by the miracles that began to happen at his tomb, threw the coffin into the sea. By the providence of God it floated for many weeks all the way to the small island of Lipari off the coast of Sicily. Bishop Agathon of Lipari, who had received a vision in a dream, met the coffin as it came ashore and reverently buried the relics in the cathedral church of his city. From Lipari they were eventually translated to Benevento on the Italian mainland and then in 983 to Rome, where they rest today on the Tiber Island in the Church of Saint Bartholomew.
These are the Lord’s own words about Bartholomew, spoken at the moment Philip first brought him to Christ. They are an extraordinary acknowledgment. The Lord is identifying Bartholomew as a true son of Israel, untouched by the deceptions that have so often marked the history of God’s people. The Greek word for “guile” (dolos) is the same word used in the Septuagint of the original deception by which Jacob obtained Esau’s blessing. The Lord is making a deliberate echo: here is a true Israelite, in whom is no such guile. The acknowledgment is unique among the Lord’s greetings of any of the Twelve. Bartholomew was authentic. He was simple. He was without deception. He was the kind of person we all hope to be.
There is a beautiful tradition about Saint Bartholomew and Saint Joseph the Hymnographer (commemorated April 4). Joseph was a great composer of liturgical hymns and canons in ninth-century Byzantium. One day, on the feast of Saint Bartholomew, while serving the Liturgy, Joseph saw the apostle himself standing at the altar. Bartholomew took the Holy Gospel from the altar table and pressed it to Joseph’s breast, saying: “May the Lord bless you, and may your song delight the whole world.” From that day Joseph began to compose hymns. Over his lifetime he wrote about three hundred canons, including some of the most beloved hymns of the Orthodox liturgical tradition. Saint Bartholomew is therefore honored as a patron of hymnography and of every Christian musician and poet.
Bartholomew matters to every Orthodox Christian for many reasons. He is the apostle whom the Lord called “an Israelite indeed in whom is no guile” — an unique acknowledgment among all the apostles. He preached with Saint Philip across Syria, Asia Minor, and Phrygia. He confronted the great pagan serpent of Hierapolis and was crucified there alongside his apostolic partner. He carried the Hebrew Gospel of Saint Matthew to India. He preached in Armenia, where he was crucified, flayed, and beheaded for the Lord. He is the supreme apostolic founder of the Armenian Church. By his providential blessing he gave the Orthodox Church its supreme hymnographer, Saint Joseph. His relics rest at Rome on the Tiber Island. His feast on June 11 is celebrated throughout the Orthodox world. He is the patron of every Christian who strives for authentic simplicity, transparency of soul, and an inner life without guile.