No very direct statement as to his parentage is made in the New
Testament; but one or two incidental allusions to some circumstances
connected with it, afford ground for a reasonable conclusion on
this point. In the enumeration which Matthew and Mark give of the
four brothers of Jesus, in the discourse of the offended citizens
of Nazareth, Simon is mentioned along with James, Juda and Joses.
It is worthy of notice, also, that on all the apostolic lists, Simon
the apostle is mentioned between the brothers James and Juda; an
arrangement that can not be accounted for, except by supposing that
he was also the brother of James. The reason why Juda is distinctly
specified as the brother of James, while Simon is mentioned without
reference to any such relationship, is, doubtless, that the latter
was so well known by the appellation of the Zealot, that there was no
need of specifying his relations, to distinguish him from Simon Peter.
These two circumstances, incidentally mentioned, may be considered as
justifying the supposition, that Simon Zelotes was the same person as
Simon the brother of Jesus. In this manner, all the old writers have
understood the connection; and though such use is no authority, it is
worth mentioning that the monkish chroniclers always consider Simon
Zelotes as the brother of Juda; and they associate these two, as
wandering together in eastern countries, to preach the gospel in Persia
and Mesopotamia. Others carry him into much more improbable wanderings.
Egypt and Northern Africa, and even Britain, are mentioned as the
scenes of his apostolic labors, in the ingenious narratives of those
who undertook to supply almost every one of the nations of the eastern
continent with an apostolic patron saint. All this is very poor
consolation for the general dearth of facts in relation to this apostle;
and the searcher for historical truth will not be so well satisfied
with the tedious tales of monkish romance, as with the decided and
unquestionable assurance, that the whole history of this apostle, from
beginning to end, is perfectly unknown, and that not one action of his
life has been preserved from the darkness of an utterly impenetrable
oblivion.