Note 52 — Chapter V · THE DISCIPLES OF JESUS.

Next to Peter, the catalogue of the first and third gospels places his brother Andrew; that of the second gospel and the Acts, James, and after him, John. The first and third Evangelists are evidently guided by the propriety of uniting the couples of brethren; Mark and the author of the Acts, by that of preferring the two apostles next in distinction to Peter to the less conspicuous Andrew, whom they accordingly put last in the quaternion. We have already considered the manner in which these four apostles are signalized in the Christian legend by a special history of their vocation. They appear together in other passages of Mark; first (i. 29), where Jesus, in company with the sons of Zebedee, enters the house of Simon and Andrew: as, however, the other Evangelists only mention Peter on this occasion, Mark may have added the other names inferentially, concluding that the four fishermen, so recently called, would not be apart from Jesus, and that Andrew had a share in his brother’s house, a thing in itself probable.52 Again, Mark xiii. 3, our four apostles concur in asking Jesus privately (κατ’ ἰδίαν) concerning the time of the destruction of the temple, and of his second advent. But the parallel passages in the other gospels do not thus particularize any of the disciples. Matthew says, The disciples came to him privately (xxiv. 3); hence it is probable that Mark’s limitation is an erroneous one. Possibly the words κατ’ ἰδίαν, being used in the document to which he referred to denote the separation of the twelve from the multitude, appeared to him, from association, an introductory form, of which there are other examples (Matt. xvii. 1; Mark ix. 2), to a private conference of Jesus with Peter, James and John, to whom he might add Andrew on account of the fraternity. Luke, on the other hand, in his account of the miraculous draught of fishes, and the vocation of the fishermen (v. 10), omits Andrew, though he is included in the corresponding narratives, probably because he does not elsewhere appear as one of the select apostles; for except on the occasions already noticed, he is only mentioned by John (vi. 9, xii. 22), and that in no very important connexion.