The Apostles Bartholomew and Barnabas and the Apostolicity of the Church 

1, In June, the Church commemorates the holy Apostles Bartholomew and Barnabas. Between the day of their remembrance — June 24 — and the feast of Saints Peter and Paul — July 12 — in Churches following the Julian calendar there is a curious calendrical symmetry: 12 and 24, as if a mutual numerical reflection.

 

2, Why the Apostles Bartholomew and Barnabas are commemorated together — I have, unfortunately, not been able to find a definite answer to this question. The sources do not provide any clear indication of the reason for this joining of their memory. Moreover, as far as can be seen from Church tradition, they did not carry out a joint apostolic ministry. Barnabas preached together with the Apostle Paul and is venerated, according to tradition, as the founder of the Church of Cyprus. Bartholomew, on the other hand, preached in other lands, particularly in the Caucasus.

 

3, Here the historian, in a sense, stops before the fact: there is no direct explanation. But the theologian is not obliged to stop there. He does not merely record events, but seeks to interpret them. For the Church is not only a keeper of memory, but also a community of interpretation — a communion that reads its life in the light of Scripture.

 

4, One may, of course, suggest a historical explanation: for example, that at some point the relics of the two apostles were transferred to Constantinople, and that their commemoration was thereby placed on the same day. For reasons not entirely clear to us, the Byzantines frequently transferred — or rather relocated — relics and holy objects from various regions of the Empire to the capital. But the act of translation of relics in itself does not yet provide a theological meaning; it is only an explanation of circumstances.

 

5. From there, the theological perspective inevitably leads us to another context. The commemoration of Bartholomew and Barnabas usually falls within the Apostles’ Fast, which in turn leads toward the feast of the holy Apostles Peter and Paul. The Church unites their memory, although they too did not preach together, yet are perceived as a single witness to the apostolic faith.

 

6, Perhaps here lies the key to understanding the feast of Bartholomew and Barnabas as well. Bartholomew is an Apostle from among the Twelve, Barnabas from among the Seventy. Thus two different ranks of apostleship — the Twelve and the Seventy — are united in one day, in order to emphasize the unity and continuity of the apostolic ministry in the Church — which continues in her life, in her actions, and in her dogmatic witness.

 

7, The Creed calls the Church “apostolic.” Apostleship is one of the four essential marks of the Church. The commemoration of Bartholomew and Barnabas reminds us of this in the liturgical life of the Church.

 

8, From the Gospel text we know that Judas fell away from the number of the Twelve Apostles. Ancient ecclesiastical traditions and authors tell us that a complete list of the Seventy Apostles has not been preserved. Moreover, Western tradition speaks of seventy-two apostles, whereas the Eastern tradition speaks of seventy. In this we see a remarkable shared sense of incompleteness: the very number of the Twelve has been disrupted, and the number of the Seventy has not been definitively fixed. Yet it is precisely this incompleteness that seems to testify to the living nature of the apostolic ministry, which is not confined to a rigid list, but continues in the Church’s memory and Tradition.

 

9, The feast of Bartholomew and Barnabas, at first glance, remains almost unnoticed within the Church’s annual cycle of commemorations, yet it is perhaps precisely the only case in which two apostolic ranks — the Twelve and the Seventy — are brought together in a single day. And in this unity there once again becomes visible the very nature of the Church’s apostleship: it was first revealed in the Twelve, then expanded to the Seventy, and thereafter is no longer a completed number, but a living and continuous ministry, present in the Church in all ages.