Saint Jude the Apostle was also nicknamed Thaddaeus. Jude is the author of The Epistle of Jude. He is almost universally understood to be the half brother of Jesus Matthew 13:55; Mark 6:3, from Joseph’s first wife.
Saint Jude was one of the twelve apostles chosen and invested (ordained, see Mark 3:14) by Jesus (but he was NOT Judas Iscariot !!).
Jude is one of the four half brothers of Jesus, and the younger the brother of James the Just, the first Bishop of Jerusalem, who was seated after the Apostle James the Greater was martyred by Herod Agrippa I which stimulated the Great Apostolic Dispersion from Jerusalem in AD 44 Acts 12.
James the Just is the author of The Book of James and the compiler of The Liturgy of Saint James the oldest surviving description of the worship sequence used by the Apostolic church for their Sunday worship service to God. That liturgy was a modified version of the Jewish worship service to God, which was originally instituted by God, through Moses at Mount Sinai, and is documented in the Pentateuch (the first fives books of the Bible written by Moses). Of course, the Jewish ritual worship routine had to be updated to account for the arrival of God’s promised Messiah, Jesus the Christ, but the update liturgy was still the format God had directed His believers to use to worship Him.
James was also the apostle who presided over the important Jerusalem Council (the de facto Zeroth Ecumenical Council) in AD 49, which decided that new Gentile converts to Christianity did not have to be circumcised and Judaized to become full Christians Acts 15.
Oral tradition (legend) reports that St. Jude was born into a Jewish family in the town of Paneas, in Galilee. Paneas was later rebuilt by the Romans and renamed Caesarea Philippi. In all probability he spoke both Greek and Aramaic, like almost all of his contemporaries in that area, and was a farmer by trade. According to the legend, St. Jude was a son of Clopas and his mother Mary, was a cousin of the Virgin Mary. Tradition also has it that Jude’s father, Clopas, was martyred because of his forthright and outspoken devotion to the risen Christ. Jude’s side of the family are describes as having been very zealous for keeping the Law of Moses, and in supporting Jesus Christ as being the promised messiah (this should not be understood as a reference to the anti-Roman rule Jewish sect referred to as the Zealots).
Oral tradition also reports that after the resurrection of Christ, Saint Jude initially preached the gospel in Judea, Samaria (as far north as modern-day Beirut) and Idumaea (the land of Edom, the southeastern desert region between Israel and the Sinai Peninsula, i.e. Saint Jude preached in the greater Palestine area).
After the persecution of the Christians in Jerusalem by Herod Agrippa, around A.D. 44 Jude’s travels widened to include Syria (including the city of Edessa, where he was known as “Thaddaeus of Edessa, and described as one of the seventy disciples of Christ”), Mesopotamia, and Libya.
After the persecution of the Christians in Jerusalem by Herod Agrippa in AD 44, Jude’s travels widened to include Syria (including the city of Edessa, where he was known as “Thaddaeus of Edessa, one of the seventy disciples of Christ”), Mesopotamia, and Libya.
According to Eusebius, he returned to Jerusalem in AD 62, and assisted at the election of his brother, St. Simeon, as Bishop of Jerusalem after James the Just was martyred in Jerusalem.
Ancient oral tradition states that Saints Jude and Simon the Zealot traveled to the diasporic Jewish community in Babylon, and stayed there witnessing that Jesus Christ, was God’s promised Messiah and that He had come as God had promised. Their entourage included one of the 70 disciples named in Luke’s Gospel Luke 10:1-20 whose name was Abdias. Jude and Simon consecrated and seated Abdias as the first Bishop of Babylon (Mesopotamia).
Abdias went on to become the author of the ancient but non-canonical Acts of Simon and Jude which recorded their many acts and Jude’s martyrdom.
According to Eusebius, he returned to Jerusalem in A.D. 62, and assisted at the election of his brother, St. Simeon, as Bishop of Jerusalem.
Some time between AD 65 or 70 Saint Jude was martyred in Armenia. According to tradition he was martyred by being clubbed to death and then having his head shattered with an axe. His remains are believed to be located at the Monastery of Saint Thaddaeus in the West Azerbaijan Province, of Iran.
Jude’s friend and long standing companion, Simon the Zealot is traditionally believed to have been martyred by being cut in half with a saw. Simon was also said to have been martyred in Persia, around the same period of time, however these ancient accounts do not suggest that they were martyred together.
In later artwork Jude is often depicted holding the axe he was martyred with. He is also usually wearing a large pectoral medallion of Christ, and he is shown with a tongue of fire over his head, both of which symbolize his zeal for Christ. He is also often shown with a scroll which represents The Epistle of Jude, which he wrote.
In the Roman Catholic Church Saint Jude is the patron saint of desperate cases and lost causes.
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