ST. JACOB THE ELDER

THE APOSTLE, THE DISCIPLE OF JESUS

Apostle James the Elder was the son of fisherman Zebedee and Mary Salome. The apostle and evangelist John was his brother. Like the apostles Peter and John, James was a special confidant of Jesus. He saw Jesus when he was transfigured on the Mount. He accompanied him to the Garden of Gethsemane on the Mount of Olives and saw him sweating a bloody path. Jesus gave him the name son of thunder. This character move matches the scene when the apostle James appears at the head of the Christian troops in the battle of Clavius against the Muslims, thus becoming the patron saint of Spain. After Jesus' ascension, James continued to preach the gospel. According to tradition, he worked in Jerusalem and Samaria. Another tradition says that he went to Spain and preached there. He was the first of the twelve apostles of Christ to suffer martyrdom. On the Easter holiday of 44, King Agrippa I had him imprisoned and beheaded. Tradition says that the Church of St. was built on Zion Hill in Jerusalem at the place of his death. Jacob. Around the year 70, his bones were supposed to be transferred to Sinai, where the monastery of St. Jakob, today there is a monastery of St. Catherine. In the 8th century, his relics were rescued from the Saracens and transferred to the province of Galicia in Spain. According to tradition, when searching for the sometimes abandoned and forgotten grave of the apostle Jacob, a star shone on it. They built the basilica of St. Jacob, which was consecrated on July 25, 816. In the basilica, the saint's relics are kept in a coffin under the main altar. 

First, James the Elder was depicted as an apostle with a book, and later as a pilgrim with pilgrim attributes: a staff, a walking stick, a bag, a hat and a pilgrim's cloak. 

In Slovenia, St. 67 churches dedicated to James the Elder.