Simeon of Jerusalem was a disciple of Jesus, a close relative, and according to most Christian traditions the second Bishop of Jerusalem (63 until his martyrdom in 107 AD), succeeding James, brother of Jesus after his martyrdom.
Ora pro nobis.
Saint Simeon was the son of Cleophas, otherwise called Alpheus, who was father also of Saint James the Just, the first bishop of Jerusalem, of Saint Jude the Apostle, and of another son named Joseph. Alpheus, according to tradition, was Saint Joseph’s brother, and his wife was the sister of Mary the mother of Jesus. Thus Saint Simeon was the nephew of Saint Joseph and Mary, and so the first cousin cousin of Jesus.
He was one of the 72 disciples, was present at the Ascension of Jesus, and among those gathered on the day of Pentecost and who certainly received the Holy Ghost on the day of Pentecost, with the Mary and the Apostles. In his Church History Eusebius of Caesarea gives the list of these bishops. According to tradition the first bishop of Jerusalem was James the Just, the "brother of the Lord", who according to Eusebius said that he was appointed bishop by the apostles Peter, James (whom Eusebius identifies with James, son of Zebedee), and John. When the Jerusalem aristocracy and Temple hierarchy martyred Saint James the Just, his brother Simeon reproached them for their atrocious cruelty. After this first bishop of Jerusalem had been put to death in the year 62 AD, that is, twenty-nine years after Our Savior’s Resurrection, the Apostles and disciples met at Jerusalem to appoint a successor, and unanimously chose Saint Simeon, who had already assisted his brother in the government of community of disciples in Jerusalem for many years.
In the year 66 or 67 AD, in the reign of Nero, during which Saints Peter and Paul suffered martyrdom at Rome, war broke out in Israel as the Jewish people began to fight for their independence, thus beginning the First Jewish War. The Christians of Jerusalem were warned by God of the impending destruction of that city and the Temple in 70 AD. With Saint Simeon at their head, they therefore left it in that year and settled on the eastern side of the Jordan River in a small city called Pella, before Vespasian, Nero’s General, later Roman Emperor, entered Judea.
(After the capture and burning of Jerusalem, the Christians returned and settled among the ruins until the Emperor Hadrian afterwards entirely razed it and built the Roman city Aelia Capitolina on its ruins and a temple to Jupiter on the site of the ancient Jewish Temple in 129/130 AD, which sparked the Third (and last) Jewish War.)
We are told by St. Epiphanius and by Eusebius that the church there flourished greatly with the return on the disciples of Jesus in the early 70s AD, and that many of the returning refugees of Jerusalem were converted by the miracles wrought by the saints. The emperors Vespasian and Domitian had commanded all Jews to be put to death, but Saint Simeon escaped their searches. When Trajan renewed the same decree, however, certain heretics who desired to control the Jerusalem Church and Jewish zealots who condemned the Jerusalem Christians for escaping to Pella rather than staying to fight, accused the Saint before the Roman governor in Palestine, as being both a Jew and a Christian.
The holy bishop was condemned to death, was tortured, and just like his cousin our Savior Jesus, he was crucified in the year 107 AD outside the walls of Jerusalem. He suffered these torments, though he was an extraordinary one hundred and twenty years old, with so much patience that he won universal admiration. He had governed the Church of Jerusalem for about forty-three years.
Almighty God, who gave to your servant Simeon boldness to confess the Name of our Savior Jesus Christ before the rulers of this world, and courage to die for this faith: Grant that we may always be ready to give a reason for the hope that is in us, and to suffer gladly for the sake of our Lord Jesus Christ; who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, forever and ever. Amen.
Almighty God, who gave to your servant Simeon boldness to confess the Name of our Savior Jesus Christ before the rulers of this world, and courage to die for this faith: Grant that we may always be ready to give a reason for the hope that is in us, and to suffer gladly for the sake of our Lord Jesus Christ; who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.
Amen.
