St. Bartholomew was one of the Twelve Apostles, as the Gospels tell us (Mark 3:18; Matt. 10:3; Luke 6:14). It is most likely that the Nathanael mentioned in today’s Gospel reading (John 1:45–51) is Bartholomew. Why this difference of name? Bartholomew is not a given first name but a patronymic and means “son of Talamai” and, therefore, Nathanael could be his given name. It was Philip who brought Nathanael Bartholomew to Christ (John 1:45), and at his first meeting with our Lord, Nathanael confessed: “Rabbi, you are the Son of God; you are the king of Israel.” Tradition holds that after Pentecost, Bartholomew preached in Greater Armenia, and that it was there, in the city of Albanopolis (today’s Derbent, Dagestan), that he was flayed alive and beheaded by order of King Astyages. When today’s opening prayer states that St. Bartholomew was ever loyal to Christ, this is but another way of phrasing what Jesus remarked about him: “This man is a true Israelite. There is no guile in him” (John 1:47).
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