Today is the feast of the Apostles of St Philip and St James, the Lesser.

The two images of the saints are from a series of all 12 apostles painted by Peter Paul Rubens in the 17th century. The full series is in the Prado, the art museum in Madrid, Spain. They were painted between 1610 and 1612 and conform well to the baroque style of liturgical art.

The two apostles are remembered together, I understand, because their relics were transported to Rome and reside in the same Church, now dedicated to all twelve apostles.

James, the son of Alphaeus is called 'James the Less' to distinguish him from James the 'brother of the Lord' who ruled the Church at Jerusalem, wrote an epistle, led an austere life, and converted many Jews to the Faith. This latter James, known as James the Greater, was crowned with martyrdom in the year 62

The commentary on the day on Universalis.com tells me:

Jerome held these two Jameses to be the same person, and this was certainly the prevailing opinion when the feast of Philip and James was instituted in 560. Nowadays, scholars prefer to divide them, in which case we might think of today as being the feast of Philip and James and James.

Philip was born at Bethsaida and started as a disciple of John the Baptist. After the Baptist's death, he followed Christ.

Philip and James the Less are two apostle about whom little is known and not much is spoken. However, on reflecting on the day, an account of an exchange between Philip and Our Lord caught my interest. In John 14:6-9 (Knox translation) we read:

Jesus said to him, I am the way; I am truth and life; nobody can come to the Father, except through me. If you had learned to recognize me, you would have learned to recognize my Father too. From now onwards you are to recognize him; you have seen him. At this, Philip said to him, Lord, let us see the Father; that is all we ask. What, Philip, Jesus said to him, here am I, who have been all this while in your company; hast thou not learned to recognize me yet? Whoever has seen me, has seen the Father; what dost thou mean by saying, Let us see the Father? Do you not believe that I am in the Father, and the Father is in me? The words I speak to you are not my own words; and the Father, who dwells continually in me, achieves in me his own acts of power. If you cannot trust my word, when I tell you that I am in the Father, and the Father is in me.

This is a clear account of the source of one of the main arguments for the use of images. The use of images is mandated by the Seventh Ecumenical Council as a necessary means by which we come to know, recognize and trust those whom we cannot see in recognizable form otherwise: Christ, the Saints, and the angels; and through Christ, the Father. One justification for this argument Our Lord was the image of the Father and it is by recognizing Our Lord whom they could see as a result of the incarnation, that the apostles could also recognize the Father, whom they could not see.

St Paul tells us in Colossians that Christ is 'the true likeness of the God we cannot see', but here we have it from Our Lord's own lips.

For comparison here Is Rubens’ St James the Greater from the same series of twelve.