condemned by holy Fathers, are worthy of honor and reception, as orthodox.
FRAGMENT: On the baptism of the Apostles.
A Some curious persons having doubts and saying: By whom were the apostles baptized, and if they were not baptized, how did they baptize? And furthermore doubting: By whom were they ordained, and if they were not ordained, how did they ordain? — moved our humility to inquire studiously and diligently concerning these matters. We found, therefore, in the Commentaries of Saint Sophronius, among many other things worthy of memory, these also, concerning which we have conducted our inquiry: namely, that the Lord and our God Jesus Christ baptized Saint Peter with his own hands; and Peter baptized Andrew; and Andrew baptized James and John; and John and James baptized all the remaining apostles. B Sophronius also says this, that our immaculate Lady the Theotokos and Mother of our life was baptized by Peter along with the Theologian John. And he adds that the Theologian John was a cousin of our Savior Jesus Christ according to the flesh. For Joseph, the betrothed of the Virgin, had from his own wife four sons, namely James, Simon, Jude, and Joses; and three daughters, namely Esther and Thamar C and a third, who was called by the same name as her mother, Salome; whom Joseph gave in marriage to Zebedee. With her, Zebedee begat James and the evangelist John, who had three mothers upon the earth: the first, indeed, Salome, from whom he was born corporally; the second, 'Thunder,' in that he was designated by the Lord as 'son of thunder' in a spiritual sense, when they stood by the cross, while He said to the Theologian, "Behold thy mother," and again to the Virgin, "Woman, behold thy son."