And one of them, whose name was Cleopas, answering said, &c. This Cleopas was the brother of S. Joseph, the husband of the Blessed Virgin, the father of S. James the less, and S. Jude , and the grandfather of S. James the greater and S. John , who were the sons of Salome, the daughter of Cleopas. See chap. iii23.
Helecas, Bishop of Csarea, tells us on the authority of S. Jerome, that "Cleopas, or Alphus, was the brother of S. Joseph, and one of the seventy disciples, and that he was slain by the Jews in the castle of Emmaus because of Christ." He was therefore a martyr. Hence, in the Roman Martyrology, the25th of September is put down as the birthday of Blessed Cleopas, the disciple of Christ, who they say was slain by the Jews for confessing the faith in the very house in which he had entertained the Lord. See also Dorotheus (Lives of the Patriarchs).
Again, Cleopas, in the Greek Κλεόπας, is the same as "all glory," for the Jews who were subjugated by Alexander and the Greeks, took Greek names. But in the Hebrew the name may be taken to mean "adding to or increasing the Church," for קהלה kehala, is an assembly or church, and כּוש, pus, is to multiply. For Cleopas gave many sons and daughters to the Church of Christ.
Art thou only a stranger in Jerusalem? Theophylact and Euthymius translate παζοικει̃ς ε̉ν Ιεζονσαλὴμ by "Art thou (only) a dweller in Jerusalem?" Others render it, "Art thou (only) a sojourner in Jerusalem?" The meaning is "Art thou such a stranger in Jerusalem, and so ignorant of what has been done in it to Jesus of Nazareth, as to ask who and what he was, about whom we are so sorrowfully conversing? All know the circumstances of His crucifixion and death, and can talk of nothing else. How is it that thou only art ignorant of these things?"
