NATHANAEL («God Has Given»). - One of the first disciples of Jesus, to whom he was brought by Philip, N. was at first reluctant (but St. Augustine, PL 35, 1445 and 36, 788 ff., and St. Cyril of Alexandria interpret the phrase "Can anything good come from Nazareth?" as affirmative), then he went. Jesus praised his sincerity and revealed to him his secret thoughts "while he was under the fig tree," whereupon N. proclaimed him the Messiah ("the Son of God, the King of Israel," a profession of faith insufficient according to Chrysostom: PG 59, 127-29), and the Master promised greater revelations (Jn. 1:45-51). N. was from Cana (Jn. 21:2; 2:1 Cana is named immediately after the call of N.).
It is very probable, and admitted today even by many Protestants (H. Ewald, H. A. W. Meyer, H. Keim, H. Alford, G. Milligan, F. Farrar, B. F. Westcott, H. J. Newman in the Sermons, II, etc.), that N. is identical with the apostle Bartholomew (v.), whose name may be considered a patronymic surname, and who in the Synoptics is always listed next to Philip. However, the Epistola Apostolorum (ca. 170) and the Fathers hold that N. was a distinct disciple. St. Jerome: "Apostoli et N." (PL 26, 502); St. Augustine says that he was not at the Supper (In Io. tr., 109, 2: PL 35, 1917; In Io. tr., 7, 15-22: PL 35, 1445-49; Enarr. in Ps., 65: PL 36, 788), explains that N. was not chosen as an apostle because he was a learned connoisseur of the prophecies (cf. Jn. 1:45), whereas Jesus wanted to transform the world with ignorant men; similarly St. Gregory the Great (Moral., 33, 16: PL 76, 693). St. Ambrose (Expos. in Lucam. 8: PL 15, 1883) praises his virtue and places him in parallel with Zacchaeus. C. Baronius still rejected the identification as "levis conjectura." St. Epiphanius (Haer., 23: PG 41, 307) identified N. with the companion of Cleopas (Lk. 24:13-35); from the 16th century onward isolated conjectures identify him with Matthew or Matthias (whose name = N.), John the Evangelist, Simon the Cananaean ("of Cana"), Stephen (Jn. 1:51 = Acts 7:56).
The name occurs in the Old Testament (Heb. Nēthān'ēl, Septuagint Nēthān'ēl), where it designates a chief of the tribe of Issachar at the time of the exodus (Num. 1:8; 2:5; 7:18-23; 10:15) and ten other personages, who appear only once, in the books of Chronicles, in Esth. 10:22; Neh. 12:21; Jud. 8:1 (Vulgate Nathanias). N. is a theophoric Semitic name that already occurs in the Akkadian texts of the Third Dynasty of Ur (ca. 21st century B.C.) in the form I-din-AN, I-din-I-lu.
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Antonino Romeo