1. 'The disciple whom Jesus loved" (BD) is first mentioned as sitting next to Jesus at the Last Supper in
John 13:23-25. Jesus loves all His disciples; so this is surely a technical title and makes sense if the BD is Jesus' brother James. "Jacob" is the Aramaic name translated "James" and the full phrase "the disciple whom Jesus loved" is inspired by Psalm 47:4-5: "He chose our heritage for us, the pride of Jacob whom the Lord loved. God has ascended with a shout."
John 13:1 marks the beginning of the Gospel's ascent motif (see 20:17) and a nearby Psalm (41:9) has just been quoted in
John 13:18.
James also takes center stage in 2 of our earliest noncanonical Gospels: the Gospel of the Hebrews and the Coptic Gospel of Thomas 12, where Jesus decrees James as the disciples' future leader and hyperbolically declares that "heaven and earth came into being" for James.
Three quick reasons why the 'disciple whom Jesus loved is not James, the brother of the Lord, but John the son of Zebedee.
1. James was not present at the Last Supper, where the 'beloved disciple' attended (John 13:23). Matthew 26:20 tells us that the Lord Jesus
'sat down with the twelve.'
2. Peter and the two sons of Zebedee were the members of our Lord's inner circle. They alone were present at the Transfiguration and were close by Him at Gethsemane. Since Peter is obviously not the BD (e.g. John 26:20) and John's brother James dies in Acts 12:2 and therefore has no time to write a Gospel, we are left with John, who was BTW the Lord Jesus' first cousin (compare Matthew 27:56; Mark 15:40; John 19:25. Salome is Mary's sister and the mother of Zebedee's sons).
3. James was not a believer in Christ six months before His death and resurrection (John 7:5); possibly not until after the resurrection.
2. At the cross Jesus entrusts the care of His mother to the BD: "Mother, see to your son...son, see to your mother (
John 19:26-27)." Thus, Jesus' identifies the BD as the son of His own mother!" That means that the BD is Jesus' brother. Joseph's death is assumed; so he is not available to take care of his wife and that duty then falls to the next eldest son, James. In the lead-up to the Pentecost outpouring, Jesus' mother is with His brothers, as would be expected, not with John the son of Zebedee (Acts 1:12).
The Greek of John 19:26-27 does not really fit your translation.
'Behold' is the obvious rendering and so it is translated in every Bible I possess. There are several reasons why our Lord might have chosen his cousin John to look after His mother rather than His brother James:
1. There is no evidence that James was a believer at this point.
2. John was a person of substance having a fishing business that employed others (Mark 1:20) and knowing the High Priest (John 18:15). He was perhaps in a better position to support Mary than James would have been.
3. Mary's sister Salome, to whom she was obviously close (Mark 15:40-41), may have been living with John, so the two would have been company for each other.
