How Old Were Christ's Disciples?

Which image is more likely to be closer to the truth about who Christ's Disciples were?

What I offer today is a dissertation I stumbled upon while doing research for a book I plan on writing. The subject of my book is the time when Jesus visited the Temple with His parents when He was 12. I was investigating the various rules and regulations concerning Jewish boys. While in my search I stumbled upon a few commentaries discussing what the age Christ's Disciples would have been. As usual, I found my self going on a tangent away from my main topic. However, this was one rabbit hole I enjoyed so much that I felt it worthy of sharing with others.

What I found was a nine page dissertation written by a father and his son on the ages of the Disciples of Jesus. The author's names are Frank and Otis Cary. It was written sometime before 1970. I am guessing, since it does not have a date, and the father (Frank) passed away in the mid 1970's. Now Frank and his father were Missionaries in Japan during the late 1800's and on through the 1900s.

Frank's son, Otis, was born in Japan in 1921 while his father and grandparents ran the missionary school. As interesting as I found the dissertation to be, I also found what I am about to share with you absolutely fascinating. Since I like history, this is where I ventured down that rabbit hole.

Being born and raised in Japan, Otis Cary spoke Japanese as well as any Japanese native. He was so good, that unless you were looking at Otis in person, you would think he was actually a Japanese native, not an American. This ability allowed him to become a Japanese POW interrogator during WWII.

With missionary zeal, he proselytized for the Allied cause. Persuading many of the prisoners to cooperate in efforts to end the war and help rebuild Japan as a Democracy. After the war, he would eventually serve 33 years as director of Amherst House. This was a special campus dorm where he was the resident mentor for a community of 20 or so of the brightest Japanese students ever to attend Colleges in an American University. He retired in 1999, and passed away from pneumonia in 2008.

One of the many aspects of this whole story took place during the war. While Otis was interrogating Japanese prisoners for the U.S.Navy, his father, Frank, was languishing in a Japanese POW camp. Frank never knew what his son was doing, and he wasn't sure if the Lord would even bring him out of his situation alive.

As I surfed the internet looking for more information about these two, I found something Frank wrote years later. He titled it, "Now It Can't Be Told". It was an interesting but not earth shattering piece he wrote about his time as a POW. Things he was warned at the time of war, that he could not write about when, or if, he was ever given the opportunity write letters to his family.

In the early Months after the war, Otis Cary became acquainted with Emperor Hirohito's youngest brother, Prince Takamatsu, and his wife, Princess Kikuko. He suggested to the prince that the Emperor, who by tradition was considered a god, should begin to show a more human side by traveling among the people and releasing informal photographs of the imperial family engaged in aspects of daily life. Shortly later, the Emperor began to do that.

During another conversation with the Prince, Cary referred to the Emperor as the Prince's "big brother," a deliberate attempt to compel the Prince to view the Emperor as a mortal. According to an account Otis gave in his 1975 book "War-Wasted Asia: Letters 1945-46," the royal sibling found the concept startling. A short time later, however, he published an article in Japan with a surprising headline: "My Big Brother, the Emperor." Hirohito renounced his divinity a short time later.

God often times uses the unlikeliest characters to bring the truth to men, who think themselves above mere mortals. Prime example would be Joseph in Egypt, and when Daniel was in captivity with both Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon, and Cyrus the Great of the Persian Empire. God used Otis Cary in a similar fashion, if not at least in a round about way, to humble Emperor Hirohito.

We never learn of all the great men in history. Some just pass on after their good deeds are done, never demanding attention nor a parade. Yet it's these men, who's shoulders we all stand upon as we move through life trying to make a mark on it, or just trying to dodge a mark being made on us. In Otis and Frank Cary's case, I am convinced they both received an embrace form our Lord as they heard the words, "Well done, good and faithful servants; you have been faithful over a few things, I will make you both  rulers over many things. Enter into the joy of your Lord." Matthew 25:23

Otis Cary 1921 - 2006
What follows is nine images I took of the dissertation on the age of the Disciples of Jesus. In all my research on the father and son who wrote this, I could not find anything else either of them ever wrote on the Scriptures again. Not saying they didn't, I'm just saying I could not find anything else. However, God uses all men as he can, and God used these two men in a very powerful way. This dissertation is presented in the archives of Chicago's University in a form that I am unable to copy from, because there is no way to keep from losing information in the process. So I decided to take screen prints, which I edited, and then posted them for you read. I pray you find this all as fascinating as I did.