When he was born, he was given the name Thomas by his parents.
As a child, he acquired the nickname “Twin” because, well… he was a twin. Not very creative, but apparently it stuck.
Posthumously, he has been given the nickname “Doubting Thomas” because, being absent when the risen Jesus appeared to all the other disciples, he was reluctant to believe until he could see him with his own eyes. This is quite an unfair nickname. If you read the entirety of the post-resurrection Gospel accounts, it’s clear that all of the disciples doubted. Nevertheless, despite the unnecessarily negative light the nickname casts on him (and, in the hands of judgy preachers, on all those who doubt), it has stuck.
I want to propose a new nickname: “Fearless Thomas.” Two reasons:
The first reason is this: Jesus had been doing his ministry in Judea where the locals wanted to stone him for blasphemy. When he wanted to head back there in order to see his sick friend Lazarus, the disciples (minus, Thomas, I suspect) protested on the grounds that Jesus would be killed. When Jesus made it clear that he was intent on going, Thomas turned to the other disciples and said,
“Let us go also, that we may die with him.”
John 11:16
I see no reason to believe that he was anything other than serious. We read of no further objections from the disciples. They do end up following Jesus back into dangerous territory.
The second reason is actually rooted in the origin story of “Doubting Thomas”: If you’ll recall, after Jesus had been brutally killed, the disciples had locked themselves indoors, hiding, too afraid to venture back out into public…all of them, that is, except for Thomas. The Gospels don’t tell us exactly why he was absent when the risen Jesus appeared to the disciples, but we do know this: Thomas was the fearless one who ventured out. Whether he was on a grocery run, or went to visit his twin sister, or just felt like a stroll out in the fresh air, we at least know that he was not caged by fear.
