JOSEPH, THE STEPFATHER OF JESUS

Hugo McCord

An extraordinary person, a vessel of honor, one whom we expect to meet in heaven, is Joseph, the stepfather of Jesus. He was “the husband of Mary, of whom Jesus was born, the one called Christ,” with Jesus “being the son (as was supposed) of Joseph” (Matthew 1:16; Luke 3:23).

I. THE IMPORTANCE OF JOSEPH’S GENEALOGY

According “to the eternal purpose which [God] accomplished in Christ Jesus our Lord” (Ephesians 3:11), Joseph, the son of Jacob and also “a son of David” (Matthew 1:16, 20; Luke 1:27; 2:4), is important as a link, even the last one, in the genealogical chain from King David down to Jesus as the “King of kings” (Matthew 1:8-16; Acts 2:30; Revelation 17:14; 19:16).

But not a drop of Joseph’s blood went into Jesus. Jesus was Joseph’s adopted son. Joseph, as the head of his house (1 Corinthians 11:3), was recognized as the father of Jesus (Matthew 13:55; Luke 4:22; 23:23; John 1:45; 6:42). As Joseph’s adopted son, the heir apparent, Jesus was qualified to sit on David’s spiritual “throne” carrying “the key of David” (Acts 2:30; Hebrews 1:8; Revelation 3:7).

II. DID JOSEPH HAVE TWO FATHERS?

Matthew (1:16) wrote that Joseph was the son of “Jacob,” while Luke (3:23) wrote that Joseph was the son of “Heli” (sometimes spelled “Eli”). Is there a biblical contradiction?

Help comes from an unexpected source. Extensive Jewish writings of the first five centuries called the Talmuds (in two parts, Mishna and Gemara) have sparse references, as would be expected, to Jesus. The ones found are hostile to the deity of Jesus, but one unintentionally explains why Matthew and Luke give Joseph two fathers. Whoever wrote it in the Talmuds was not trying to harmonize Matthew and Luke, but was simply recording a matter of history.

The statement speaks of “Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Mary, the daughter of Eli” (Bava Bathra, sec 110 a, apud Thomas Hartwell Horner, AN INTRODUCTION TO THE CRITICAL STUDY AND KNOWLEDGE OF THE HOLY SCRIPTURES, Philadelphia: E. Littell, 1831, I, 197).

How can Joseph be the son of Jacob (Matthew 1:16) and also be the son of Heli (Luke 3:23)? Just as “daughters-in-law” (Ruth 1:8) can be called “daughters” (Ruth 1:11-12), so Joseph can be called the son of Jacob and at the same time be called the son-in-law of Heli, being married to Heli’s daughter, and is called the “husband of Mary” (Matthew 1:16).

Mary’s blood, as a descendant of David and Nathan (Luke 3:31), was from her father Heli (Talmuds, ibid.), making Jesus physically a descendant of David. Joseph’s blood from David and Solomon (Matthew 1:6) qualified Jesus by being adopted to sit on David’s spiritual throne (Acts 2:30; Hebrews 1:8).

III. JOSEPH, AN HONORABLE MAN

Neither Joseph nor Mary knew that God had selected them for major roles in the life of Jesus. Mary, “a virgin engaged to a man named Joseph, of the house of David” (Luke 1:27), was shocked when the angel Gabriel told her that she was to be the birth mother of Jesus. The surprised girl asked Gabriel, “How will this happen since I have not been with a man?” (Luke 1:34). He explained:

The Holy Spirit will come over you, and Power of the Highest One will overshadow you, and the Holy One being born will be called the Son of God (Luke 1:35).

When Mary’s fiancé Joseph learned that Mary was pregnant, he too was shocked. He, being honorable, and not wanting to disgrace her, decided to break the engagement quietly. However, while he was thinking about the problem, the angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream, saying, “Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to marry Mary, your fiancée, because her conception is by the Holy Spirit. She will bear a son, and you will call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins” (Matthew 1:19-21).

IV. JOSEPH OBEYING CAESAR

Caesar Augustus, emperor of the Roman Empire 31 B.C. to 14 A.D., ordered that a census be taken of the inhabited earth. This was first done when Quirinius was the governor of Syria. All were enrolled, each in his own city. Joseph went up from Galilee, out of the city of Nazareth, to Judea, to the city of David which is called Bethlehem (because he was of David’s family) to be enrolled with Mary his fiancée, who was expecting (Luke 2:1-5).

Those Spirit-inspired words of Luke have been challenged by Bible scholars in three ways:

(1) that Caesar Augustus “ordered a census to be taken of the inhabited earth” scholars denied until W. M. Ramsay found an inscription on a temple wall in Ankara in Turkey of Augustus’ words ordering the world-wide census;

(2) that Quirinius “was the governor of Syria” at the time of the census (c. 5 B.C.) scholars denied until W. M. Ramsay found stones showing that Quirinius was twice “the governor of Syria,” first being the military governor 8-4 B.C., and, second, the civil governor 6-11 A.D.;

(3) that all people were to be “enrolled, each in his own city,” scholars denied until an Egyptian papyrus was found verifying the return-home law (Joseph Free, ARCHAEOLOGY AND BIBLE HISTORY, p. 285).

V. JOSEPH’S LOVE FOR MARY

How much Joseph loved Mary is shown by the fact that he was willing, in the 9th month of her pregnancy, to be her personal escort on the 70 mile journey from Nazareth to Bethlehem as she rode on a donkey’s back, with the unborn Jesus protected by a water bag!

On their arrival in Bethlehem the inn was full. Then, as they left the inn,

Mary said to Joseph, “Take me down from the ass, for that which is in me presses to come forth.” ... And Joseph took her down, and he found a cave, and let her into it (THE PROTEVANGELION, XII: 10-14).

The cave contained a stable, where Jesus was born. Probably Mary had brought with her from Nazareth swaddling-cloths (long narrow bands of material), for Luke writes that “she wrapped him in swaddling-cloths, and laid him in a feeding trough” (Luke 2:7).

VI. JOSEPH, NOT A WEALTHY MAN

Shepherds near Bethlehem, keeping watch over their flocks, were told by an angel that “Christ the Lord” is “born to you this day in the city of David” (Luke 2:11). Excited and thrilled, they said “one to another, ‘Let us go now into Bethlehem and see what has happened, which the Lord has made known to us.’ They left immediately, and found both Mary and Joseph and the baby lying in the trough,” and they told what the angel had said to them about Jesus (Luke 2:15-17).

Surely the next day Joseph was able to find a room in Bethlehem. Later we learn that Joseph and Mary and the baby were staying in a certain Bethlehem “house” (Matthew 2:11), but that was more than a month later (cf. Leviticus 12:4). In the meantime, after the birth of a son, 33 days were required for purification of the mother’s blood (Leviticus 12:4). After the 33 days the mother would be obligated to go to the temple at Jerusalem, five miles away, to present to the priest two sacrifices, one a burnt-offering, and one a sin-offering (Leviticus 12:6).

Normally the burnt-offering was “a lamb a year old” and the sin-offering was “a young pigeon or dove” (Leviticus 12:6). But if the mother’s “means” did not “suffice” for “a lamb,”

then she shall take two doves, or two young pigeons, one for a burnt-offering, and the other for a sin-offering, and the priest shall make atonement for her and she shall be clean ... from the fountain of her blood (Leviticus 12:7-8).

After Mary’s 33 days, she and Joseph brought “the child Jesus” from Bethlehem to the temple in Jerusalem (Luke 2:27). Apparently they felt the need to economize, for they did not sacrifice a lamb along with a dove or pigeon, but they offered a “pair of doves or two young pigeons” (Luke 2:24).

VII. JOSEPH, A HERO

After the temple priest had accepted Mary’s two offerings, cleansing her “from the fountain of her blood,” and had pronounced “atonement” for her (Leviticus 12:7), then Joseph and his family returned to a “house” in Bethlehem (Matthew 2:10). The three were there when “wise men from the east,” guided by a star, found them (Matthew 2:1, 9). When they saw the baby and his mother, they fell down and worshiped Jesus (Matthew 2:11).

Then God used Joseph, a “vessel of honor” (cf. 2 Timothy 2:21), to save Jesus’ life. In a dream the Lord’s angel told Joseph to “take the young child and his mother, and flee into Egypt” to escape King Herod’s plan to kill the baby (Matthew 2:13).

Joseph did not wait. He “arose and took the young child and his mother by night, and departed into Egypt” (Matthew 2:14). Were two donkeys enough? What an arduous journey of over a hundred miles! Joseph was a hero!

The stay of Joseph and his family in Egypt was brief. After the death of King Herod in April, B.C. 4, the Lord’s angel appeared again to Joseph in a dream, telling him to take “the young child and his mother” back to “the land of Israel” (Matthew 2:19-21).

If Jesus was born in late 5 B.C., then he probably had his first birthday on the long trip, over 200 miles, from Egypt to Nazareth (Matthew 2:23). What if Mary and her baby had been without Joseph? Yes, Joseph was a hero. God was using him.

VIII. JOSEPH, NOT A HERO

Jesus’ “parents went every year to Jerusalem at the feast of the passover” (Luke 2:41). When Jesus was 12 years old Joseph and Mary were neglectful parents on the day they left Jerusalem to return to Nazareth. They failed to check to see if their 12 year old son was in the caravan, and did not notice his absence during all of the first day of the journey (Luke 2:44). One has to say that, on this occasion, neither Joseph nor Mary was a hero.

IX. JOSEPH’S EARLY DEATH

The evidence showing how loving and devoted Joseph was to Mary is so overwhelming, one has to say that his not standing by her side as she stood by Jesus’ cross must mean that now she was a widow. The last mention of Joseph was about a year (29 A.D.) before Jesus was crucified, when people said, “Is not this Jesus, the son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know?” (John 6:42).

But on Friday, April 7, A.D. 30, while Jesus was dying on the cross, he noticed that none of his brothers and sisters (Mark 6:3) was standing by Mary, and he turned to a non-family friend and asked him to consider Mary as his mother and to take care of her (John 19:26-27). The strong inference is that Joseph, who had demonstrated such loving devotion to Mary, and who now would be standing by her side if he were alive, was dead. Truly he was an extraordinary man.