Audela

Joseph

The carpenter of Nazareth, and Jesus's legal father

Place in the genealogy

  • Matthew · name 41 · Abraham forward to JesusFrom the exile to Christ: the returnCalled 'the husband of Mary'. The chain of begetting stops here.
  • Luke · name 2 · Jesus back to AdamFrom Jesus back to ZerubbabelLuke writes 'as was supposed', guarding the virgin birth in the same breath as the ancestry.

Where Scripture records this person

  • He plans a quiet divorce, is told the child is of the Holy Ghost, and obeys.
  • Egypt, the return, and the settling in Nazareth, each time at a word from God.
  • Bethlehem, because he was of the house and lineage of David.
  • The temple, the yearly Passover, and the search for the boy Jesus.
  • Is not this the carpenter's son?

Who this person is in Scripture

Joseph is described as a just man who, on learning Mary was pregnant, decided to end the marriage privately rather than expose her. That is the last plan of his that Scripture records; from then on he acts on what he is told, four times, without a recorded word of his own.

Matthew's genealogy ends with him deliberately. Every earlier link says one man was the father of the next; verse 16 says Joseph was the husband of Mary, of whom was born Jesus. Joseph gives Jesus his legal place in David's line and his home in Nazareth. Scripture never records him speaking, and never says when he died.

Family, as Scripture gives it

Father
Jacob in ; names Heli
Spouses
Mary

The two fathers named for Joseph are one of the main differences between the genealogies, and interpretations of it differ.

What this teaches

  • Joseph's obedience is quiet, immediate and costly to his reputation. Scripture praises him by describing what he did, not by explaining how he felt.

Read in the Bible

Back to the genealogy of Jesus