Joseph of Nazareth
The husband of Mary, a descendant of David and a carpenter of Nazareth. In Matthew he is told in dreams to take Mary as his wife, to flee to Egypt with the child and to return. He does not appear in the accounts of the ministry of Jesus.
Matthew and Luke both trace Joseph’s descent from David (Matthew 1:1–16) (Luke 3:23–31). In Matthew he is “a righteous man” who, finding Mary with child before they lived together, resolves to end the betrothal quietly, until an angel tells him in a dream to take her as his wife and to name the child Jesus (Matthew 1:18–25). Further dreams send him to Egypt with the child and his mother and bring him back to settle at Nazareth (Matthew 2:13–23). In Luke he goes with Mary to Bethlehem for the census, presents the child in the temple, and searches Jerusalem with her for the twelve-year-old Jesus (Luke 2:4–5, 22, 41–51); see the Birth of Jesus.
The people of Nazareth know Jesus as “the carpenter’s son” and as the son of Joseph (Matthew 13:55) (Luke 4:22), as does the crowd at Capernaum in John (John 6:42); Luke adds “as was supposed” (Luke 3:23). Joseph does not appear in the accounts of the ministry, and the Gospels do not tell of his death.
In the timeline
- c. 6–4 BC, estimated dateThe Birth of Jesus
Matthew and Luke each tell, in a story set in the days of Herod, that Jesus was born at Bethlehem to Mary, a virgin betrothed to Joseph of David’s line, and grew up at Nazareth in Galilee.