St Joseph - Guatemala

St Joseph - Hand carved from Guatemala.

Joseph "of the House of David" (Hebrew יוֹסֵף, also known as Saint Joseph, Joseph the Betrothed, Joseph of Nazareth, Joseph the Worker and other titles) is known from the New Testament as the husband of Mary, mother of Jesus and although according to Christian tradition he was not the biological father of Jesus, he acted as his foster-father and as head of the Holy Family. Joseph is venerated as a saint within the Roman Catholic, Eastern Orthodox, and Anglican churches.

The genealogy in the Gospel of Matthew says that Joseph's father was called Jacob; but according to the genealogy in the Gospel of Luke Joseph was a son of Heli. The canonical Gospels do not, however, give the date and place of Joseph's birth nor his death. All that is known from them is that Joseph lived at times in Nazareth in Galilee, stayed for a couple of years in Bethlehem in Judea, and was forced into exile for a time in Egypt.

Joseph's profession is described in the Gospels as a τεκτων, a Greek word for a variety of skilled craftsmen, but Christian tradition has him as a "carpenter", although the modern English words "joiner" or "cabinet-maker" might fit the sense of the Greek better. Very little other information on Joseph is given in the Gospels, in which he never speaks. His places of birth and death are not given, and his dates have been presented very differently at different periods; sometimes he has been seen as much older than Mary, and at other periods only slightly older. He is mentioned in the Gospels as present on the visit to Jerusalem when Jesus was twelve, but no mention can clearly be placed later than that one. Christian tradition, though vague on the time and place of his death, represents Mary as a widow during the adult ministry of her son.

In the Roman Catholic and other traditions, Joseph is the patron saint of workers and has several feast days. He was also declared to be the patron saint and protector of the universal Catholic Church (along with Saint Peter) by Pope Pius IX in 1870, and is the patron of several countries and regions. He is a rare example of a saint from the early days of the church whose devotional role has tended to increase in the centuries since the Middle Ages.