One place in scripture where this cultural clarification has been beneficial is in the Christmas story. In reading Matthew 1, Americans or those of us from the West might skip over or miss deeper meaning of the relationship that Mary and Joseph had surrounding the miracle of the immaculate conception. "Now the birth of Jesus Christ took place in this way. When his mother Mary had been betrothed to Joseph, before they came together she was found to be with child from the Holy Spirit. And her husband Joseph, being a just man and unwilling to put her to shame, resolved to divorce her quietly" (Matt 1:18-19). Ok, so the story changes Joseph's role from fiance to husband in the matter of a couple sentences. Did Matthew get his wires crossed when he was writing this part? Is it some strange translation of the words into English that impose a different meaning on them? Not exactly. You see, it says Mary was betrothed to Joseph; this means her family had an agreement with his that their two children would get married. Joseph apparently thought enough of Mary to agree to this arrangement. Whether Mary approved of this match was of little consequence. If you remember from one of my first posts in Jordan, engagements work differently in this culture. To be engaged, both people would have had to enter into agreement that their lives were now bound together. Today couples sign an engagement contract but biblical engagements worked mostly off of verbal agreements. Either way, this is a binding legal contract. It is culturally appropriate than to refer to Joseph as Mary's husband in this instance because she belongs to him as a wife belongs to a husband. Such a contract can only be broken by scandal. If broken, the man would revert back to single status while the woman would now be considered divorced. For whatever reason, she was deemed unworthy to marry this man, join his family and bear his children. She would forever be considered damaged goods. This was the future that Mary was facing when Joseph found out about her pregnancy. Logically though he had no choice but to divorce her, he knew the child was not his. Joseph had nothing to lose by divorcing Mary and no doubt he could go on to find another wife in Nazareth. However, Joseph's character is attested to in that he wanted to spare her the shame of the situation (we'll talk more about shame another day) and divorce her quietly.
In addition to his character, Joseph's faith is clearly seen in this story. "But as he considered these things, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream, saying, 'Joseph, son of David, do not fear to take Mary as your wife, for that which is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. She will bear a son and you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.' All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had spoken by the prophet:
'Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son,
and they shall call his name Immanuel'
(which means, God with us). When Joseph woke from sleep he did as the angel of the Lord commanded him: he took his wife but knew her not until she had given birth to a son. And he called his name Jesus" (Matt 1:20-25). God could have come to Mary before her engagement to Joseph and spared Joseph and his family the scandal of it all. God could have come to Joseph first and warned him that his betrothed would become pregnant by divine intervention before the fact and spared Joseph the emotional roller coaster. Instead, God worked all things out in His own timing, waiting for Mary to be legally bound to Joseph. Because of this, Joseph was forced to make a decision between obeying the word of the Lord or divorcing Mary in favor of saving face and protecting his family from embarrassment.
Joseph quickly falls off the map as the gospel story continues. What little screen time he is given is sufficient though to let us ascertain what type of man God chose to raise his Son on Earth. Joseph was a hard working carpenter who wanted to do the right thing. When the right thing became difficult, he continued to follow God's path for his life. That path led him to a small stable in Bethlehem where his wife bore a child that was not his but a child in whom all of his hope and faith rested. Joseph held Immanuel in his arms and saw the promises of God fulfilled.
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