♔ ST. JOSEPH'S PARENTS ♔

♔ ST. JOSEPH’S FATHER JACOB ♔

By the time of Jesus’ birth, the foreign king Herod of Ascalon had usurped the throne of the sons of King David. Nevertheless, Joseph remained the rightful heir of the kings of Judea. He was of royal lineage and the Bible traces his genealogy in the Gospel of St. Matthew, naming his father to be Jacob:

… Abraham begot Isaac, Isaac begot Jacob… Jesse begot David the king. And David the king begot Solomon… Matthan begot Jacob. And Jacob begot Joseph, the husband of Mary, and of her was born Jesus who is called Christ. – St. Matthew 1:1-16

Then how do we explain the genealogy given in the Gospel of St. Luke? If we read his account Joseph is still a descendent of King David but his father is not Jacob, but rather Heli:

And Jesus himself was beginning about the age of thirty years; being (as it was supposed) the son of Joseph, the son of Heli, the son of Matthat, the son of Levi… Nathan the son of David . . .  – St. Luke 3:23, 31

Now you ask, “How could Joseph have had two fathers?” This is how: Heli, also known as Joachim, was the father of the Blessed Virgin Mary – St. Joseph’s bride. According to the law, upon marrying the Virgin Mary, Joseph’s “legal father” or “father in-law” became Heli. If you notice in Matthew’s account, the word “begot” is used when descending the family tree, this means that they were biological fathers or at least guardians thought to be fathers. In St. Luke’s account, the words “son of” are used instead of “begot.” This could refer to “son in the eyes of the law,” our modern day “son in-law.”

Now, many of the names in Luke’s account are also biological fathers, so this may cause confusion. We must now look to other divinely inspired sources for confirmation that Jacob was indeed St Joseph’s biological father. According to the visions of Blessed Anne Catherine Emmerich (1774-1824), St Joseph’s father was indeed Jacob – as was prefigured in the Old Testament. (Genesis 30:24):

Among many things which I saw today of the youth of St Joseph, I remember what follows. Joseph, whose father was called Jacob… His parents lived in a large house outside Bethlehem, once the ancestral home of David, whose father Jesse had owned it. 
   
♔ ST. JOSEPH’S MOTHER AND SIBLINGS ♔

We have already gone over the question of who fathered our illustrious St Joseph, and have come to the conclusion that it was Jacob; however the Bible is silent on the matter of who his mother was. Since the Old Testament Joseph appears to pre-figure our New Testament St. Joseph, and both testaments name Jacob as the name of both fathers, we can piously go with the idea that Rachel is the name of both mothers.

If we choose to, we may look to the Nihil Obstat & Imprimatur granted writings of Mother Cecilia Baij (1694-1766) who, as abbess of the Benedictine Convent of St. Peter in Montefiascone, Italy, received revelations from Our Lord in the middle of the 18th century:

St Joseph’s father’s name was Jacob and his mother’s name was Rachel. Both distinguished themselves by leading very holy lives; they had in common nobility of birth (both were of the family of David) as well as the practice of virtue.

As to the question of Joseph having brothers we are told by Blessed Anne Catherine Emmerich, that he had five brothers. Most other mystics, however, claim that St. Joseph was an only child. These “brothers” mentioned by Emmerich were most likely cousins who at times lived with Joseph’s family. According to early Church tradition and as chronicled by St. Hegesippus (110-180), Cleophas, also referred to as Alpheus, was a relative to St. Joseph who was sometimes referred to as his brother. He was wed to the Virgin Mary’s cousin, who was also named Mary. He is mentioned in the Gospel of St. John 19:25 and of St. Luke 24:18.