Well, let’s jump right into the thick of it shall we?
The other day I went to breakfast at my local diner and started some conversation with another patron who just happened to be a Greek Orthodox. He mentioned something to me in his stories that I took some objection to, although I didn’t press the topic since I didn’t have my Bible resources there to back me up. He mentioned that, of course, Mary (the Virgin Mary, Jesus’ earthly mother) was a perpetual virgin and Jesus’ brothers (as mentioned several places in the Bible) were only half brothers from Joseph.
Before we jump on this I want to mention that my intention here is to stay completely Biblical. If it’s not in there, as far as I am concerned, God didn’t want it there. It’s either not true or not pertinant to the ultimate goal of salvation through Jesus Christ.
An intertesting take for sure, and I am positive this comes from the oral traditions that Orthodoxy and Roman Catholicism rely upon, however, it doesn’t seem Biblical, or logical for that matter. Let’s examine:
Firstly and logically there is no evidence anywhere I can find to suggest that Joseph was ever married either previous to or after marrying Mary. The best I can find is this is another story carried on by the Catholics – the History of Joseph the Carpenter (Historia Josephi Fabri Lignari) which wasn’t written until between 600 and 700 AD, many hundreds of years AFTER the Bible. Secondly there are passages which explicitly mention that Jesus has brothers.
Matthew 1 “24When Joseph woke up, he did as the angel of the Lord had commanded him, and embraced Mary as his wife. 25But he had no union with her UNTIL she gave birth to a Son. And he gave Him the name Jesus.“
The key word there is UNTIL. He had no union with her UNTIL she gave birth to a son, meaning he did afterward. I mean, of course he did, she was his wife and in those days they tended to have big families. Indeed, the Bible mentions brothers and sisters of Jesus (Mat 13:55-56). The Bible text also uses wording specific to siblings (suggenes) when referring to Jesus’ siblings and not (anepsios), which is cousins or more distant relatives. Clearly they are flesh and blood brothers and sisters of Joseph and Mary. Of course that would be HALF brother and sisters as Jesus was conceived of the Holy Spirit , but for the purposes of this discussion they were certainly children of Mary.
Logically speaking , Joseph would not have outlived Mary as she was a much younger woman and even if Mary had “ascended” into heaven as the Orthodox believe, that wouldn’t have happened by the time frame these passages are referring to, so the brothers and sisters must have been biological children of Joseph and Mary.