When Did St Joseph Die?

When Did St Joseph Die?

I have already written a post about Saint Joseph. https://www.fryuhanna.com/2021/03/17/st-joseph/

However, I wish now to speak a little bit more speculatively in a way which will bring out, perhaps, the relationship of Saint Joseph to human salvation.

The question is, when did Saint Joseph die? There is nothing said in the Gospels or any other reliable ancient source. All we know is that he was there at the time Our Lord was found in the Temple, and then disappears from history, he is not present at all during the ministry of Christ. Saint Joseph must certainly have been deceased by the time of the crucifixion because otherwise our Lord would not have trusted Mary to St John. However, even that may provide us with a clue.

My own view is that Joseph had surely passed to his reward by the time Our Lord commenced his public ministry, and in particular, by the time of the Baptism. The reason for this is that at the Baptism, God the Father spoke from heaven. It would not be right for God to call him his beloved son while Saint Joseph was alive.

Neither would it have been right for Saint Joseph to have been alive during the ministry of the Lord, for there could be no human with authority over the Lord at that time. This helps to explain some of the apparently random comments made in the Gospels. First of all, at the end of chapter 2 of St Luke’s Gospel, in the finding of Jesus in the temple, who was then twelve years of age, the Lord said to Joseph and Mary: “Did you not know that I must be in my Father’s house.” He is indicating that God is His true father, but the Lord was still a child, and so He returned to Nazareth with his parents: “… and was obedient to them; and His mother kept all these things in her heart.” I suggest that this last statement is a sign that the information came to Saint Luke from Mary herself. Clearly, Saint Joseph was alive at the time and for an uncertain period afterwards, otherwise, it would make no sense to have spoken of Jesus being obedient to him.

However, in Luke 8 it reads that when his mother and his brothers, leaving his cousins, came to him but could not join him because of the crowd, He was told that they were standing outside and wished to see Him. But the Lord replied “My mother and my brothers are those who hear the word of God and act on it.” I interpret this as meaning that His mother no longer had any social or human power over Him. He was responsible only to God the Father and for that reason, I believe it is entirely proper that Saint Joseph would by this time have been deceased.

I would suggest that this also explains why Our Lord refers to His mother as “woman” both in the wedding at Cana and at the foot of the cross in St John’s Gospel. That is, to address her as “mother” would be to acknowledge a continuing authority over Him – but He does tell St John to behold his mother – for she has authority over the Lord’s disciples.

This is speculation, but it is not random; it is based upon a sense of what is fitting and appropriate in divine history, which is, after all, the divine plan for our salvation. I conclude then, that it is quite possible, and in accordance with the intentions of God, that the earthly authority of St Joseph, which Our Lord had acknowledged before He had attained to adulthood, be removed by the passing of that great saint, before Christ commenced His public mission.