The betrothal of Mary and Joseph: a true marriage

# The Marriage of Mary and Joseph

The term *desposórios de Maria e José* refers to the legitimate royal marriage that united the Virgin of Nazareth to the carpenter from David’s house. To the question, “Were Mary and Joseph married?” the answer from both Scripture and the Church is an unequivocal yes: according to Jewish matrimonial custom, the betrothal (*qiddushin*) created a fully valid marital bond, hence the Gospels refer to Mary as Joseph’s wife even before cohabitation (Matthew 1:18-25 and Luke 1:27).

## The Jewish Marriage in Two Stages: *Qiddushin* and *Nissuin*

To comprehend the betrothal, one must move beyond the modern concept of “engagement.” In Second Temple Judaism, marriage took place in two distinct stages, usually separated by about a year. The first stage was the *qiddushin* (קידושין), also known as *erusin*, where, in front of witnesses, a man acquired a woman as his wife through consent and the payment of the *mohar*, the bride price. From this moment onwards, the woman was legally a full spouse. This is evident in the Torah: Deuteronomy 22:23-24 treats a betrothed young woman who joins another man as an adulteress, subject to the same penalties as a married woman, and the dissolution of the bond required a divorce letter (*get*).

The second stage was the *nissuin* (נישואין), from a root suggesting “raising” or “leading,” marking the wedding ceremony where the husband took his wife from her father’s house to his own home, initiating cohabitation. During this period, the woman remained with her family of origin but was no longer considered a bride in our modern sense; she was a spouse awaiting her journey to her husband’s home. It is precisely during this interval that the Gospels place the Annunciation and the virgin conception of Jesus.

## What the Gospels Say: Matthew 1:18-25 and Luke 1:27

Matthew begins his narrative with legal precision: *”μνηστευθείσης τῆς μητρὸς αὐτοῦ Μαρίας τῷ Ἰωσήφ”* (Having been betrothed to his mother Mary, Joseph) (Matthew 1:18). Luke uses the same verb: the angel is sent to a virgin who was *εμμεστευμένην* (betrothed) to a man named Joseph (Luke 1:27). The Greek participle *mnesteuomai* technically translates *qiddushin*. Mary was already Joseph’s wife, even before they cohabited.

The angel confirms this. In Matthew 1:20, he tells Joseph: *”μην φοβάσαι να λάβεις Μαριάν, τὴν γυναῖκά σου,”* (Do not fear to take Mary as your wife), literally “your woman,” “your spouse.” The Catechism of the Catholic Church (CIC) interprets this episode accordingly: “Joseph was invited by God to ‘take Mary, his wife’ (Mt 1:20), pregnant by the power of the Holy Spirit, for Jesus, called Christ, would be born of Mary’s spouse, in the line of David’s descendants (Mt 1:16)” (CIC, n. 437). What the angel asks Joseph to do in one of his dreams that guided him throughout his mission is not to marry, but to complete the marriage already existing; he requests that Joseph celebrate *nissuin* and lead his wife to his home.

Joseph’s obedience is described with the exact vocabulary of matrimonial time: “Called to protect the Redeemer, Joseph did as he was commanded by the Angel of the Lord and took his wife” (Mt 1:24) (John Paul II, Redemptoris Custos, n. 1). The Greek verb in Mt 1:24, παρέλαβεν τὴν γυναῖκα αὐτοῦ, “took his wife,” is the technical language of matrimonial union. The Catechism summarizes the situation in Lk 1:27 using the same key: God chose a “virgin betrothed to a man of the house of David, named Joseph” (CIC 488), where “betrothed” accurately translates the spouse of qiddushin still not brought home.

A True and Virgin Marriage: Augustine and Thomas

If the bond was real, the question arises: is an unconsummated marriage a true marriage? Saint Augustine answered affirmatively with an argument that became classic. In his writings on marriage, he shows that the three goods defining marriage were all present in the union of Mary and Joseph: the offspring (Jesus, welcomed and not generated), fidelity (no violation of the marital bed), and the sacred and indissoluble bond. What constitutes marriage, teaches the Doctor of Hippo, is the consent of the spouses, not the use of the body—and the consent of Mary and Joseph was full.

St. Thomas Aquinas, in the Summa Theologica (III, q. 29), systematizes the answer: the marriage of Mary and Joseph was true because it achieved the perfection of its essential form, the inseparable union of souls through marital consent. Regarding the ordering to offspring, Thomas observes that it was also accomplished eminently: Jesus did not come into existence outside that marriage, but was welcomed, protected, and raised within it. Virginity subtracted nothing from the truth of the marriage, because carnal consummation belongs to the integrity of the sign, not to its essence. This is the theological foundation for Mary’s perpetual virginity lived within an authentic espousal bond.

Modern magisterium has embraced this thesis without hesitation. Leo XIII, in the encyclical Quamquam Pluries (1889), teaches that a true marital bond existed between the Blessed Virgin and Joseph, and precisely because of this, Joseph approached more closely than any other creature to the highest dignity of Mother of God. John Paul II drew the decisive consequence: “As we deduce from the Gospel texts, Mary’s marriage to Joseph forms the legal basis for Joseph’s paternity. It was in order to ensure protective paternal care to Jesus that God chose Joseph as Mary’s husband” (Redemptoris Custos, n. 7). Thus, St. Joseph’s paternity is not a pious fiction: “his paternity, however, is not merely ‘apparent’ or only ‘substitute’; but it is fully endowed with the authenticity of human paternity, with the authenticity of the paternal mission within the family” (Redemptoris Custos, n. 21). The son of the wife is, for Israelite law, the son of the husband: Jesus is the Son of David because Mary was truly married to Joseph.

The Feast of the Betrothal: January 23

The Church did not leave this mystery without liturgy. Devotion to the betrothal gained momentum in the 15th century with Jean Gerson, Chancellor of the University of Paris, a great promoter of Saint Joseph’s cult, who exalted the virgin matrimonial in his writings and preaching at the Council of Constance. In subsequent centuries, the feast of Mary and Joseph’s betrothal spread throughout dioceses and religious families, settling on January 23rd. It never permanently established itself in the universal Roman calendar, but it survives today in the proper calendars of orders and congregations, especially those with a Josephine spirituality, as a memory of the day when, legally, the Holy Family was born.

Conclusion: The marriage that sustains the mystery

Os desposórios de Maria e José são muito mais que uma curiosidade arqueológica bíblica: são uma peça estrutural da encarnação. Pelo vínculo conjugal, Jesus entra na descendência messiânica de Davi, recebe um pai segundo a lei e cresce num lar verdadeiro. O Papa Francisco resumiu tudo numa frase: «A grandeza de São José consiste no fato de ter sido o esposo de Maria e o pai de Jesus» (Patris corde, n. 1). Esposo primeiro, pai em consequência: essa é a ordem dos mistérios. Quem quiser aprofundar o lugar deste matrimônio na teologia sobre o santo patriarca encontrará uma análise completa no nosso estudo de josefologia, a teologia católica de São José.

### Perguntas frequentes

**1. Maria e José eram casados de verdade?**
Sim. Segundo o costume judaico, os desposórios (qiddushin) já constituíam vínculo matrimonial pleno e válido, dissolúvel apenas por carta de divórcio. Por isso os evangelhos chamam Maria de esposa de José (Mateus 1:20, 24) antes mesmo da coabitação, e a Igreja sempre ensinou que se tratou de um matrimônio verdadeiro, ainda que virginal.

**2. O que eram os desposórios no casamento judaico?**
Eram o primeiro dos dois tempos do matrimônio judaico. Nos qiddushin, o homem tomava a mulher como esposa diante de testemunhas, mediante consentimento e a prestação nupcial (mohar). Cerca de um ano depois vinham os nissuin, quando o esposo conduzia a esposa à sua casa. Entre os dois momentos, a mulher já era juridicamente casada, embora vivesse na casa paterna.

**3. Por que Mateus chama Maria de esposa de José antes de viverem juntos?**
Porque em Mateus 1:18 Maria já tinha celebrado os desposórios (em grego, o particípio de mnesteuomai), que no direito judaico faziam dela esposa em sentido pleno. O anjo confirma isso ao dizer a José «não temas receber Maria, tua mulher» (Mateus 1:20): pede que ele complete o casamento existente conduzindo-a ao lar, não que inicie um novo.

**4. O casamento de Maria e José foi consumado?**
Não. Foi um matrimônio virginal: verdadeiro quanto ao vínculo, mas sem união carnal. Santo Agostinho mostrou que os três bens do matrimônio (prole, fidelidade e vínculo indissolúvel) estavam todos presentes, e São Tomás de Aquino ensinou que a essência do casamento está no consentimento conjugal, não na consumação.

**5. Quando se celebra a festa dos desposórios de Maria e José?**
A festa dos desposórios celebra-se em 23 de janeiro. Difundiu-se a partir do século XV, impulsionada por Jean Gerson, e espalhou-se por dioceses e ordens religiosas. Hoje não consta do calendário universal romano, mas permanece em calendários próprios de várias famílias religiosas, sobretudo de espiritualidade josefina.