LCMS Convention Workbook St. Louis, Missouri — 2019, Page 264

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II. THEOLOGICAL DOCUMENTS­­—COMMISSION ON THEOLOGY AND CHURCH RELATIONS

his wife (and to interfere with this divine relationship) until
he could see the complete fulfillment of this work of God,
namely the birth of this child. The angel comes to assure the
terrified Joseph that he need not be afraid to take Mary into
his home, implicitly pronouncing God’s blessing on the relationship by explicitly calling Mary his “wife.” Joseph obeys
the angel’s instructions, but out of respect for his Lord and
for Mary, his wife, he has no sexual relations with her until
she gives birth to her son.46
[At this point, the instructor should decide whether or not
to pause and hear the reactions of the students to these two
interpretations. Many of the points for or against either of
the interpretations, which are discussed below, will likely
arise in such a discussion.]
The dilemma now becomes visible. The first interpretation
does not seem to give verse 18 its full weight, or at least
seems to take it in its more natural sense:
• Why does Matthew say she “was found to be” instead of
just saying that she was pregnant through the work of
the Holy Spirit?
• Is it fair to the text to assume that Joseph learned Mary
was pregnant but did not learn the “origin” of this child?
• The idea of adultery is never mentioned by Matthew; are
we right in introducing it here if there is another possible explanation for Joseph’s decision?
The second interpretation, on the other hand, seems to
render verse 20 redundant:
• The reason Joseph should not be afraid is quite clearly that the child is the result of the Spirit’s work. How
would the angel’s message encourage Joseph, according
to this interpretation?

46
Ulrich Luz provides one of the better surveys of this interpretation in his Matthew
1–7: A Commentary (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2007), 93–95, although he himself
holds that Joseph did not know the child was “of the Holy Spirit” until the angel
revealed that to him in his dream. The fragment from Origen’s commentary, often
referred to but not quoted, reads as follows: Ἐφοβεῖτο οὐχ ὅτι ἐπόρνευσεν, ἀλλὰ διὰ
τὸ παράδοξον καὶ ὅτι ἠγνόει, εἰ ἤδη μεμόρφωται τὸ ἐξ ἁγίου πνεύματος [Ephobeito
ouch hoti eporneusen, alla dia to paradoxon kai hoti ēgnoei, ei ēdē memorphōtai
to ex hagiou pneumatos] Origen, “Fragment 18,” Origenes, Die Griechischen
Christlichen Schriftsteller (Leipzig: J. C. Hinrichs Verlag, 1941), 23.
A rough translation might read as follows: “He was not fearing that she had
committed adultery; on the contrary, [he was afraid] because of the wonder and
his not knowing if that which (was conceived) through the Holy Spirit had already
been formed.”

For the question of the force of “until” in Matt. 1:25, see Gibbs, Matthew 1:1–11:1,
103–104.

• Doesn’t this interpretation make all of the characters
seem less real?
Much, much more could be said about this issue than time
will allow in this session, and at least one commentator has
warned that this discussion often turns emotional.47
2. A more beneficial approach is to set this dilemma aside
for the moment and ask ourselves, why is any of this
material is important for Matthew. Why does it need to
be included in his narrative at all?
In his fourth homily on Matthew, John Chrysostom takes
an approach to this material that seems to be both humane
and full of common sense.48 The spirit of his treatment will
serve as more of a guide than the specific content of his
homily, but his approach does offer us a way forward.

That may very well be just the question that Matthew wants
us to be asking at this point in his story. In Matthew, the saints
of old are referred to as “righteous” (e.g., Matt. 13:17; 23:29, 35),
but how can their behavior help us here? What did the Old
Testament saints do when their fiancées told them that they
were pregnant through the work of the Spirit of God? Joseph
finds himself in a situation that no would-be righteous man
has ever found himself in before or will find himself in again.
Old standards and definitions will need to be clarified in the
light of what God is now doing through this virgin. And, to
return briefly to our first question, would it have been any
easier for Joseph to decide upon the right course of action had
he known that the child was “of the Holy Spirit”? Would not
knowing make it easier? Jeffrey Gibbs points out that Joseph’s
inability to judge for himself what the right course might be
in this situation gives us “the first glimpse of a powerfully important theme in Matthew’s Gospel, namely, that in order for
human beings to know the ways of God and his Christ, those
ways must be revealed to them.”53
Perhaps Matthew chose to write this description of Joseph
in slightly ambiguous terms just so that his readers would
be forced to ponder these questions. However, Matthew
guards against positions either of legalism or of permissivism. Joseph is both just and concerned for the well-being of
Mary. He desires to obey faithfully the laws God had given
His people concerning marriage and marital fidelity. Whatever the origins of the child Mary was carrying, those origins did not fall within what God had allowed for between
fiancé and fiancée. At the same time, Joseph’s behavior betrays no hint that he is seeking to justify himself by a “strict”
adherence to the law regardless of what harm that might
do to others. Joseph’s internal struggle to determine a right
course of action in this very upsetting situation is shown by
the relatively rare verb that Matthew uses in the beginning
of verse 20. The verb ἐνθυμηθέντος (enthymēthentos), translated “as he considered (these things),” appears in only one
other passage in the New Testament, Matt. 9:4. There it is
used twice of the scribes who, having given this same kind
of careful thought to the matter, have decided that Jesus is
a blasphemer. The verb seems to be used in contexts where
people are faced with problems they

In the end, it doesn’t seem to be too much of an obstacle
toward our understanding of the text that we are unable to
confidently resolve the dilemma posed by verses 18 and 20.
What is clearly most important to the evangelist is that his
47

Luz, Matthew 1–7, 94 footnote 38.

48
John Chrysostom, Homilies on the Gospel of Saint Matthew, vol. 10 of Nicene
and Post-Nicene Fathers: First Series, ed. Philip Schaff (Peabody: Hendrickson
Publishers, 1994), 20–30.

13

A somewhat wooden and “neutral” translation would read
as follows (matching the lines of the text above):
a. Now Joseph her husband,
b. being righteous and not wanting to expose her to public
disgrace,
c. intended to divorce her secretly.
The phrases “being righteous” and “not wanting” (and the
words in Greek that they translate) are constructed in a way
that allows them to take on various forces in differing contexts. Raymond Brown outlines three ways in which these
two phrases have been related to each other and to the rest
of the verse.51 As we will immediately see, this discussion
is inseparable from the question of what the word δίκαιος
(dikaios, “righteous”) means here.
A. “Kindness or mercy was the key factor in Joseph’s
uprightness or justice …” Those who hold this view
would translate 19bc “an upright man and therefore
unwilling to expose her publicly.”
49
The study follows the Greek transliteration convention presented in The SBL
Handbook of Style, 59-60.
50
Nestle-Aland, ed., Novum Testamentum Graece, 28th ed. (Stuttgart: Deutsche
Bibelgesellschaft, 2012), 2.
51
The three positions below summarize Raymond E. Brown, The Birth of the
Messiah (New York: Doubleday, 1993), 126-128.

Secondly, Joseph gives us a glimpse of what it does mean
to be righteous before God, to be justified by faith, when
he believes the message delivered to him by God’s messenger in a dream. Luther’s point above can hardly be
exaggerated. Think of the incredible nature of the message
itself: “Your fiancée is pregnant with a child through the
working of the Holy Spirit.” Then recall that this message
was delivered by an angel. Then remember that this angel
appeared to Joseph in a dream. Such faith in and of itself
cannot be explained in ways that reason will be satisfied
with. It, too, is a wonder, a marvelous working of the Holy
Spirit of God.

Franzmann already points us forward to our third question,
but one final point needs to be made here before we pause
for discussion. In one of his sermons on Luke 1:39–56,
Luther mentions the events of our text in passing. He paraphrases and then comments on Matt. 1:20:
An angel came from heaven and said: “Fear not.
There is no dishonor or disgrace. She is with child
by the Holy Spirit.” Joseph had nothing to go by save
the word of God and he accepted it. A godless man
would have said it was just a dream, but Joseph believed the word of God and took unto him his wife.56

11. How often do you find yourself in situations where
you simply don’t know what the right thing to do
might be? What do you do in those situations? How
does God still reveal His righteous ways to us today?

In the end, Matthew leaves us in no doubt about the course
of the righteous man in a situation he cannot possibly comprehend: Joseph believes the word of God and obeys it. For
obvious reasons, the adult Jesus cannot say, “Whoever does
the will of my Father in heaven is my father,” but notice how
Joseph’s actions in this case bring him within the definition
of Jesus’ family — a definition that transcends both biology
and law (cf. Matt. 12:46–50).
10. What have these first two questions concerning
Matthew 1 taught us about justification? Among the
points to be emphasized here would be especially the
point that, no matter what Joseph might have known
It is interesting to note that a compound of this verb, διενθυμέομαι (dienthymeomai;
“give serious thought to,” “ponder”) is used by Luke in Acts 10:19 to describe a
very similar sort of situation. Note also the reference to Peter’s (inward) perplexity
in 10:17.

54

The Martin Luther Christmas Book, trans. Roland H. Bainton (Philadelphia:
Muhlenberg Press, 1948), 30-31.

Justifying Christmas — Leader’s Guide |

15

If the Greek grammar alone could answer this question,
there would be just one position and no need for discussion.
The additional material in the commentaries and studies
also shows that it is not very difficult to find evidence in
contemporary ancient literature to support each of the three
views of righteousness listed above — although the second
position is probably weakest in this regard. Here, as is regularly the case in reading the Bible, each reader is required
to take upon himself or herself some of the responsibility of
interpretation.

Discussion Questions
7. How can we as readers move toward an interpretation
we feel confident in? What sort of questions do we need
to be asking? Where can we look for answers?
8. Which of the three positions do you prefer? On what do
you base your preference?
Matthew uses the various forms of δίκαιος (dikaios) more
than any other evangelist, 17 times in all.52 It should not be
surprising, then, that the word would not be used in the
same way even every time it occurs in Matthew. Think, for
example, of Matt. 5:45, where Jesus teaches that the Father
sends rain “on the just and on the unjust.” Here the word
and its opposite are used to encompass all of humanity, and
the point is not to define precisely what makes a person
righteous and before whom but simply that God shows His
love to all and we ought to do the same. When, in Matt.
9:13, our Lord says that He came “not to call the righteous,
but sinners,” and contrasts mercy and sacrifice, the word
cannot signify those who have been declared righteous by
God but, rather, those who think they are righteous on the
basis of their own character or nature. Then again, when
our Lord says that the “righteous will shine like the sun” in
their Father’s kingdom (Matt. 13:43), He does mean those
who have been justified by faith in Him.

52

Mark uses the word only twice; Luke, 11 times; and John, three times.

14 | Justifying Christmas — Leader’s Guide

The strictly divine character of this intervention
in history [the conception from the Holy Spirit] is
marked, further, by the fact that it cuts athwart the
normal thinking of man, even of pious man. Joseph,
the son of David, just man though he be, has no
eyes for the working of God. His objections must
be overcome; the son of David must be compelled
to accept the gift God gives to David’s house (1:1925). God’s ways surprise man and humble him. The
disciples who recorded this act of Joseph did so in
the consciousness that they, too, had been graciously
overpowered. They had not left their trades and their
homes at the stirring of their noble impulses but by
the intervening will of God.55

Martin H. Franzmann, Follow Me: Discipleship According to Saint Matthew (St.
Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 1961), 12.

2019 Convention Workbook

c. ἐβουλήθη λάθρᾳ ἀπολῦσαι αὐτήν.50 [eboulēthē lathra
apolysai autēn.]

or been able to understand as he was contemplating his
future with Mary, “in order for [him] to know the ways
of God and his Christ, those ways must be revealed to
[him].”57 The same is true for us, of course, as Gibbs’
original statement makes clear. As Franzmann said, we
have “no eyes for the working of God.”58 How could
anyone possibly think that they could be justified by
doing the works of the law when, from one moment to
the next, we find it difficult — if not impossible — to
know what the right thing to do is, to know how to love,
to know how to obey?

56

Gibbs, Matthew 1:1–11:1, 105.

a. Ἰωσὴφ δὲ ὁ ἀνὴρ αὐτῆς, [Iōsēph de ho anēr autēs,] 49

are not logically or rationally equipped to solve.54 Martin
Franzmann explains further:

55

53

It will help us understand the discussion of this verse if we
first look briefly at the Greek text. Verse 19 reads as follows:

4. But what if Mary had become pregnant after the wedding? Not a hint of scandal then, of course, but also no
chance for God to bring to fulfillment all of the promises
leading up to this birth.

Justifying Christmas — Leader’s Guide |

9. What, then, should we think Matthew means by “righteous” when he uses it to describe Joseph in the opening chapter of his Gospel?

6. What is Matthew telling us about Joseph when he refers
to him as “just/righteous”? In the context of verse 19,
we need to expand the question to read as follows:
What does Joseph’s decision to end his engagement
quietly have to do with the fact that he is righteous?

b. δίκαιος ὢν καὶ μὴ θέλων αὐτὴν δειγματίσαι, [dikaios ōn
kai mē thelōn autēn deigmatisai]

5. Why should Joseph’s internal deliberations even be
recorded for us? Because it is this intricately interwoven
situation that allows Mary to give birth to her child in
safety, the true story of the child’s origin to be told and
Joseph to assume the role of legal father/guardian. Origen
was right about one thing, at least; this is a wonder, and it
should make us all tremble with fear every time we hear it
told. Matthew simply summarizes the whole complicated
situation by saying, “All this took place to fulfill what the
Lord had spoken by the prophet” (v. 22).

C. “Obedience to the Law was the key factor in Joseph’s
uprightness or justice …” Those who hold this view
would translate 19bc “an upright man but unwilling to
expose her publicly.”

Focus Question: Matt. 1:19

The point that is important for us to see is the perfect timing of the fulfillment of God’s plan through His Spirit and
using these children of His.
3. What if Mary had become pregnant before the engagement? Surely even the betrothal would have been seen as
Joseph’s acknowledgement that the child was his. How,
in such a case, could Joseph possibly have had any future
relationship with this mother and her child?

B.“Respect or awe for God’s plan of salvation was the key
factor in Joseph’s uprightness or justice …” Those who
hold this view would also translate 19bc “an upright
man and therefore unwilling to expose her publicly.”

readers see how God was at work to fulfill His promises,
especially the one given through the prophet Isaiah and
quoted by Matthew in verse 23. Knowing of the dilemma,
though, and now having given careful consideration to
some of the issues involved, we are much better prepared to
take up our second question.

why is it so important that Joseph “must be compelled” to
do it? R. T. France sets up the question this way:
The “book of origin” [Matt 1:1–17] has left us with an
unresolved problem. Joseph has been shown to be
the “son of David,” the heir to the royal dynasty of
Judah, but in v. 16 Matthew has abandoned his regular formula to indicate that Jesus, the son of Joseph’s
wife Mary, was not in fact Joseph’s son (and Matthew
carefully avoids ever referring to Joseph as Jesus’
“father”). What then is the relevance of this dynastic
list to the story of Jesus, son of Mary? These verses
[Matt 1:18-25] will explain, therefore, how Jesus came
to be formally adopted and named by Joseph, despite
his own natural inclinations, and thus to become
officially “son of David”; the angel’s address to Joseph
as “son of David” in v. 20 will highlight the issue.60
But, again, why is this all so important to Matthew (and,
therefore, should be to us)? The history of the discussions
and even controversies concerning the identity of Jesus as
true God and true Man has often emphasized the virgin
birth and the two natures in Christ more than it has
questions of Jesus’ lineage. Gibbs points out the importance
of the latter for all those — from Eve and Adam to Mary
and Joseph — who were awaiting the promised Messiah
and Savior:
Given the OT’s view of the king as God’s “anointed,”
this second title [“Son of David”] has some theological overlap with the declaration that Jesus is “Christ.”
“Son of David” however, specifically evokes what
might be the dominant strain of messianic expectation in both the OT and in Second Temple Jewish
literature.[61] The spring from which the expectation
flowed is God’s promise to David that a Son from
his royal line would “build a house” for God’s name,
and God would establish his throne so that he would
rule over the people of God forever. This king would
be God’s “Son,” and God would be his “Father” and
never withdraw his favor from him (2 Sam 7:12–16,
1 Chr 17:11–14). Although David’s immediate son
Solomon, who enjoyed a long and peaceful reign
and built the temple, clearly was an aspect of the
fulfillment of that promise, the subsequent history

Focus Question: Matt. 1:21–25

12. Why is it important that Joseph be involved in naming the Child? Our final question on Matthew 1 involves no complicated grammatical analysis or detailed
study of ancient languages, but it does have an important point to make about “justifying Christmas.” Our
final question simply requires us to be careful readers
of Matthew’s story of the “origin of Jesus Christ, son
of David, son of Abraham.” Perhaps the answer to this
question is already well known among the students in
the class. If so, the following can help show the importance of Joseph naming this child.
In the quote from Franzmann above, he wrote that “the son
of David must be compelled to accept the gift God gives to
David’s house.”59 What exactly does he mean by that, and

R. T. France, The Gospel of Matthew, New International Commentary on the
New Testament (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2007), 47.

60
57

Gibbs, Matthew 1:1–11:1, 105.

58

Cf. Franzmann, Follow Me, 12.

59

Franzmann, Follow Me, 12.

16 | Justifying Christmas — Leader’s Guide

Jewish literature written between the years (roughly) 500 B.C. and A.D. 70, the
time of the “second temple” in Jerusalem, built by Zerubbabel and renovated by
Herod I.

61