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The Contradiction Desk
Claimed Bible contradictions, stated the way they circulate, each with one diagnosis and the evidence for it: the Hebrew, the Greek, the manuscripts.
Joseph and his mother, or his father and his mother?
Luke 1 says Jesus was conceived without a human father. Luke 2:33 in most modern versions calls Joseph his father. The King James reads Joseph and his mother.
Luke 2:33, in every translation this tool compares.
The real question: does Luke undercut his own story of the virgin birth? The school form lists the stepdad under father. Is the form wrong about the family, or using the word the family uses?
Luke 1:34-35 has the Holy Spirit come upon Mary, who has not known a man. In most modern versions Luke 2:33 says his father and his mother marvelled. Luke calls Joseph Jesus's father a chapter after saying he was not. The claim also circulates the other way, from defenders of the King James, as evidence that modern versions weaken the virgin birth.
Bible Hub's page of Greek texts shows the SBL Greek New Testament, Nestle 1904, Westcott and Hort and Tischendorf reading ho pater autou kai he meter, his father and his mother, and the Robinson-Pierpont Byzantine text, the Greek Orthodox Church text and both Textus Receptus editions reading Ioseph kai he meter autou, Joseph and his mother. The CSB's textual note says other manuscripts read But Joseph and his mother. Which way Luke 2:33 reads depends on which text a Bible prints.
And Joseph and his mother marvelled at those things which were spoken of him.
The Skeptic's Annotated Bible does not cite this verse. Its question "Was Joseph the father of Jesus?" makes the larger case: verses that call Jesus David's seed according to the flesh need a real father, presumably Joseph, while Matthew and Luke say the Holy Ghost was the father. At full strength, Luke 2:33 in the critical text is one more place where the Gospels speak of Joseph as father.
The CSB Study Bible says Joseph was legally Jesus's father even though it was the Holy Spirit who caused Mary to conceive, and points to its notes on the genealogy and on 1:34-35.
If his father is original, as the critical editions print, Luke himself used father of Joseph and the reader must take it as legal or family fatherhood, which is the harmonizing case. The variant explains why King James readers never saw the phrase. It does not make the phrase go away, and it does not answer the skeptic's wider point about Davidic descent, which is a separate claim.
Not evidence that modern versions deny the virgin birth. The same versions print Luke's account of the conception in chapter 1.
- Bible Hub, Luke 2:33 Greek texts, https://biblehub.com/texts/luke/2-33.htm
- CSB Study Bible, textual note and note on Luke 2:33-35
- The Skeptic's Annotated Bible, Was Joseph the father of Jesus?, https://skepticsannotatedbible.com/contra/jesus_dad.html
- King James Version, Luke 2:33
