§ 42 On the external life of Jesus up to the time of his public appearance
What were the external conditions under which Jesus lived, from the scene just considered up to the time of his public appearance? On this subject our canonical gospels give scarcely an indication.
First, as to his place of residence, all that we learn explicitly is this: that both at the beginning and at the end of this obscure period he dwelt at Nazareth. According to Luke ii. 51, Jesus when twelve years old returned thither with his parents, and according to Matthew iii. 13, Mark i. 9, he, when thirty years old (comp. Luke iii. 23), came from thence to be baptized by John. Thus our evangelists appear to suppose, that Jesus had in the interim resided in Galilee, and, more particularly, in Nazareth. This supposition, however, does not exclude journeys, such as those to the feasts in Jerusalem.
The employment of Jesus during the years of his boyhood and youth seems, from an intimation in our gospels, to have been determined by the trade of his father, who is there called a τέκτων (Matt. xiii. 55). This Greek word, used to designate the trade of Joseph, is generally understood in the sense of faber lignarius (carpenter);34 a few only, on mystical grounds, discover in it a faber ferrarius (blacksmith), aurarius (goldsmith), or cæmentarius (mason).35 The works in wood which he executed are held of different magnitude by different authors: according to Justin and the Evangelium Thomæ,36 they were ploughs and yokes, ἄροτρα καὶ ζυγὰ, and in that case he would be what we call a wheel-wright; according to the Evangelium infantiæ arabicum,37 they were doors, milk-vessels, sieves and coffers, and once Joseph makes a throne for the king; so that here he is represented partly as a cabinet-maker and partly as a cooper. The Protevangelium Jacobi, on the other hand, makes him work at buildings, οἰκοδομαῖς,38 without doubt as a carpenter. In these labours of the father Jesus appears to have shared, according to an expression of Mark, who makes the Nazarenes ask concerning Jesus, not merely as in the parallel passage of Matthew: Is not this the carpenter’s son? οὐκ οὗτός ἐστιν ὁ τοῦ τέκτονος υἱός; but Is not this the carpenter? οὐκ οὗτός ἐστιν ὁ τέκτων (vi. 3). It is true that in replying to the taunt of Celsus that the teacher of the Christians was a carpenter by trade, τέκτον ἦν τὴν τέχνην, Origen says, he must have forgotten that in none of the Gospels received by the churches is Jesus himself called a carpenter, ὅτι οὐδαμοῦ τῶν ἐν ταῖς ἐκκλησίαις φερομένων εὐαγγελίων τεκτων αὐτὸς ὁ Ἰησοῦς ἀναγέγραπται.39 The above passage in Mark has, in fact, the various reading, ὁ τοῦ τέκτονος υἱός, which Origen must have taken, unless he be supposed altogether to have overlooked the passage, and which is preferred by some modern critics.40 But here Beza has justly remarked that fortasse mutavit aliquis, existimans, hanc artem Christi majestati parum convenire; whereas there could hardly be an interest which would render the contrary alteration desirable.41 Moreover Fathers of the Church and apocryphal writings represent Jesus, in accordance with the more generally accepted reading, as following the trade of his father. Justin attaches especial importance to the fact that Jesus made ploughs and yokes or scales, as symbols of active life and of justice.42 In the Evangelium infantiæ Arabicum, Jesus goes about with Joseph to the places where the latter has work, to help him in such a manner that if Joseph made anything too long or too short, Jesus, by a touch or by merely stretching out his hand, gave to the object its right size, an assistance which was very useful to his foster-father, because, as the apocryphal text naively remarks: nec admodum peritus erat artis fabrilis.43
Apart from these apocryphal descriptions, there are many reasons for believing that the above intimation as to the youthful employment of Jesus is correct. In the first place, it accords with the Jewish custom which prescribed even to one destined to a learned career, or in general to any spiritual occupation, the acquisition of some handicraft; thus Paul, the pupil of the rabbins, was also a tent-maker, σκηνοποιὸς τὴν τέχνην (Acts xviii. 3). Next, as our previous examinations have shown that we know nothing historical of extraordinary expectations and plans on the part of the parents of Jesus in relation to their son, so nothing is more natural than the supposition that Jesus early practised the trade of his father. Further, the Christians must have had an interest in denying, rather than inventing, this opinion as to their Messiah’s youthful occupation, since it often drew down upon them the ridicule of their opponents. Thus Celsus, as we have already mentioned, could not abstain from a reflection on this subject, for which reason Origen will know nothing of any designation of Jesus as a τέκτων in the New Testament; and every one knows the scoffing question of Libanius about the carpenter’s son, a question which seems to have been provided with so striking an answer, only ex eventu.44 It may certainly be said in opposition to this, that the notion of Jesus having been a carpenter, seems to be founded on a mere inference from the trade of the father as to the occupation of the son, whereas the latter was just as likely to apply himself to some other branch of industry; nay, that perhaps the whole tradition of the carpentry of Joseph and Jesus owes its origin to the symbolical significance exhibited by Justin. As however the allusion in our Gospels to the trade of Joseph is very brief and bare, and is nowhere used allegorically in the New Testament, nor entered into more minutely; it is not to be contested that he was really a carpenter; but it must remain uncertain whether Jesus shared in this occupation.
What were the circumstances of Jesus and his parents as to fortune? The answer to this question has been the object of many dissertations. It is evident that the ascription of pressing poverty to Jesus, on the part of orthodox theologians, rested on dogmatical and æsthetic grounds. On the one hand, they wished to maintain even in this point the status exinanitionis, and on the other, they wished to depict as strikingly as possible the contrast between the μορφὴ θεοῦ (form of God) and the μορφὴ δούλου (form of a servant). That this contrast as set forth by Paul (Phil. ii. 6, ff.), as well as the expression ἐπτώχευσε, which this apostle applies to Christ (2 Cor. viii. 9) merely characterizes the obscure and laborious life to which he submitted after his heavenly pre-existence, and instead of playing the part of king which the Jewish imagination attributed to the Messiah, is also to be regarded as established.45 The expression of Jesus himself, The Son of man hath not where to lay his head, ποῦ τὴν κεφαλὴν κλίνῃ (Matt. viii. 20), may possibly import merely his voluntary renunciation of the peaceful enjoyment of fortune, for the sake of devoting himself to the wandering life of the Messiah. There is only one other particular bearing on the point in question, namely, that Mary presented, as an offering of purification, doves (Luke ii. 24),—according to Lev. xii. 8, the offering of the poor: which certainly proves that the author of this information conceived the parents of Jesus to have been in by no means brilliant circumstances;46 but what shall assure us that he also was not induced to make this representation by unhistorical motives? Meanwhile we are just as far from having tenable ground for maintaining the contrary proposition, namely, that Jesus possessed property: at least it is inadmissible to adduce the coat without seam47 (John xix. 23), until we shall have inquired more closely what kind of relation it has to the subject.