Justin Glessner

The tensions and gaps between Joseph’s canonical reception (in Matthew 1-2 and Luke 1-2) left him wide open for literary development. This essay considers the reception of Joseph in the Protevangelium of James (PJ) and examines the overlapping and intertwining ways in which interpretation and social context influence that reception. In contrast to that of Luke (Luke 1-2) and similar to that of Matthew (Matt 1-2), PJ’s infancy account is arguably Joseph’s tale. Joseph’s point-of-view characterization in PJ feasibly plays a key role in mediating collective memory and putative in-group identity, bound up with the processes of male self-fashioning. In particular, through its meditation on the outwardly perplexing circumstances of Joseph’s ‘not quite’ marriage to Mary and in its positioning of the ‘rodhandling’ priestly elite, PJ can be seen to have been instrumental in inspiring, or at least being conducive to, forms of masculine subjectivity at home within early Syrian ascetical circles.

This study confronts competing views of conventional masculinity found in the earliest, and often overlooked, receptions of the character of Joseph of Nazareth found in the Gospels of Luke and Matthew, the Protevangelium of James, and the Infancy Gospel of Thomas. Supplementing critical studies of spectacular gender performances in early Christianity, the author reveals deep instabilities inherent even (or especially) in seemingly ordinary or ‘everyday’ coding of masculine subjectivities in ancient Christian narratives, while also putting to the test ways in which canonical infancy material might be considered part of reception history. The study exposes the political mechanics behind Joseph’s colorful characterizations and opens interpretive possibilities for rethinking normative views of manliness in early Christianity and beyond.