Joseph's profession is described in the Gospels as a τεκτων, a Greek word for a variety of skilled craftsmen, but Christian tradition has him as a worker in wood, or "carpenter", although the modern English words "joiner" or "cabinet-maker" might fit the sense of the Greek better. Very little other information on Joseph is given in the Gospels, in which he never speaks. His places of birth and death are not given, and his dates have been presented very diffently at different periods; sometimes he has been seen as much older than Mary, and at other periods only slightly older. Persistent traditions, with some Gospel evidence to support them, make Joseph a widower when he married Mary, with children from an earlier marriage. He is mentioned in the Gospels as present on the visit to Jerusalem when Jesus was twelve, but no mention can clearly be placed later than that one. Christian tradition, though vague on the time and place of his death, represents Mary as a widow during the adult ministry of her son.
