How old was Mary at Christmas?

19 Comments

• Reply December 17, 2016

  Guest;

  15 years

• Reply December 17, 2016

  Guest;

  legal?

• Reply December 17, 2016

  Guest;

  13?

• Reply December 17, 2016

  Guest;

  14?

• Reply December 17, 2016

  Guest;

  My grandmother Mary is 89.

• Reply December 17, 2016

  Guest;

  Is she a virgin

• Reply December 17, 2016

  Guest;

  Matthew’s Gospel certainly claims that she was; that’s the import of Joseph’s dream in Matthew 1:18-25. Matthew understood it as an ultimate fulfillment of Isaiah 7’s prophecy.

• Reply December 17, 2016

  Guest;

  Her pelvic region was matured sufficiently for child birth. How early is that?

• Reply December 17, 2016

  Guest;

  history has it , she was 14

• Reply December 17, 2016

  Guest;

  The Protoevangelium of James claims that Mary was 12 at the time of her betrothal to Joseph. However the Protoevangelium of James is not considered overly reliable given that it is believed to have been written around the year 145 AD. I am not currently aware of other early sources that address her age during the Annunciation

  And Mary was in the temple of the Lord as if she were a dove that dwelt there, and she received food from the hand of an angel. And when she was twelve years old there was held a council of the priests, saying: Behold, Mary has reached the age of twelve years in the temple of the Lord. http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/0847.htm

• Reply December 17, 2016

  Guest;

  ok ?

• Reply December 17, 2016

  Guest;

  How old was Joseph at the time?

• Reply December 17, 2016

  Guest;

  40-ish?

• Reply December 18, 2016

  Guest;

  Mary was a teenager around 15-16

• Reply November 25, 2018

  Guest;

  I find Terry Wiles answer most instrumental John David Barton

• Reply November 25, 2018

  Guest;

  The Jewish bar mitzvah was at age 13. I therefore can’t imagine God impregnating Mary prior to 13. A bat mitzvah for orthodox girls are now at age 12, but a BAT mitzvah is a recent invention.

• Reply November 26, 2018

  Guest;

  Jan Dixon Sykes A girl becomes a bat mitzvah at the age of 12 according to Orthodox and Conservative Jews, and at the age of 13 according to Reform Jews

• Reply November 26, 2018

  Guest;

  Yeah, why I said “orthodox.” Because I figured Mary’s family was orthodox.

• Reply November 27, 2018

  Guest;

  your average arranged middle eastern marriage in Judea 1st century was a teen one. 9 times out of ten