^1:18Now the birth of Jesus Christ happened this way. While his mother Mary was engaged to Joseph, but before they came together,¹² she was found to be pregnant through the Holy Spirit. ^1:19Because Joseph, her husband to be,¹³ was a righteous man, and because he did not want to disgrace her, he intended to divorce her¹⁴ privately. ^1:20When he had contemplated this, an¹⁵ angel of the Lord¹⁶ appeared to him in a dream and said, “Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife, because the child conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. ^1:21She will give birth to a son and you will name him¹⁷ Jesus,¹⁸ because he will save his people from their sins.” ^1:22This all happened so that what was spoken by the Lord through the prophet would be fulfilled: ^1:23“Look! The virgin will conceive and bear a son, and they will call him¹⁹ Emmanuel,”²⁰ which means²¹ “God with us.”²²^1:24When Joseph awoke from sleep he did what the angel of the Lord²³ told him. He took his wife, ^1:25but did not have marital relations²⁴ with her until she gave birth to a son, whom he named²⁵ Jesus.

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Matthew 1:18: Now the birth of Jesus Christ took place in this way. When his mother Mary had been betrothed to Joseph, before they came together she was found to be with child from the Holy Spirit.

Footnotes

12 The connotation of the Greek is “before they came together in marital and domestic union” (so συνέρχομαι 3).
13 Grk “husband.” See following note for discussion.
14 Or “send her away.” In the Jewish context, “full betrothal was so binding that its breaking required a certificate of divorce, and the death of one party made the other a widow or widower (m. Ketub. 1:2; Sota 1:5; m. Git. passim …)” (R. H. Gundry, Matthew: A Commentary on his Literary and Theological Art, 21).
15 Grk “behold, an angel.” The Greek word ἰδού (idou) has not been translated because it has no exact English equivalent here, but adds interest and emphasis ( 1).
16 Or “the angel of the Lord.” Linguistically, “angel of the Lord” is the same in both testaments (and thus, he is either “an angel of the Lord” or “the angel of the Lord” in both testaments). For arguments and implications, see ; M. J. Davidson, “Angels,” , ; W. G. MacDonald argues for “an angel” in both testaments: “Christology and ‘The Angel of the Lord’,” Current Issues in Biblical and Patristic Interpretation, 324–35.
17 Grk “you will call his name.”
18 The Greek form of the name Iēsous, which was translated into Latin as Jesus, is the same as the Hebrew Yeshua (Joshua), which means “Yahweh saves” (Yahweh is typically rendered as “Lord” in the OT). It was a fairly common name among Jews in 1st century Palestine, as references to a number of people by this name in the and Josephus indicate.
19 Grk “they will call his name.”
20 A quotation from Isa 7:14.
21 Grk “is translated.”
22 An allusion to Isa 8:8, 10 ().
23 See the note on the word “Lord” in . Here the translation “the angel of the Lord” is used because the Greek article (ὁ, ho) which precedes ἄγγελος (angelos) is taken as an anaphoric article ( ) referring back to the angel mentioned in v. .
24 Or “did not have sexual relations”; Grk “was not knowing her.” The verb “know” (in both Hebrew and Greek) is a frequent biblical euphemism for sexual relations. However, a translation like “did not have sexual relations with her” is too graphic in light of the popularity and wide use of Matthew’s infancy narrative. Thus the somewhat more subdued but still clear “did not have marital relations” was selected.
25 Grk “and he called his name Jesus.” The coordinate clause has been translated as a relative clause in English for stylistic reasons.