A Twitter user has taken on the identity of Joseph of Nazareth, to give us a perspective of what he might have been going through during the birth of Jesus Christ.

The work of an anonymous tweeter from Germany has attracted thousands of followers on social networking site Twitter. He goes by the pseudonym Joseph Von Nazareth. His profile page, joseph_von_naza, is aimed at re-inventing the nativity. He writes “We have heard the story a thousand times, but nobody has ever thought about how Joseph felt about the whole thing.” The tweets began on Dec 1 and are written in German. The tweeter intends to continue until Christmas, narrating the nativity in 140-character messages right until then. For now, his tweets are focused on his girlfriend Mary and her pregnancy. He has been in a state of turmoil ever since he found out about it.

“Did not sleep a wink the whole night. I am seriously considering whether I should leave Mary,” reads one of the tweets. “Of course, I know that Mary would be stoned if I left her. And I certainly do not want that to happen,” reads another one. Joseph has an explanation as to how he started tweeting too. He says he did it on Mary’s advice, that ‘that’s what all the people do these days’. He calls himself a simple carpenter who does not know his way with this ‘new-fangled’ technology stuff.

But Joseph the old fashioned does seem to have some marketing skills of his own. He’s attempting to use the micro-blogging site to improve his carpentry business. “Why I am here. A bit of advertising: If you have carpentry work in and around Nazareth? Then I’m your partner!” He also seeks advice of other men in his love-life. ‘I wonder whether there are other men who have already experienced my situation?’ he tweeted yesterday. ‘A girlfriend pregnant by another. What have they done?’ he asks innocently.

In just eight days, Joseph has managed to attract well over 4,500 followers and has began tweeting in both English and German, after his story went viral.

via Spiegel Online