What age difference is acceptable?

[Joy]

Indeed. Which would have been age 12 (and which is when we see Jesus starting to act independently).

And He got in trouble for it, so I assume He wasn't following the custom of the times.

Actually, he was. A 12 year old was considered a fully functional (and responsible) adult.

Yet even in adulthood, sons remained subject to their fathers, well into their father's old age (we can see another example of this in the story of Isaac and his two sons). A family travelling from Nazareth to Jerusalem would stick together, which is why Jesus' mother was so worried about him - she couldn't find where he was. It would be no different if I were travelling with my parents to Israel, and wandered off somewhere, and then my parents need to go home or go to their lodging and are trying to find me.

But your parents know you aren't the Messiah, I presume. Jesus' parents did know He was the Messiah/God, and He still got a scolding from His mom, probably because He was still a child.

[Josh]

Childhood ended in that culture at age 12. Their concept of it was quite different than ours today.

[Joy]

And yet God ordered the age of twenty and above, for two issues:

1. Those who had murmured would not enter the Promised Land
2. Those who were able to go to war

God's ways don't always measure up with man's customs.

[Jeff Altweg]

in the early 1900's there were older Civil War vets ,with small pensions , in their 70's and even 80's , getting married to 18 or 19 year old girls....long before SS payments came .....Some even had Kids, though there was no DNA testing back then ,with all that entails....many civil war pensions were still being paid out to surviving widows into the 1950's then....

[Jeff Altweg]

Did a bit more research......The last surviving widow of a Civil war vet died in 2020 in Marshfield Mo.... She was 17 ,and he was 93 when they married ..

[Josh]

Did a bit more research......The last surviving widow of a Civil war vet died in 2020 in Marshfield Mo.... She was 17 ,and he was 93 when they married ..

That one was done entirely so he could share his pension, as far as I know.

[Joy]

Did a bit more research......The last surviving widow of a Civil war vet died in 2020 in Marshfield Mo.... She was 17 ,and he was 93 when they married ..

That one was done entirely so he could share his pension, as far as I know.

Interesting.