The Genealogy of Jesus (Part 2)
Matthias Stom. The Adoration of the Shepherds (oil on canvas), c. 1650.
Palazzo Madama, Turin, Italy.
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In Part 1 of this “Genealogy of Jesus” blog, we compared Jesus’ genealogy reported in Matthew 1: 1-16 with that reported in Luke 3: 23-38, and we noted the differences. Seemingly, Matthew traces Jesus’ genealogy from Abraham to Jesus through Joseph’s lineage, establishing his legal claim to the Davidic kingship, while Luke seemingly traces Jesus’ genealogy in reverse order from Adam through Jesus via Mary’s lineage, establishing his biological link to the Davidic line. But reconciling the two is fraught with difficulties. One possible solution is the introduction of several levirate marriages within Jesus’ genealogy.
The levirate marriage solution was first proposed by Africanus in the third century and is cited in Eusebius’s Ecclesiastical History, 1.7. According to Deuteronomy 25: 5-10, if an elder brother dies without children, the younger is obliged to marry the elder brother’s widow. Their firstborn son would then become the legal legal heir of the deceased elder brother, even though he is the biological son of the younger brother. Under this arrangement, as Deuteronomy 25: 6 says, “The first son she bears shall carry on the name of the dead brother so that his name will not be blotted out from Israel.” Levirate marriage was common in Old Testament times, and it offers an attractive explanation, especially for the most obvious discrepancy concerning Jesus’ grandfather: was he Jacob or Heli? Under the levirate marriage explanation, Jacob and Heli are brothers who successively had the same wife by levirate marriage; thus Joseph, was the legal son of Jacob and the biological son of Heli.
Raymond Brown notes a difficulty with this explanation, however: Jacob and Heli could only be brothers if they had the same father; yet, Matthan is the father of Jacob and Matthat is the father of Heli. We could assume that Matthan and Matthat are variants of the same name, but then they also have different fathers: Eleazar is the father of Matthan and Levi is the father of Matthat. Are we thus to assume a series of levirate marriages? Brown calls the problem insurmountable and says that the entire levirate marriage explanation “should be abandoned as a solution in the problem of the two genealogies, and even in the more restricted problem of Jesus’ overabundance of grandfathers” (p. 504). Over seventy years ago, however, J. Gresham Machen offered an elegant solution to the problem (The Virgin Birth of Christ, vol. 8, p. 65). If Matthan and Matthat are not the same person, there is no need to appeal to a levirate marriage at all, and the difficulty regarding the father of Matthan and Matthat disappears. Then, if Heli were an heirless only son whose sister married Jacob, and if Heli died, then Jacob’s son Joseph would become Heli’s heir. Alternatively, if Matthan and Matthat are the same person (presupposing a levirate marriage one generation earlier), then “we need only to suppose that Jacob [Joseph’s father according to Matthew] died without issue, so that his nephew, the son of his brother Heli [Joseph’s father according to Luke] would become his heir” (Machen, vol. 8, p. 208).
The levirate marriage explanation seems rather complicated, but then ancient genealogies within close-knit communities that practice intrafamily marriage are complicated. We shouldn’t expect easy solutions with such genealogies.
Matthew Gives Joseph’s Genealogy and Luke Gives Mary’s
This is the most common explanation. To begin with, Matthew clearly emphasizes Joseph’s point of view in the early chapters of his gospel, while Luke emphasizes Mary’s. In addition, both Matthew and Luke clearly emphasize the virgin birth, creating a unique circumstance for a genealogy. Matthew uses the formula “A was the father of B; B was the father of C,” while Luke uses the formula “A, (son) of B, (son) of C.” Both Matthew and Luke break their patterns when they reach Jesus, however. Matthew 1: 15-16 says:
“Eleazar the father of Matthan,
Matthan the father of Jacob,
Jacob the father of Joseph,
the husband of Mary,
of whom was born Jesus,
who is called Christ.”
While Luke 3: 23-24 says:
“Now Jesus himself was about thirty years old when he began his ministry.
He was the son, so it was thought, of Joseph,
the son ot Heli,
the son of Matthat,
the son of Levi…”
Notice that in Matthew the pattern “A the father of B” breaks with “Jacob the father of Joseph, the husband of Mary, of whom was born Jesus,” and in Luke the pattern of “A (son) of B” varies with “…He was the son, so it was thought, of Joseph.” Matthew is careful to note in 1: 25 that Joseph “had no union with her until she gave birth to a son. And she gave him the name Jesus.” Likewise, Luke is very explicit about the virgin birth, having Mary herself question the mechanics of it in 1: 34: “How will this be,” Mary asked the angel, “since I know not a man?” Exactly how one handles a virgin birth in a genealogy poses and interesting problem, and Matthew and Luke approach it in two different ways.
As I suggested above, Matthew gives the genealogy of Jesus from David through Joseph, establishing his legal claim to David’s throne, while Luke gives the genealogy of Mary from David through Nathan, establishing a biological link to David, fulfilling the promise God made to David in 1 Chronicles 17: 11: “When your days are over and you go to be with your fathers, I will raise up your offspring to succeed you, one of your own sons….” If Jesus is to be the Messiah, he must fulfill both conditions: a biological link to David, and a legal claim to his throne. The twin genealogies in Matthew and Luke fulfill both conditions.
Many modern critics have difficulty with Matthew giving Jesus’ genealogy through Joseph and Luke giving it through Mary. After all, Mary is not even mentioned in Luke’s genealogy. Raymond Brown says flatly that “this solution cannot be taken seriously: a genealogy traced through the mother is not normal in Judaism” (p. 89). But neither is a virgin birth normal, and the genealogical problems associated with it. Although the Babylonian Talmud notes that “The family of the father is regarded as the proper family, but the mother is not regarded as proper family” (Baba Bathra, 109b), modern Judaism defines a Jew as “one born of a Jewish mother or one who is properly converted.” This definition dates back to the first century before Christ, shortly after the Roman occupation of Palestine. And there are several instances where women figure prominently in Jewish genealogies, most notably in Matthew’s where he lists four women (Tamar, Rahab, Ruth and Uriah’s wife, Bathsheba), and in Mark 6: 3 where Jesus’ enemies say, “Is not this the carpenter, the son of Mary…?” The “usual” phrase in Judaism would be: Is not this the carpenter, the son of Joseph…?”
As we might expect, modern criticism on the genealogy of Jesus fills volumes. We possess not a poverty but a plethora of possibilities. It is important to remember, though, that debate need not imply error in either genealogy. More likely, the twin genealogies in Matthew and Luke offer different perspectives on Jesus’ ancestors, each serving its own purpose within the narrative framework of each gospel.