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Topic: Lineage of Mary!
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Eden
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THE GENEALOGY OF THE LORD JESUS CHRIST:
Why are the Lord’s genealogies recorded in Matthew and Luke
the same in some portions, but different in others?
(The following Bible study is in part extracted from Smith’s Bible Dictionary, dated 1868,
which is no longer under copyright.)
It has been noted throughout the centuries by careful Bible students that the genealogy of the Lord Jesus Christ recorded in the book of Matthew is different from the Lord’s genealogy recorded in the book of Luke.
In order to deal with that difference, it has been assumed among other things, especially in our present time, that one genealogy gives the descent of Jesus Christ through His assumed natural father Joseph, and that the other genealogy gives the descent of Jesus Christ through His mother Mary since Jesus Christ was born of the Holy Spirit and Mary and not through the agency of Joseph, and therefore it has been believed that the genealogies are so different, with one giving the genealogy of Joseph and the other of Mary.
However, this Bible study will seek to prove that both genealogies are those of Joseph, and none are of Mary.
THE TWO GENEALOGIES OF THE LORD JESUS CHRIST
The New Testament books of Matthew and Luke each records a genealogy of our Lord Jesus Christ whom the prophets had announced had to be of the seed of Abraham and of the house of David, and of whom the angel declared that to Him would be given the throne of His father David, that He might reign over the house of Jacob forever. To establish this person’s genealogical descent was a matter of utmost importance to all Jews, and such a record of descent was readily available in the public archives at Jerusalem.
The Messiah’s descent from David and Abraham therefore being an essential part of His Messiahship, required that a detailed and accurate genealogy be given as part of the gospel record.
Furthermore, since to the Jews He was to be manifested first, His descent from David and Abraham was a matter of special interest to them, and therefore any proof of His descent would be especially adapted to convince them, namely, that it would be drawn from documents which they deemed authentic. And such documents were the genealogical records preserved at Jerusalem.
To the above consideration must be added that the lineage of Joseph also had to be made out from authentic records for the purpose of the census ordered by Augustus, so that it becomes certain that the genealogy of his assumed son, Jesus Christ, was also extracted from the public registers in Jerusalem.
In them, as was the custom, Jesus, the son of Mary the espoused wife of Joseph, could only appear as Joseph’s son. And so it is written in John 1:44-46:
44 Now Philips was of Bethsaida, the city of Andrew and Peter.
45 And Philip finds Nathanael and says to him, “We have found him of whom Moses in the law, and the prophets, did write, Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph.”
46 And Nathanael says, “Can any good thing come out of Nazareth?”
In transferring the contents of the public records to the pages of the gospels, the evangelists only added the clarifying expression “as was supposed” in Luke 3:23 and its equivalent “the husband of Mary” in Matthew 1:16 to the public extract, saying:
23 And Jesus Himself began to be about 30 years of age, being (as was supposed) the son of Joseph, which was the son of Heli...
16 And Jacob begot Joseph the husband of Mary, of whom was born Jesus, who is called Christ.
But, if both the genealogy recorded from the public register in Matthew and the genealogy recorded from the public record in Luke are those of Joseph, why are the two genealogies so different? This supposed difficulty has exercised many a good Christian mind over the centuries.
Below, I have first of all set forth both genealogies for observation. However, because Matthew, in Matt.1:2-16, recorded his genealogy in a descending format, from Abraham to Jesus, and Luke, in Lk.3:23-38, recorded his genealogy in an ascending format, from Jesus to Adam, for the sake of easier comparison only I have reversed the order of Luke’s genealogy to a descending format, and have also stopped Luke’s genealogy (which goes all the way back to Adam) at Abraham, as Matthew did, in order to compare the two genealogies more easily. And lastly, the italicized names in the lists below show where the differences in the genealogies are located, while the bold names show where the genealogies are the same.
The genealogy according to Matthew
Abraham
Isaac
Jacob
Judah
Phares
Esrom
Aram
Aminadab
Naashon
Salmon
Booz
Obed
Jesse
David
Solomon
Roboam
Abia
Asa
Josaphat
Joram
Ozias
Joatham
Achaz
Ezekias
Manasses
Amon
Josias
Jechonias and his brothers
Salathiel
Zorobabel
Abiud
Eliakim
Azor
Sadoc
Achim
Eliud
Eleazar
Matthan
Jacob
Jacob begot Joseph the husband of Mary of whom was born Jesus, who is called Christ The genealogy according to Luke
Abraham
Isaac
Jacob
Judah
Phares
Esrom
Aram
Aminadab
Naashon
Salmon
Booz
Obed
Jesse
David
Nathan
Mattatha
Menan
Melea
Eliakim
Jonan
Joseph
Judah
Simeon
Levi
Matthat
Jorim
Eliezer
Jose
Er
Elmodan
Cosam
Addi
Melchi
Neri
Salathiel
Zorobabel
Rhesa
Joanna
Judah
Joseph
Semei
Mattathias
Maath
Nagge
Esli
Naum
Amos
Mattathias
Joseph
Janna
Melchi
Levi
Matthat
Heli
Joseph
Jesus, as was supposed, the son of Joseph
As already stated above, this study hopes to show that both of these genealogies are those of Joseph, and thus also of Jesus Christ, as the legal son of Joseph and Mary.
One thing any genealogy clearly needed to establish was Joseph’s descent from King David, for it was prophesied that the Messiah would come out of Jesse who was David’s father, as is stated in Isaiah 11:1, Luke 2:4, and Acts 13:22-23:
1 There shall come forth a rod out of Jesse and a Branch shall grow out of his roots.
4 And Joseph also went up from Galilee, out of the city of Nazareth, into Judaea, unto the city of David, which is called Bethlehem; (because he was of the house and lineage of David)
22 ...saying, I have found David the son of Jesse...
23 Out of this man’s seed has God according to His promise raised unto Israel a Saviour, Jesus.
One thing any genealogy thus had to unhesitatingly assert was that Joseph was a legal successor to the throne of David.
For this reason, when we look at the two genealogical lists, we can immediately see that Matthew’s list on the left contains the names of the succession of the kings of Judah which are well-known to us from the books of Kings, and that list thus shows that Joseph, and thus Jesus, was in the line of succession of the Davidic kingly line.
By contrast, it can further be seen that Luke’s list on the right is much longer than the list of Matthew and contains many names which are completely unknown to us from a political point of view, and also repeats the name of Joseph a number of times, showing, as will be explained further below, that Luke’s list contains the names of Joseph’s paternal family line, and is strictly a birth line of private persons.
Now one further clue that Luke’s list is a paternal list can be found in the following. Had, for instance, only Matthew’s genealogy been recorded in the Bible, we would immediately have thought that Matthew’s genealogy was both Joseph’s kingly succession and his paternal list. But now that a second genealogy has been recorded by Luke, which contains many additional, much more private names, we can no longer automatically assume that Matthew’s kingly succession list is also Joseph’s paternal succession list.
To further substantiate that possibility, when we examine Matthew’s kingly succession list, we notice further that the kingly succession list can not be a paternal list because it contains the name of Jechonias, which name does not appear in Luke’s list, as shown below:
The genealogy according to Matthew
David
Solomon
Roboam
Abia
Asa
Josaphat
Joram
Ozias
Joatham
Achaz
Ezekias
Manasses
Amon
Josias
Jechonias and his brothers
Salathiel
Zorobabel
The genealogy according to Luke
David
Nathan
Mattatha
Menan
Melea
Eliakim
Jonan
Joseph
Judah
Simeon
Levi
Matthat
Jorim
Eliezer
Jose
Er
Elmodan
Cosam
Addi
Melchi
Neri
Salathiel
Zorobabel
Jechonias, the Bible tells us in Jeremiah 22:28,30, was childless and was foretold that none of his seed would sit upon the throne of David:
28 Is this man Coniah a despised broken idol? Is he a vessel wherein is no pleasure? Wherefore are they cast out, he and his seed, and are cast into a land [that is, Babylon] which they know not?
30 Thus says the LORD, “Write you this man childless, a man that shall not prosper in his days: for no man of his seed shall prosper, sitting upon the throne of David, and ruling any more in Judah.
Childless Jechonias, therefore, who appears only in the kingly succession list of Matthew, could thus never have been the father of Salathiel, whose name follows the name of Jechonias in the kingly succession list of Matthew, and therefore neither could Joseph nor Jesus Christ have been physically descended from Jechonias.
If the Bible is true to its Word at all, we can therefore safely conclude that the names immediately following Jechonias are not the names of his actual sons, but are the names of the heirs to the throne of David.
Now, when we further look at Matthew’s kingly succession list, we see that the name David was followed by the name of his real son Solomon who indeed succeeded David to the throne. But when a failure of the Solomonic line occurred at Jechonias, we find that both Matthew’s list and Luke’s list suddenly both record the same names of Salathiel and Zerubabel, and Luke’s list further adds that Salathiel’s real father was Neri, of the house of Nathan.
Now, Nathan was another son of David, born to one of David’s other wives or concubines, as is stated in 2 Samuel 5:13-14:
13 And David took him more concubines and wives out of Jerusalem, after he was come from Hebron; and there were yet sons and daughters born to David.
14 And these be the names of those that were born to him in Jerusalem; Shammuah, and Shobab, and Nathan, and Solomon.
And indeed when we look at Luke’s list, we see that the name which follows David is the name of David’s other son Nathan, and we see further that Salathiel and Zerubabel were physically descended from Nathan.
What must thus have happened is that when the Solomonic kingly line failed and ended in Jechonias, then the line of Nathan next became heir to the throne of David, and as a result, the names of Nathan’s descendants Salathiel and Zerubabel became transferred and recorded in the kingly succession list of Matthew as “sons of Jechonias.”
This principle of transferring the inheritance of a man who dies childless to his next of kin is found in Numbers 27:8-11:
8 And you shall speak to the children of Israel, saying, “If a man dies, and has no son, then you shall cause his inheritance to pass to his daughter.
9 And if he has no daughter, then you shall give his inheritance to his brethren.
10 And if he has no brethren, then you shall give his inheritance to his father’s brethren.
11 And if his father has no brethren, then you shall give his inheritance to his kinsman that is next to him of his family, and he shall possess it; and it shall be to the children of Israel a statute of judgment, as the LORD commanded Moses.”
Since Jechonias died childless, he had neither daughters nor sons, and as a result the inheritance ended up in the family of his kinsman Nathan. That is, Salathiel, of the house of Nathan, King David’s other son, inherited the kingly mantle when Judah returned from Babylon’s Captivity to the land of Judah.
Thus, in Salathiel and Zorobabel, the two genealogies coincide for 2 generations, but then follow 7 generations in Matthew which are not in Luke, until at last the two genealogies coincide again in the name of Matthan or Mattat, as shown below:
The genealogy according to Matthew
Jechonias and his brothers
Salathiel
Zorobabel
Abiud
Eliakim
Azor
Sadoc
Achim
Eliud
Eleazar
Matthan
Jacob
Jacob begot Joseph the husband of Mary of whom was born Jesus, who is called Christ The genealogy according to Luke
Salathiel
Zorobabel
Rhesa
Joanna
Judah
Joseph
Semei
Mattathias
Maath
Nagge
Esli
Naum
Amos
Mattathias
Joseph
Janna
Melchi
Levi
Matthat
Heli
Joseph
Jesus, as was supposed, the son of Joseph
Now, Matthan and Matthat are merely variations of the same word stem, which stem is Nathan. With this in mind, when we look at Luke’s list below, we see at once that this list must be a paternal, family list of private persons because, beginning with Nathan, we find the same name reoccur in its variations 6 more times, as we would expect to be the case in any paternal family list of private persons. Such a repetition of names does not, however, occur in Matthew’s list because that isn’t a family list but a kingly succession list.
And, for the same reason we find that the name Joseph with one variation of Jose is repeated 5 times in Luke’s list, confirming again that Luke’s list is a paternal, family list, as can be seen from that list of Luke below (please note that I have set Luke’s list in two columns below to keep the list shorter, but note that both columns belong to Luke’s list):
The genealogy according to Luke
Nathan
Mattatha
Menan
Melea
Eliakim
Jonan
Joseph
Judah
Simeon
Levi
Matthat
Jorim
Eliezer
Jose
Er
Elmodan
Cosam
Addi
Melchi
Neri
Salathiel
Zorobabel
Rhesa
Joanna
Judah
Joseph
Semei
Mattathias
Maath
Nagge
Esli
Naum
Amos
Mattathias
Joseph
Janna
Melchi
Levi
Matthat
Heli
Joseph
Jesus, as was supposed, the son of Joseph
Returning now to my earlier statement that both Matthew’s and Luke’s lists near their ends coincide once again in the name Matthan and Matthat, in the lists below we further see that both names of Matthan and Matthat are then followed by 2 different names of sons, Jacob and Heli, and then both of those sons Jacob and Heli have only one son after them, named Joseph who was the husband of Mary and the supposed father of Jesus Christ:
The genealogy according to Matthew
Eleazar
Matthan
Jacob
Joseph the husband of Mary
of whom was born Jesus The genealogy according to Luke
Levi
Matthat
Heli
Joseph
Jesus, as was supposed, the son of Joseph
How can it be explained that Joseph would in one list have a father named Jacob and in the other list his father’s name is Heli? By using the same principle of the inheritance moving into the kinsman line when a man was childless, in Matthew’s kingly succession list, Eleazar must have been childless, and thus the kinsman Matthat from Luke’s paternal list was moved into Matthew’s kingly succession list, Matthat and Matthan thus being the same person.
Luke’s Matthat then had 2 sons, Jacob the elder and Heli the younger. Jacob then was childless, and as a result, the son of Jacob’s younger brother Heli, namely Joseph, was moved into Matthew’s kingly succession list as a “son of Jacob” when in fact Joseph’s real birth father was Heli, and so Joseph became heir to his uncle Jacob and heir to the throne of David.
Thus, by using the simple principle that Matthew recorded in his genealogy the successive heirs to David’s and Solomon’s throne, while Luke recorded in his genealogy the paternal stem of Joseph who was also the heir to the throne of David and also the supposed father of Jesus the Messiah, explains all the anomalies of the two genealogies and the reason for there being two at all. And thus we see that Joseph was of the lineage and house of David, via David’s son Nathan.
ONE ADDITIONAL DIFFICULTY
In addition to the above seeming difficulty, there is another difficulty worth mentioning in this brief study which also arises from the two genealogies, namely the total seeming disagreement between the recorded descendants of Zerubabel as found in 1Chronicles 3:19-24 and the descendants of Zerubabel as listed above in the genealogical lists of Matthew and Luke. The 7 sons of Zerubabel listed in 1Chron.3:19-24 are these:
1 Chronicles 3:19-24 — The 7 sons of Zerubabel
Meshullam
Hananiah
Hashubah
Ohel
Berechiah
Hasadiah
Jushad-hesed
Now, in Matthew’s and Luke’s lists, the following names are recorded as sons of Zerubabel:
The genealogy according to Matthew
Salathiel
Zorobabel
Abiud
Eliakim
Jonan
Joseph The genealogy according to Luke
Salathiel
Zorobabel
Rhesa
Joanna
Judah
Joseph
Semei
As can be seen from the list of names of Zerubabel’s 7 sons as recorded above in 1Chron.3:19-24, not one name from Chronicles resembles Abiud or Rhesa or Eliakim or Joanna as recorded sons in Matthew’s and Luke’s lists. How can this be?
This difficulty can be gotten rid off if one assumes that the name Rhesa has slipped into the text from the margin. That is, originally, Rhesa was not a name at all, but was a Chaldean kingly title. In the second and third centuries after Christ, princes of the East rose to prominence as sovereigns and were known as Rhesa. This same title Rhesa or its Persian/Iranian variant Reza is still common among Persian/Iranian kings today, as we recently had the now-deceased Shah Reza Pahlavi, who was king of Persia/Iran prior to the Khoumeni revolution of 1978.
And such a Rhesa prince was exactly what Zerubabel must have been in his time of the Chaldean captivity, for in Ezra 1:1 and 2:1-2 we find that Zerubabel is sought separately from the chief of the fathers and also Ezra 4:1-2 further says that the adversaries of Judah came separately to Zerubabel and also to the chief of the fathers:
1 Now in the first year of Cyrus king of Persia, that the word of the Lord by the mouth of Jeremiah might be fulfilled, the Lord stirred up the spirit of Cyrus king of Persia, that he made a proclamation throughout all his kingdom...saying,
2 Thus says Cyrus king of Persia, The Lord God of heaven has...charged me to build him an house at Jerusalem, which is in Judah.
3 Who is there among you of all His people? His God be with him, and let him go up to Jerusalem, which is in Judah, and build the house of the Lord God of Israel...in Jerusalem.
5 Then rose up the chief of the fathers of Judah and Benjamin, and the priests, and the Levites, with all them whose spirit God had raised, to go up to build the house of the Lord which is in Jerusalem.
1 Now these are the children of the province that went up out of the captivity...whom Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon had carried away to Babylon, and came again to Jerusalem and Judah, every one to his city;
2 Which came with Zerubabel: Jeshua, Nehemiah, Seraiah, Reelaiah, Mordecai...
1 Now when the adversaries of Judah and Benjamin heard that the children of the captivity were building the temple unto the LORD God of Israel;
2 Then they came to Zerubabel, and to the chief of the fathers, and said to them, “Let us build with you...”
From the above we see that Zerubabel was not only one of the chief of the fathers, but he was also the chief of the chiefs, because in Ezra 4:2 above he was sought out first and separately from the chief of the fathers. Zerubabel was therefore the Rhesa or prince of Judah.
We may therefore safely assume that Rhesa was Zerubabel’s title which a Christian Jew had originally written in the margin of a New Testament manuscript to denote Zerubabel as Rhesa and that this title Rhesa eventually slipped in among Luke’s list of names.
When we therefore set the name Rhesa next to Zerubabel so that he becomes Rhesa (Chief) Zerubabel in Luke’s list, we then see that the next name in Luke’s list is Joanna, which is merely a Greek variant of the Hebrew name Hananiah, the son of Zerubabel according to 1Chron.3:19:
1 Chronicles 3:19-24 — The 7 sons of Zerubabel
Meshullam
Hananiah
Hashubah
Ohel
Berechiah
Hasadiah
Jushad-hesed
In Matthew’s list that name Joanna is omitted because he wasn’t in the kingly succession line but was in the paternal family line.
Next in Luke’s paternal family list, which was written in Greek, we find Jud-ah, which is a variant of the name Ab-jud, and which is recorded in Matthew’s kingly succession list as Ab-iud:
The genealogy according to Matthew
Jechonias and his brothers
Salathiel
Zorobabel
Abiud
Eliakim
Jonan
Joseph The genealogy according to Luke
Salathiel
Rhesa (Chief) Zorobabel
Joanna
Judah
Joseph
Semei
In the Hebrew list of 1Chron.3:24 this same name occurs as Hod-aiah, a near descendant of Zerubabel.
Further, in Luke’s paternal family list below, it is very likely that the Greek Semei, which follows two names after Judah, and which is a variant of the Hebrew Shemei, is the same as Shemaiah in 1Chron.3:22, also a near descendant of Zerubabel:
The genealogy according to Matthew
Jechonias and his brothers
Salathiel
Zorobabel
Abiud
Eliakim
Jonan
Joseph The genealogy according to Luke
Salathiel
Rhesa (Chief) Zorobabel
Joanna
Judah
Joseph
Semei
In conclusion, it is virtually certain that both genealogies are those of Joseph, with Matthew’s genealogy recording how Joseph was in the kingly succession line of King David via David’s son Solomon, and Luke’s genealogy recording how Joseph was paternally of the house and lineage of his forefather David via David’s son Nathan.
JOSEPH, OF THE
HOUSE OF DAVID
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Michael Harrison
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It is said that we cannot prove God. Many people looking to disprove God cite evolution as the reason why there is no God. Yet, does evolution disprove God? Yet those who believe in God, 'accept' what is written, whatever it means. So, the clearest theme in the bible, overall, is faith. It is the 'necessary' ingredient in order to please God. For one must believe that He IS in order to come to a saving knowledge of Him.
Yet, if one believes the gospels, he thinks that he has a sound basis for his faith based on the factual account of Jesus. Do you know however, that the lineage of Jesus is not provable? We are given two lineages. One is supposedly of Joseph, and the other for Mary (is the most popularly accepted accrediting). However, the lineage of the women was not kept in OT days.
Some pass this off claiming that the lineage given in both gospels is for Joseph. Yet, they differ in the path that they take. Well, there are rationalizations to explain why this is so, but they are not 'proofs'. They are as speculative and diverse as whether it is an 'Old Earth', or 'New'. But scripture is as vague concerning the lineage of Christ, as it is about creation. Where does your faith stand? They do not teach this in any church where I have attended. What would become of believers if this were commonly taught?
Posts: 3273 | From: Charlotte N.C. | Registered: Sep 2007
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