A RECORD OF the genealogy of Jesus Christ the son of David, the son of Abraham:
2Abraham was the father of Isaac,
Isaac the father of Jacob,
Jacob the father of Judah and his brothers,
3Judah the father of Perez and Zerah, whose mother was Tamar,
Perez the father of Hezron,
Hezron the father of Ram,
4Ram the father of Amminadab,
Amminadab the father of Nahshon,
Nahshon the father of Salmon,
5Salmon the father of Boaz, whose mother was Rahab,
Boaz the father of Obed, whose mother was Ruth,
Obed the father of Jesse,
6and Jesse the father of King David.
David was the father of Solomon, whose mother had been Uriah’s wife,
7Solomon the father of Rehoboam,
Rehoboam the father of Abijah,
Abijah the father of Asa,
8Asa the father of Jehoshaphat,
Jehoshaphat the father of Jehoram,
Jehoram the father of Uzziah,
9Uzziah the father of Jotham,
Jotham the father of Ahaz,
Ahaz the father of Hezekiah,
10Hezekiah the father of Manasseh,
Manasseh the father of Amon,
Amon the father of Josiah,
11and Josiah the father of Jeconiah and his brothers at the time of the exile to Babylon.
12After the exile to Babylon:
econiah was the father of Shealtiel,
Shealtiel the father of Zerubbabel,
13Zerubbabel the father of Abiud,
Abiud the father of Eliakim,
Eliakim the father of Azor,
14Azor the father of Zadok,
Zadok the father of Akim,
Akim the father of Eliud,
15Eliud the father of Eleazar,
Eleazar the father of Matthan,
Matthan the father of Jacob,
16and Jacob the father of Joseph, the husband of Mary, of whom was born Jesus, who is called Christ.
17Thus there were fourteen generations in all from Abraham to David, fourteen from David to the exile to Babylon, and fourteen from the exile to the Christ.
Original Meaning
DURING THIS TIME the Mediterranean world experienced the famed pax Romana (Lat., “Roman peace”), a condition of comparative calm that originated with the reign of Caesar Augustus (27 B.C.–A.D. 14) and lasted at least to the reign of Marcus Aurelius (A.D. 161–180). The Roman historian Tacitus attributes the beginnings of this period of peace almost single-handedly to the immense powers of Augustus. But as Tacitus observes, the concord that Augustus inaugurated did not bring with it freedom for all of his subjects. Many throughout the Roman world hoped for change. He writes:
Nobody had any immediate worries as long as Augustus retained his physical powers, and kept himself going, and his House, and the peace of the empire. But when old age incapacitated him, his approaching end brought hopes of change. A few people started idly talking of the blessings of freedom. Some, more numerous, feared civil war; others wanted it.1
Tides of revolution continually swirled just below the surface and periodically rose to disturb the pax Romana.
In one of the remote regions of the empire, where a variety of disturbances repeatedly surfaced, the hoped-for freedom finally arrived in a most unexpected way. A rival to Augustus was born in Israel. But this rival did not appear with fanfare, nor would he challenge directly the military and political might of Rome. Even many of his own people eventually became disappointed with the revolution that he would bring, because it was a revolution of the heart, not one of swords or chariots.
This was the revolution brought by Jesus, the long-awaited Messiah of Israel. Matthew’s Gospel harks back upon a long history of anticipation within Israel. His recounting elucidates how Jesus’ life and ministry fulfilled the promises of the Old Testament prophets, but also shows how Jesus disappointed many of the misplaced expectations of the people.
Jesus Messiah Brings a New Beginning for Humanity (1:1)
MATTHEW INTRODUCES HIS Gospel with language reminiscent of Genesis. The Greek word that the NIV renders “genealogy” in 1:1 is genesis2 (“beginnings”), which is also the title of the first book of the Old Testament in the Septuagint (the LXX, the Greek translation of the Old Testament). In fact, an almost identical expression to Matthew 1:1 occurs in the LXX of Genesis 2:4 and 5:1 to narrate both the beginning record of God’s creation and the first genealogy of God’s human creatures. Moreover, in Matthew the expression functions not only as a heading for the genealogy in 1:2–17,3 but also for the beginning narrative of Jesus’ infancy in 1:18–2:23.4 A case can also be made that the expression functions as a title for the entire book about Jesus that follows.5 Just as Genesis gave the story of one beginning—God’s creation and covenant relations with Israel—so the Gospel of Matthew gives the story of a new beginning—the arrival of Jesus the Messiah and the kingdom of God (cf. also Mark 1:1).
Matthew’s opening words (“Jesus Christ the son of David, the son of Abraham”) had special importance to a Jewish audience, which traced its ancestry through the covenants God made with Israel. The heading, with Jesus’ names and his ancestry, is packed with meaning.6
In common practice a person had a single personal name, which often carried some religious significance. This book is about “Jesus” (Iesous), which is his historical, everyday name, the name normally used in the narrative of the Gospels. This name is Yeshua in Hebrew (meaning “Yahweh saves,” cf. Neh. 7:7), which is a shortened form of Joshua (yehošuaʿ ), “Yahweh is salvation” (Ex. 24:13); this name will come to have profound notions of salvation associated with it in Jesus’ life and ministry (cf. 1:21).7
“Christ” (Christos) is a title, derived from the Hebrew mašiaḥ (“anointed”), that harks back to David as the anointed king of Israel. The term came to be associated with the promise of an “anointed one” who would be the light of hope for the people of Israel. God had promised David through Nathan the prophet that his house and throne would be established forever (2 Sam. 7:11b–16)—a promise now seen as having been fulfilled in Jesus as the Messiah. The full name using the transliterated form (i.e., “Jesus Christ”) is accurate and traditional, but in common usage it can be misunderstood to be something like a first and last name.
“Son of David” is an important expression in Matthew’s Gospel (9:27; 12:23; 15:22; 20:30–31; 21:9, 15; 22:42, 45). Matthew uses the name of this great king seventeen times, more than any other book of the New Testament. King David was the revered, conquering warrior of Israel’s history. The wording “son of David” expresses a promised figure who would perpetuate David’s throne, thereby pointing to the Messiah’s lineage and royal expectation (see 2 Sam. 7:11b–16). But it also evoked images of a Messiah who would come conquering—a mighty warrior like David who would destroy Israel’s enemies and reestablish the throne in Jerusalem and the kingdom of Israel as in the golden days of David.
But Jesus is also “the son of Abraham.” In tracing the ancestry not only to David but also to Abraham, Matthew holds a light of hope to the entire world. The covenant God made with Abraham established Israel as a chosen people, but it was also a promise that his line would be a blessing to all the nations (Gen. 12:1–3; 22:18).8
Consequently, the introduction of this Gospel with its ancestry of Jesus offers an important key to interpreting Matthew’s message. Jesus’ ministry brought fulfillment of God’s covenant to the particular people of Israel (e.g., 10:6; 15:24), but it also brought fulfillment of God’s promise to bring universal hope to all the nations (cf. 21:43; 28:19). This latter theme becomes increasingly pronounced in the Gospel and rises to a climax in the concluding commission (cf. 28:18–20).
Jesus Messiah’s Genealogy (1:2–17)
GENEALOGIES WERE IMPORTANT in the ancient world and played an especially significant role for the Jews. According to the Old Testament (e.g., 1 Chron. 1–9), God’s people kept extensive genealogies, which served as a record of a family’s descendants but were also used for practical and legal purposes to establish a person’s heritage, inheritance, legitimacy, and rights. Knowledge of one’s descent was especially necessary, if a dispute occurred, to ensure that property went to the right person.9
Matthew most likely draws on some of the genealogies found in the Old Testament10 and uses similar wording. For the list of individuals after Zerubbabel, when the Old Testament ceases, Matthew probably uses other records that have since been lost. Sources indicate that extensive genealogical records were extant during the first century,11 with some of the more important records of political and priestly families kept in the temple. Later rabbinic tradition, for example, tried to establish the descent from David of a near contemporary to Jesus, Rabbi Hillel, through a genealogical scroll that was purportedly located in Jerusalem.12 The official extrabiblical genealogies were lost with the destruction of the temple and Jerusalem in A.D. 70, though private genealogies were retained elsewhere.
Luke gives a genealogy of Jesus as well (see Luke 3:23–38).13 There are several basic differences between Matthew’s (1:2–17) and Luke’s list. (1) Matthew gives a descending genealogy, beginning with the earliest ancestor, Abraham, placed at the head and citing later generations in forward lines of descent (i.e., moving from father to son), culminating with the birth of Jesus. This is the more common form of Jewish genealogy in the Old Testament (e.g., Gen. 5:1–32). Luke gives an ascending form of genealogy that reverses the order (moving from son to father), starting with Jesus and tracing it backward to Adam (Luke 3:23–38; cf. Ezra 7:1–5). This reverse order is more commonly found in some Greco-Roman genealogies.
(2) Matthew places special emphasis on the covenants made with Israel, in line with the opening verse of his Gospel, by tracing Jesus’ lineage to David (1:6) and Abraham (1:2). Luke places special emphasis on Jesus’ relation to all of humanity and to God himself by tracing his lineage to “Adam, the son of God” (Luke 3:38)—Jesus is the son of Adam and the son of God.
(3) The names of several persons after the Babylonian deportation differ between the two genealogies. For example, Matthew follows the line through Jeconiah, Shealtiel, and Zerubbabel, while Luke follows the line through Neri, Shealtiel, and Zerubbabel.
(4) Matthew omits several names that are found in the genealogy of Luke, most likely for the purpose of literary symmetry for memorization (see comments on 1:17, below). The verb gennao (“give birth to, father”) is used in each link of Matthew’s genealogy and is often used to indicate a more remote ancestor (e.g., grandfather or great-grandfather).
(5) One of the most significant features of Matthew’s record is his emphasis on Jesus’ kingly lineage. David is not simply the son of Jesse (Luke 3:31–32) but he is “King David” (Matt. 1:6). Further, Matthew traces Jesus’ genealogy through David’s son Solomon, who had succeeded his father as king of Israel, while Luke traces the line through David’s son Nathan, who never reigned as king (cf. 1:6; Luke 3:32; cf. 2 Sam. 5:14).
What accounts for the differences in the genealogies of Jesus given in Matthew and Luke? Two basic explanations are often cited, although the variations are numerous. (1) The first view emphasizes generally that Matthew gives Jesus’ line through his father Joseph while Luke gives Jesus’ line through his mother Mary. (2) The second basic view emphasizes that Matthew and Luke focus on Joseph in both genealogies but for different purposes. While fully accounting for the differences remains unsolvable with the information we now possess, it does seem clear that Matthew intends to demonstrate Jesus’ legal claim to the throne of David. David’s greater Son, the anticipated Davidic messianic king, has arrived with the birth of Jesus.14
From Abraham to King David (1:2–6a). Matthew’s emphases in his genealogy give clues to his understanding of Jesus’ identity and ministry.15 The basic pattern of the genealogy is established in the first listing: “Abraham was the father of Isaac” (lit., “Abraham fathered Isaac”). This is in line with the typical Old Testament wording, such as the LXX rendering of 1 Chronicles 1:34: “Abraham fathered Isaac.” This same pattern occurs forty times, using the active voice of the verb gennao (cf. the KJV expression, “begat”). This expression emphasizes the human descent of each generation, which paves the way for a dramatic change of construction in 1:16, where a passive voice occurs, by which Matthew points to the divine origin of Jesus.
Matthew states that Jacob fathered “Judah and his brothers,” probably to point to the inclusiveness of the covenant family of Israel from which Messiah would come. Judah was the son of Jacob who would carry the scepter, the ruling staff (Gen. 49:8–12). The Messiah would come from the royal line of Judah (Gen. 49:10), but he lived within the covenant people that came from the lines of the other brothers. Through Tamar, Judah fathered two brothers, Zerah and Perez (Matt. 1:2), who are probably mentioned because they were twins (Gen. 38:27–30).
Approximately 450 years are enclosed within the four generations of the families from Perez to Amminadab, who was connected with the first census taken of the Israelite nation by Moses during the desert wanderings (Num. 1:7).16 Approximately 400 more years elapse during the span of time of the six generations listed from Nahshon, who led the tribe of Judah in the desert, to the rise of the monarchy with David’s birth.17 This is a direct indication that Matthew omits names from the genealogy in 1 Chronicles 2:5, 9–15. Such omission was common in the ancient world, primarily to make a genealogy easy to memorize (see comment on 1:17).
Boaz (cf. 1 Chron. 2:11–12) is the first person in the genealogy since Judah who is well known in the Old Testament narratives. He is one of the leading characters in the book of Ruth, where he marries Ruth the Moabitess and fathers Obed (Matt. 1:5; cf. Ruth 4:17, 21; 1 Chron. 2:12). Little else is known of Obed except that he fathers Jesse (Matt. 1:5; cf. Ruth 4:17, 21), who in turn fathers David. Jesse figures prominently in the Old Testament narrative, primarily during the anointing of David by Samuel, the early rise of David to power in the court of Saul, and David’s initiation to military life with the slaying of Goliath (1 Sam. 16–17).
The inclusion of five women in Jesus’ genealogy—Tamar, Rahab, Ruth, Bathsheba, and Mary—is often recognized as a clue to Matthew’s emphasis.18 Women were not usually included in Old Testament genealogies, for descent was normally traced through men as the head of the family. When women were included, there was usually some particular reason.19 Similarly, Matthew seems to have several reasons for including these women in Jesus’ genealogy (see Bridging Contexts).
Tamar (cf. Gen. 38), Judah’s daughter-in-law, gave birth to Perez and Zerah after she tricked Judah into thinking that she was a temple prostitute and had intercourse. Judah had not fulfilled his vow of giving her to his youngest son, so she took the situation into her own hands. Her lineage is not made clear—some suggest that she was a Canaanite,20 while others insist she was not.21 Tamar is also listed in the genealogy found in 1 Chronicles 2:4: “Tamar, Judah’s daughter-in-law, bore him Perez and Zerah.” Since Matthew’s phraseology is so similar to that of 1 Chronicles, Matthew may have brought over her name simply because it was listed there, or he may have intended to include a woman whose rights were abused by men.
Rahab (cf. Josh. 2) was a Gentile and a prostitute of Jericho, who protected the two spies sent by Joshua to reconnoiter the land promised to the people of Israel (Josh. 2:1–21). Only here do we find Rahab featured in David’s ancestry, a fact not recorded elsewhere in Scripture nor anywhere else in Jewish writings.22
Ruth (cf. Ruth 3) is a Moabitess (e.g., Ruth 1:4; 2:1, 6). To the tenth generation a Moabite was not to be admitted to the congregation (Deut. 23:3), but here Matthew makes clear that Gentile women, Rahab and Ruth, were in the royal line of Jesus.
As noted above, one of the most significant features of Matthew’s record is the emphasis on Jesus’ kingly lineage. David is not simply the son of Jesse (as is stated in Luke’s genealogy, Luke 3:31–32) but is “King David” (Matt. 1:6), an explicit emphasis on royalty in the genealogy of Jesus. From here Matthew maintains an emphasis on kingship, using the word “king” twenty-two times, more than any other book in the New Testament. Throughout his Gospel, Matthew maintains a focus on Jesus as “the King of the Jews.”23
From King David to the Babylonian exile (1:6b–11). Next Matthew traces the genealogy of Jesus during the monarchy that lasted in the southern kingdom of Judah from King David to the Babylonian exile. It was a time of intense strife in both the northern and southern kingdoms. Strife came from within as various factions contended for power and from outside as conquest loomed from Assyria and Babylon. Matthew may have patterned this section after 1 Chronicles 3:10–14, because the genealogies in both Chronicles and Matthew omit several kings found in the narrative of the books of Kings and Chronicles. As in the listing from Abraham to David, names were omitted to make it uniform for ease of memorization (see comment on 1:17).
“Uriah’s wife,” whom we know as Bathsheba (cf. 2 Sam 11:1–27), is the fourth woman named in the line of Jesus. She was a person of questionable ethical and moral character, like Tamar and Rahab before her.
As noted above, Matthew traces Jesus’ genealogy through David’s son Solomon. That lineage culminates in the birth of Jesus as the ruling royal pedigree. The striking characteristic of this section is the alternating series of godly and wicked kings that ruled Israel. The genuineness, and unlikeliness, of this genealogy must have stunned Matthew’s readers. Jesus’ ancestors were humans with all of the foibles, yet potentials, of everyday people. God worked through them to bring about his salvation.
There is, in other words, no pattern of righteousness in the lineage of Jesus. Adulterers, prostitutes, heroes, and Gentiles are all found in the genealogy from Abraham to David. We see that wicked kings fathered good kings, and good kings fathered wicked kings. Wicked Rehoboam (cf. 1 Kings 14:21–31) and his wicked son Abijah (cf. 15:1–7) had offspring who were good kings—Asa (cf. 15:10–11) and Jehoshaphat cf. 22:41–44). Their offspring was the wicked king Joram (cf. 2 Kings 8:16–19). As Carson notes, “Good or evil, they were part of Messiah’s line; for though grace does not run in the blood, God’s providence cannot be deceived or outmaneuvered.”24
Matthew moves directly from Jehoram to Uzziah, omitting reference to Ahaziah (2 Kings 8:25–26), Joash (also called Jehoash, 2 Kings 12:1–3), and Amaziah (2 Kings 14:1–4), who was the immediate biological father of Uzziah or Azariah (2 Kings 14:21–22). The alternating sequence of good and evil kings then continues through Josiah, who fathered the wicked king Jeconiah or Coniah (Matt. 1:11; cf. Jer. 22:24, 28; 24:1), also called Jehoiachin (2 Chron. 36:9).
According to the Old Testament record (2 Kings 23:31–24:20), several ungodly kings ruled briefly after Josiah just before the Exile: his sons Jehoahaz, Jehoiakim, and Zedekiah and his grandson Jehoiachin/Jeconiah (cf. 2 Kings 24:18–25:7; 2 Chron. 36:10). What then does Matthew mean when he states that Josiah was “the father of Jeconiah and his brothers at the time of the exile to Babylon”? A way of resolving the difficulty is to recognize that the LXX at times uses the Greek name Ioakim for both Jehoiakim and his son Jehoiachin/Jeconiah.25 Thus, Matthew’s reference to “Jeconiah and his brothers” may well have a double entendre, intending the readers to think of the end of the Davidic rule in Jerusalem with Jehoiakim and the ongoing history of David’s lineage with his son Jehoiachin26 (cf. the expression Judah “and his brothers” in 1:2). The nation then goes into exile and returns without a ruling king, which must await the arrival of the heir to the throne, Jesus Messiah.
From the Babylonian exile to Jesus Messiah (1:12–16). After the return of Israel from the Exile, the Davidic line continues through Jeconiah. Apparently Jehoiachin/Jeconiah died in Babylon during the Exile (cf. Jer. 52:34). He was a wicked king (2 Kings 24:8–9; 2 Chron. 36:9), and his evil was so great that Jeremiah’s blistering prophecy declared that “none of his offspring will prosper, none will sit on the throne of David or rule anymore in Judah” (Jer. 23:30).
With such a stunning prophetic curse on Jeconiah and his offspring, we might assume this also invalidates Jesus’ claim to the throne. However, as suggested above, if Matthew follows Joseph’s legal claim to the throne and Luke follows Mary’s biological claim to the throne (which includes Joseph’s legal claim as the adoptive heir of Heli), it helps explain how Matthew recognizes that the curse against Jeconiah does not invalidate the legal line. The curse would have prevented a natural, biological son from ascending to the throne, although the legal claim to the throne could apparently still come through Jeconiah’s line.
Jeconiah fathered Shealtiel (1 Chron. 3:17), who in turn fathered Zerubbabel, the leader of the first group allowed to return to Israel from the Exile. Zerubbabel was the governor of Judah under the Persian king Darius I (Ezra 3:2; 5:2) and is held in high esteem as a man of renown in Jewish tradition (Sir. 49:11). The nine names from Abiud to Jacob are known to us only from Matthew’s genealogy, not from elsewhere in the Old Testament or any other Jewish literature. Matthew may have had access to genealogical records stored in the temple that were destroyed with the sacking of Jerusalem by the Romans in A.D. 70.
The culmination of Matthew’s genealogy in Jesus Messiah (1:16–17). Matthew now arrives at the culmination of the genealogy. Jesus is the true son of David, a rightful legal heir to the covenant promises linked to the Davidic throne. He is likewise the true son of Abraham, a rightful legal heir to the covenant promises linked to the Abrahamic seed and land. But there is much more about Jesus than anyone may have anticipated. His birth was not like any other in the line of David.
Matthew displays intentional precision in his account of Jesus’ earthly life and ministry in order to accentuate truths that are important for devotion and doctrine. In the genealogy, he writes, “. . . and Jacob the father of Joseph, the husband of Mary, of whom was born Jesus, who is called Christ” (1:16).27 The English obscures two important points that Matthew makes about Jesus in the Greek text.
(1) Behind the English words “of whom” stands the Greek relative pronoun hes. The feminine gender of the relative pronoun points specifically to Mary as the one from whom Jesus Christ was born. This genealogy has regularly emphasized the male who fathers a child, but here Matthew delivers a precise statement of the relationship of Jesus Christ to Joseph and Mary. While the genealogy establishes Joseph as the legal father of Jesus, Matthew emphasizes that Mary is the biological parent “of whom” Jesus was born, preparing the reader for the virgin birth by shifting attention from Joseph to Mary.
(2) The expression “was born” translates the verb gennao in a passive voice and gives further clarification of the origin of Jesus. As we noted earlier, in 1:2–16 there are forty occurrences of this same verb. All the others are in the active voice (e.g., 1:2: “Abraham was the father of”; lit., “fathered, gave birth to” Isaac), emphasizing the human action in giving birth to a child. But in 1:16 the verb is in the passive voice, where the subject, Mary, receives the action or is acted upon. Matthew specifies that it was not the sole action of Mary who gave birth, preparing the reader for the angelic announcement of divine action in the conception and birth of Jesus (1:18–25). This is a common construction in the New Testament, which many grammarians call a “divine passive,” where God is the assumed agent of the action.28 By way of contrast, Matthew uses the verb tikto in the active voice where Mary is the subject who gives birth to Jesus (1:25).
By the use of the feminine form of the relative pronoun “of whom” and the passive form of the verb “was born,” Matthew intentionally stresses that Mary is the mother of Jesus, but that she was “acted upon” to give birth to the child. Later Matthew will clarify that the conception is miraculous, brought about by the Spirit of God coming upon her (1:18–25). Jesus is indeed the Christ, the Messiah, the son of David, the son of Abraham (1:1), but he is also the Son of God, Immanuel, “God with us” (1:23). This is no ordinary king in the line of David.
Matthew further reveals that even the structure of the genealogy intends to culminate in Jesus Messiah. Genealogies were often organized for ease of memorization. Matthew structures the genealogy to count fourteen generations from the covenant made with Abraham to the covenant made with David, fourteen generations from the end of David’s reign to the deportation to Babylon, and fourteen generations from the Babylonian deportation down to Jesus.
There are forty-one names in the genealogy, which creates a difficulty, because fourteen generations multiplied by the three groups of generations equals forty-two names. This probably indicates that one name needs to be counted twice. On this reckoning, the fourteen names in the first group of fourteen generations begin with Abraham and end with David. The second group of fourteen generations runs from David to the deportation to Babylon, and the fourteen names to be counted in this group begin with Solomon and end with Jeconiah. The third group of fourteen generations, from the deportation to Jesus, begins again by counting Jeconiah and ends with Jesus’ name. As we suggested above, the name “Jeconiah” may serve as a double entendre to indicate both Jehoiakim and the end of the second group of generations, and also to indicate Jehoiachin and the beginning of the third group of generations after the deportation. On this supposition, the name “Jeconiah” is counted twice to indicate the two different rulers and eras in Matthew’s genealogy. Thus, the breakdown is as follows:
Abraham to David
Solomon to Jeconiah/Jehoiakim
Jeconiah/Jehoiachin to Jesus
Some generations in the family tree were skipped so that the structure could be made uniform for memorization, while other members were given certain kinds of prominence to make a particular point. David is mentioned twice, although only counted once, to emphasize for Jewish readers that Jesus is the Davidic Messiah. The number fourteen may even be a subtle reference to David, because the numerical value of the Hebrew consonants of his name is fourteen (d w d = 4+6+4). The Jewish practice of counting the numerical value for letters is called gematria.29 Alluding to the number of the consonants for David’s name would have been significant for an audience that was intimately familiar with this Hebrew background and practice.
Bridging Contexts
PURPOSE OF A GOSPEL. When the Gospels are compared with other writings of antiquity, it becomes clear that the authors wrote on two levels: to present the historical Jesus and to offer a perspective on Jesus that addressed the needs and concerns of the Gospel writer’s own audience. On both levels the authors intended either to awaken or to strengthen the faith of their readers.30 The unique viewpoint of each author on both levels is apparent by simply reading the first verse(s) of each Gospel. Notice how strikingly different each one begins:
Matthew 1:1: “A record of the genealogy of Jesus Christ the son of David, the son of Abraham.”
Mark 1:1: “The beginning of the gospel about Jesus Christ, the Son of God.”
Luke 1:1–4: “Many have undertaken to draw up an account of the things that have been fulfilled among us, just as they were handed down to us by those who from the first were eyewitnesses and servants of the word. Therefore, since I myself have carefully investigated everything from the beginning, it seemed good also to me to write an orderly account for you, most excellent Theophilus, so that you may know the certainty of the things you have been taught.”
John 1:1: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.”
As discussed in the introduction, each of the Gospels gives an accurate recounting of the historical details of Jesus’ life and ministry, yet each offers a unique perspective on that life and ministry for the particular needs of the audience being addressed.31 For example, Mark’s Gospel appears to be focused on a basic proclamation of the gospel for those who may have needed a primer on Jesus’ life and ministry. Luke states explicitly that he is giving a historical recounting to convince Theophilus of the factuality of the life and ministry of Jesus. And John gives a theological reflection about Jesus as the eternal Logos, a reflection that may have been needed not so much for the first generation of the church but for later believers.
What about Matthew? Matthew’s opening verse gives an important clue to his overall purpose and perspective. It had special meaning for those with a Jewish background, attempting both to awaken the faith of Jews and to strengthen the faith of Jewish Christians, insofar as Jesus is the “Messiah,” the “son of David,” the heir to the promises of Israel’s throne through King David. But this Gospel is also intended to awaken and strengthen the faith of those from a Gentile background. Gentiles and Gentile Christians would find tremendous hope in seeing that as the “son of Abraham,” Jesus’ lineage brings fulfillment to the promises to all the nations of the world, because he is the heir to the universal covenantal blessing established through the patriarch.
This is an important clue to one of Matthew’s purposes for writing his Gospel. He directs his story to those with a Jewish background, detailing how Jesus is the fulfillment of the promises made to the people of Israel. Yet he will weave into the story a message to those from all nations, detailing how Jesus brought fulfillment to the universal hope of salvation for all people.
The faithfulness of God. As the heading flows directly into the genealogy, Matthew unfolds the lineage of Jesus, the One whom he has identified as the Messiah. However, the genuineness—and the unlikeliness—of this genealogy must have stunned Matthew’s readers. Jesus’ descendants were humans with all of the foibles, yet potentials, of everyday people. But God worked through people such as these to bring about his plan of salvation.
There is no pattern of righteousness in the lineage of Jesus. We find adulterers, prostitutes, heroes, and Gentiles. Wicked Rehoboam was the father of wicked Abijah, who was the father of good king Asa. Asa was the father of good king Jehoshaphat (1:8), who was the father of wicked king Joram. While this does not excuse Matthew’s readers of their responsibility to pursue godliness, because ultimately even the privileged who pursued wickedness were judged, it surely caused them, as it should us, to stand in awe of the God who sovereignly works his will through everyday people.
Thus, at the very start of his Gospel, Matthew points his readers beyond the personal qualifications of individuals who belong to the line of the Messiah. He focuses instead on the faithfulness of God to bring about his plan of salvation. As will be made clear throughout Matthew’s story of Jesus’ life and ministry, it was God’s overwhelming love for his people that energized his faithfulness. After noting the juxtaposition of sinners with righteous people in the genealogy, Michael Green exclaims, “At the very beginning of the Gospel the all-embracing love of God is emphasized. Nothing can stand in its path. There is nobody who does not need it.”32 This becomes the explicit message of Matthew’s story about Jesus Messiah.
Men and women. Most scholars see the inclusion of the five women in Jesus’ genealogy as another clue to Matthew’s emphases. As noted above, women were not always included in Old Testament genealogies. When they were included, there was usually some particular reason. Speculation about Matthew’s purpose has a long history,33 but he seems to have a variety of reasons for including these women in Jesus’ genealogy. Something positive can be said for each of the following, although it may be difficult to narrow Matthew’s purpose to any one alone.
(1) Women had experienced increasing marginalization and even abuse within Jewish society. Jesus’ line includes Tamar, a woman wrongfully denied motherhood by the deceitfulness of men. The women in the genealogy represent the gender equality that had been denied them within much of Jewish culture.34 From the beginning Jesus came to restore the personal equality and dignity of women with men.
(2) Tamar, Rahab, and Bathsheba had reputations for morally indiscreet behavior and character. They are examples of women sinners Jesus came to save, a powerful statement about the offer of salvation to those of either gender.35
(3) The first four women may have been Gentiles, although the ethnicity of Tamar and Bathsheba is unclear.36 It is clear, however, that Ruth was a Moabitess, and to the tenth generation a Moabite was not to be admitted to the congregation (Deut. 23:3). Rahab was undoubtedly a Canaanite. Matthew may thus be indicating that salvation is a possibility for every ethnic group, which is a strong motif in this Gospel (Matt. 8:5–13; 28:18–20). Jesus Messiah, who could not have male Gentiles in his ancestry, nonetheless had Gentile ancestors in these women, suggesting his suitability as the Messiah for Gentiles as well as for Jews.37
(4) The women mentioned had unusual marriages, sexual scandals, or suspicions of having had illegitimate children. Matthew may be disarming prejudice against Mary’s circumstances by those Jews who might forget their own history, even as he refutes charges of illegitimacy against Mary (1:18–25).38
(5) These women each represent a crucial period in Israel’s history when a Gentile displayed extraordinary faith in contrast to Jews who lacked courage and faith: Tamar versus Judah’s disloyalty, Rahab versus the desert generation’s faithlessness, Ruth versus the unfaithful Israelites at the time of the judges, and Uriah versus David’s sinfulness with Bathsheba. The messianic line was preserved, even through Gentiles, when Israel was unfaithful.39
The overriding importance of Matthew’s opening verses is to understand that God is faithful to his covenant promises to Israel and to all the nations. With the birth of Jesus Messiah, the dawning of salvation has arrived for all people regardless of ethnicity, gender, or status. Indeed, by including these unexpected names in the messianic genealogy, Matthew shows that God can use anyone—however marginalized or despised—to bring about his purposes. Against the backdrop of a world increasingly hostile to Christianity, Matthew solidifies his church’s identity as the true people of God, who transcend ethnic, economic, and religious barriers to find oneness in their adherence to Jesus Messiah.
Contemporary Significance
AS PEOPLE BEGIN a study Matthew’s Gospel for the first time, a glazed look almost invariably comes over their faces as they turn to chapter 1 and read the opening verses. It’s nothing but a list of names! What could possibly be the contemporary significance of such a dry list? We may even, to our own tragic loss, turn away from this magnificent Gospel if we don’t see the value of Matthew’s heading and genealogy.
The apologetic value. Jewish readers would immediately recognize the significance of Matthew’s opening verses for establishing Jesus’ claim to the Davidic throne and clarifying his messianic identity. For those stirred to believe in Jesus as Messiah, the fulfillment of their hopes is realized as they begin their new life with him. This was at least part of Matthew’s purpose for writing his Gospel, and even today it has immediate relevance to Jews and Christians alike.
This was the experience of the prolific scholar of the eighteenth century, Alfred Edersheim. Born into a Jewish family in Vienna, Austria in 1825, young Alfred became a Christian in his early twenties under the influence of Scottish Presbyterian chaplains serving in Europe. He went to Scotland and England, where he entered pastoral ministry and then studied and later lectured at Cambridge and Oxford. He spent the bulk of his adult life writing on the life of Christ, culminating with what is probably his most influential work, The Life and Times of Jesus the Messiah, which he designated as his apologia pro vita mea (“a defense for my life”).40 Like the apostle Matthew, Alfred Edersheim found in Jesus’ life and ministry what the genealogy attested, that Jesus was indeed the Messiah of his people Israel. In commenting on Jesus’ nativity, Edersheim gives a stirring testimony to his Messiah:
He was the One perfect Man—the ideal of humanity, His doctrine the one absolute teaching. The world has known none other, none equal. And the world has owned it, if not by the testimony of words, yet by the evidence of facts. . . . If He be not the Messiah, He has at least thus far done the Messiah’s work. If He be not the Messiah, there has at least been none other, before or after Him. If He be not the Messiah, the world has not, and never can have, a Messiah.41
Edersheim found in the record of another Jew before him, the evangelist Matthew, a convincing record of the factuality of Jesus as the hope of Israel, the Messiah, the Son of David. Thus, as we begin our study of Matthew’s Gospel, we find in it a message that is of vast, immediate value to any Jewish reader, and also of value for Christians to help Jews understand more fully the true identity of Jesus Messiah.
One objective, therefore, will be for us to truly understand how this Gospel can speak directly to the needs of our Jewish friends and neighbors, offering them a clear understanding of how Jesus can indeed fulfill their hopes and dreams.
Roots. Matthew’s opening verses also have striking relevance for readers of any background. As he traces Jesus’ lineage back to Abraham, he clarifies that the covenantal promise includes all humanity. We all can find our roots in the salvation history traced in Jesus’ genealogy.
Try asking people if they can trace back their own lineage. On occasion I will call two or three people up to the front of my class and ask them to write on the board the names of their parents, grandparents, great-grandparents, and so on, as far back as they can remember. Almost without exception students can only go back to their grandparents, or at most their great-grandparents. On one occasion three young men at the seminary came up at the same time—one from a Japanese-Hawaiian background, one from a Mexican-American background, and one from a Chinese-American background. In spite of their cultural differences, they each could go back only three generations.
Much of this may be attributable to the fact that we are no longer an oral culture, in which young people used to be steeped in their heritage by memorizing their family tree. Another factor may be that we are a much more mobile world, with many young people growing up removed from their extended family. Moreover, in our modern self-importance, we often ignore the past.
But despite our lack of knowledge of our family heritage, Matthew shows us that we have another set of roots—roots of faith. Once a person becomes a Christian, she or he is immediately adopted into a family of faith that has a long and well-documented genealogy. Through church history we can trace back through nearly two thousand years to the family of faith initiated by Jesus, and through him to the covenantal roots God had established through the patriarch Abraham. The apostle John tells us:
He came to that which was his own, but his own did not receive him. Yet to all who received him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God—children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband’s will, but born of God. (John 1:11–13)
Contrasting his earthly family and his family of faith, Jesus asked, “ ‘Who is my mother, and who are my brothers?’ Pointing to his disciples, he said, ‘Here are my mother and my brothers. For whoever does the will of my Father in heaven is my brother and sister and mother’ ” (12:49–50). Jesus’ fulfillment of the covenantal promises made to Abraham enables all who have heard his call to salvation to join his spiritual family. No matter what may be our pedigree, or lack of pedigree, we all now have roots in the Messiah’s line, which unites all Christians of whatever background, race, color, culture, or nationality in the promises of God.
History. Christians are historians. Since we now have roots in the salvation-historical family of God, we must become diligent in the discovery and solidification of that history. The crucifixion, resurrection, and ascension of Jesus were the core of the preaching of the early church. The early Christians had seen these mighty events occur, and they were profoundly struck with the uniqueness of Jesus as the atoning sacrifice for the sins of humanity. Therefore, they had to carefully document the events of Jesus’ life and ministry and to give credible answers to the challenges against Jesus in their day. As such they were diligent historians, with the theological foundation of their faith firmly embedded in the facts of history.
We must be no less diligent today. The challenges to the person and work of Jesus are as ferocious today as they were during the first century. Pluralism, secularism, and relativism pose direct challenges to the uniqueness of Jesus in our day and require that we rest our beliefs on the firm foundation of the facts of history, not wishful thinking, emotional subjectivity, or historical speculation. By implication, this becomes the responsibility of church leaders and members alike. Each of us must be well schooled and trained in the uniqueness of Jesus among the religions of the world, among the philosophical schools, and among political ideologies.
This requires a thorough understanding of who Jesus is, what he came to do, and how he carried it out. As N. T. Wright muses, “I long for the day when seminarians will again take delight in the detailed and fascinated study of the first century. If that century was not the moment when history reached its great climax, the church is simply wasting its time.”42
All of us as Christians are called to solidify our faith in a careful and credible understanding of the earthly ministry of our Lord Jesus Messiah. This is one of the primary purposes for our study of Matthew’s Gospel.