'The book of the generation of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the
son of Abraham. 2. Abraham begat Isaac; and Isaac begat Jacob; and
Jacob begat Judas and his brethren; 3. And Judas begat Phares and
Zara of Thamar; and Phares begat Esrom; and Esrom begat Aram; 4.
And Aram begat Aminadab; and Aminadab begat Naasson; and Naasson
begat Salmon; 5. And Salmon begat Booz of Rachab; and Booz begat
Obed of Ruth; and Obed begat Jesse; 6. And Jesse begat David the
king; and David the king begat Solomon of her that had been the
wife of Urias; 7. And Solomon begat Roboam; and Roboam begat Abia;
and Abia begat Asa; 8. And Asa begat Josaphat; and Josaphat begat
Joram; and Joram begat Ozias; 9. And Ozias begat Joatham; and
Joatham begat Achaz; and Achaz begat Ezekias; 10. And Ezekias begat
Manasses; and Manasses begat Amon; and Amon begat Josias; 11. And
Josias begat Jechonias and his brethren, about the time they were
carried away to Babylon: 12. And after they were brought to
Babylon, Jechonias begat Salathiel; and Salathiel begat Zorobabel;
13. And Zorobabel begat Abiud; and Abiud begat Eliakim; and Eliakim
begat Azor; 14. And Azor begat Sadoc; and Sadoc begat Achim; and
Achim begat Eliud; 15. And Eliud begat Eleazar; and Eleazar begat
Matthan; and Matthan begat Jacob; 16. And Jacob begat Joseph the
husband of Mary, of whom was born Jesus, who is called
Christ.'--MATT. 1. 1-16.
To begin a Gospel with a genealogy strikes us modern Westerns as
singular, to say the least of it. To preface the Life of Jesus with an
elaborate table of descents through forty-one generations, and then to
show that the forty-second had no real connection with the forty-first,
strikes us as irrelevant. Clause after clause comes the monotonous
'begat,' till the very last, when it fails, and we read instead: 'Jacob
begat Joseph the husband of Mary, of whom was born Jesus.' So, then,
whoever drew up this genealogy knew that Jesus was not Joseph's son.
Why, then, was he at the pains to compile it, and why did the writer of
the Gospel, if he was not the compiler, think it important enough to
open his narrative? The answer lies in two considerations: the ruling
idea of the whole Gospel, that Jesus is the promised Jewish Messiah,
David's son and Israel's king; and the characteristic ancient idea that
the full rights of sonship were given by adoption as completely as by
actual descent. Joseph was 'of the house and lineage of David,' and
Joseph took Mary's first-born as his own child, thereby giving Him
inheritance of all his own status and claims. Incidentally we may remark
that this presentation of Jesus as Joseph's heir seems to favour the
probability that He was regarded as His reputed father's first-born
child, and so disfavours the contention that the 'brethren' of Jesus
were Joseph's children by an earlier marriage. But, apart from that, the
place of this table of descent at the beginning of the Gospel makes it
clear that the prophecies of the Messiah as David's son were by the
Hebrew mind regarded as adequately fulfilled by Jesus being by adoption
the son of Joseph, and that such fulfilment was regarded as important by
the evangelist, not only for strengthening his own faith, but for urging
his Lord's claims on his fellow-countrymen, whom he had chiefly in view
in writing. Such external 'fulfilment' goes but for little with us, who
rest Jesus' claims to be our King on more inward and spiritual grounds,
but it stands on the same level as other similar fulfilments of prophecy
which meet us in the Gospels; such as the royal entry into Jerusalem,
'riding upon an ass,' in which the outward, literal correspondence is
but a finger-post, pointing to far deeper and truer realisation of the
prophetic ideal in Jesus.
What, then, did the evangelist desire to make prominent by the
genealogy? The first verse answers the question. We need not discuss
whether the title, 'The book of the generations of Jesus Christ,'
applies to the table of descent only, or to the whole chapter. The
former seems the more probable conclusion, but the point to note is that
two facts are made prominent in the title; viz. that Jesus was a true
Jew, 'forasmuch as He also is a son of Abraham,' and was the true king
of Israel, being the 'Son of David,' of whom prophets had spoken such
great things. If we would take in the full significance of Matthew's
starting-point, we must set by the side of it those of the other three
evangelists. Mark plunges at once, without preface or allusion to
earlier days, into the stir and stress of Christ's work, slightly
touching on the preliminaries of John's mission, the baptism and
temptation, and hurrying on to the call of the fishermen, and the busy
scenes on the Sabbath in Capernaum. Luke has his genealogy as well as
Matthew, but, in accordance with his universalistic, humanist tone, he
traces the descent from far behind Abraham, even to 'Adam, which was the
son of God,' and he works in the reverse order to Matthew, going upwards
from Joseph instead of downwards to him. John soars high above all
earthly birth, and begins away back in the Eternities before the world
was, for his theme is not so much the son of Joseph who was the son of
David and the son of Abraham, or the son of Adam who was the son of God,
as the Eternal 'Word' who 'was with God,' and entered into history and
time when He 'became flesh.' We must take all these points of view
together if we would understand any of them, for they are not
contradictory, but complementary.
The purpose of Matthew's genealogy is further brought out by its
symmetrical arrangement into three groups of fourteen generations
each--an arrangement not arrived at without some free manipulating of
the links. The sacred number is doubled in each case, which implies
eminent completeness. Each of the three groups makes a whole in which a
tendency runs out to its goal, and becomes, as it were, the
starting-point for a new epoch. So the first group is pre-monarchical,
and culminates in David the King. Israel's history is regarded as all
tending towards that consummation. He is thought of as the first King,
for Saul was a Benjamite, and had been deposed by divine authority. The
second group is monarchical, and it, too, has a drift, as it were, which
is tragically marked by the way in which its last stage is described:
'Josias begat Jechonias and his brethren, about the time that they were
carried away to Babylon.' Josiah had four successors, all of them
phantom kings;--Jehoahaz, who reigned for three months and was taken
captive to Egypt; his brother Jehoiakim, a puppet set up by Egypt,
knocked down by Babylon; his son Jehoiachin, who reigned eleven years
and was carried captive to Babylon; and last, Zedekiah, Josiah's son,
under whom the ruin of the kingdom was completed. The genealogy does not
mention the names of these ill-starred 'brethren,' partly because it
traces the line of descent through 'Jeconias' or Jehoiachin, partly
because it despises them too much. A line that begins with David and
ends with such a quartet! This was what the monarchy had run out to:
David at the one end and Zedekiah at the other, a bright fountain
pouring out a stream that darkened as it flowed through the ages, and
crept at last into a stagnant pond, foul and evil-smelling. Then comes
the third group, and it too has a drift. Unknown as the names in it are,
it is the epoch of restoration, and its 'bright consummate flower' is
'Jesus who is called the Christ.' He will be a better David, will
burnish again the tarnished lustre of the monarchy, will be all that
earlier kings were meant to be and failed of being, and will more than
bring the day which Abraham desired to see, and realise the ideal to
which 'prophets and righteous men' unconsciously were tending, when as
yet there was no king in Israel.
A very significant feature of this genealogical table is the insertion
in it, in four cases, of the names of the mothers. The four women
mentioned are Thamar a harlot, Rachab another, Ruth the Moabitess, and
Bathsheba; three of them tainted in regard to womanly purity, and the
fourth, though morally sweet and noble, yet mingling alien blood in the
stream. Why are pains taken to show these 'blots in the scutcheon'? May
we not reasonably answer--in order to suggest Christ's relation to the
stained and sinful, and to all who are 'strangers from the covenants of
promise.' He is to be a King with pity and pardon for harlots, with a
heart and arms open to welcome all those who were afar off among the
Gentiles. The shadowy forms of these four dead women beckon, as it were,
to all their sisters, be they stained however darkly or distant however
remotely, and assure them of welcome into the kingdom of the king who,
by Jewish custom, could claim to be their descendant.
The ruling idea of the genealogy is clearly though unostentatiously
shown by the employment of the names 'Jesus Christ' and 'Christ,' while
throughout the rest of this Gospel the name used habitually is Jesus.
In verse 1 we have the full title proclaimed at the very beginning; then
in verse 16, 'Jesus who is called Christ' repeats the proclamation at
the end of the genealogy proper, while verse 17 again presents the three
names with which it began as towering like mountain peaks, Abraham,
David, and--supreme above the other two, the dominant summit to which
they led up, we have once more 'Christ.' Similarly the narrative that
follows is of 'the birth of Jesus Christ.' That name is never used again
in this Gospel, except in one case where the reading is doubtful; and as
for the form 'Jesus who is called Christ,' by which He is designated in
the genealogy itself, the only other instance of it is on the mocking
lips of Pilate, while the uniform use of Jesus in the body of this
Gospel is broken only by Peter in his great confession, and in, at most,
four other instances. Could the purpose to assert and establish, at the
very outset, His Messianic, regal dignity, as the necessary
pre-supposition to all that follows, be more clearly shown? We must
begin our study of His life and works with the knowledge that He, of
whom these things are about to be told, is the King of Israel.