A Genealogy

Matthew 1: 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….

Blah blah blah blah blah…

It is not wrong, I don’t think, to maybe expect the story the story of Jesus Christ, son of God, savior of the world, to start off with just a little bit more of a bang, is it? These are the first words of the New Testament, and as dull as they may at first glance be, they are important. Because they are about a journey through time that will, 28 generations after Solomon, begin to converge in a whole series of journeys across time and geography- journeys that include the chapters of our own lives right here, right now.

The genealogy I just read covered 14 generations, from Abraham through Solomon- about 700 years. Another 14 generations would take the genealogy of Jesus into the time of Israel’s captivity in Babylon. And then another 14 generations later, a total now of almost 2500 years from the time of Abraham, the birth of Jesus would happen. It was 2500 years of Jewish history in the making, and it’s been 2000 years of world history in the remembering.

But first, buried within that seemingly dull list of names, there were four surprises, planted there by Matthew like warning flags to tell his readers that what they would be reading was going to be a very unusual story. Normally, a Jewish genealogy was about one thing- the line of patriarchs- the honorable and pious men who passed on their legacy- I guess- in spite of all the women in the way.

Now, the surprises placed in this family tree, however, were exactly that- women! Something had happened in the mind of some very Jewish, culturally patriarchical men like Matthew, that had caused them to open their eyes wider than they had ever been before. Something had caused Matthew to acknowledge the personhood, the importance of women at a time when that just wasn’t done. There was no reason to, after all! Women weren’t men, and in the thinking of the time, men were what mattered. Men, and the number of donkeys they owned.

So when Matthew sneaks the names of Tamar and Rahab, prostitutes, and Ruth, a conniver, and Bathsheba, a woman who took baths on her roof in full view of King David..when Matthew makes sure the reader knows that Jesus has these women’s blood pulsing through his veins, Matthew is saying, without shouting it, that everything, as it has been known, was being turned upside down.

The doors to a relationship with God, being a co-creator with God in the Kingdom of God, had just been opened a whole lot wider than they had ever been before.

Joseph

Matthew 1: 18-24 (NLT):

18 This is how Jesus the Messiah was born. His mother, Mary, was engaged to be married to Joseph. But before the marriage took place, while she was still a virgin, she became pregnant through the power of the Holy Spirit. 19 Joseph, her fiancé, was a good man and did not want to disgrace her publicly, so he decided to break the engagement quietly.

20 As he considered this, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream. “Joseph, son of David,” the angel said, “do not be afraid to take Mary as your wife. For the child within her was conceived by the Holy Spirit. 21 And she will have a son, and you are to name him Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.”

22 All of this occurred to fulfill the Lord’s message through his prophet:

23 “Look! The virgin will conceive a child!
      She will give birth to a son,
   and they will call him Immanuel,
      which means ‘God is with us.’”

24 When Joseph woke up, he did as the angel of the Lord commanded and took Mary as his wife. 25 But he did not have sexual relations with her until her son was born. And Joseph named him Jesus.

In these opening verses of the gospel, as written by Matthew, Joseph is named five times, and Mary, three times. There is purpose and precision in the writing of the gospels, and this emphasis on Joseph by Matthew is not coincidence. The first seventeen verses of Matthew, in fact, trace the genealogy of Jesus, not through Mary, his biological parent, but through Joseph, his step-father! The genealogy establishes Joseph’s relationship to Abraham, the founder of Judaism, and to King David,the star of Judaism. So, what’s up with that?

It’s called patriarchy and Judaism was a patriarchal religion. Jews were the intended audience of Matthew, so from the genealogy to the picking and choosing of quotes from various prophets, Matthew was nailing down the Jewishness of Jesus.  It was important from the start to do that, both for his intended audience, and for the flavor of the story he was about to tell them.

It’s not hard to imagine Matthew sitting with the scrolls of the prophets, a copy of Mark’s gospel, and the other various quotes and vignettes concerning Jesus collectively called the “Q” source. Let’s face it,he was picking and choosing: the first prophetic quote above- highlighted in green- is a compilation of pieces of verses from Isaiah 7:14; 8:8, and 10. And some of Matthew’s later prophetic quotes will be even more complicatedly constructed than that.

Which leads to the point that Matthew, like the other gospel writers, was telling a story, not reporting. A story about an event is a collection of facts with soul, spiced by the storyteller’s  own personality and intentions. Think of Woodward and Bernstein’s All the President’s Men, or Truman Capote’s In Cold Blood. Both are stories, in different genres, about cold, straight-forward facts arranged and presented in such a way that the events they describe can be understood in larger contexts.

Joseph- good man- carries the first part of Matthew’s story of Jesus. Just as a man would have led Shabbat, worship at the temple, and leadership in all family and civic affairs. The story, to have any credibility with Matthew’s readers, had to be begun that way. That Mary was named, and that other women were named within his gospel’s later chapters, is a portent of the status of women that was already beginning to change because of the way Jesus regarded and treated them.

Something stirring and revolutionary was in the air! And Matthew wanted to share the excitement with the people he most loved. Naturally, he told the story in the colors and shapes they would most easily understand.

 

The Nativity- according to Mark

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Nope, he doesn’t say a thing about it. Nor does John. For them, the story of Jesus’ birth, as told by Matthew and Luke (in different ways), was not a part of the story which needed to be told.

Now, given the big deal we make over Christmas, doesn’t that seem odd? It might be argued that each gospel was a part of a whole, since that’s how we read and apply the four New Testament books. If that was truly the case, though, wouldn’t the Matthew and Luke stories about the birth, or about numerous other episodes in Jesus’ life, be a bit more congruous? Wouldn’t you think that all the facts they wrote about would line up in perfect agreement?

In fact, each gospel was a stand alone project. There is no reason to assume- none!- that gospel writing was a group endeavor. Each was written by a different person, for a different audience, with differing motivations. Obviously, Luke and Matthew shared some source material for their gospels- the book of Mark and a collection of stories and sayings about Jesus known as the ‘Q’ source- but even those sources were specifically reshaped for the particular messages Matthew and Luke were writing.

For Mark and John, the Messiahship of Jesus began at his baptism; thus, no ‘away in the manger’ stories. That is not a minor point to be passed over on our way to Luke 2:1 or Matthew 1:18. For Mark and John, “becoming” the son of God was the important part of the story, not being “born” the son of God.

Personally, I like that viewpoint because it gives me a shot at the same status.