spin

Analogies are meant to be meaningful, PhilosopherJay. That one is not. There are relatively few similarities in the two lists though one would expect much more. These are from different approaches and as I pointed out they are grammatically and formally different, you know, "begat, begat, begat" versus "(son) of, (son) of, (son) of".

Besides, an analogy is not evidence in any sense. It is merely a means of elucidation. I was hoping for evidence.

I'm sorry, PhilosopherJay, but this doesn't make sense to me. Was the genealogy in Chronicles also copied by the same person? -- after all it also has Sheatiel and Zerubbabel. The thought isn't transparent to me.

(True.)

(I don't understand the subject/agent of "establish". An ancient reader or us? Besides, sources weren't necessary for veracity in ancient times, just belief.)

This doesn't seem to follow from what came before it.


spin

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JW:
There are far more problems in the Genealogies than is commonly discussed in Polemics. Here is a sampling of "difficulties" based on either the quantity of manuscripts or quality. Keep in mind that there are exponentially more variations if you consider the differences in ALL manuscripts:


Matthew 1: (KJV)
"4 And Aram begat Aminadab"

According to I Chronicles 2:10 it was Ram that begat Aminadab, not Aram. The earliest extant Greek manuscripts have the Greek equivalent of the English "Aram" for Matthew 1:4. (so presumably the KJV is correctly translating Matthew's error). The NIV has changed "Aram" to "Ram" correcting Matthew's error. The LXX states that Aram begat Aminadab so it's likely that Matthew made his error by simply copying from the LXX as he apparently was not fluent in Hebrew and so could not check the original Hebrew language. Some Bible scholars do theorize that the LXX was changed in some places to conform to the Gospels and that this is one of those instances. In any case Matthew's apparent use of "Aram" does not agree with any known Hebrew
text and in the absence of any evidence that the Hebrew use of "Ram" was the result of any change would be an error by Matthew.


Matthew 1: (KJV)
"5 And Salmon begat Booz of Rachab"

The only Rachab mentioned in the Tanakh was the Rachab of the
Conquest who lived about two hundred years before Boaz. Every
significant Church Father who commented on Matthew 1:5 assumed that Matthew was referring to the Rachab of the Conquest.


Matthew 1: (KJV)
"7Abia begat Asa; :8 And Asa begat Josaphat"

Generally, the oldest extant Greek manuscripts such as the Sinaitic and Vatican codices have the Greek equivalent of the English "Asaph" instead of "Asa" who according to the Tanakh should be in this location. The NASB has a footnote for Matthew 1:7 indicating that the Greek word was the equivalent of the English "Asaph". Most of the older Greek manuscripts indicating "Asaph" were unknown to the translators of the KJV.


Matthew 1: (KJV)
"8 Joram begat Ozias"

According to I Chronicles 3:11 (JPS), Joram begat Ahaziah so Matthew has omitted Ahaziah from his genealogy.


Matthew 1: (KJV)
"8 Joram begat Ozias"

According to I Chronicles 3:11 (JPS), Joram begat Ahaziah who begat Joash so Matthew has also omitted Joash from his genealogy.


Matthew 1: (KJV)
"8 Joram begat Ozias"

According to I Chronicles 3:11 (JPS), Joram begat Ahaziah who begat Joash who begat Amaziah so Matthew has also omitted Amaziah from his genealogy.


Matthew 1: (KJV)
"10 Manasses begat Amon; and Amon begat Josias"

Generally, the oldest extant Greek manuscripts such as the Sinaitic and Vatican codices have the Greek equivalent of the English "Amos" instead of "Amon" who according to the Tanakh should be in this location. The NASB has a footnote for Matthew 1:10 indicating that the Greek word was the equivalent of the English "Amos". Most of the older Greek manuscripts indicating "Amos" were unknown to the translators of the KJV.


Matthew 1: (KJV)
"11 And Josias begat Jechonias and his brethren, about the time they were carried away to Babylon:"

According to I Chronicles 3:15 (JPS), Josiah (Josias in KJV) begat
Jehoiakim who begat Jeconiah (Jechonias in KJV) so Matthew has
omitted Jehoiakim from his genealogy.


Matthew 1: (KJV)
"11 And Josias begat Jechonias and his brethren, about the time they were carried away to Babylon:"

According to the Tanakh Jechonias only had one brother.


Matthew 1: (KJV)
"13 And Zorobabel begat Abiud; and Abiud begat Eliakim"

According to the Tanakh (JPS), I Chronicles, 3:19-20, Abiud was not one of the eight children of Zerubbabel ("Zorobabel" in KJV).


Matthew 1: (KJV)
"17 So all the generations from Abraham to David are fourteen
generations; and from David until the carrying away into Babylon are fourteen generations"

Matthew has omitted four generations from his genealogy between David and the Babylonian exile. Even without them he still has fifteen chronological names.


Matthew 1: (KJV)
"17 and from the carrying away into Babylon unto Christ are fourteen generations."

Almost 600 years separate the birth of Shealtiel from the birth of
Jesus resulting in an average of 46 years per generation. This
average is contradicted by all known averages for this period outside of Matthew. Luke's average would be 27 years and Josephus' average would be 25 years.


Luke 3: (KJV)
23 "And Jesus himself began to be about thirty years of age, being (as was supposed) the son of Joseph, which was the son of Heli,"

Compare to Matthew 1: (KJV)
16 "And Jacob begat Joseph the husband of Mary, of whom was born Jesus, who is called Christ."

The father of Joseph (not sure what the correct term is for the
father of the husband of the wife who virgin birthed you as I don't believe that Amy Vanderbilt ever addresses this issue) according to "Luke" is Heli and according to "Matthew" is Jacob. Just going by names "Matthew" seems to have picked names based on their significance and order in the Tanakh. Jacob was the father of Joseph who had Egyptian children and "Jesus" is remarkably similar in sound to the Egyptian "Iusa" which means "the ever coming one". Of course this is just rampant speculation on my part.


Luke 3: (KJV)
27 "Which was the son of Joanna, which was the son of Rhesa, which was the son of Zorobabel, which was the son of Salathiel,"

Luke has 20 generations from Zerubbabel to Jesus (it goes without saying that some of these generations are missing in some manuscripts) while Matthew has 11. As mentioned previously, for the time period covered Luke's number of generations is more plausible. Most of the names Luke lists for this period are unknown outside of Luke. Where Luke got them, God knows.


Luke 3: (KJV)
27 "Which was the son of Joanna, which was the son of Rhesa, which was the son of Zorobabel, which was the son of Salathiel, which was the son of Neri,"

Compare to Matthew 1: (KJV)
12 "And after they were brought to Babylon, Jechonias begat
Salathiel; and Salathiel begat Zorobabel;"

According to Luke Neri was the father of Salathiel while according to Matthew and the Masoretic text Jeconiah was the father of Salathiel.


Luke 3: (KJV)
31 "Which was the son of Melea, which was the son of Menan, which was the son of Mattatha, which was the son of Nathan, which was the son of David,"

Compare to Matthew 1: (KJV)
6 "And Jesse begat David the king; and David the king begat Solomon of her that had been the wife of Urias;"

According to Luke Jesus was descended through Nathan while according to Matthew Jesus was descended through Solomon.


Luke 3: (KJV)
32 "Which was the son of Jesse, which was the son of Obed, which was the son of Booz, which was the son of Salmon, which was the son of Naasson,"

The earliest extant manuscripts have "Sala" which is different
than "Salmon" from the Tanakh. A majority of modern Christian
translations have mistranslated "Sala" as "Salmon" to make it agree to the name from the Tanakh.


Luke 3: (KJV)
33 "Which was the son of Aminadab"

The earliest extant manuscripts lack Aminadab and there is tremendous variation in names at this point in manuscripts indicating a likely omission in the original.


Luke 3: (KJV)
33 "Which was the son of Aminadab, which was the son of Aram, which was the son of Esrom"

The textual evidence is that "Aram" above should be "Arni"
so "Matthew" has "Aram" as the son of Hezron (Esrom) and "Luke" has "Arni". Aram by any other name.


Luke 3: (KJV)
37 "Which was the son of Cainan, which was the son of Arphaxad"

There is no "Cainan" in the related genealogy of either the Masoretic text or Josephus' listing. "Cainan" is in most Greek (Christian) translations of the Tanakh but Augustine is the first Church Father to mention the name so it's likely that "Cainan" was added to Greek translations because it was in "Luke".

If I was a nitpicking type of guy I'd list a lot more problems of a
more subtle nature.



Joseph

BIRTH, n.
The first and direst of all disasters. As to the nature of it there
appears to be no uniformity. Castor and Pollux were born from the egg. Pallas came out of a skull. Galatea was once a block of stone. Peresilis, who wrote in the tenth century, avers that he grew up out of the ground where a priest had spilled holy water. It is known that Arimaxus was derived from a hole in the earth, made by a stroke of lightning. Leucomedon was the son of a cavern in Mount Aetna, and I have myself seen a man come out of a wine cellar.

http://www.errancywiki.com/index.php/Main_Page

Chili

The intricate weave of the genealogies is like a jewel in the Watchmaker argument and suggests to me that only one author wrote all four Gospels.

gstafleu

1) We know Jesus (at least as presented in the gospels) was a fictional character.
2) We know that Christianity started out not monolithically but as a number of strands.

Isn't the most parsimonious explanation then that we have here two genealogies from two different traditions? Why would we even expect them to be the same?

Gerard

PhilosopherJay

Hi Spin,

I'm sorry that I lack the time to provide a fuller account with more evidence. I shall try to do so in the future. At the moment, having no time to look at my notes, I can only come up with this off the top of my head.

The terms "begat" and "son of" as used in the two genealogies are not simply different, they are grammatical binary opposites -- to begat a son is the opposite of being the son:

1) Nathan begat a son that is me

2) I am the son that Nathan begat.

The sentences are mirror images of each other with the term "son" replacing "begat" as the middle connecting term between I/me and Nathan began.

Transformation of stories in ancient cultures through binary opposites was demonstrated by Claude Levi Strauss more than 50 years. When we find two structures proporting to be the same thing (in this case -- the geneology of Jesus Christ) and an important element is a binary opposite of the other, creating practically a mirror image of the other, we can be reasonbly certain that the creator of one narrative had to be looking at the other in order to create the mirror image.

Additionally, note that such geneology lists with such a straightforward structure and of such length simply do not exist in the Old Testament. While many geneologies do exist, they all give additional information about various members of different generations and most of them are much shorter. We should also note that the lists match up in names in two sections. If derived from two separate traditions, we would expect one break that does not show a heritage separating and then coming together again. If I believe Marvin married donna and you believe Marvin married debbie then all the children and generations afterward should not match up.


Besides the 1) binary opposite begat-son structure, the 2) straight-forwardness of the structure of the two narratives in opposition to all such narratives in the Old Testament, 3) the length of the two narratives in opposition to the length of such narratives in the Old Testament, and the 4) inclusion of two separate sections of overlaps on the list all point towards one author consciously redoing the work of the other. Additionally, The Luke list 5) adds to the prestige of Jesus by showing him as of international origin, directly descended from God, instead of just descended from the Jewish patriarch. We may take this as a critique of the Matthew list by the Luke writer and as a reason for the Luke list writer redoing the Matthew list.

While none of these propositions taken individually prove that the Luke writer copied and expanded the Matthew list, taken all togther, they form a stronger case that the texts are related in just such a way as opposed to being independent.

As far as the need for citing sources, practically any educated man by the First and Second century would have realized that if you didn't cite sources, you might be accused of making things up. However, if one was simply telling a tale for entertainment purposes, no sources were necessary.

Warmly,

Jay Raskin

spin

Is there any other way for one genealogy to go backwards and the other forwards?

(Incidentally the word "son" is generally not in the Lucan genealogy. A simple genitive is used.)

You're pulling my leg right? Given that they can't be of such length, seeing as the time of Jesus is supposed to be 600 years after that of Shealtiel, you wouldn't expect them to be. This doesn't stop long genealogies such as that of the Davidic line or the Aaronic line in Chronicles.

Do check out the genealogies of Aaron in 1 Chr 6 and of Solomon in 1 Chr 3.

Not apparently meaningful.

Not accurate.

Also not accurate.

The construction of genealogies in those times was one of evolution. You can trace the genealogy of the high priestly line through several incarnations that develop differently: just compare the genealogy of Ezra in 2 Esdras 1:2-3 with 1 Chr 6:3-15 and the partial genealogy in Josephus AJ 10.8.6. Genealogies were popular and obviously not stable. It would be unreasonable to assume that one of the genealogies in the gospels was necessarily dependent on the other.

Why may we take it as you describe?

Much of what you have outlined seems untenable to me, so the sum total would be the opposite of a strong case in my understanding.

Lots of material in Josephus is unsourced as well as lots of stuff in Pliny the Elder. What would ever make you think that a genealogy needed sources? Have you ever seen one in the bible or para-biblical literature that had sources provided?


spin

graymouser

What is surprising to me about the genealogies is that they weren't harmonized; they're early in the Gospels and the disagreements are somewhat bold. What do the textual critics say this means for the transmission and development of these two Gospels?

spin

I think it shows that each of these gospels had a sufficient community behind them for them for sufficient time to maintain their individuality. (There's lots of willing contradictions preserved in the Hebrew bible.)


spin

PhilosopherJay

Hi Spin,

You don't seem to have understood my arguments as you are not responding to them. For example, asking if there is any way that two genealogies can be constructed besides as binary opposites with one going forward and the other backwards is quite absurd. You must know that genealogies are rarely constructed father to son to son to son or son to father to father to father. Most genealogies describe many other family relationships, including brothers, sisters, uncles and aunts.

When I get a chance I will make my arguments clearer to you. I hope other members have understood it.Thanks.

Warmly,

Philosopher Jay

judge

The only solution that can possibly make any sense at all is the greek version of matthew contains a translation shortcoming.

The Aramaic seems to make more sense in that it differentiates between the Joseph in Matthew 1:16 and the Joseph in Matthew 1:19

The use of ORBG in classical and contemporary Aramaic thought