Layman

As usual Vork, you simply rehash a bunch of conclusory allegations. But you make my point quite well. Even James, who is referred to in noninterpolations by Paul twice, and by Jospehus as the brother of Jesus, then I doubt very much that references to Jesus' cousins or to Jude are going to accomplish much.

Toto

This doesn't make sense. James by himself could be the biological brother of Jesus or have a title of Brother of the Lord, so there is really no better attestation for James as a brother. But a whole host of blood relatives are harder to explain away. You don't usually hold back on a stronger argument when a weaker one is criticized.

I hadn't thought about John the Baptizer being turned into Jesus' cousin, but I don't see any evidence that Joses started out as an enemy.

Geoff Hudson

From X-Talk:

Perhaps the genealogy one should use for John the prophet (who I think could well have been Rechabite, despite his father Zechariah being described as a priest) is that in Mat.1. In Matthew 1:5, Booz had a mother Rachab (not Rahab). If Rachab was Rechabite, then the Rechabite line is grafted into the genealogy before the birth of David.

In Mt.1:16, Jacob would be the father of Zechariah, the husband of Elizabeth, of whom was born John, who is called THE prophet.

But I think the main reason the Rechabites had an interest in David was because they saw him as the last prophet of the Spirit before the temple was built by his son Solomon.

Somewhere in Josephus, I recall the "Samaritans" want to wear priests clothes. I think the problems the establishment priesthood had with the "Samaritans" were problems with Rechabites. An editor has changed Rechabites to Samaritans. Somewhere in Josephus, "Samaritans" are said to throw human bodies around in the temple - more likely they were animals bodies because the Rechabites rejected animal sacrifices as a means to achieve purity of the spirit.

Geoff

Clarice O'C

Hi All,

I dusted off a book, 1874, to see what old scholarship had to say about the Matthew geneaology. It is F.W. Farrar's _The Life of Christ_.

Farrar says that:

"It is now almost certain that the genealogies in both Gospels are genealogies of Joseph, which, if we may rely on early traditions of their consanguinity, 'involve' genealogies of Mary also. The Davidic descent of Mary is implied in Acts ii. 30; xiii. 23; Rom. i. 3; Luke i. 32, &c. St. Matthew gives the legal descent of Joseph, through the elder and regal line, as heir to the throne of David; St. Luke gives the natural descent," footnote 1, pp. 9-10, Volume I.

Is anyone in scholarship saying this today? Does it hold water? If not, why not?

Best,
Clarice

Toto

Does anyone in scholarship treat those genealogies of Jesus as anything other than an embarrassment?

Bernard Muller

This is a reply from one of my reader. I answered, that in order to work, and because it is hyphosesis stacked above each others, each one having a small chance to have happened, the overall result is quasi null.
This is what apologists are providing in case like that, just an extremely small possibility that an apparent conflict is not. And it is accepted!
Here is the e-mail I got:
"I just want to share with you something I read about the genealogy of Jesus, since the gospels of Matthew and Luke give different versions. I read this from The Daily Study Bible, the Gospel of Luke, by William Barclay, and in it, Barclay writes:
"The problem of this(Luke's) genealogy is its relationship with Matt 1:1-17. the facts are these -- only Luke gives us the section from Adam to Abraham; the section from Abraham to David is the same in both; but the section from David to Joseph is almost completely different. Ever since men studied the New Testament they have tried to explain the differences.
(i) It is said that both genealogies are symbolic and that Matthew gives the ROYAL descent of Jesus and Luke the PRIESTLY descent.
(ii) One of the earliest suggestions was that Matthew in fact gives the genealogy of Joseph, and Luke of Mary.
(iii) The most ingenious explanation is as follows. In Matthew 1:16 Joseph's father is Jacob; in Luke 3:23 it is Heli. according to the Jewish law of levirate marriage (Deut 25:5f) if a man died childless his brother must, if free to do so, marry the widow and ensure the continuance of the line. When that happenend a son of such a marriage could be called the son of either the first or the second husband. It is suggested that Joseph's mother married twice. Joseph was in actual fact the son of Heli, the second husband, but he was in the eyes of the law the son of Jacob, the first husband who had died. It is then suggested that while Heli and Jacob had the same mother they had different fathers and that Jacob's father was descended from David through Solomon and Heli's father was descended from David through Nathan. This ingenious theory would mean that both genealogies are correct. In fact, all we can say is that we do not know."
And since Barclay only suggests these theories, and ends with "we do not know", his suggestions on the differences of the genealogies are still open to much debate and discussion."
GOT IT!
Best Regards, Bernard

Geoff Hudson

This is not a direct response, but is related to the genealogy in Mat.1 which I think lends itself to a record of the Spirit in people through history - there are simpler such records in Acts and Hebrews.

[ ] Read out
{ } Read in

Chapter 1

A RECORD OF THE SPIRIT OF GOD

(1)A record of the…

[genealogy of Jesus Christ]

{Spirit of God}, the [son] {spirit} of David, the [son] {spirit} of Abraham:

(2){The spirit of} Abraham was the [father] {spirit} of Isaac,
{the spirit of} Isaac was the [father] {spirit} of Jacob,
{the spirit of} Jacob was the [father] {spirit} of Judah and his brothers
(3){the spirit of} Judah was the [father] {spirit} of Perez and Zerah, whose mother was Tamar
{the spirit of} Perez was the [father] {spirit} of Hezron
{the spirit of} Hezron was the [father] {spirit} of Ram
(4){the spirit of} Ram was the [father] {spirit} of Amminadab
{the spirit of} Amminadab was the [father] {spirit} of Nashon
{the spirit of} Nashon was the [father] {spirit} of Salmon
(5){the spirit of} Salmon was the [father] {spirit} of Boaz
whose mother was Rachab,
{the spirit of} Boaz was the [father] {spirit} of Obed
{the spirit of} Obed was the [father] {spirit} of Jesse
(6)and {the spirit of} Jesse was the [father] {spirit} of King David,

Note:
v.(1)David was hardly THE son of Abraham.

Geoff