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Loading...Yesterday I was asked about the use of the Jewish interpretive procedure called gematria (the interpretation of words by the numerical value of their letters), and its use in the NT. In that post, I explained how it worked. Now I want to explain how it gets used in the NT. As it turns out, it appears at the very outset (implicitly) in the first book of the NT, the Gospel of Matthew, and at the very end (implicitly) in the final book Revelation. The latter will be familiar to many of you: 666! But the former? It’s a bit trickier.
And to explain it I need to provide some background on the genealogy in Matthew’s Gospel in general. In my next post I’ll talk about the possible use of gematria. Here’s what I’ve said about it before:
A reader who first comes to the New Testament, and so begins at the beginning, with Matthew chapter 1, first finds him/herself confronted with a genealogy. This may not seem like an auspicious beginning, but the genealogy is highly significant for understanding Matthew’s Gospel since this genealogy is meant to emphasize Jesus’ “credentials” precisely as the messiah. And so v. 1 indicates that Jesus was “the son of David, the son of Abraham.” (“son of” in this context obviously means: “descended from”). And why highlight his relationship to David and Abraham in particular, before giving the details in the genealogy? It is because Matthew’s ancient readers would realize full well that Abraham was “the father of the Jews,” and David was the greatest king in the history of Israel, whose descendant was to resume his rule, enthroned in Jerusalem, reigning over a sovereign state of Israel as God’s anointed. This son of David would be descended from the Jewish greats and would, in fact, be the messiah. Thus Matthew begins his Gospel by indicating that Jesus was a Jew (from Abraham) in the line of the ancient kings (from David).
This emphasis on Jesus’ Jewishness and his royal family lineage is confirmed by what follows, in the genealogy that traces his family line all the way back to the father of the Jews, Abraham himself. The genealogy is patterned consistently, almost monotonously, tracing fathers and sons first from Abraham (v. 2) to King David (v. 6), then from David to the deportation to Babylon (v. 12), and then from the deportation to Jacob (the father of Joseph, v. 16).
At this point, however, as I have pointed out in previous posts, the author runs into a dilemma: it turns out that the genealogy is …
The matter starts getting curiouser and curiouser. Want to learn more? Join the blog. Or forever wonder…
Would gematria be numerology, inferring meaning from numbers, or gnosticism, finding meaning that’s not obvious, or both?
It would be a particualr kind of numerology. Gnosticism is a term used to refer to a set of religions, not to a mode of interpretation.
So did Matthew not think that someone would not catch this genealogical manipulation? This is like comparing Mark 11:12 – 26 with Matthew 21:18-22. It is clear that Matthew tried to make the cursing of the fig tree look more miraculous since Mark’s version could be explained by Peter misidentifying the fig tree on the second trip to Jerusalem. Do you think that it is because of illiteracy and willingness of people to believe anything that Matthew would try something that seems so blatantly dishonest to me knowing that he is unlikely to get caught?
I really don’t know. It does seem like he would have noticed that he dropped out some names to get to 14-14-14. Then again, he clearly did *not* notice that the last group of 14 was only 13. So I’m not sure what he was noticing. It’s possible the author of Matthew picked up the genealogy from someone else who didn’t notice either, or was dishonest, or … or something else.
Matthew or one of the early copyists. Are there any manuscripts where they have “fixed” this?
Nope!
Is there any chance this is another of those Septuagint different from Hebrew situations? Do the Kings and Chronicles references work in the Septuagint but not in Hebrew, so early Christians using the Greek translation get one meaning, and we modern’s using a Hebrew translation get another?
The dropped names? No, I”m afraid not.
Perplexing indeed, to start the Gospel with a genealogy of Joseph, not the father of Jesus.
Is it possible that Matthew is here trying to use two sources that said two different things?
Someone believed that Jesus was the son of God. Someone else believed he was the son of Joseph, who was the son of the son of … of the son of David.
Two completely different theories, but Matthew wanted both!
Interesting idea. It’s possible, yes. You would have thought he’d see the problem, but maybe not….
Did the Messiah have to be a descendant of David? I know the Jews expected a descendant of David to return to the throne, but is that necessarily the Messiah himself? I’m curious what Mark thought: he says nothing about Jesus’ ancestry but has blind Bartimaeus call him “son of David.” Yet in Mark 12:35-27 Jesus seems to question their belief that the Messiah was to be a son of David. I sometimes wonder if Jesus was defending the fact that he was not a descendant of David, but could still be the Messiah. Obviously later on disciples made him a descendant whether he was or not.
Yes, that Mark 12 passage is very tricky. Lots of opinions about it. One that I’ve always rather liked is that Jesus is not denying that the messiah is the Son of David but is asking his opponents how they can explain that he is that AND his Lord. Mark himself has an answer to that question, but it’s a stumper for the PHarisees, which is probably part of the point. In any event, there were certainly understandings of the messiah that were non-davidic, e.g. the priestly messiah at Qumran and the heavenly messiah in some apocalyptic texts.
Excellent post. I have learned more through this blog than I have all semester in some of my college courses!
I should charge tuition!!
Hi Bart can you explain to me the writings about the church fathers. What influences did had on the Bible? And we should view theirs writings?
The term “church fathers” refers to Christian writers from the centuries after the New Testament (other than those branded “heretics”). They had not influence on the bible itself since they were writing later. Their writings give us considerable insight into Christianity in later periods.
First, let me compliment you and those who worked so hard on the new design of the blog. It’s terrific and I especially appreciate the improved response time. I have two questions, one related to today’s post and one that isn’t. 1) Can the frequent appearance of certain numbers in the Old Testament, 40 for example, be explained by gematria? 2) We know that Luke used Mark, Q and L as sources for the Gospel of Luke. If Luke wasn’t a traveling companion of Paul, what did he use as his source for Acts?
1. Numbers like 40 (or 7, etc.) are significant in themselves; sometimes gematria can be used to show that a word is significant because it contains that number 2. Other written sources, no longer available. (The problem of course is that *most* written sources from the time are no longer available.
Christians often bring up Joseph’s supposed line, but when confronted with, “But you believe God is his father, right?”, then they bring up adoption. Or Mary’s line.
The tribal line however traces through the biological father only. Adoptions not included. And Mary the mother does not count for tribal line.
There are 40 male names exclusive of Christ in Matthew’s Geneology, 41 including Christ. Saint Augustine makes reference to this in his commentary:
“After having divided the whole into three periods of fourteen generations, he does not sum them all up and say, The sum of the whole is forty two; because one of those fathers, that is Jeconiah, is reckoned twice; so that they do not amount to forty-two, as three times fourteen does, but because one is reckoned twice over, there are only *forty one* generations. Matthew therefore, whose purpose was to draw out Christ’s kingly character, counts *forty* successions in the genealogy exclusive of Christ.” +Blessed Augustine
The numbers {40, 41} correspond to the Calendar Weeks from The Great Feast of The Annunciation to The Nativity (Birth) of Christ. If Annunciation occurs on a Friday or Saturday then there are 41 calendar weeks, else there are 40 calendar weeks.
There is a pattern in the Greek Holy Scriptures involving the number 40 and 41. This pattern *proves* the Divine Inspiration of The Holy Scriptures.
Three examples:
‘EGO EIMI’ (I AM) | New Testament | 40 Instances
bibleproofs.org/ia.html
‘PROSKUNEO’ (Worship) | New Testament | 40 Instances
bibleproofs.org/wr.html
‘ONOMA’ (Name) | {Matthew, Mark, Luke} | 40 Instances
bibleproofs.org/nm.a.html
Again, I suggest you consider textual variants. And not who is saying these things and about what. (Look at the EGO EIMI in John 9, e.g.)
Prof. Ehrman, thank you for your response.
You raised two points:
(a) For all patterns we are using the 1904 Patriarchal Text of The Holy Orthodox Church.
(b) You mentioned John 9 (the blind man). There are 6 cases of ‘ego eimi’ spoken by someone other than Christ. These exclusions are as follows:
Matthew 26:22, Matthew 26:25, Luke 1:19, John 9:9, Acts 10:21, Acts 26:29.
Note: The critical text has one additional case – Acts 22:3.
What we are interested in are the number of times the words ‘EGO EIMI’ is spoken by God, and these are as follows:
Three times in Matthew
Matthew 14:27, Matthew 22:32, Matthew 24:5
Three times in Mark
Mark 6:50, Mark 13:6, Mark 14:62
Three times in Luke
Luke 21:8, Luke 22:70, Luke 24:39
Twenty three times in John
John 4:26, John 6:20, John 6:35, John 6:41, John 6:48, John 6:51, John 8:12, John 8:18, John 8:24, John 8:28, John 8:58, John 10:7, John 10:9, John 10:11, John 10:14, John 11:25, John 13:19, John 14:6, John 15:1, John 15:5, John 18:5, John 18:6, John 18:8
Four times in Acts
Acts 9:5, Acts 18:10, Acts 22:8, Acts 26:15
Four times in Apocalypse
Revelation 1:8, Revelation 1:17, Revelation 2:23, Revelation 22:16
3 + 3 + 3 + 23 + 4 + 4 = 40 instances.
As you probably know, EGO EIMI is just a standard way in Greek to say who or what you are. I am a teacher. I am a runner. I am a bozo. It doesn’t carry any special significance, the vast majority of the time. Even when it stands alone, most of the time it must means “Yup, that’s me” — as in “Are you Prof. Ehrman?” “I am!”
@ “it doesn’t carry any special significance, the vast majority of the time”
Prof. Ehrman,
‘EGO EIMI’ in John 8:58 has Christological Significance relating to The NAME of God (Exodus 3:14 LXX) as you have stated (see also Revelation 1:8 ‘EGO EIMI ~ O ON’).
The connection between EGO EIMI and The Name of God occurs not only in John’s Gospel but in all Four Gospels; for example Mark 13:6: ‘My Name ~ EGO EIMI‘.
You admit that the number 40 is very significant in the Scriptures.
QUOTE: “Numbers like 40 (or 7, etc.) are significant in themselves”
QUESTION:
Do you see any special significance in the fact that there are exactly 40 times where the one speaking the words ‘EGO EIMI’ is Christ?
I have given you two other examples (there are many others!) of this pattern for consideration ‘PROSKUNEO’ (Worship), and ‘ONOMA’ (Name) in {Matthew, Mark, Luke}. All three examples have value 40.
You mentioned that there are textual variants in the Greek and I responded to this by specifying that we are looking at the Patriarchal Text of 1904 which is The New Testament Greek Text of The Holy Orthodox Church. Moreover the first two patterns hold even in the critical texts (if I’m not mistaken).
No, I don’t. Biblical scholars don’t pay a lot of credence to this kind of thign for lots of reasons. One involves the textual variants I mentioned earlier. Even bigger: the formation of the canon was a matter of a great deal of serendipity. Sojme of teh books could have gone one way or another. These kinds of amazing findings can be found in most books, if you actually look for them. (The Patriarchal Text of 1904 is not a good represenation of teh oldest form of the Greek texts of the NT)
Speaking of puzzling verses:
Romans 3:15 “Their feet are swift to shed blood”
How? Are we talking kicking?
It’s a poetic image. They are quick to rush into a situation where they can wound or kill someone.
Professor, are you aware of any evidence anywhere anyone caught and disclosed “Mathews” Joram jump to Uzziah cheat? Would the effect have been very discrediting? Like if Lincoln had said Four score and nine years ago, in 1863, he might not have been re-elected!
I don’t know of any discussions in antiquity off hand, but I wouldn’t be surprised if someone like Origen caught it.
I have read that matrilineal decent was or became important in Judaism. Is this idea in any way connected to the post?
It’s an interesting point. But it appears that is a strictly modern phenomenon, when it became important with the founding of the state of Israel to know who really could be considered a Jew. And since no one can know with complete certainty who their father was, they do know who their mother was. So that became the criterion — birth to a Jewish mother.
Are there actually cases of genealogies being kept (or invented) for other people in Judah for the centuries between David and the Exile? Or between the Exile and 4 BCE? That seems like at least a possibility for priestly and royal families (less likely for carpenters), but do we have any evidence of such name lists?
For David to the exile you have the genealogy recorded in 1 Chronicles 1-9, but there is zero way of knowing who came up with it. Certainly people didn’t keep their family trees! Did royalty? Maybe? But part from biblical genealogies, no, no evidence…
Very interesting! Thanks
Dr. Ehrman, First, love the new blog. VERY easy to navigate!
Next, as I understand it, while the idea of adoption is accepted and addressed in Hebrew teaching there is nowhere in the Hebrew bible that states that GENEALOGY/birthright is passed on in this fashion. Further, Matthew’s genealolgy references Jeconiah who was ‘cursed by God’. In the book of Jeremiah it’s clearly stated that Jeconiah’s line will NEVER sit upon the throne of Israel.
Is this perhaps why Luke’s genealogy is different?
I’m aware of the apologist argument for Luke’s genealogy tracing Mary’s line but, again, in Hebrew tradition genealogy is traced through the men to determine which tribe they are from and through women to determine if they are in fact Jewish. Seems as though the writers didn’t have all the information or were hoping that their readers wouldn’t.
Yes, that is one of the argument for why Luke would not trace it through Solomon’s line.
Dr. Ehrman, well done you.
Dear Dr. Ehrman,
Even though I’m aware of Bible contradictions, I discovered something where I hope you can help:
The Greek version of the name Jesus adds up to 888.
Now, I found the following:
https://menorah-bible.jimdofree.com/english/structure-of-the-bible/alphabets-and-numerical-values/
It shows that a bunch of terms from the Hebrew Bible add up to 888.
Some of these are surely contrived. But two combinations seem to be more striking:
The name “El Shaddai” combined with “I am that I am”.
And the term “God of Abraham, God of Isaac, God of Jacob” plus “Yahweh Elohim”.
Random terms might be a coincidence. But those names of God seem a bit more “definitive” to me. And they all appear in the scene where God first appears to Moses.
I know that Jesus’ actual name is Jeshua. But Christians would say that the connections are based on the name as revealed in the New Testament.
Also I know that the name Jesus is a generic name identical to Joshua. But Joshua isn’t claimed to be human God on Earth, so the Christians could still see the number connections between God and Jesus as justified.
I consider myself an atheist. But those discoveries leave an uneasy taste in my mouth.
Can we say with confidence that this is a mere coincidence?
Regards,
Denny
Yup, it’s flat-out amazing how many coincidences like this you can find. But when you stack them up against the coincidences you DON’T find, they begin to make better statistical sense….
Do you happen to have other examples of these kinds of coincidences?
Well, I wasn’t going to dive into it, but I guess I better. The coincidences you mentioned don’t actually occur. “ONOMA” for example, does not in fact occur 40 times in the NT; just in the first three Gospels it occurs over 70 times; PROSKUNEO doesn’t occur 40 times in the NT, but over 70, etc.
THe main reason this kind of number game doesn’t work, though, is because of textual variants in our manuscripts. Different manuscripts use different words in places, so that it is never possible to know how many times many words occur. Even on the basic level: how many times does the name “Jesus” occur? It depends which manuscript you’re reading.
Are you sure we’re talking about the same topic? In the link I posted, it’s not about how many times a certain word occurs, but what gematria value certain words have.
The strange thing I meant was the fact that the New Testament name of Jesus has the gematria value of 888.
And names of God from when he introduces himself to Moses (El Shaddai + I am that I am. God of Abraham, Isaac, Jaccob + Yahweh Elohim) also add up to 888.
Ah sorry — I started answering *that* question and then for some reason thought you were really asking something else. But yes, that kind of coincidence happens ALL the time. Read soem rabbinic interpretations of the Hebrew Bible: it’s a amazing what one can do. But even with the NT: the word for Amen = 801; so does Alpha and Omega. Amen goes to God who is the alpha and the omega. It is also the number of pneuma, Spirit. Gnostic authors claimed that the spirit that came into Christ at the baptism in Mark was the alpha and the omega, the divine essence from above that empowered him for ministry. And so forth and so on.