In James D. Tabor’s book The Jesus Dynasty, he writes about Jesus, John the Baptizer, and Mary being of royal lines – descendants from the lines of David and Levi. How is this calculated and/or understood? Is it a pater-lineal succession of first-born men, does it refer to ALL descendants (male I am assuming), does any of this have a historical record so that we can discover the exact birth lines … etc? If this is correct (what Tabor writes), then I would imagine that much would have been made of Jesus during his lifetime regarding this important linage, specially in apocalyptic times. But this was not the case. (It could also mean that there were at least hundreds who could also make a claim to this exalted status.)
I’ve never read anything by James Tabor, but I’ve heard of that book. The two genealogies of Jesus in the gospels don’t even agree with each other. Prof Ehrman has blogged about this topic on at least two occasions that I can think of, I’d suggest searching for those. Use the search function for the word “genealogy” and you’ll get several hits on the blog entries. I don’t think serious scholars pay this idea of the royal line any heed. It’s impossible to prove. Sure, you can trace the first few names after David from the OT, but when you get closer to Joseph (father of Jesus) there is no way to prove any of that patri-lineal list. Between Matthew and Luke’s genealogy they don’t even agree on the same names. Matthew screws up the number of generations back to David (so much for Biblical inerrancy). The whole idea of Jesus being of royal blood is almost certainly a legend created after the death of Jesus to lend his supposed Messiah-ness further credence.
In any event, read Prof Ehrman’s blog posts on Matthew and Luke’s genealogies. He pokes numerous holes in all of it.
gmatthews said
I’ve never read anything by James Tabor, but I’ve heard of that book. The two genealogies of Jesus in the gospels don’t even agree with each other. Prof Ehrman has blogged about this topic on at least two occasions that I can think of, I’d suggest searching for those. Use the search function for the word “genealogy” and you’ll get several hits on the blog entries. I don’t think serious scholars pay this idea of the royal line any heed. It’s impossible to prove. Sure, you can trace the first few names after David from the OT, but when you get closer to Joseph (father of Jesus) there is no way to prove any of that patri-lineal list. Between Matthew and Luke’s genealogy they don’t even agree on the same names. Matthew screws up the number of generations back to David (so much for Biblical inerrancy). The whole idea of Jesus being of royal blood is almost certainly a legend created after the death of Jesus to lend his supposed Messiah-ness further credence.In any event, read Prof Ehrman’s blog posts on Matthew and Luke’s genealogies. He pokes numerous holes in all of it.
I’ve read Tabor’s book and it’s pretty fanciful, approaching Dan Brown territory. I’m more fascinated by the hints of a tradition found in some of the early second century church fathers that Jesus’ biological family and their descendents were privileged in some way by the early church. Of course we know about Jesus’ brother James who suddenly springs up as the leader of the Jerusalem church even though the gospel traditions put a distance between Jesus and his family. Read ** you do not have permission to see this link ** wiki article and see the section on the so-called DESPOSYNI.
Such was my assumption as well, but we all know the dangers inherent in the word “assume.” My main concern is whether or not there was a conscious effort made during the time of Jesus to maintain clear and active records concerning lineage, and if so just how it was accomplished. IF record keeping of this type was done, then it provides an interesting light into what and how people might have thought about this. If NOT, then any suggestion of a “royal family” becomes baseless and, as you say, approaches Dan Brown territory. Concerning James as “suddenly springing up,” it would make some sense to me that as Christian Orthodoxy developed and the perspective of Paul took firm control, factors that could militate against it would most likely be marginalized and/or eliminated. The Ebionites, for example, would be simply cast aside as “heretics,” and any suggestion placing James as the head of the church or playing an important role during the ministry of Jesus would also be cast to the winds.
No, there was no record keeping of this sort. If you were Herod or the High Priest perhaps you were important enough for someone to care about your genealogy being in writing, but otherwise, no. Hardly anyone could read so what would be the point? Were their oral family histories? I’m sure there were, but they were no more or less accurate than oral histories today (Prof Ehrman has a new book on this topic coming out). But, Jesus was just a poor carpenter, why would there be any records of his family history?
On your other point about James and Paul, I don’t think Paul’s ideas would have been widely known or accepted until after James was killed. Paul’s letters were only written a decade or so before James was stoned and in Paul’s own lifetime he had to struggle against views that opposed him (2 Corinthians, Galatians) so his message was NOT orthodoxy (as if there was such a thing in the 1st century!) until long after (relatively speaking) the lifetime of James.
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