Loading...Another bit drawn mainly from my undergraduate textbook, but of relevance to my current thread on the birth narratives of Jesus.
There is one other interesting and frequently-noted feature of Matthew’s genealogy of Jesus (actually, not of Jesus, but of Joseph). That is the fact that it makes explicit reference to women among Jesus’ ancestors. That is highly unusual. Women scarcely ever appear in most ancient Israelite and Jewish genealogies;, which invariably trace a person’s lineage from father to son (or vice versa) all the way back through the family line; see, as I pointed out earlier 1 Chronicles 1-9. Where are the women? For ancient genealogists, as a rule, they were not important enough to mention.
But Matthew not only ends his genealogy by mentioning Mary, Jesus’ mother, but he also includes reference to four other women: Tamar (v. 3), Rahab (v. 5), Ruth (v. 5), and the “wife of Uriah” that is, Bathsheba (v. 6). Stories about all four of these women are found in the Jewish Scriptures (Tamar: Genesis 38; Rahab: Joshua2, 6; Ruth; Ruth 1-4; and Bathsheba: 2 Samuel 11-12).
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Dear Professor Ehrman,
Thanks for the master peace, you really make things look so easy, it’s like you memorise the whole book, actually all the books, mind!
Anyway here’s my wee bit..
Dr James Tabor of Charlotte in the University of North Carolina has taken the second suggestion a bit further, in the Jesus Dynasty, and in a documentary by Dr Robert Beckford of Canterbury Christ Church University.
I won’t go through the details here as I am sure you know the suggestion doctor, but I will dare to ask your opinion of how Dr Tabor views it.
thanks
Actually, I haven’t read Tabor’s treatment; but I’d be happy to respond if you want to summarize it for us.
Hi Bart, apologies if you’ve covered this before but do you think there is any historical basis in a controversy over Jesus’ paternity which the gospels potentially allude to?
I wish we knew! Some scholars have thought that the virgin birth story started out as a Christian response to the opponents of Jesus (after his death?) pointing out that he was born out of wedlock; the Christians — in this theory — responded that it was indeed an unusual birth, and that Mary and Joseph had indeed only been betrothed, not married, but it was the Holy Spirit that made her pregnant, not Joseph. Once that view was floated, Christians found support in Scripture, Isaiah 7:14. Anyway, that’s the theory. Not sure what I think of it.
Do you think the virgin story arose and later developed in the ways it did because some Christians were reading certain things in the Hebrew Scriptures (Isaiah 7:14, Micah 5:2, Hosea 11:1, Jeremiah 31.15, etc.) and then applying them to Jesus/interpreting them messianically; or that the virgin story arose independent of what some Hebrew scriptures said and then later some Christians defended their claims about the virgin birth finding justification of their prior views in the Hebrew scriptures. In other words, did they likely first come to believe what they did because of Hebrew Scriptures or the believed it and then later sought to find justification for that belief in the OT. I ask because it confuses me how something that didn’t happen historically (virgin birth) came to be believed based on Isaiah 7:14, Micah 5:2, Hosea 11:1, Jeremiah 31.15, etc. alone.
Here’s what I said in response to a similar question, 23 seconds ago:
Some scholars have thought that the virgin birth story started out as a Christian response to the opponents of Jesus (after his death?) pointing out that he was born out of wedlock; the Christians — in this theory — responded that it was indeed an unusual birth, and that Mary and Joseph had indeed only been betrothed, not married, but it was the Holy Spirit that made her pregnant, not Joseph. Once that view was floated, Christians found support in Scripture, Isaiah 7:14. Anyway, that’s the theory. Not sure what I think of it.
I was so scared of misquoting Dr Tabor I kept saying ‘I think’ so many times, but I am so sure that’s what he thought, anyway, here’s are excerpts from Dr Tabor’s book: (The Jesus Dynasty)
The birth of Jesus:
“[The gospel of] Matthew implies that Isaiah’ s prophecy was ‘fulfilled’ by the miraculous virgin birth of Jesus—but the original text clearly carries no such meaning.” (p. 46)
“The assumption of the historian is that all human beings have both a biological mother and father, and that Jesus is no exception. That leaves two possibilities—either Joseph or some other unnamed man was the father of Jesus.” (p. 59)
and this is from his own website:
http://jamestabor.com/2012/07/12/pantera-as-the-unnamed-father-of-jesus/
Here’s his own words:
What I attempted to do was to offer a survey of the historical possibilities, so far as they have come down to us. You can read a summary of my overview, “An Unnamed Father of Jesus,” here. Clearly, the possibility of Mary becoming pregnant “out of wedlock,” and moreover, by the mysterious “Panthera,” which some sources report was a Roman soldier, can be taken as a slanderous charge that she was either raped or guilty of sexual immorality. I address that issue in my post, “Joining the Slanderers,” here, where I argue that if Joseph is not the father of Jesus we simply do not know the circumstances involved in the pregnancy and should reserve judgment
I really was so scared, thanks for putting up with me doctor.
Yes, basically Tabor is laying out the view I alluded to earlier as being held by some, that Mary became pregnant out of wedlock; later detractors from Jesus attacked him for his dubious parentage; Christians countered by saying that it was all hihgly unusual, but for a different reason, God had made her pregnant. That led ot the idea that she was a PARTHENOS (virgin) who had given birth to a divine being. And later the opponents of Christians twisted to say that she was made pregnant by PANTHEROS (the words look similar), who was taken to be a Roman soldier. Tabor, as a historian, thinks this is more likely than a virgin birth, since, well, virgin births don’t happen, historically!
In approximately 25 years of listening to evangelical preaching, I never heard the view that Ruth seduced Boaz, which is obviously not something evangelicals tend to approve of. 1 Samuel 24:3 mentions Saul going into a cave to ‘cover his feet’ which I suppose is a euphemism for relieving himself. Is that at all related to Ruth uncovering Baoz’s feet? Are there any other biblical examples which shed light on or confirm this interpretation?
Another one is Isaiah 6: the seraphim have two wings that cover their faces two that cover their “feet” and with two they fly. “Feet” here is almost certainly a euphemism for “genitals”. They cannot look upon the holy and they cannot expose their nakedness in his presence.
So what would a foot washing mean???
Sorry, I’m not sure what you’re asking.
In reference to the gentils / feet connection.
lol
The theory that Matthew wanted to ‘soften the blow’ by indicating that Jesus’ mother wasn’t the first in the lineage of David of having ‘non-traditional sexual relationships’ has a lot going for it, imo.
Here’s my 2 cents on why the women are included:
I believe that women are mentioned because this genealogy is for Mary, not Joseph. I think Matthew is trying to show that God can use women to bring about His great plans. There seems to be an error in translation where it says Jospeh the “husband” of Mary. It should read, “guardian or “father.” This is a different Joseph than Mary’s husband; it’s her father. Besides we already know from Luke that the father of Joseph (Mary’s husband) is Jacob not Heli. Understanding the word as “guardian” or “father” then makes the last set of generations add up to the correct 14, not the erroneous 13 generations resulting from the “husband” interpretation. It always bugged me that the generations did not add up and that Joseph appeared to have 2 totally different genealogies (this one and Luke’s), so I researched it. It wasn’t easy to find though.
Here is the way that Mary’s portion of the genealogy reads in the Aramaic-English vs Greek-English translation:
“Yaqob begot Yoseph the guardian of Maryam, her from whom was
begotten Yeshua, who is called The Messiah.”
http://wisdomintorah.com/wp-content/uploads/ebooks/english/Peshittant.pdf
Here is a detailed explanation of the mistranslation and correction:
http://www.peshitta.org/bethgazza/Gabra.htm
Pls delete the above comment. Thanks.
sorry, I”m not sure which one you wanted deleted!
Regarding Ruth, I don’t believe she uncovered Boaz’s private parts. Check out the following excerpt from this link providing a good explanation:
http://www.torahclass.com/old-testament-studies/51-old-testament-studies-ruth/707-lesson6-ruth-3
Ruth stole in quietly so as not to disturb his sleep, uncovered his feet, and lay down next to him. Sometime later, in the middle of the night, something awakened Boaz and he was startled to find a person lying next to him. It was dark, he was drowsy, and so blurts out, “who is there?!” Ruth responds that it is she, and would he spread his robe over her BECAUSE he is her go’el.
Wow there’s a lot going on here, so let’s take it step by step. The most controversial aspect of this section is the part of Ruth “uncovering his feet”. The controversy is that “feet” is often used as a Biblical idiom that is referring to genitals. “Covering one’s feet” is also at times used to describe going to the bathroom. Thus some scholars (primarily those who specialize in literary criticism techniques) believe that what Ruth did was to expose Boaz’s genitals as an expression of her desire for him to marry her. And that maybe this was some heretofore-unknown engagement practice in that era. In fact that line of thought has become a rather popular recent interpretation of the scene, but more level headed scholars (gentile and Jew) make it clear that there are too many problems associated with this approach to make this what was going on.
Let’s first dispel this new view that Ruth committed a very sexually provocative act upon the slumbering Boaz. The Hebrew word that is usually rendered “feet” in the book of Ruth is margeloth. In the entire Bible it is only used in 3 places here in Ruth and once more in Daniel 10, and there it means legs and not feet.Margeloth refers to a larger region of the body than merely feet. In fact some scholars think that it basically means everything from the hips down (that is, the legs and feet, the entire of the extremities that starts at the hip). The usual Hebrew word for foot or feet throughout the Old Testament is regel. And indeed we DO find the word regel used in the idioms that definitely refer to the genitals. Nowhere in the whole of the Bible do we find margeloth used that way; and thus it is almost certainly inaccurate to translate margeloth to be “feet” here in Ruth; rather it should be translated as legs.
Thus we have Ruth uncovering Boaz’s legs (not his feet) and her lying there next to him as instructed by her mother in law, and nothing more. However that there are sexual overtones to all this is hard to dispute; the issue is the degree. Certainly what man would go to bed alone, only to be startled awake by a lovely young woman lying next to him, and not be a little excited by the situation? If you’re an older man like Boaz and this young thing sneaks into your bed, crawls under your blanket and essentially proposes marriage, well, that’ll get your attention for sure. But it seems that the author of this story intends it to be this way; after all, Ruth is trying to entice Boaz to marry her and by all accounts she is quite beautiful not only in character but in appearance. So what could be more normal than for her to make use of these natural gifts in a way that interests men?
Let’s also dispel this thought of aggressive sexual action taken by Ruth upon Boaz as he sleeps by our recalling the context and history of the Ruth narrative. Ruth and Boaz have shown themselves to be exemplary people; devout, faithful to Yehoveh, righteous and upright. Boaz has raved about how well known Ruth’s high character is among the residents of Beit-Lechem, and Boaz has been shown to be a kind man with only noble motives and intentions in all he does. Except within the institution of marriage, for a woman to look upon an exposed man could bring her a terrible punishment (recall the instance in the Torah of a wife who helped her husband in a fight by grabbing the genitals of her husband’s opponent; it resulted in her hand being cut off). For Ruth to uncover a man’s private parts would be nothing less than prostitution. So to accuse Ruth and Boaz of engaging in sexual activities that are strictly forbidden by the Laws of Moses would be completely inconsistent with all we have learned about them, and counter to the entire purpose and nature of the story.
Dr Ehrman,
I know I’m a late comer here, but hopefully my question can be answered.
Is it possible that Mary was found to be sexually unfaithful and that, by making note of these other sexually unfaithful women of the royal lineage, Matthew is saving Jesus from banishment to the claim of the Messianic lineage? This would answer why all the women he listed were involved in some kind of sexual “sin” of one kind or another.
Yes, in fact this is a widespread view among scholars! And I’m inclined to think something similar myself — but not that it has to do with “unfaithfulness” as with “sexual impropriety” (Most of these women were not cheating on their spouses!)
So why include a virgin birth story? Isn’t it redundant, and perhaps contradictory, to defend Mary’s sexual misconduct by noting other women of the royal lineage committed similar acts and then go on to say “Well, but she was a virgin after all”?
And where do you think Joseph fits in all of this? It was always interesting to me how Mark 6.3 called Jesus “son of Mary”, implying that his father was unknown.
I know I’m asking a lot so, if you prefer, a book recommendation or future post would be just as appreciated. Or, if you have the time to response here, I’d love to read your thoughts.
I think the idea is that Mary was accused of having sex before marriage with Joseph; the genealogy shows that other women with sexual slurs against them were instrumental in carrying out God’s purposes. Mark is interesting for the reason you mention — given the fact that it has no birth narrative.
Parallel to the inclusion of 4 “scandalous” women: I’ve always found it interesting that Jesus is said to be the descendant of (almost) all of the kings of Judah, nearly all of whom (the exceptions being Hezekiah and Josiah) “did not do what was right in the eyes of the Lord his God.” So Jesus is a descendant of royalty but, sad to say, mostly of not-so-great kings.
It comes with being in the Davidic line….