Read:
http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=matthew%201:1-17&version=31---
I remember this one time when I was probably about 10 years old, I was reading my Bible like a good little Sunday school student, and I read this passage. Not feeling very compelled or moved by the passage and I had to wonder, "Why in the world is this passage even here?" So, I asked my Sunday school teacher. Her answer, "I don't really know." She wasn't really much help. Well I've learned a thing or two since, only a thing or two, and both of those things I learned are about this very passage.
So, put your learning hats on and let us do some learning!
Alright class, the first thing we need to do is put ourselves into the shoes of a first century Jewish man or woman, your choice of course, and we need to see some stuff that the author is trying to tell us about Jesus.
First, and foremost Matthew is trying to tell us where Jesus came from and who Jesus is. By starting out Jesus' genealogy with Abraham, Matthew is telling the Jews he is writing to that Jesus is the fulfillment of a promise. Abraham was the father of the Jews (and the Muslims). The promise made to him is that he would have lots of decendents and such. Which was slightly hillarious to Abraham and his wife, Sarah, because both were super old. Abraham in his 100s and Sarah in her 90s. So, by starting with Abraham, the author of Jesus' genealogy is telling us how Jewish Jesus is.
Matthew then continues the genealogy to the King David to show how Jesus fulfills prophecy of being a descendant of David's. Since we are pretending to be first century Jews we need to understand that David is kind of the most important King to the nation of Israel. King David is to the Jews what King Arthur is to the English. We also need to know is that in ancient Hebrew numbers and letters doubled for each other. And if you notice how Matthew organizes Jesus' family tree you'll see that Matthew separates the names by groups of 14. The number 14 would be written as DVD, or David. There are three groups of 14. So, in the genealogy Matthew is repeating three times: David, David, David. Which to a first century Jew would really send home the fact that Jesus is king.
So, let's summarize what we know so far: 1) Jesus is the fulfillment of God's promise to Abraham. 2) Jesus not only descends from David, but is to be seen as a king. So, if you're a first century Jew reading this you're probably thinking around this time, "Wow! This Jesus guy is super-duper important! Like really, really important."
But, Matthew does a few interesting things with Jesus' genealogy. The first weird thing he does is put some women in it. Now, don't be too quickly offended here ladies, but women in this time were simply not important for a genealogy. So, the fact that Matthew adds women is perplexing. But, Matthew goes a bit further with his addition of these women. He doesn't add the standard Jewish women from history. Instead of adding somebody like Sarah, Abraham's wife, or Rebekah (Abraham's daughter-in-law, Isaac's wife), Matthew adds the likes of Tamar, Rahab, Ruth, and Bathsheba.
Let us learn a bit about these four ladies: The first lady to learn about is Tamar. I particularly enjoy Tamar's story, because I think it's kind of funny. If you have your Bible with you turn to Genesis 38, we'll start with verse six.
Read:
http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=genesis%2038:6-27;&version=31; Gen. 38:6-27
When I first read this passage, I was shocked. I mean, I was appalled at what God had allowed into the Bible. You would think an 8th grade health student wrote this. The way I see it there is some great material in this passage for sex-ed teachers. But, anyways on a more serious note. Tamar's first husband was a bad guy, and God struck him down. Then the next brother in line to marry Tamar, really doesn't want to have children, like really doesn't want to have children with her, so he does his little thing that I'm too embarrassed to paraphrase in church because I'm afraid I might get in trouble, even though it's in the Bible. So, God's not too please with him either and kills him. At this point, Judah sends Tamar away and makes her think that she'll marry the youngest brother when he grows up. Of course, Judah is afraid of loosing another son so he doesn't actually plan on giving him into marriage. Then one day Judah is on his way somewhere and Tamar is checking in on the youngest son and dresses like a prostitute. Judah sees her, thinks she's a prostitute, makes some sweet whoppee with her, and gives her some collateral while she is waiting for her actual pay. But, when Judah shows up and is like, "Where my ho at?" and doesn't find her, cause she wasn't actually a prostitute, he releases the goat, and then she shows up preggers with twins. So, clearly those offspring don't come from the greatest heritage, but Matthew adds them anyways.
The next woman mentioned in Jesus' genealogy is Rahab. I won't read Rahab's entire story, but let it be known she's a whore too, and not just any kind of prostitute, a Gentile one.
The next lady on this list is Ruth. Now, Ruth is a little better then Tamar and Rahab, since she's not so promiscuous. Ruth actually is apart of fantastic story. There is a whole Old Testament book called Ruth that chronicles her story. So, clearly there is too much story to paraphrase here. But what needs to be known about Ruth and why it's odd that she's on this Jewish genealogy is that she is a gentile. The thing about gentiles is that they are not the Jew's favorite people. Gentiles to the Jews are kind of a lower class of human. Gentile's don't worship the one true God (making them inferior to the Jews), gentiles are known to have practices that are less the moral (again, making them inferior to the Jews). If you go to
www.dictionary.com the fourth and ninth definition for gentile is: "heathen or pagan." I'm not for sure why, but that definition is given twice. So, for Matthew to include them in Jesus' genealogy is to taint the very Jewish-ness of Jesus.
The last lady Matthew uses in Jesus genealogy is Bathsheba. Turn your Bibles to 2nd Samuel 11.
Read:
http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=2%20samuel%2011;&version=31; 2nd Samuel 11
This is one of the more famous stories in scripture, and probably one of my favorites. David is a very interesting character. First off, it's not a very good king who would incite a war but not go out with his troops. Then, I'm left wondering, "What is David even doing on the roof at night anyways?" Is David a peeping-tom? And why do they have to be called peeping-toms? I don't much care for that title. Then David drags his character through the mud a little bit more by sleeping with Bathsheba. This makes Bathsheba pregnant, which isn't so good, because well she's somebody else's wife. (That somebody else is a gentile by the way.) So, what does David do? He brings the guy home and gets him drunk so that Bathesheba's actual husband will sleep with her. But, unlike Uriah, has all sorts of honor, even when drunk and wont' go home to enjoy his wife while his mates are out dying for Israel. So, now David is in a real predicament. I mean really, what do you do when you made another man's wife pregnant while he was away serving his country and couldn't lie about it? Well, I know what to do! Have the other man killed. There is nothing immoral about that at all, especially for a man who is supposedly a man after God's own heart. Matthew in the genealogy adds a little punch to this part by saying: "Bathsheba, who was Uriah's wife." Ouch!
So, where does Jesus come from? A group of non-Jews, whores, liars, murderers, and other lovely folk. So, what does this say about the rest of us?
