Study notes: My King's Family | Rocky Cross Baptist Church

These study notes go with the sermon on Matthew 1:2-17, "My King's Family." They follow the three parts of the sermon. Under Family Sequence they cover the structure and order of the genealogy: the three sets of fourteen, the Abraham, David, exile and Christ movement, and the questions about numbering and about Luke's list. Under Family Secrets they cover the four women, the wicked kings and the scandals. Under Finally See Him they cover verse 16, where Jesus finally appears, and the way the whole list points to him.

Setting the Stage: The Frame Around the List

Before the sequence, look at the frame, because Matthew built one. Verse 1 introduces Jesus with three titles: Christ, son of David, son of Abraham. Verse 17 closes the list by repeating the same three names in reverse order: Abraham, David, the Christ. Turner, Bock and Comfort point out that this forms an inclusio. Mentioning Abraham ends verse 1 and starts verse 2, and the genealogy then runs Abraham, David, Messiah. In their commentary they call the whole thing chiastic: Abraham in verse 2, David in verse 6, the Messiah in verse 16. France adds that verses 1 and 17

together give the list its formal framework and pick out its three key names. This is not a pile of names. It is a carefully built room with a door at each end.

Next, the opening phrase. In Greek it is biblos geneseos, "the book of the origin" or "the book of the genesis." The Handbook from the United Bible Societies says the phrase comes straight out of Genesis, from the "generations" formula in Genesis 2:4 and Genesis 5:1. It notes that in Genesis the phrase can cover narrative as well as lists, so Matthew may be introducing the birth story as well as the genealogy. Plummer reasons the same way. He thinks the title covers more than the pedigree and probably serves as a heading for the first two chapters, "the Gospel of the Infancy". France draws a theological conclusion: the word genesis suggests that the coming of Jesus is a new beginning, a new creation. Leithart notes that Matthew's opening is an overt echo of the Greek Old Testament, and that the early chapters of the Gospel run in a sequence that mirrors the Pentateuch. The genealogy, a miraculous birth, a dreamer named Joseph, a murderous king and an escape all echo Genesis and Exodus.

Wiersbe supplies a good contrast. The genealogy of Adam in Genesis 5 is a funeral bell, with its repeated "and he died." The first genealogy of the New Testament emphasizes birth and not death. Wiersbe says the Old Testament tells the sad history of the Adam family, and Matthew introduces the one who came to save the "generations of Adam".

Keener makes a subtle point about that same phrase. In Genesis, "the book of the generations of so-and-so" is followed by that person's descendants. Matthew's list runs the other way, and the person it is named for is the last one in it. Keener calls the point profound: Jesus is so much the focal point of history that his ancestors depend on him for their meaning. In Keener's reading, God directed Israel's history and preserved the Davidic line because of his plan to send Jesus. Stewart makes the same observation. Old Testament genealogies take their name from the first name on the list, and Matthew's emphasis falls on the last, Jesus. Keener's background commentary adds that ancient biographies typically opened by rehearsing the subject's noble lineage.

Why start a book with a genealogy at all? France says that to the Jewish world Matthew belonged to, a genealogy mattered, and he lists five strands it introduces. It puts Jesus in line with the history of Old Testament Israel. Its three groups of fourteen suggest that preparation is complete and fulfillment has come. It traces Jesus through the royal line of Judah, which stakes a claim to the title "King of the Jews." It establishes him as son of David. And it mentions irregularities in the royal line that counter objections to the manner of Jesus' birth. Those five strands give the whole outline of what follows.

Green gives some color on how seriously Jews took pedigrees. Ezra 2:62 records returning exiles who could not find their family records and were excluded from the priesthood. The rabbi Hillel was gratified that he could trace his line to David. Josephus opens his autobiography with his pedigree. And Herod the Great, half Jew and half Edomite, was so embarrassed by his absence from the official genealogies that he ordered their destruction, so that nobody could

claim a purer pedigree than his own. Barclay tells the Herod story too. Plummer notes that Julius Africanus passes on the Herod story, and that even if it is true it causes no difficulty, because families kept their own records and the Scriptures themselves traced the descent.

One more point on credibility. Keener argues that Jesus' Davidic descent is historically very probable. All the clear early Christian sources attest it. Hegesippus reports that Roman authorities interrogated the grandsons of Jesus' brother over their Davidic descent. And non-Christian Jewish opponents never bothered to refute the claim. His background commentary adds that the claim was made before the temple fell in AD 70, when it could still have been checked.

Part One: Family Sequence

Here is how I would pitch the first movement. The genealogy has a sequence, and that sequence is not an accident. God was moving a promise through history, one generation at a time, toward a person.

The three fourteens. Verse 17 gives Matthew's own summary: fourteen generations from Abraham to David, fourteen from David to the exile in Babylon, and fourteen from the exile to the Christ. Turner, Bock and Comfort describe the three movements and what each one says. The first, from Abraham to David (verses 2 through 6a), shows Jesus' sonship and lines him up with the historical outworking of God's promise. The second, from David to the exile (verses 6b through 11), recounts Israel's decline under the judgment of God. The third, from the exile to the Messiah (verses 12 through 16), traces the faithful purpose of God in fulfilling his promise despite his people's rebellion. They add that the three sections pivot on David and the exile. David is one of the highest points of the Old Testament narrative and the exile one of the lowest. They suggest that Matthew saw in Jesus one who would restore a new Israel from an exile even more deplorable than the one in Babylon.

Barclay offers a memorable way to say it. The first section is the rise to royalty, the second is the tragedy of freedom lost, and the third is the glory of liberty restored. He ties those three stages to the story of every human life: man was made for greatness, man lost his greatness, and man can regain it in Christ. Stewart gives a parallel summary. In the first list we see the origin of David's house, in the second its rise and decline, and in the third its eclipse. At the end of the third, the promise to David's house is fulfilled. In David the family of Abraham attained royalty, lost it at the captivity, and in Christ regained it. Plummer puts it more compactly: in David the family became royal, at the captivity the royalty was lost, and in Jesus the royalty is recovered.

Notice also the cliffhanger structure. France says the regular scheme indicates that the time of preparation is now complete. Blomberg says the genealogy culminates in the arrival of the Christ, and suggests the exile is central because Jesus is seen as the climax of the restoration of the nation from exile. Keener adds a further thought. Matthew may have preferred a round number for ease of memorization. But he probably also meant to imply that, as with the new Elijah figure of Matthew 3:4, Israel was due for its Messiah when Jesus was born.

Why fourteen? This is the part commentators love to argue about, so let me lay out the options and who holds them.

The first is gematria. Hebrew letters double as numbers, and in the Hebrew name David, dalet-vav-dalet, the letters are worth four, six and four, which adds up to fourteen. Blomberg thinks this probably accounts for the centrality of the number. David's name is itself the fourteenth entry in the first set. Turner, Bock and Comfort agree and say that by this device Matthew underlines the importance of Jesus' Davidic roots and the providence of God through Israel's

history. France notes that the practice is well attested among the rabbis, that Revelation 13:17–18 is the only clear New Testament parallel, and that if Matthew did not do it deliberately, he would probably have been delighted to have it pointed out to him. Keener's background commentary says that Greek and Hebrew letters served as numerals, and adds that a later Jewish text, 2 Baruch, divided history into fourteen epochs.

Others are cautious. Keener says the numerical allusion may be questionable. Perhaps fourteen was simply Matthew's average estimate of the generations between periods, or a round number chosen for easy memory. Stewart is skeptical on a different ground. The Gospel was written in Greek, he argues, so readers might not have caught a Hebrew numerical play. He also lists two other theories. One is that there were fourteen high priests from Aaron to Solomon's temple, and fourteen more from the temple to Jaddua. Morris quotes the scholar Finkelstein for this, saying a mystic significance attached to the number in both Sadducean and Pharisaic circles. The other is that Matthew found fourteen names in the first group and trimmed the other two to match. Morris mentions a less likely proposal, that three times fourteen is six weeks of generations leading up to the age of the Messiah.

Barclay and Green stress the memory function. Barclay says the pedigree is a mnemonic, a thing arranged to be easy to memorize in an age before printed books. Green says the names are arranged so they could be memorized, and he calls the arrangement an acrostic on the name David. Carson, whom Turner and his co-authors quote, sums up the right attitude: the symbolic value of the sets of fourteen matters more than their precise breakdown. One can say that the number is deliberate, that David stands at its center, and that the playful numeric signature is the sort of thing a Jewish teacher would delight in.

Do the numbers actually add up? This is where an alert reader may raise a hand. Count the names and you do not get three fourteens by simple tally. Blomberg says the actual numbers are thirteen, fourteen and thirteen, and that ancient counting often alternated between inclusive and exclusive reckoning. He points to a rabbinic parallel in the Mishnah tractate Avot. Turner, Bock and Comfort show a table where only the second set has fourteen on a straightforward count. They note that Brown found fourteen names in the first set if Abraham counts, and that Gundry solves the third set by counting Joseph and Mary separately. They find that last move unconvincing, because it counts a non-generation.

The United Bible Societies Handbook gives two simple solutions. In the third set, "Jesus" could be the thirteenth name and "Christ" the fourteenth. Or David could be counted as both the last name of the first set and the first name of the second, which yields three tidy lists of fourteen. Lexham notes that the genealogy is one name short of forty two and suggests David may be counted twice, given the emphasis on David and the three-by-fourteen structure. France says flatly that in fact the first and last groups contain only thirteen generations, and that Matthew's observation here is theological rather than statistical.

There is also an old suggestion from the early church. Willker's textual commentary quotes Epiphanius in the fourth century. He said the third group looks short because some scribes saw "Jechoniah" next to "Jechoniah" and thought one was a duplicate. The son, he said, was named Jechoniah after his father, so the two are distinct entries. Willker presents that as an ancient attempt to restore the count, and he lays out an alternative arrangement that gets fourteen in each section if Jehoiakim is counted at the end of the second set. I would use that gently. It shows that Christians noticed the arithmetic very early and still trusted the text.

The omitted kings. Matthew skips names, and he expects us to notice. Between Joram and Uzziah in verse 8, the Old Testament lists Ahaziah, Joash and Amaziah. Matthew leaves them out. Between Josiah and Jechoniah in verse 11 he skips Jehoiakim. France says the lists are deliberately selective, like many Old Testament genealogies that use the same verb "beget." He adds that Matthew covers the roughly 600 years after David in thirteen generations, and that Matthew has twenty-seven generations after David against Luke's forty-two. Keener says that between Zerubbabel and Joseph, five centuries, Matthew lists about nine names where Luke lists eighteen. Skipping generations was common in ancient genealogies, and Keener says Matthew would have seen no harm in approximating. Blomberg notes that the verb "was the father of" can mean "was the ancestor of". Morris says "father" can be used of any descendant, not only the immediate family, as in Matthew 3:9.

Why those particular omissions? Constable says the three kings in verse 8 were especially wicked, all had connections with Ahab, Jezebel and Athaliah, and all died violently. He adds that the two kings missing before the exile were also evil. Stewart connects the three to Athaliah, who tried to wipe out the Davidic line, and to Exodus

20's warning about iniquity visited to the third and fourth generation. Spurgeon sees theology in it: three are left out altogether, even sinners fit only to be forgotten were in the line, and this shows how little can be made of being born of the will of man or of the will of the flesh. Cereghin gathers several older writers who argue the omissions were judicial blottings-out. Be careful with that one, though. It builds a lot on a thin foundation, and Cereghin's own sources include some speculative claims. Stewart is more modest, saying simply that the reason for the omission is unstated. And Constable adds a caveat of his own: Matthew did not sanitize the list, since he still names Tamar, Rahab and David's sin.

Where did Matthew get the names? Morris and the Handbook agree on the sources. The list through Zerubbabel tracks 1 Chronicles chapters 1 through 3, with help from Ruth 4. The Handbook says it apparently follows the Septuagint text of those chapters. For the names after Zerubbabel, from Abiud down to Jacob, the sources are unknown. Turner, Bock and Comfort say those nine names span about five hundred years and none appears in the Old Testament. Stewart says Matthew's third group, apart from its first three names, is completely unknown until Joseph and Jesus. Keener points out that Matthew does not simply invent a fourteenth name for his final set. That may suggest he was bound to a prior source. Spurgeon draws a pastoral lesson. The later names were persons altogether obscure and insignificant, and our Lord came to a family of low estate, with a carpenter as his reputed father. He calls Jesus "the poor man's King".

Verse-by-verse tour of the sequence. Here are the pegs for walking through the names.

In verse 2, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and then "Judah and his brothers." Lexham notes that Judah receives the first annotation in the list and draws the reader to the promise that the scepter would not depart from Judah in Genesis 49:10. Constable says the writer separated Judah from his brothers because the messianic promise of rulership went to Judah alone, while the phrase "his brothers" alludes to the twelve tribes and hints at Matthew's royal interests . France says the brothers are mentioned probably to show Jesus' solidarity with the twelve patriarchs. Morris adds that brotherhood is an important concept for Matthew, who uses the word "brother" thirty-nine times.

Stewart observes that Isaac's birth and Jesus' birth are both supernatural, though not identical. The genealogy begins with the record of one supernatural birth and ends with another. Stewart also makes the sovereignty point at Judah. Reuben was the firstborn and Judah the fourth, so the line is not determined by age or human merit but by God's choice. Spurgeon says the line ran not in Ishmael but in Isaac, and not in Esau but in elect Jacob. Let us observe and admire the sovereignty of God, he says.

In verse 3, Perez and Zerah, "whose mother was Tamar." Stewart says the Old Testament traced the royal line through Perez, and that "son of Perez" was a rabbinic expression for the Messiah. Constable says the same, quoting McNeile. Heaster notes that Zerah was apparently the firstborn and Perez got the line, and he suggests that genealogies like this show God's delight in working through the underling. That is an application, not a claim about the Greek.

In verses 3 and 4, the names Hezron, Ram, Amminadab, Nahshon, Salmon. Keener notes that Matthew's "Aram" reflects one spelling in the Septuagint that could also allude to the Gentile mission. Stewart says Amminadab appears in Exodus 6:23 as the father of the wife of Aaron, and Nahshon was the leader of Judah's tribe in the wilderness. He adds that only two names appear between Hezron and Nahshon, a period of about 400 years, so each name represents a century. Of Aram he says "Like Hesrom, Aram was unknown to men but important to God."

In verse 5, Salmon, Boaz, Obed, and the two women Rahab and Ruth. In verse 6, Jesse, "David the king," and Solomon "by the wife of Uriah." Turner, Bock and Comfort note that "the king" is added to David, which stresses his centrality, and that David is the pivotal person at the end of the first set and the beginning of the second. Constable adds that Matthew does not call Solomon or the other kings "king." He probably wanted to focus attention on David and Jesus, and quotes Carson's line that David's royal authority, lost at the exile, is regained and surpassed by "great David's greater son". Morris says Matthew uses the word "king" twenty-two times, more than any other New Testament book, and that this is where he makes clear that there is royalty in Jesus' line, so that he is rightly "King of the Jews".

In verses 7 through 11, Rehoboam down to Josiah and then "Jechoniah and his brothers at the time of the deportation to Babylon." Lexham notes that this verse concludes the second third and, with Jechoniah's brothers, identifies him with the nation. It draws the reader to the story of Jechoniah in 2 Kings 24 and 25, where he is deported and later

pardoned. Constable adds that the brothers, Jehoiakim and Zedekiah, also ruled, and quotes Bruce on the pathos: "Judah and his brethren" were partakers in the promise, and "Jeconiah and his brethren" were the generation of the promise eclipsed.

In verses 12 through 16, from Jechoniah, Shealtiel and Zerubbabel, through the obscure names, to "Jacob the father of Joseph, the husband of Mary, of whom was born Jesus, who is called Christ." We will spend the third movement there.

Textual footnotes worth knowing. Metzger shows that the earliest Greek text in verses 7 and 8 reads "Asaph," the psalmist, not "Asa," the king. In verse 10 it reads "Amos," the prophet, not "Amon," the king. Metzger treats these as spelling errors that were already in the sources Matthew used. He says Lagrange preferred the king's names, but the Committee went with the weight of the manuscripts. Keener's commentary takes the opposite approach. He says many commentators see these as theologically significant adjustments, deliberate allusions that connect Jesus to priestly and prophetic threads in Israel's story. In his commentary he is cautious on how far to press it. His background commentary says most translations have obscured the point. The Handbook agrees that "Asaph" is the earliest form but notes that most translations use "Asa". So the commentators differ. One camp says clerical slip, the other says deliberate allusion. It is best mentioned as an interesting possibility. One more caution: Cereghin calls "Amos" in the ESV a clear error. In the library, though, the ESV and Metzger's text both read the Asaph and Amos forms, so readers may find those forms in their own Bibles.

Verse 11 has a similar variant. Omanson and Metzger say later manuscripts added "Jehoiakim" to harmonize with 1 Chronicles 3, but that would give fifteen names in the second set, and the shorter text has better support. Stewart says no modern translation accepts the longer reading.

The Luke question. Someone will ask why Luke's genealogy is different. Turner, Bock and Comfort give the data. Luke has more than sixty persons Matthew does not mention. They agree from Abraham to David, with one difference. At David, Matthew goes to Solomon and Luke to Nathan, and the lists diverge until they meet briefly at Shealtiel and Zerubbabel, then diverge again until Joseph.

There are three main solutions among the commentators, and they conflict.

The first is that Luke gives Mary's line and Matthew gives Joseph's. Wiersbe states this as the generally held view. Copeland holds it, and adds that Luke traces the "fleshly" ancestry through Nathan while Matthew gives the "legal" right through Solomon. Cereghin presents Mary's line through Nathan as a kind of insurance policy in case Joseph's line was cut off by the curse on Coniah in Jeremiah 22.

The second is that both genealogies belong to Joseph. Matthew gives the royal succession, the "official" line, and Luke gives Joseph's actual physical ancestry. France holds this. He says Luke clearly states he is giving the genealogy of Joseph, the "supposed" father, and that it was not the practice to trace a genealogy through the female line. He notes that the verb "beget" is used of non-genetic relationships in 1 Corinthians 4:15 and Philemon verse 10 . Morris agrees. He calls the Mary theory unlikely, notes the levirate-marriage idea is ingenious but lacks evidence, and prefers the royal-succession explanation, with no certainty. Plummer says the Mary theory is not worthy of consideration, because neither Jew nor Gentile would derive the birthright from the mother. He notes that precisely the two Gospels that record the virgin birth are the two that give Joseph's pedigree.

The third is levirate marriage, associated with Julius Africanus, in which Jacob and Heli were half-brothers. Keener mentions it. He says Luther suggested Mary's line but the grammatical evidence is not compelling. He thinks the best alternative to harmonizing is to say Matthew emphasizes the royal nature of the lineage rather than formulating a biologically precise list.

Turner, Bock and Comfort are candid: the Mary theory arose as an expedient to relieve a difficulty, per Carson, and evangelicals must admit there are difficulties that cannot be fully resolved, though there is also insufficient evidence to falsify the record. Blomberg likewise says knowing which solution is right is probably impossible unless new evidence turns up. For the pulpit, I would lay out the two main options in a sentence each, say that faithful scholars land in different places, and say that nothing in the Gospel's message depends on resolving it. Both genealogies

affirm Jesus' Abrahamic and Davidic ancestry. Notice also that Turner, Bock and Comfort observe the two writers had different purposes. Luke's genealogy sits between the baptism and the temptation, both about divine sonship, and runs back to Adam and God. Matthew's serves Christology, showing Jesus as the fulfillment of the promises.

The Jeconiah question. In Jeremiah 22:30, God says to write this man childless: none of his offspring will sit on David's throne. Yet Matthew places Jechoniah squarely in Jesus' legal line. The library gives several handlings. Constable quotes a Scofield note: had Jesus been Joseph's natural son, the curse would have blocked him, but he came through Mary's line, and as Joseph's adopted son the curse did not touch him. Copeland argues Jesus is "legal" heir through Joseph, a descendant of Solomon, and "fleshly" heir through Mary, a descendant of Nathan, so the Jeconiah problem is answered. Constable also observes that Jehoiachin had seven sons but none succeeded him, so the prophecy was fulfilled. Heaster offers a more speculative reading that "childless" means spiritually unprosperous. This is a point where the library offers options, not a settled answer, and I would flag it to the congregation as one of the places where Scripture asks us to trust.

Part Two: Family Secrets

Now the second movement. A listener who tuned out during the names perks up when the skeletons come out. Matthew puts them right there in the list. As the Christ-Centered Exposition commentary puts it, "All in all, this is one crooked family tree\!"

The four women: why they are surprising. Women were not needed in ancient genealogies. Keener says genealogies need include only men, so the unexpected appearance of four women draws attention to them. Green and Barclay both stress the cultural background. In both Greek and Jewish culture a woman had few legal rights, and a Jewish man thanked God daily that he had not been made a Gentile, a slave or a woman. France points out that the mention of a mother alongside a father does occur in Old Testament genealogies, and that Tamar's mention comes from 1 Chronicles 2:4 and Bathsheba's from 1 Chronicles 3:5. But the four mothers Matthew selects form a striking group.

Morris points out the road not taken. In Jewish writings four women are often singled out, Sarah, Rebecca, Rachel and Leah. Matthew chooses Tamar, Rahab, Ruth and Bathsheba instead. Turner, Bock and Comfort note that the matriarchs are absent from verse 2. Keener says that if Matthew had wanted merely to evoke Israel's history, he would have named the matriarchs. So the choice is deliberate.

Who they were.

Tamar. Turner, Bock and Comfort summarize Genesis 38: she was the wife of Judah's son Er, and she had an incestuous liaison with her father-in-law Judah after he failed to give her a levirate husband. Green calls her an adulteress. Barclay says she was a deliberate seducer. Note that Turner, Bock and Comfort and Keener point out that Jewish tradition tends to exonerate her. Keener notes that tradition praises her and the Testament of Judah denies she was Canaanite. Her story is the first scandal in the list, and Morris notes that the children were conceived out of wedlock. Stewart quotes Bruce, who calls her mention "impolitic," reminding readers of a hardly readable story.

Rahab. Matthew's Gospel is the only place that names her as mother of Boaz. Morris says this fact is not recorded elsewhere in Scripture or in other Jewish writings. Turner, Bock and Comfort summarize her story: the prostitute of Jericho who protected the Israelite spies out of fear of God, and whose family was spared. Stewart and France both note a chronological difficulty if she is the same Rahab, since she appears too early for the generations given,

and Stewart says our information is insufficient to be certain. Wiersbe in another place calls her one of the first soul-winners in the Bible and compares her to the Samaritan woman. Keener says Matthew weaves her into the Old Testament line here.

Ruth. A Moabitess. Morris reminds us that Deuteronomy 23:3 says to the tenth generation a Moabite was not to be admitted to the assembly. Barclay and Stewart say the same. Turner, Bock and Comfort stress that her night scene with Boaz is not a seduction but a marriage proposal to a kinsman as the law envisioned. Cereghin makes the application that although she was a Moabitess, she sought God and God's people, so no one's background shuts them out.

Bathsheba, who is not named. The Greek says "the wife of Uriah." Why? Turner, Bock and Comfort list the possibilities: a euphemism, a pointer to David's sin in having Uriah killed, or a hint that Solomon's mother was a Gentile, since Uriah was a Hittite. They think the last likeliest. Blomberg thinks it reminds the reader of David's adultery and murder. Constable says it draws attention to the wickedness of David's sin, and notes Uriah was a Hittite so Jews would have regarded her as one by marriage. Stewart suggests Matthew calls attention to Uriah's righteousness in contrast to David's. Heaster notes that even forgiven sin remains in the record of divine history. Lexham says it serves as a reminder of David's imperfection and prepares the reader for the scandal around Mary.

Spurgeon's comment on the pair is a good one to quote briefly. He says the grace of God was signal in that the line should be continued in this once-guilty pair, and that it shows our Lord's kinship with fallen humanity.

Why did Matthew include them? Here is where the commentators divide.

View one: the women show that Jesus came to save sinners. Plummer holds this. He doubts the women are meant as a parallel to the Virgin mother, and doubts they answer slander about Jesus' birth. He thinks the point is that the one who came "not to call the righteous, but sinners" was descended from flagrant sinners and from a stranger. Morris says Matthew is surely saying the gospel is for all people and for sinners; it is a sinful world and he is writing about

grace. Spurgeon sees the Savior as "the sinner's Friend". Turner, Bock and Comfort note that this view goes back to the church fathers, but they point out it does not fit Ruth and Bathsheba well, since the Old Testament does not present them as guilty in the same way.

View two: the women are Gentiles, foreshadowing the mission. Keener champions this one. He says the primary link between the four is Gentile ancestry: Tamar of Canaan, Rahab of Jericho, Ruth the Moabitess, and the ex-wife of Uriah the Hittite. He argues that Matthew is reminding readers that three ancestors of David and the mother of Solomon were Gentiles, and that Gentiles were never an afterthought in God's plan. He links this to the magi in chapter 2 and the Great Commission in 28:19. Keener's background commentary says the same. Stewart notes that the Abrahamic blessing for "all families of the earth" is fulfilled at the Great Commission, so universal blessing stands at the beginning and the end of the Gospel. The objection, noted by Turner, Bock and Comfort, is that this view does not explain why Mary is next in the list.

View three: the women share irregular unions and suspicions of illegitimacy, preparing for Mary. Blomberg argues the only factor that clearly applies to all four is that suspicions of illegitimacy surrounded their sexual activity and childbearing, a perfect fit with the suspicion around Mary that Matthew takes pains to refute immediately after. He adds that John 8:48 hints at the Jewish charge that Jesus was illegitimate. France likewise says there were at least suspicions of marital irregularity in each case, all vindicated by God's later blessing, and that they form a precedent

for the birth of Jesus. Lexham repeats that the scandalous nature of Tamar's story prepares the reader for the scandal around Mary. Green hears the rumors too, pointing to Mark 6:3, Galatians 4:4 and the Jewish rumor that Jesus was the child of a Roman soldier.

Keener presses an objection to this view. If Matthew were defending Mary against slander, why choose Tamar and Bathsheba, who really did act immorally by the standards of the day? And if irregular birth were the point, Sarah, Rebekah and Rachel, whose wombs God opened, would be better examples. He allows that the irregular-birth reading is possible and not inconsistent with the Gentile reading. Turner, Bock and Comfort add that the view must presume Rahab had an illegitimate child, which the Old Testament does not say, and that Ruth's union seems legitimate.

View four: Hutchison's proposal, summarized by Constable, that the four stories illustrate Gentile faith standing out against Jewish unbelief. He lists four purposes: God's providence preserving Messiah's line even in apostate times, God's heart for godly Gentiles, the importance of the covenants with a focus on faith and obedience rather than a racial line, and a call to repentance and humility.

Turner, Bock and Comfort's own verdict is honest. They say the inclusion of the women has not yet been satisfactorily explained, that certain elements of all the views have merit, and that perhaps the best summary is that God's grace in Jesus reaches beyond Israel to Gentiles, beyond men to women, and beyond the self-righteous to sinners. Constable's summary is similar. He lists several purposes: Jesus includes sinners, the kingdom is universal,

Mary is prepared for, and Matthew may disarm criticism by showing God countenanced irregular unions in Messiah's ancestry. Constable quotes Merrill: these women exemplify the sovereign grace of God, who is able to use the foreign and perhaps even the disreputable, and even seems to delight in doing so.

One need not choose a single view as the only one. A safe and faithful way to say it is that Matthew puts sinners, outsiders and women in the line of the Messiah, and the rest of his Gospel shows why. The angel will say in verse 21 that Jesus will save his people from their sins. Jesus will say in chapter 9 that he came to call sinners. The magi will come from the east in chapter 2, and the Great Commission goes to all nations.

Green draws the three barriers the women break. Barriers between men and women come down, because women share in the Messiah's official genealogy. Barriers between Jew and Gentile come down, because Ruth plays her part. And barriers between good people and bad come down, because sinful women like Tamar and Bathsheba stand next to Mary. Green quotes Romans 3:22 through 24 as the summary. Barclay says nearly the same: Jew and Gentile, male and female, saint and sinner, and he notes that God can find servants among those from whom the respectable would shudder away. Blomberg adds something I like for the pastor's heart. It is not enough merely to minister to the marginalized; Matthew honors the women simply by including them, so we must find ways of exalting them and affirming their value in God's eyes.

The secrets in the men. Do not let the women carry all the scandal. The men are a rogues' gallery too. Cereghin lists them: Abraham, who twice lied about Sarah, and failed with Hagar; Judah, who is tied to the Tamar affair; David, adulterer and murderer, who was also a poor father to Absalom; Solomon, whose many foreign wives turned his heart; and Rehoboam, whose mother was an Ammonite. He says there is no "godly line" but there is a "messianic line," and that line is full of sinners. He also quotes the line that Jesus chose the family with a man who consorted with prostitutes, a murderer, an apostate and several bad kings. Take that rhetoric with some caution, since the claim that Jesus "chose" his family goes beyond what the passage says. But the point about the list stands.

Heaster notes the generational pattern in verse 7 onward: wicked Rehoboam begat wicked Abijah, who begat good Asa, who begat good Jehoshaphat, who begat wicked Joram. His conclusion is that spirituality is not genetic, and neither is sinfulness, and that we cannot assume the children of the faithful will be righteous. Copeland says the same thing in a tidy form. Godliness is not inherited: Solomon had Rehoboam, Hezekiah had Manasseh, Josiah had Jeconiah. "God has no grandchildren," he says. He also reminds us that even Manasseh eventually repented, so parents should not lose heart. Cereghin makes the repentance point too: Manasseh, the worst of the kings, repented in prison in 2 Chronicles 33.

Spurgeon's note on verse 10 is worth reading. He calls the line of kings "of a mixed character, not one of them perfect and some of them as bad as bad could be," and imagines Manasseh's presence as a hint that those who come after Christ would include "some of the chief of sinners who would be miracles of mercy". On verse 11 he says poor captives and those bound with the fetters of sin may see some like themselves in this ancestry, now that the Christ is born of a race once carried away to Babylon.

And then there is the exile itself, the family's greatest public shame. Morris notes it was a very significant happening in the life of the nation. Blomberg says the exile appears centrally perhaps because Jesus is seen as the climax of Israel's restoration. The shame of the family becomes a hinge, not a dead end.

Application: family secrets. Here the Matthew text meets the pew. Constable and others point out that Matthew did not clean up the family. The Christ-Centered Exposition commentary says this genealogy would have been massively significant to Jewish people considering trusting Christ, or to those already believers who were losing their families and possessions as a result. A listener who feels the weight of a messy family history can hear that the Savior's own family was messy and that this was the family through which the Son of God stepped into history. Cereghin adds a practical line: whatever one's family history, it is no barrier to walking with God, and one can start a legacy by being a first-generation Christian. Heaster, too, says we cannot blame a bad background for a lack of spirituality. A caution on Heaster: he is writing from a non-Trinitarian perspective and uses this very chapter to argue against Christ's pre-existence. Wiersbe, Stewart and the others read the chapter within an orthodox frame, and Wiersbe explicitly says Jesus Christ, being eternal God, existed before Mary and Joseph or any of his ancestors. Heaster's pastoral observations are best used with care, apart from his Christology.

There is also a quiet counter-theme. Not every name is scandalous. Many are simply unknown. Stewart's line about Aram being unknown to men but important to God is a gift. Spurgeon says the later names were persons altogether obscure. Ordinary, faithful, forgotten generations also carry the promise.

Part Three: Finally See Him

The third movement is where the list lands. Verse 16 is the most carefully written verse in the genealogy, and it rewards slow reading.

The grammar of verse 16. Thirty-nine times, Turner, Bock and Comfort count, Matthew has written the active verb egennesen, "begat" or "was the father of," from verse 2 through the first part of verse 16. Then the pattern breaks. Verse 16 says "Jacob the father of Joseph, the husband of Mary, of whom was born Jesus." The verb is now passive, egennethe, "was born." The relative pronoun "of whom" is feminine, so it refers to Mary alone. Blomberg makes the same point about the feminine pronoun and concludes that Joseph is clearly not the human father. France says the new phrasing makes clear that Matthew does not regard Jesus as Joseph's son physically, and he adds that the genealogy therefore gives Jesus' legal ancestry, not his physical descent. Morris says the passive is probably the "divine passive," pointing to God's action, and that the change prepares us for the virgin birth narrative. Lexham notes that Joseph's annotation is unique, since previous annotations described the son, not the father, and that the passive removes active agency from Mary. Stewart says the formula after Joseph is dropped, and that when Mary is reached it clearly indicates physical birth rather than legal descent. Keener adds that Matthew probably believes this to be Jesus' legal, not blood, line, and that adoption lines were significant in his world, even qualifying sons for royalty.

Notice something else. Joseph is not named "father of Jesus" but "husband of Mary." Turner, Bock and Comfort note that his brief appearance in Matthew underlines his modeling of obedience and his Davidic descent. Constable points out that this identifies Joseph through his wife, contrary to the usual forms of identification in ancient Judaism . That is the list's pivot. For forty generations the question was "who fathered whom?" Now the question is "who is this one that is born?"

The text of verse 16. Metzger identifies three main readings. The first is the standard text, "Joseph the husband of Mary, of whom Jesus was born," which is widely supported across manuscript families. A second reading, with Joseph "to whom being betrothed the virgin Mary bore Jesus," appears in several Greek and Old Latin witnesses.

Metzger explains it arose because "husband of Mary" was thought misleading in a genealogical context, and he gives the standard reading an {A} rating, meaning virtually certain. The third reading, in the Sinaitic Syriac, says Joseph "begat Jesus," and Metzger argues that the supposed support for it from other witnesses falls away on examination. France adds that the Sinaitic Syriac reading is verbally close to the standard text and is now generally regarded as a

corruption. He says it could hardly have been written by the Matthew who goes on to write verses 18 through 25. Stewart says that reading could be used to deny the virgin birth only if "begat" means physical paternity rather than legal recognition. Plummer, in an older commentary, called the reading uncertain, though he was sure of what the writer meant. Pastors can safely tell their people the text is secure and the meaning is clear.

"Who is called Christ." Constable says the phrase ho legomenos, "who is called," implies no doubt, and is one of Matthew's favorite expressions, used twelve times to name persons or places. Stewart says it shows the claim was legitimate since he descended from David. Lexham notes that Jesus receives the title "Christ," pointing back to verse 1, and that David is the only other name in the list that carries a title, "king". Think about that. The list has two titles in it. One is attached to David and one to Jesus. Constable says the word "king" with David would evoke profound nostalgia and eschatological hope. Matthew thus makes the royal theme explicit: King Messiah has appeared. Fenton, quoted there, says the title marks the end of the period of waiting.

What it means to "finally see him." Here is how I would frame it. The genealogy is a long wait, and verse 16 is the arrival. Plummer says that "in Jesus, who is called Christ, the royalty is recovered". France says the three fourteens indicate that "in Jesus the time of fulfilment has arrived". Green says the climax of the genealogy is "great David's greater Son" and that Jesus is the fulfillment of all history, including the promise to Abraham that in his seed all the families of the earth would be blessed, and the promise to David that his throne would be established forever. Constable gives the two covenants. God vowed to give Abraham seed, land and blessing, and through him to bless the whole world. He promised David a dynasty and throne forever. Both promises arrive in one person.

Barclay offers a human way into the word "fulfillment." He says the common people addressed Jesus as Son of David, and that Jesus is the answer to the dreams of men. He quotes Peter in Acts 2, Paul in Romans 1:3, and Revelation 22:16 for the Davidic claim. And he gives an illustration from Gerald Healy's play. Famine-era workers are set to dig roads that lead nowhere, and a character says in wonder "They're makin' roads that lead to nowhere." Barclay says that if we believe in prophecy we can never say that of history, because history is on the way to the goal of God. The genealogy says history is not a road to nowhere. Every generation, even the shameful ones, was a stretch of the road to a person.

Copeland offers another angle on the long wait. He observes that 2,000 years passed between the promise to Abraham and its fulfillment, and that the gap between Christ's ascension and our day has barely reached that. So God keeps his word, and we need not lose heart waiting for the promised return. That is a pastoral application of the sequence: if God took forty-two generations to deliver, he is not slow, he is faithful.

The Name behind the list. The Christ-Centered Exposition commentary reminds us that "Jesus" is the Greek form of Joshua, "Yahweh saves," and ties verse 1 to the angel's word in verse 21: "he will save his people from their sins". Spurgeon puts the wonder this way: here is the One who "was in the beginning with God" and yet has a genealogy, and he is one with us "in ties of blood with sinners one". He adds on verse 18 that a word or two sufficed to describe the birth of all the kings whose names we have read, but for our Lord Jesus there is much more to be said, and that he is born of a woman that he might be human but not by man that he might not be sinful. Exell's collection of old homiletical outlines offers a list of ten things about Jesus' ancestry from Bonar: human, Jewish, Gentile, royal, lowly, holy, imperfect, mortal, immortal. That is a nice way to say that all the strands meet in him.

Look at the way "finally" works inside the structure too. Matthew has been giving us a sequence of fathers and sons for sixteen verses. At the end, the line does not go on. There is no next generation. The line stops at the One whom everything was moving toward. Keener's point about the name of the book supports this: ancestors take their meaning from him. Here is a thought: the genealogy is not a ladder we climb to reach God; it is the road God walked to reach us. As Wiersbe says, Jesus is the "last Adam" who came to save the generations of Adam, and by faith we can be born into his generation.

A bridge to verses 18 through 25. Several sources note that the genealogy is preparation for the next paragraph. Lexham says the Davidic line maintained in unusual ways prepares for Mary, the fifth and final woman. Stewart says the next section is a justification of the genealogy, showing that though Jesus' birth was supernatural, he can still rightly be regarded as the legitimate son of Joseph and heir to David's throne.

Six Truths from the Sermon

Several people taking notes asked for the six truths from the sermon, which went by quickly on Sunday. Here they are in order, with the Scripture that supports each.

Good, bad, and ugly are all in. Nothing edited out.
Righteousness is not hereditary. Rehoboam, Abijah, Asa, Jehoshaphat, Joram. Hezekiah, Manasseh. Amon, Josiah.
No firstborn rights. Isaac, Jacob, Judah, Perez, David, Solomon. Never the one you'd pick.
Righteousness earns nothing. Sovereign grace. Deuteronomy 7:7-8; Romans 9:11-16; Ephesians 2:8-9.
The Savior is numbered among sinners and comes from sinners. Isaiah 53:12; Matthew 9:13; Hebrews 2:11.
Your family past is not your responsibility. The secrets are not your shame. Ezekiel 18:14-20; 1 Peter 1:18-19; 2 Corinthians 5:17.

Bottom line: Jesus isn't ashamed of his family tree, so he isn't ashamed of you.

Books and Sources

If you would like to study this passage further, or get any of these books for yourself, here are the sources behind these notes, in order.

Turner, David L.; Bock, Darrell L.; Comfort, Philip Wesley, Matthew and Mark.
France, R. T., Matthew: An Introduction and Commentary.
Stine, Philip C.; Newman, Barclay M., A Handbook on the Gospel of Matthew.
Alfred Plummer, An Exegetical Commentary on the Gospel According to S. Matthew.
Peter J. Leithart, Jesus as Israel: The Typological Structure of Matthew's Gospel.
Warren W. Wiersbe, The Wiersbe Bible Commentary: New Testament.
Craig S. Keener, A Commentary on the Gospel of Matthew.
Don Stewart, The Gospel of Matthew: A Verse by Verse Commentary (3rd ed.) (2020).
Keener, Craig S., The IVP Bible Background Commentary: New Testament.
Green, Michael P., The Message of Matthew.
William Barclay, The Gospel of Matthew, Volume 1 (Chapters 1 to 10), Revised Edition (1975).
Blomberg, Craig L., Matthew.
Morris, Leon, The Gospel according to Matthew.
Mangum, Douglas, Lexham Context Commentary: New Testament.
Wieland Willker, A Textual Commentary on the Greek Gospels, Vol. 1: Matthew (12th ed.) (2015).
Thomas L. Constable, Notes on Matthew (2026 Edition) (2026).
Charles Haddon Spurgeon, Commentary on Matthew: The Gospel of the Kingdom.
John Cereghin, Pilgrim Way Commentary on Matthew (2025).
Duncan Heaster, Verse by Verse Commentary on Gospel of Matthew (2014).
Metzger, Bruce M., A Textual Commentary on the Greek New Testament, Second Edition.
English Standard Version.
Omanson, Roger L., A Textual Guide to the Greek New Testament.
Mark A. Copeland, The Gospel of Matthew: Sermon Outlines (Executable Outlines) (2007).
Christ-Centered Exposition Commentary: Matthew (sample chapter) (2013).
Exell, Joseph S., Matthew.
Haddon Robinson; Craig Brian Larson (eds.), The Art and Craft of Biblical Preaching: A Comprehensive Resource for Today's Communicators (2005), including a contribution by Sunukjian.
John R. W. Stott, Between Two Worlds: The Art of Preaching in the Twentieth Century (1982).
Haddon W. Robinson; rev. Scott Wenig, Biblical Preaching: The Development and Delivery of Expository Messages, 4th ed. (excerpt) (2024).
Pentz, Croft M., Expository Outlines from Matthew.
John A. Broadus, A Treatise on the Preparation and Delivery of Sermons (1870).