Skeletons In Jesus’ Stepfather’s Genealogical Closet?
Posted: Tuesday, October 04, 2011
by Joel Hendon
http://hebronics.org/index.html
In the first chapter of Matthew, we find a genealogical record of Joseph who married Mary, the mother of Jesus, who was begotten by the Holy Spirit of God. This is not the blood line of Jesus, but rather that of his stepfather, Joseph. Jewish custom and Jewish law always listed their family genealogies of the husband or head of the household.
Beginning early, in this genealogy, we have the story of Judah, one of the twelve sons of Israel, who married a gentile Canaanite. By her, he fathered three sons: Er, Onan and Shelah. Judah chose a wife for the eldest son Er, whose name was Tamar (In the New Testament Greek form, spelled Thamar).
The biblical record shows that Er was evil and God slew him because of it. And under the Jewish tradition, when a man died and had no children by his wife, the next son in line must take her and raise seed up unto his brother. After Judah made Onan take Tamar, he refused to bring up seed by her since it would be considered his brother’s rather than his own, so God also slew him.
The younger son, Shelah, was too young to be given to Tamar at the time and Judah promised to give him to her when he became a man. But he failed to do so. In the meantime, Judah’s wife had died. When Tamar saw that Shelah was not going to be given her, she dressed herself as a prostitute with a veil over her face and set herself in a tent beside the road where Judah would be passing. When he came by and saw her, he went in unto her.
But to shorten the story, she was made pregnant and when it was learned, they were about to have her slain until she showed the items Judah had left with her. He then acknowledged that he was the father. Twins were born of this illicit relationship, the first born of the two was named Pharez. Looking back into the genealogy in Matthew’s account, Pharez was in the lineage. For a full reading of this affair, read chapter 38 of Genesis.
Next of the questionable characters in the lineage comes the name Rachab who gave birth to Booz by Salmon (Rachab and Booz are the Greek spellings of Rahab and Boaz in the Old Testament Hebrew or Arabic). Rahab was described as a harlot in the Old Testament account. Boaz then married Ruth, another non-Jew, a Moabite.
And lastly, comes Bathsheba, the wife of an Hittite, and undoubtedly also one herself. David sinned woefully in the case of gaining her as his wife, and she gave birth to Solomon as is recorded in the genealogy of Joseph by Matthew. So here we have four women who were not Jews by birth. Of course, that was only outside the Jewish tradition and also God had warned them always to stay away from the pagan peoples.
But our primary point here which we are attempting to make is the fact that the biblical account, unlike most novels and books written by uninspired men, freely exposes the sinful acts and lives of it’s people even when they are involved in such an important place as in the coming or our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. It is true Matthew’s account was not the blood lineage of Jesus after we pass David, but the incidents mentioned above were before David.
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