Genealogies Part 2

If you're like me, you've seen it and read it and let your eyes go numb overlooking it many times.

Mat 1:17 : "So all the generations from Abraham to David are fourteen generations; and from David until the carrying away into Babylon are fourteen generations; and from the carrying away into Babylon unto Christ are fourteen generations." [Someth Oldeth Kingeth's merry ole' version]

Wow. It sounds so impressive, doesn't it? That proves the time was right for the Messiah, no? Can't you see it? A Biblical defender in a nice suit with appropriately slicked hair (why is it that televangelists always have such nice hair? is there some kind of screening? ) pounding some pulpit to emphasize that we clearly know that the timing of Jesus was perfect.

OK. Forget about the number 14 for a moment. Just look at the time durations. Abraham lived in around 2000BC (give or take), David around 1000BC. The Jews were taken to Babylon in around 600BC. And of course Jesus' birth is something around 0BC/AD (Wikipedia-me if you want to check the dates).
The times aren't the same. Fourteen generations is something like 550 years. So maybe it was about 14 from the captivity to the birth of Christ, but that's about it.

You don't even need dates, really. You can count all the kings of Israel before Babylon if you are good with your Old Testament trivia. But we know that the Israelites were in Egypt for (what?) something like 400 years, right? And that's only one small part of the time from Abraham to David.

And the "14" is strange. Go to the book of numbers sometime... well, ok don't. But if you did, count the generations listed. Here's a clue. It isn't 14. Do the same thing with Kings and Chronicles. What you'll find is that there are number of generations missing from this genealogy.

The Defender may point out that this was a common practice -- kind of a short hand -- to skip generations. That makes a lot of sense. And I believe it. Can you imagine being that poor scribe that had to maintain this stuff? Sooner or later you'd be very tempted to say "just go look over there for the rest".
In addition, the word translatedeth "begat" probably really means "caused to be born" or something. That is, it is not necessarily the father. It could be a grandfather or even great-grandfather.

But.... but.... but...
what's with the 14?
I mean, OK, the genealogy skips some people. I can deal with that. But then why turn around and make a big deal out of how many there are? "Let me pick 14 people and then I'll make a proof out of the fact that there are only 14." The scholar in me says: "Whasafras?"
How does that make sense?

It seems like there are 2 things we can say: there were *not* 14 generations between all these people, and the number of generations wasn't even the *same*.

So why is it there?
There's a really simple reason. It's wrong. You can spin it. You can dodge it. You can lay awake at night trying to think of clever ways of explaining it. But either it's wrong or the genealogies in the Old Testament are wrong. Either it's wrong, or all of the dates that we know and archeology around them is wrong.

If I'm a Critic, I shrug and say "of course it's wrong." Someone got overzealous with numbers. It probably wasn't even Mathew, but some scribe who added it later. It fits.

But if I'm a Defender, I ... am ... hosed. Once I say that, then I'm saying that the Bible has flaws. If it has contradictions or scribal errors in the genealogy in Mathew, then where else are there flaws? You see, with this section, we have something unusual: we have something verifiable. We know that there are 2 such genealogies in the Bible (Matt and Luke) and that these reflect the ones in the books of the Jewish Bible. There are lots of places to cross reference. And if this is true, and we find out that they do not match, then what about the places where there are no cross-references? What about the story of the woman taken in adultery (only in John) or the virgin birth (only Matt and Luke) or any of the other stories where we just don't have a frame for comparison. If we look at the places that we can compare and they are "wrong," then there is no rock on which to rest the other parts. In that case, I am saying "the places I can verify aren't right, but the places I can't verify are."

Of course, there's a lot more here. The history of the scribal work that produced this is very important. And of course, you can wonder whether the verse is even original. And of course, you can ask when Matthew was written -- and by Matthew or someone else -- since that may help explain why this verse is here.

But it shakes up the world.