CHAPTER 1. THE GENEALOGY AND BIRTH OF JESUS. The genealogy may readily appear to us a most ungenial beginning of the Gospel. A dry list of names! It is the tribute which the Gospel pays to the spirit of Judaism. The Jews set much store by genealogies, and to Jewish Christians the Messiahship of Jes... [ Continue Reading ]
Matthew 1:2-6 a. καὶ τοὺς ἀδελφοὺς αὐτοῦ. This is not necessary to the genealogical line, but added to say by the way that He who belonged to the tribe of Judah belonged also to _all_ the tribes of Israel. (Weiss, Matthäusevang.).... [ Continue Reading ]
The genealogy divides into three parts: from Abraham to David (Matthew 1:2-6 a); from David to the captivity (Matthew 1:6-11); from the captivity to Christ. On closer inspection it turns out to be not so dry as it at first appeared. There are touches here and there which import into it an ethical si... [ Continue Reading ]
τὸν φαρὲς καὶ τὸν Ζαρὰ : Zerah added to Perez the continuator of the line, to suggest that it was by a special providence that the latter was first born (Genesis 38:27-30). The evangelist is on the outlook for the unusual or preternatural in history as prelude to the crowning marvel of the virgin bi... [ Continue Reading ]
a. τὸν Δαβὶδ τὸν βασιλέα, David _the King_, the title being added to distinguish him from the rest. It serves the same purpose as if David had been written in large letters. At length we arrive at the great royal name! The materials for the first part of the genealogy are taken from Ruth 4:18-22, an... [ Continue Reading ]
Matthew 1:6-10, ἐκ τῆς τοῦ Οὐρίου, _vide_ above. The chief feature in this second division of the genealogical table is the omission of three kings between Joram and Uzziah (Matthew 1:8), _viz._, Ahaziah, Joash, Amaziah. How is the omission to be explained? By inadvertence, or by intention, and if t... [ Continue Reading ]
Ἰωσίας ἐγεν. τὸν Ἰεχονίαν. There is an omission here also: Eliakim, son of Josiah and father of Jeconiah. It was noted and made a ground of reproach to Christians by Porphyry. Maldonatus, pressed by the difficulty, proposed to substitute for Jeconiah, Jehoiakim, the second of four sons ascribed to J... [ Continue Reading ]
In the last division the genealogical table escapes our control. After Zerubbabel no name occurs in the O. T. We might have expected to find Abiud in 1 Chronicles 3:19, where the children of Zerubbabel are given, but Abiud is not among them. The royal family sank into obscurity. It does not follow t... [ Continue Reading ]
Ἰακὼβ … τὸν Ἰωσὴφ : the genealogy ends with _Joseph_. It is then presumably his, not Mary's. But for apologetic or dogmatic considerations, no one would ever have thought of doubting this. What creates perplexity is that Joseph, while called the husband (τὸν ἄνδρα) of Mary, is not represented as the... [ Continue Reading ]
The evangelist pauses to point out the structure of his genealogy: three parts with fourteen members each; symmetrical, memorable; πᾶσαι does not imply, as Meyer and Weiss think, that in the opinion of the evangelist no links are omitted. He speaks simply of what lies under the eye. There they are,... [ Continue Reading ]
μνηστευθείσης … αὐτούς indicates the position of Mary in relation to Joseph when her pregnancy was discovered. Briefly it was betrothed, not married. Πρὶν ἢ συνελθεῖν means before they came together in one home as man and wife, it being implied that that would not take place before marriage. συνελθε... [ Continue Reading ]
THE BIRTH OF JESUS. This section gives the explanation which ἐξ ἧς ἐγεννήθη (Matthew 1:16) leads us to expect. It may be called _the justification of the genealogy_ (Schanz), showing that while the birth was exceptional in nature it yet took place in such circumstances, that Jesus might justly be re... [ Continue Reading ]
Ι. ὁ ἀνὴρ : proleptic, implying possession of a husband's rights and responsibilities. The betrothed man had a duty in the matter δίκαιος … δειγμανίσαι. He was in a strait betwixt two. Being δίκαιος, just, righteous, a respecter of the law, he could not overlook the apparent fault; on the other hand... [ Continue Reading ]
_Joseph delivered from his perplexity by angelic interposition_. How much painful, distressing, distracting thought he had about the matter day and night can be imagined. Relief came at last in a dream, of which Mary was the subject. ταῦτα … ἐνθυμηθέντος : the genitive absolute indicates the time of... [ Continue Reading ]
τέξεται Ἰησοῦν : Mary is about to bear a _son_, and He is to bear the significant name of _Jesus_. The style is an echo of O. T. story, Genesis 17:19, Sept [3], the birth of Isaac and that of Jesus being thereby placed side by side as similar in their preternatural character. καλέσεις : a command in... [ Continue Reading ]
τοῦτο δὲ … ἵνα πληρωθῇ. ἵνα is to be taken here, and indeed always in such connections, in its strict telic sense. The interest of the evangelist, as of all N. T. writers, in prophecy, was purely religious. For him O. T. oracles had exclusive reference to the events in the life of Jesus by which the... [ Continue Reading ]
_The prophetic reference_. As it is the evangelist's habit to cite O. T. prophecies in connection with leading incidents in the life of Jesus, it is natural, with most recent interpreters, to regard these words, not as uttered by the angel, but as a comment of the narrator. The ancients, Chry., Theo... [ Continue Reading ]
_Joseph hesitates no more_ : immediate energetic action takes the place of painful doubt. Euthymius asks: Why did he so easily trust the dream in so great a matter? and answers: because the angel revealed to him the thought of his own heart, for he understood that the messenger must have come from G... [ Continue Reading ]
καὶ οὐκ ἐγίνωσκεν … υἱόν : absolute habitual (note the imperfect) abstinence from marital intercourse, the sole purpose of the hastened marriage being to legitimise the child. ἕως : not till then, and afterwards? Here comes in a _quæstio vexata_ of theology. Patristic and catholic authors say: not t... [ Continue Reading ]