Tool Beta
The Ancient World Behind the Text: Ideas
The customs, offices and ideas a first reader knew without being told, what each meant then, and the nearest thing you already know.
Family trees, myths and genealogies
Lists of ancestors that proved who you were: a true Israelite, a priest, an heir of David. Matthew opens with one. Some teachers also spun stories and family trees out of the Bible's lists, which 1 Timothy calls myths and endless genealogies.
Her grandmother could name the family back seven generations, and everyone at the table knew why it mattered. A genealogy is a list of ancestors. In Jesus' world it was proof: of belonging to Israel, of the right to serve as a priest, or of a claim to David's throne. Lists could skip names and round off numbers to make a pattern, and they normally named men only.
Ancient biographies usually began with their subject's noble ancestry, and Jewish genealogies documented a person's line as a pure Israelite, a priest or royalty. At least partial records of important families, especially priestly ones, were kept in the temple. A claim to David's line made before AD 70 could still be checked (Keener, citing Romans 1:3). Josephus closes his own priestly pedigree with the words "Thus have I set down the genealogy of my family" and says he took it from the public records. Jews kept genealogies to establish heritage, inheritance, legitimacy and rights. Genealogies could leave out generations, and dividing history into eras was common. Women did not need to appear. Bailey writes, "Middle Eastern genealogies are expected to be lists of men." Wright adds that tracing your line through David and the kings of Judah was a political statement under Herod, who had no royal blood. Lists could also be spun out. Some Jewish works of the period expanded the Bible's genealogies, and some claimed ancestry the Bible never gave. Philosophers from Plato on dismissed myths and genealogies together. Philo and Josephus denied that Scripture held any myths, but stories elaborating on the Bible were common, and Keener thinks these are the myths of 1 Timothy. The ESV Study Bible takes the genealogies there as speculation built on Old Testament accounts of biblical figures and their family trees. Jewish tradition also named Pharaoh's magicians Jannes and Jambres, the kind of elaboration that may lie behind the myths Paul opposes. Keener takes the Jewish myths of Titus 1:14 to mean especially haggadot, stories that amplified or explained the Bible's narratives.
An analogy: a royal line of succession printed in an official program. It looks like a dry list of names, but every name is a claim, and anyone who wants the crown has to appear on it.
A family tree at the start of a story states a claim before the story begins, as Matthew 1:1 does with David and Abraham, while Luke 3:23-38 runs the other way, from Jesus back to Adam, as Greek genealogies did. A list could be shaped, cut and counted to make a point, so its gaps and surprise names are part of the message. Speculation spun out of the Bible's family trees is what 1 Timothy 1:4 calls endless genealogies.
Not an exact official record. A line of succession lists every heir in order. Ancient genealogies could leave out generations and shape history into eras, and some writers spun stories and claims out of the Bible's lists.
Two points. First, why Matthew names four women. Keener and the CSB Study Bible read them as Gentiles, or tied to a Gentile, hinting at the coming mission to all peoples. Bailey sees saints and sinners, men and women, all showing initiative. Wright reads them as reminders of the strange ways God worked inside the royal family, preparing for Mary's story. Heiser, following Amy Richter, argues that each woman's story echoes the Watchers' sin as told in 1 Enoch. Matthew names them, he writes, "to portend a messianic reversal of the sin of the Watchers." Second, what the myths and endless genealogies of 1 Timothy 1:4 were. Keener and his notes take them as Jewish elaborations of biblical stories and family lines, and the ESV Study Bible as speculation on Old Testament accounts. Wright and Bird find the false teaching rooted in Jewish soil. If the letter is late, they add, the attack on myths and genealogies is more likely aimed at the Valentinians, whose teaching traced a genealogy of heavenly beings.
- {"u":"https:\/\/jayms.com\/bible-study-tools-2\/ancient-world-passages\/matthew-1-1-17\/","n":"Matthew 1:1-17, The family tree","s":"Matthew opens with Jesus' ancestry from Abraham through David and the exile, in three sets of fourteen generations, and names four women along the way.","r":"Matthew 1:1-17"}
- {"u":"https:\/\/jayms.com\/bible-study-tools-2\/ancient-world-passages\/1timothy-1-1-11\/","n":"1 Timothy 1:1-11, Myths, endless genealogies and would-be teachers of the law","s":"Paul greets Timothy, whom he left in Ephesus, and tells him to stop certain people teaching strange doctrines and spending themselves on myths and endless genealogies; they want to be teachers of the law without understanding it, while the law is meant for the lawless.","r":"1 Timothy 1:1-11"}
- {"u":"https:\/\/jayms.com\/bible-study-tools-2\/ancient-world-passages\/2timothy-3-1-9\/","n":"2 Timothy 3:1-9, Terrible times, homes entered, and Jannes and Jambres","s":"Paul warns that the last days will bring terrible times and people who love themselves, money and pleasure, having a form of godliness but denying its power; some worm their way into homes and win over gullible women, opposing the truth as Jannes and Jambres opposed Moses.","r":"2 Timothy 3:1-9"}
- {"u":"https:\/\/jayms.com\/bible-study-tools-2\/ancient-world-passages\/titus-1-10-16\/","n":"Titus 1:10-16, The circumcision group, and Cretans always liars","s":"Many rebellious talkers and deceivers, especially of the circumcision group, are upsetting whole households for dishonest gain; Paul quotes a Cretan prophet who called Cretans always liars, and warns against Jewish myths and human commands, for to the pure all things are pure.","r":"Titus 1:10-16"}
- {"u":"https:\/\/jayms.com\/bible-study-tools-2\/ancient-world-passages\/titus-3-9-15\/","n":"Titus 3:9-15, A divisive person, winter at Nicopolis, and Zenas and Apollos","s":"Titus is to avoid foolish controversies, genealogies and quarrels about the law, and to warn a divisive person twice before having nothing more to do with him; Paul plans to winter at Nicopolis and asks Titus to send Zenas the lawyer and Apollos on their way with everything they need.","r":"Titus 3:9-15"}
- {"u":"https:\/\/jayms.com\/bible-study-tools-2\/divine-council-index\/matthew-1-1-6\/","n":"Matthew 1:1-6","s":"Four women named in the genealogy of Jesus, each with an irregular story.","r":"Matthew 1:1-6"}
- Craig S. Keener, The IVP Bible Background Commentary: New Testament, on Matthew 1:1-17, 1:2-16 and 1:17
- NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible, notes on Matthew 1:3, 1:6, 1:13-16 and 1:17
- ESV Study Bible, study note on Matthew 1:1-17
- CSB Study Bible, note on Matthew 1:2
- Kenneth E. Bailey, Jesus Through Middle Eastern Eyes, ch. 2, The Genealogy and Joseph the Just
- N. T. Wright, Matthew for Everyone, Part One, comment on Matthew 1:1-17
- Michael S. Heiser, Reversing Hermon, ch. 5, The Sin of the Watchers and the Genealogy of Jesus
- Josephus, The Life of Flavius Josephus 1, trans. William Whiston
- Craig S. Keener, The IVP Bible Background Commentary: New Testament, on 1 Timothy 1:4
- NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible, note on 1 Timothy 1:4
- ESV Study Bible, study note on 1 Timothy 1:4
- N. T. Wright and Michael F. Bird, The New Testament in Its World, ch. 23, Date, Opponents, and box Portals and Parallels: Irenaeus on Valentinian Cosmology
- NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible, note on 2 Timothy 3:8
- Craig S. Keener, The IVP Bible Background Commentary: New Testament, on 2 Timothy 3:8
- Craig S. Keener, The IVP Bible Background Commentary: New Testament, on Titus 1:14 and 3:9
- NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible, notes on Titus 1:14 and 3:9
