Why does Matthew include these women in Jesus' genealogy?

Question

One of the unique features of Jesus genealogy in the book of Matthew is the inclusion of four women, not counting Mary.

Matthew 1:3

Judah the father of Perez and Zerah, whose mother was Tamar

Matthew 1:5

Salmon the father of Boaz, whose mother was Rahab, Boaz the father of Obed, whose mother was Ruth

Matthew 1:6

David was the father of Solomon, whose mother had been Uriah’s wife

Matthew 1:16

and Jacob the father of Joseph, the husband of Mary, and Mary was the mother of Jesus who is called the Messiah.

Why does Matthew include these women and no others? Is there a common element that somehow distinguishes them for inclusion in Jesus' genealogy?

Answer 1

In part, Matthew is laying the groundwork for the naming of Jesus, so named because "He will save His people from their sins" (Mt 1:21). In various ways, these women reveal the mess of the Messiah's own family tree.

Matthew is not of course implying that the women are the primary sinners in the stories they evoke. But the mention of David without Bathsheba could bring to mind a host of other aspects of his life. Instead, Matthew rubs our noses in it; he doesn't even say "Bathsheba," but "her of Uriah." Similarly, with Judah and Tamar. Rahab of course never gets her name mentioned without a reminder of the fact that she had been a harlot.

Another aspect of the genealogy may tie to the climax of the Gospel, where Jesus sends the disciples to disciple the nations, and of course the incorporation of the nations into Messiah has traces in His own family line, with Ruth in particular. But the connotations of sin are not absent in Ruth's story either; her mention evokes the events leading to her inclusion in Israel, events in which Israel had come under the judgment of famine due to their sins (as predicted in e.g. Deut 28).

Answer 2

Each of these women recognized the expectation of the "Promised Seed" by faith in God's covenant with Abraham and David, respectively.

For an amplified discussion of Tamar, Rahab, and Ruth, and their respective goal of the pursuit-and-capture of the "Promised Seed" by faith, please click here. (Please note however that Bathsheba is not mentioned by name in the Matthew genealogy, but only mentioned to show that the kingly right of Jesus to the Davidic throne was through Solomon.) And so finally it is Mary who is named and understands from the angel Gabriel that she was to be the actual mother of The Promised Seed (compare Luke 1:32 with the "help to Israel" mentioned by Mary in Luke 1:54-55), and so she provided her consent to the angel Gabriel to conceive (Luke 1:38).

In other words, the listing of these four women by name was to highlight how the "Promised Seed" was expected by them through their understanding and faith in the Abrahamic and Davidic covenants. That is, they desired and therefore each had sought to conceive the Promised Seed by faith.

Last but not least, we must note that these four women plus Bathsheba were women of "shame": if she was not unattractive, then she was indeed a widowed wallflower (Tamar); another was the mother of Boaz, who was a Canaanite prostitute (Rahab); another widow was a cursed Moabite (Deut 23:3) that had married Boaz (Ruth); one was an adulteress (Bathsheba); and finally the last was a woman of abject penury and of no account (Mary). In other words, Jesus was not a man with a distinguished racial pedigree to his name.

Answer 3

Matthew’s genealogy forms the preface to an extended account of Jesus’ nativity in which Mary plays the most prominent role.

But Matthew’s genealogy cannot be taken “literally.” It has been edited to make a “theological” point, as virtually everyone has recognized since antiquity. But what point?

Although not literally Mary’s genealogy, I believe that Matthew included these women of “ill repute” as a polemic. Mary fits into the genealogy in the same way Tamar, Rahab, and Bathsheba do. Women whose virtue was questioned, to say the least, but who played an otherwise critical (indispensable) role in the perpetuation of the lineage.

As “Gone Quiet” wrote, these women “redeemed” themselves in the Scriptures—a fact that men (who record the genealogies) may overlook. After all, men expect women to be more virtuous, and may be less forgiving when they are not—especially when the infraction committed by women is sexual. (And nevermind that every man in these genealogies is a sinner.)

Well aware of the fact that God is no respecter of persons Matthew's genealogy is scandalous.

This may even serve to date Matthew’s Gospel—it was, at least in its introduction, written to counter the charge that Jesus was “illegitimate.” A charge made early in Jesus’ ministry (See John.) If Jesus was "illegitimate" so were so many men included in the genealogies of honored men.

Such a charge (illegitimacy) would have had little effect outside an exclusively Jewish milieu. And would have been rendered moot after the more-or-less systematic destruction of Jewish records by Herod, the Zealots, and the Romans in the first century.

It's really Mary's genealogy, not even Jesus', spiritually, not literally.

Answer 4

Let us consider that the four women mentioned in Matthew's genealogy were foreigners. This is obviously the case regarding Rahab and Ruth. Tamar's ancestry is not given in the Genesis account where she is named, but as she is intimately connected with Judah's shameful behavior among the Canaanites, starting with taking a consort who is Canaanite, it is reasonable to suppose that Tamar is also a Canaanite. Bathsheba's origins are unknown, but Matthew seems to take care to emphasize her connection to the Hittites. These four represent, then, the Church being drawn from all the nations - the Hittites to the north of Israel, Moab to the south, the Canaanites to the west and Jericho on the eastern border. Matthew is also the one evangelist who relates the visitation of the Magi, again emphasizing that this news is for all the nations.

Answer 5

The first sign is that women were not included in Israeli genealogies. The second sign is their reputation. The teaching is that Jews who did not believe in the virgin birth of Jesus, who looking at previous women, respected Mary at least as an ordinary mother. I hope it is understandable in English.

Answer 6

He skipped one by the way. One of the more interesting ancestors of Jesus was born in the cave above Sodom and Gomorrah. Lot and his daughters flee to the cave. In there, with the help of quantities of wine, The group has an incestuous encounter. One of the children that come from that encounter is Moab. Moab is the ancestor of Ruth who is the ancestor of David who is the ancestor of Christ. God sometimes walks us by twisted pathways. As one other answer points out, God seems to have omitted the more virtuous women from the line of his son.

Answer 7

1. In the first verse, the words Abraham and David are close, this, for a Jew, brings to mind Mount Moriah, the Jewish Temple in Jerusalem and the Sacrifice of the Lamb.

2. Jewish genealogies were always male and the social behaviors that allowed the enslavement of relatives and it was extremely insulting to Jewish culture to quote women... In this part the Jews are "nervous on edge"...

3. Contextualized, all atypical plot of the first verses was to justify the 18th verse of the first chapter, if the Jews do not believe in the story or story of the virgin birth of Jesus Christ, respect his birth in a natural way, because the Jewish matriarchs according to the Hebrew scriptures had moral problems of a sexual nature. .

4. Some later, realizing that it could not only be a defense, but an attack, could be behind the Yeshu quote. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yeshu

Answer 8

Each of these women (except Rahab) risked their life in a seemingly immoral sexual relationship in order to perpetuate the messianic lineage.

• Tamar conceived twins with her father-in-law Judah while disguised as a prostitute at the gate of a Canaanite town. Not knowing he was the their father, he planned to burn her to death when he discovered she was pregnant. Tamar's courage ensured the survival of Judah's line. (Gen. 38)

• Rahab was a prostitute of Jericho who risked her life to act as a spy for Joshua's men. Without her, the battle of Jericho would not have been won and the conquest of Canaan would have failed. King David and his descendants, including Jesus, might never have been born. (Josh 2)

• Ruth was a Moabite who left her own people to follow her mother-in-law to an enemy land. It was forbidden for Israelites to marry Moabite women, (Deuteronomy 23:3) so her determination to follow her mother-in-law to a foreign land was an extremely dangerous proposition. (Book of Ruth)

• Bathsheba could have have been condemned for adultery by having sex with David while she was the wife of Uriah the Hittite. Instead, after losing her first child, she became the mother of Solomon and the foremother of all of the kings of Judah. (2 Sam' 11-12)

• Mary also risked condemnation as an adulteress when she turned up pregnant while betrothed to Joseph after returning from the home of the priest Zechariah. Under Jewish law, a betrothal was a legal marriage. If Joseph had not protected her, she could even have been stoned to death. (Mt. 1:19)

Each of these women, speaking from a human point of view, appeared to violate the sexual mores of their times. In reality, they were providential instruments who, whether knowingly of not, were used by God to prepare the lineage of king David, and ultimately Jesus. For Matthew the sinless birth of Jesus was a crucial idea. Because of their special roles in producing it, they were included in Matthew's genealogy.

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The case of Rahab may be an exception because Rahab of Jericho lived centuries before Rahab the mother Boaz. Either Matthew means "mother" in the sense of foremother, or he mentions Boaz' mother for another reason, unknown to us.

Answer 9

The question really ought to be why are 5 women mentioned, since Mary is mentioned last as the mother of Jesus.

Some commentators note a numerical coded pattern of 7 (the numeric representation of perfection) or multiples that suggests that this may be some sort of coded message with a hidden meaning that has long been lost.

The author has deliberately added these five women and evidently left out some male generations (possibly because they destroyed the sequence of 14 (double perfection) generations). The Imperfect actions of these women aiding the double perfect plan. King David, the name in numerics is D-V-D is represented as D = 4, V = 6, D = 4, which equals 14 - double perfection. It is 14 generations from Abraham to King David (Double perfect ruler of Israel), 14 generations from David to the greatest calamity of the exile, and 14 generations from the exile to the saviour. Yet Matthew added these 5 women who's imperfect actions aided the double perfect plan of God's salvation for all .

It cannot be a lineal genealogy of Jesus since if we take it at face value, then if Jesus is fathered by the Holy spirit, the lineage mentioned is null and void, since hereditary descent is always through the male line, not the female line. These 5 women were all involved in some scandalous sexual impropriety, 4 were foreigners (non-Jew, gentiles) which at first glance, destroys any claims that Jesus had a 'pure' national blood line. Note Also Mary is mentioned as the mother of Jesus, and is herself involved in the scandal of pregnancy outside of wedlock. And yet all 5 women played vital roles in furthering the advancement of the kingdom of God in their time. In other words, God used the activities of scandalous women to aid the Israelites and further God's plan.

Rahab was a prostitute in Jericho who aided the Israelite spies and directly furthered God's plan. Ruth was the grandmother of king David. The wife of Uriah the Hittite, had an adulterous relationship with David, and fathered Solomon the wisest ruler of Israel - So God used an adulterous relationship to create the greatest king of the Jews. Mary was the mother of Jesus the saviour.

If the whole genealogy in Matthew is meant to represent God's doubly perfect plan then by including these 'fallen' women, the author is saying that God's plan for salvation can mitigate even the gravest of sins, and use the greatest of Sinners for his cause. It also shows that God had always planned for salvation to include even the lowest of outcasts from Israelite/Jewish society, by using foreign women to represent gentiles.

There may well be some secret numerology embedded within the text, then could these women have been added because the numerology of their name adds some kind of code revolving around the number 7 that typically represents perfection?