In Matthew’s birth narrative, Matthew tells the lineage of Jesus through 3 sets of fourteen generations. The first set  (v.2-6) begins with Abraham and ends with David. The second set (v.6-11) begins with David and ends with Jeconiah. And the last set (v.12-16) begins with Jeconiah and ends with Jesus. Clearly in retelling a birth narrative, Matthew is trying everything he can to make a connection between Jesus and the office of the Jewish Messiah. Matthew intentionally starts and stops each section of generations with prominent figures in the Jewish community. The effect of this is that it personally connects Jesus directly to Abraham, David and Jeconiah. This is important because as the narrative continues we learn that Jesus is not the son of any man in actuality but sent directly from God by the Holy Spirit. Because Jesus was not “born of man” so to speak, Matthew demonstrates that his human father Joseph is from direct lineage of David and Abraham.

Also something I found interesting in this particular section is the strong emphasis to make sure that he pointed out fourteen generations even though there are not fourteen generations. Several times in the genealogy, Matthew omits people in the genealogy on purpose to keep the fourteen generation theme consistent. I think this is important because fourteen is a multiple of seven, and seven in Jewish culture represented completeness. Once again pointing to the case that everything is complete through Jesus because he is from God. Genealogies were very important in establishing a proper aretalogy. In this section, both Luke and Matthew are trying to demonstrate that Jesus is from God. Luke even takes his genealogy of Jesus further all the way to Adam! It is clear form the genealogy stories that the important thing that Matthew wants us to understand is that Jesus is from God.

In the birth story, Matthew tries to make as many parallel to Jesus and the Jewish people as possible. Just as Moses’ mom and to predict him from a king trying to kill all the male infants, so Mary must protect Jesus from being killed as an infant. Just as God brought the Israelites out of Egypt, so he brings Jesus and his family out of Egypt. Matthew tries to use as many parallel as possible to prove the Jewishness and Divinity of Jesus. No one man could have this much in common with huge figures such as Moses and David unless he was from God, seems to be Matthew’s whole premise.

a. Gospel stories of Jesus’s youth appear only in Matthew and Luke. In this, there is no underlying oral tradition behind it at all which makes each set functionally specific to each Gospel. In Matthew 1:1-17, he specifically discusses the genealogy of Jesus and formats it in 3 sets of fourteen. Many argue that this represents Jesus as the Messiah as a blood relative of David (which in Hebrew means 14). Other theories for this include the idea that this is a poetic approach symbolizing Joseph’s and Herod’s dreams which were sent from the Holy Spirit to tell of the process of the coming of the Messiah (White 242-243). Matthew’s genealogy section one of Jesus begins with Abraham and ends with King David of Israel (Matthew 1:1-6). The next section included fourteen generations between David and Jechoniah which is when the deportation to Babylon took place (Matthew 1:7-11). Last, after the deportation to Babylon, the generations between Jechoniah and Joseph were listed which would make Jesus the fourteenth generation of section three (Matthew 1:12-17). Matthew does this in a way to highlight Jesus’ deep roots and lineage with Israel and the Jews. Because this lineage exposes that Jesus is the son of both David the king and Abraham the patriarch, he is now shown to be royal and a true Israelite. As shown in ancient aretalogies, lineages become very important in validating and convincing a following that an individual, in this case Jesus, is divine if it can be tied back to a powerful historical figure(s) such as David and Abraham.

b. Verses 1:18-2:23 are all included by Matthew with the purpose of providing proof and reason of Jesus being the Messiah who has come to fulfill Jewish prophecy. Matthew explains the forthcoming of the holy spirit, the rising star which led to Jesus, and the Messiah’s extraordinary birth. All of  these serve as Matthew’s literary evidence of prophecy. Joseph’s, Mary’s and baby Jesus’s flight to Egypt is unique to the Gospel of Matthew, as is Herod’s slaughter of the children. Raymond Brown refers to this as verisimilitude, or a story that gives the appearance of being real when it is not, especially if it is based off of some other legend or event. In this case, he argues that Matthew’s story is based off of the story of Moses’s birth and the pharaoh’s attempt to kill all of the male children of the Israelites (White 240). The Matthew birth narrative also ties directly with the Moses-Joshua/Egypt-Exodus tradition, especially in Matt 2:15 when he says “Out of Egypt have I called my son.”. The parallel to this is shown in Exodus as it quotes “When Israel was a child I loved him, and out of Egypt I called my son (II:I). Furthermore, it is stated that Matthew’s story of Jesus’s return from Egypt to Nazareth is based on the wording of Isaiah II:I. All of this points to the theory that Matthew is collecting Jewish scriptures and combining them to develop his literary story of Jesus’s birth and further prove that he is truly the Messiah, son of God.

The birth narrative of Jesus does not appear in the book of Mark, the first written gospel, and surfaced at first in the book of Matthew. It is speculated whether there was oral tradition regarding Jesus’ birth before the writings of Matthew, however as Matthew has such a specific theme in telling and composing the birth story, it is easiest to understand that in it’s earliest form the story is carefully and intentionally crafted by Matthew.

Matthew’s main theme regarding the birth narrative is the clear emphasis on Jesus as the Messiah being a part of the Davidic bloodline, and also being fully Jewish. His genealogy is separated into three, roughly fourteen generation parts. A theory for this arrangement is that the numerical value of the name David in Hebrew is fourteen. Another potential reason is the flow or the rhythm of the literary structure as crafted by Matthew; there are three parts of generations, and three different dreams given to Joseph.

The first part of the genealogy begins with Abraham and leads to David, claiming strong ties to his role as a Jew (from Abraham,) and as royalty and “messiah,” or “anointed one,” (from David.) The second is David to Jechoniah at the deportation of Babylon. And the third is from the deportation of Babylon to Joseph, the father of Jesus “who is called the Messiah.” (1:16) Matthew’s intention for this genealogy is largely to emphasize the identity of Jesus as a true Israelite, and to show his ties to the important figures of Abraham and David. This is Matthew’s way of stating the divine parentage (or lineage) of Jesus, which often are tied to birth stories in aretalogies. Matthew focuses on these main figures and ideas to support his claims of Jesus, as there was little circulation of information about his lineage.

The book of Matthew has a strong theme of prophecy and fulfillment, especially from Jewish scriptures. Matthew uses scriptures that aren’t necessarily referencing Jesus, and shapes them to the story of the birth of Jesus. His use of Hosea 11:1 “Out of Egypt I have called my son,” originally speaks of the Exodus of Israel out of Egypt. It is purposed by Matthew to be prophetic for Joseph in his dreams to move out of Egypt. He further related the birth story of Jesus to the Moses tradition by referencing Jeremiah 31:15, “Rachel weeping for her children.” Matthew related this verse to the slaughter of the children found in the Moses story, and then ties it to the order of Herod, which put Jesus in the same circumstances as Moses. Matthew uses these Jewish scriptures, as well as other prophecy fulfillments, to further shape the image of Jesus as divine and set apart by God. Through the line of Abraham and David he is seen as royal and a part of God’s chosen people, and through the references to Exodus and the Moses tradition he is seen as a similar savior to God’s people; a figure with divine purpose as seen in his birth story, or the “anticipated prophet like Moses” (White, 248)