1 A genealogy of Jesus Christ, son of David, son of Abraham.
2 Abraham begot Isaac, then Isaac begot Jacob, then Jacob begot Judah and his brothers;
3 then Judah begot Perez and Zerah by Tamar, then Perez begot Hezron, then Hezron begot Ram;
4 then Ram begot Amminadab, then Amminadab begot Nahshon, then Nahshon begot Salmon;
5 then Salmon begot Boaz by Rahab, then Boaz begot Obed by Ruth, then Obed begot Jesse;
6 then Jesse begot David the king. Then King David begot Solomon by her who had been of Uriah, Sins may be forgiven, but your curriculum remains. The only women included in the genealogy (Tamar, Rahab, Ruth [Deut. 23:3], Bathsheba) represent some violation—perhaps to emphasize the grace of God.
7 then Solomon begot Rehoboam, then Rehoboam begot Abijah, then Abijah begot Asa;
8 then Asa begot Jehoshaphat, then Jehoshaphat begot Joram, then Joram begot Uzziah;
9 then Uzziah begot Jotham, then Jotham begot Ahaz, then Ahaz begot Hezekiah;
10 then Hezekiah begot Manasseh, then Manasseh begot Amon, then Amon begot Josiah;
11 then Josiah begot Jeconiah and his brothers about the time of the Babylonian captivity.
12 After the Babylonian captivity Jeconiah begot Shealtiel, then Shealtiel begot Zerubbabel;
13 then Zerubbabel begot Abiud, then Abiud begot Eliakim, then Eliakim begot Azor;
14 then Azor begot Zadok, then Zadok begot Achim, then Achim begot Eliud;
15 then Eliud begot Eleazar, then Eleazar begot Matthan, then Matthan begot Jacob;
16 then Jacob begot Joseph the husband of Mary, by whom was begotten Jesus, who is called Christ. Here the formula changes, because Jesus could not be the son of Joseph—cf. Jeremiah 22:30.
17 So all the generations from Abraham to David are fourteen generations, and from David until the Babylonian captivity are fourteen generations, and from the Babylonian captivity until the Christ are fourteen generations. This is really Joseph’s genealogy. As foster father he confers the legal right to the throne of David on Jesus. Since the throne of David has to do with the covenant people, this genealogy only goes back to Abraham. In contrast Mary’s genealogy (Luke 3:23-38) goes back to Adam and God—Jesus was literally son of both Adam and God. It has been observed that from David to the captivity there were seventeen kings, but Ahaziah reigned only one year, Amon only two and Abijah only three, so they would not count as generations—Matthew is correct in saying there were fourteen ‘generations’.
18 Now the birth of Jesus Christ was like this: After His mother Mary was betrothed to Joseph, before they joined together, she was found to be pregnant by the Holy Spirit.
19 Then Joseph her husband, The betrothal was legally binding, so the man was then called ‘husband’, even before the physical union. being a just man and not wanting to humiliate her publicly, decided to repudiate her secretly.
20 But while he pondered these things, wow, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream saying: “Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to receive Mary as your wife, because that which has been conceived in her is of the Holy Spirit.
21 And she will give birth to a Son and you will call His name Jesus, because He will save His people from their sins.”
22 Now all this happened so that what was spoken by the Lord through the prophet should be fulfilled, namely:
23 “Behold, the virgin will become pregnant and bear a Son, and they shall call His name Emmanuel”, The quote is from Isaiah 7:14. Matthew uses the Greek parthenos, which unambiguously means ‘virgin’, to translate the Hebrew ’alma, which is ambiguous—it refers to a young woman who may be a virgin, but not necessarily. Isaiah did not use bethulah, which refers unambiguously to a virgin, because, I suppose, the context demands an immediate fulfillment, which was supplied by Isaiah’s wife, as the next chapter makes clear. which being translated is, ‘God with us’.
24 Then Joseph, being aroused from sleep, did as that angel of the Lord commanded him and received his wife, Apparently there was some urgency involved; it sounds like he did it that same night (Mary was at least three months pregnant).
25 but did not know her until The use of this conjunction implies that they had normal relations after Jesus’ birth, and in fact they had at least six children together. In the Bible the verb ‘to know’ is used to refer to sexual intercourse. she had given birth to her son, the firstborn. Only 0.5% of the Greek manuscripts, of objectively inferior quality, omit “her” and “the firstborn” (as in NIV, NASB, LB, TEV, etc.). That’s eight manuscripts against 1,454 that have been collated, but there are probably over 300 others yet to be collated that will swell the number against the eight. And he called His name JESUS.