Levites and the Exodus Multitude (2)

This Part 2 is the continuation and conclusion of “Levites and the Exodus Multitude (1)”.  Part 1 should be read first.  Little of the background material in (1) will be repeated here in (2).

In Part 1, three questions were posed:

#1. How did the lineage branch of Levi’s son Koháth (Jacob’s grandson), reckoned from that 1 man, become 8,600 male descendants early in the wilderness…after only 4 generations?!  Nu.3:27-28 “Of Kohath…the numbering of all the males from one month old and upwards, was 8,600.”  That’s an astounding increase in so few generations!  cf. 1Ch.6:1-3.  The lineage was traced in (1).

Levi and his 3 sons Kohath, Gershón, Merarí and their families moved with Jacob/Israel from the Land of Canáan to Egypt (Ge.46:6, 11) circa/c 1827 BC.

#2. How did the tribe of Levi, grown from his 3 sons, become 22,000 or 22,300 males from age one month and up…during that same period (215 years)?!  Nu.3:39 “All the numbered men of the Levites, from a month old and upward, were 22,000.”  An astounding increase!

Furthermore, during that same period, the initial 75-85 males (Ge.46:27 Septúagint/LXX) with Jacob & Joseph in Egypt increased to 603,550 non-Levite warriors age 20 and up, early in the wilderness (Nu.1:45-47)!  Exiting Egypt, Ex.12:37-38 “The sons of Israel journeyed…600,000 men on foot. And a mixed multitude went with them.”  Josephus Antiquities of the Jews 2:15:1 “The entire multitude of those who went out, including the women and children, that were of a fit age for war, were 600,000.”  Philo On the Life of Moses 1:27:147 “The men of age to bear arms were more than 600,000 men.”

#3. How did the 75-85 males become 600,000 after only 4 generations?!  Another astounding increase in only 215 years!  (ref Part 1 for the timeline.)  Could near 600,000 be accurate?  also see the topics “Chronology: Abraham to the Exodus” and “Israelites Identification”.

Following Jacob’s move into Egypt, Ge.47:27 “Israel settled in the land of Egypt, in the Góshen region, and became very numerous”.  Egypt’s Pharaoh said in Ex.1:7-9, “The people of the sons of Israel are more and mightier than we”.  ref Ps.105:23-24.  Perhaps they really did outnumber the Egyptians!?  Ex.1:22 so Pharaoh commanded for all Hebrew male babies to be cast into the Nile River.  Ex.2:2-3, 10 when Moses was three months old, his mother placed him in a basket and put him in the Nile.  Ac.7:19-21 confirms the infants were put out to die.  (Infanticide reduced somewhat the Hebrew population.)

Ex.18:21 Moses, early on the way to the Promised Land, was advised by his father-in-law Jethró  to divide all the departees according to thousands of people, or clans.

Yet in Ex.23:29-30 the Lord told Moses that He would drive out the wicked inhabitants of the Land of Canaan little by little, so the Land wouldn’t become desolate and wild animals be too numerous.  Apparently the approximately 2 million people (including women & children) coming in from Egypt to replace the wicked occupants wouldn’t fill the Land area.  Comparatively, in 2020 AD the population of modern Israel was 8.5 million…6 million more than the total exodus population approaching that Land.  Though ‘Hebrews’ had outnumbered Egyptians, the Canaanites outnumbered the exodus population.

Prior to entering the Land, in De.11:23 Moses told the next two generations, “The Lord will drive out all these nations from before you, and you will dispossess nations greater and mightier than you”.  In those days, a force of 600,000 men would itself be a great army!  But others had greater renown.  The combined armies/peoples of the seven “nations” were greater (De.7:1).  Nu.13:31 the Israelite spies said, “We can’t attack those people, for they are stronger than we”.  So they feared the Land occupants.

In Nu.20:17 & 21:22, it seems unrealistic that 2 million people (including women & children) could’ve traveled on the King’s Highway en masse.  Even if they walked on the road plain in ‘rows’ of seventy, the line of people would have stretched for miles!

Nu.3:16-20, Ex.6:16-25 and 1Ch.6:1-4 attest to the same number of few Levite generations, beginning with Levi.  There’s no indication that any generations were omitted/skipped.  see Part 1.

So, in light of the above passages (and those referenced in Part 1)…were there really 600,000 Israelite warriors, 22,000 Levite and 8,600 Kohathite males early in the wilderness?  That many?!  It is somewhat disconcerting that to date little or no evidence of a mass exodus totaling 2 million people in the wilderness has been found.  Perhaps continued archaeological efforts will unearth more evidence?

Following are three possible explanations for the large population numbers in the exodus/wilderness:

1.) Biblical numbers could’ve been misread or misunderstood by translators.  If so, there weren’t really as many as 8,600 Kohathites, 22,000 Levites, plus 600,000 soldiers then.  The Hebrew term for thousand is éleph (Strongs h505).  Eleph is also translated family in Jg.6:15 KJV.  But Jg.6:15 LXX, “Gideon said to Him, ‘My thousand [family KJV] is weakened in Manasseh”.  Did eleph really refer to a troop/family (instead of 1,000)?  For detailed analyses of this possibility, ref: John W. Wenham Large Numbers in the Old Testament, Colin J. Humphreys The Number of People in the Exodus From Egypt, Jim Snapp The Quest for the Historical Census, Clark Morledge Did An Army of 600,000 Israelites Conquer the Land of Canaan?, David M. Fouts A Defense of the Hyperbolic Interpretation of Numbers in the Old Testament, Ben-Zion Katz Recounting the Census.  It’s possible the numbers 600,000, 22,000, 8,600 were mistakes in translation from the ancient Hebrew.  However, 2,000 years ago the Jewish historians Josephus & Philo both said the number of exodus soldiers was 600,000.

2.) There were brothers or half-brothers in the generations, not listed by Moses in the Péntateuch.  For example, the later 1Ch.23:20 listing of Issiáh as a son of Moses’ uncle Uzziél may indicate that was the case.  Ge.5:3-30 said the ancient antediluvians had other unidentified sons & daughters.  Abraham had at least 6 additional identified sons not born to Sarah (Ge.25:1-2).  Some Bible historians and yeshíva teaching think the large population in the exodus resulted from polygyny.  e.g. c 1300 BC, Jg.8:30-32 “Gideon had seventy sons, for he had many wives. His concubine in Shechém also bore him a son, Abimélech. Gideon died at a good old age.”  (see “Polygyny – Lawful in God’s Eyes?”.)

3.) There were others besides Israelites in the exodus.  Included with the approximately 600,000 fighting men leaving Egypt (Nu.11:21) was a mixed multitude of people.  Adding women & children would’ve brought the total to 2,000,000 or so!  Nu.1:45-47 “All the numbered men were 603,550. The Levites weren’t numbered among them.”  Who all comprised this mixed multitude?

Ex.12:37-38 “A mixed multitude of people went up with them, along with flocks and herds.”  Others also left Egypt with biological Israelites.  JFB Commentary Ex.12:38 “A great rabble’ (see also Nu 11:4; De 29:11); slaves, persons in the lowest grades of society, partly natives and partly foreigners, bound close to them as companions in misery, and gladly availing themselves of the opportunity to escape.”  Ellicott Commentary “Some may have been Egyptians, impressed by the recent miracles; some foreigners held to servitude, like the Israelites, and glad to escape their masters.”  LXX NETS “A great mixed crowd went up with them.”  So many non-Israelites also left Egypt in the exodus.

Cambridge Bible Note “Non-Israelites of various kinds are meant; e.g. Egyptians who had intermarried with Israelites.”  Since Israelite newborn males were thrown into the Nile River, there’d be a surplus of Israelite females to marry Egyptians or others.  In Le.24:10, Moses wrote of a man in the camp whose mother was an Israelite but whose father was an Egyptian.  So, Egyptian blood was present in Israelites.

The Bible uses patrilineal reckoning from the fathers (not the traditional Jewish matrilineal reckoning from mothers).  Nu.1:18 “They registered by ancestry in their families, by their father’s households, according to the number of names.”  Not according to the mothers.  Philo op.cit. “Among the mixed multitude were those born to Hebrew fathers by Egyptian mothers, who were enrolled as members of their father’s race. And some, also, who had come over to them by reason of the magnitude of the incessant punishments which had been inflicted on their own countrymen [Egyptians].”

Also, we read of intermarriage by Joseph c 1837 BC, 225 years prior to the exodus.  Ge.41:45 Pharaoh had given Joseph an Egyptian wife named Asenáth, the daughter of the priest of On (LXX Heliópolis).  So Joseph’s sons Ephráim & Manasséh were both half Egyptian (Ge.46:20).

Did Ephraim & Manasseh likewise take Egyptian wives?  If so, then Joseph’s grandchildren had mostly Egyptian blood!  (Ephraim & Manasseh were first cousins of Kohath, the son of Levi.)  Ge.46:27 LXX says Joseph had nine sons.  Jacob prophesied that the names of Joseph’s other (half-Egyptian) sons would be attached to the inheritances of Ephraim & Manasseh (Ge.48:5-6).  Early in the wilderness, the soldiers of Ephraim & Manasseh numbered 72,700 men (Nu.2:18-21).  Although they became two of the twelve tribes of Israel in the Land of Canaan, there was (much) Egyptian blood in their ancestry.

Note: Ge.50:23 Manasseh’s son was Machír.  Machir’s son Gilead (Joseph’s great-grandson) was of the same generation as Moses & Aaron.  Nun, the father of Joshua, was the same generation as Gilead.  Zelophehád (son of Hépher) was Gilead’s grandson. (see 1Ch.7:14-27, Nu.26:28-37, 27:1, Jsh.17:3.)

Ex.30:11-16 Moses was to levy a poll tax on the men of military age.  (This became the basis for the later temple tax.  cf. Mt.17:24-27.)   Ex.38:25-26 “The silver from those of the community who were numbered was 100 talents and 1,775 shekels. A half-shekel a head for those who were numbered from age 20 and up, for 603,550 men.”  This half-shekel tax for the tabernacle was taken from all non-Levite soldiers. (A shekel weighed approximately ½ ounce.)  Barnes Notes “The talent contained 3,000 shekels.”  So 100 talents of silver = 300,000 shekels.  Add the 1,775 shekels, and the total = 301,775 shekels.  This amount is exactly 603,550 half-shekels (békahs)!  It matches the population figure of Nu.1:45-47.  The amount of silver taken as tax appears to confirm the number of Israelite/mixed multitude fighting men.

{Sidelight: However, the 1,000,000 talents in 1Ch.22:14 would equal 3 billion shekels (at the rate used in Ex.38:25-26)!  But 1½ billion ounces of silver is unrealistic…it would be enough to build Solomon’s temple of solid silver!  Also, the 10,000 talents of silver in Est.3:8-9 would equal 30 million shekels!  That’s 15 million ounces or nearly 1 million lbs. of silver personally owned by Hamán!  An unrealistic amount.  It’s likely the weight of the shekel or talent had changed since Moses wrote Exodus.}

Early in the wilderness is Nu.3:39-43. “All the Levites from one month old and upward were 22,000….All the firstborn males from one month old and up were 22,273.”  The difference was only 273 males.  v.44-45 “The Lord spoke to Moses saying, ‘Take the Levites instead of the firstborn among the sons of Israel.”  The firstborn, who had belonged to the Lord (Ex.13:1-2), were redeemed…replaced by the 22,000 Levites.

But Nu.1:46 says there were 603,550 warriors from their tribes, age 20 and up.  If only 22,273 out of the more than 603,550 were firstborns…those were huge families!  603,550 ÷ 22,273 = 27.  Did each family average more than 27 sons?  Add an equal number of daughters, and that’s over 50 children per family!  But… most of those 603,550 weren’t ‘purely’ Israelites.

In the wilderness 39 years later is Nu.26:57-62. “These are those who were numbered of the Levites….23,000.”  So during 39 years, the number of Levite males increased from an approximate 22,000 to 23,000.  That’s an increase of only 1,000 in that generation.

Note: The male Israelites/mixed multitude age 20 and up (born in Egypt) died in the wilderness, except for Joshua & Caleb (Nu.14:27-30).  Excluded were Levites (Nu.1:47), males under age 20, and women.  Aaron’s grandson Phineás, in the 4^th generation of Kohathites after Kohath, was probably born around the time of the exodus.  Phineas’ bold intervention in Nu.25:7 didn’t occur until the 40^th year of their wanderings.  Phineas’ father Eleazár (Aaron’s son), the high priest, even outlived Joshua in the Land (cf. Nu.20:28 & Jsh.24:29-33).

What about past servants among the mixed multitude in the exodus?  Going back several generations….

In Ge.12:5, 16, 20:14, Abrám had many servants.  Ge.14:14 in Abram’s household (before the birth of Ishmaél) were 318 fighting men.  Plus he had other ‘house’ servants and those watching the livestock!

Ellicott Commentary Ge.14:14 “This large number of servants born in his house…added to the older men left to defend and take care of the cattle, proves that Abram was the chieftain of a powerful tribe.”  Barnes Notes “Abram had now a company of 318 trained men, born in his own house; which implies a following of more than 1,000 men, women and children.”  Pulpit Commentary “The children of his own patriarchal family, neither purchased nor taken in war, 318, implied a household of probably more than 1,000 souls.”  Abraham’s household was very large!  Ge.17:26-27 all the males were circumcised.

Ge.26:12-14 Isaac’s great substance.  Cambridge Bible Ge.26:14 “A large number of slaves and attendants.”  Ge.32:5-6 Jacob’s large household.  (Ge.34:13-15 indicates they’re circumcised.)  Ge.36:7 Jacob and Esau’s property was too great for them to dwell together.  Barnes Notes Ge.36:7 “What remained in the hands of Isaac was virtually Jacob’s, though he had not yet entered into formal possession of it.”

Ge.45:9-10 & 46:5-7, 26 “All the direct descendants of Jacob who went to Egypt with him were 66 in number; this does not include the wives of Jacob’s sons.”  Gill Exposition Ge.46:7 “No mention is made of servants, though no doubt many came along with him.”  James B. Jordan The Moses Connection “Abraham had 318 trained fighting men in his sheikdom. Estimates range up to 3,000 or more for his complete household. These servants multiplied and became those of Isaac and Jacob. It might have been 10,000 people who moved to Goshen.”  So…numerous servants also went to Egypt c 1827 BC.

Francis Peloubet Select Notes, v.27, p.319 “Also the servants, ‘Who were reckoned as part of the household, and were admitted to the covenant [of circumcision, Ac.7:8], and recognized as Israelites.”

William R. Harper The Old Testament Student, v.6, p.248 “Jacob took to Egypt the whole body of his servants and retainers. These dependents…were all included in the covenant of circumcision, gradually blended while in Egypt, with the blood-kindred of Jacob, so that all alike were reckoned Israelites.”

Jacob’s entire household, including circumcised descendants and servants, had numbered perhaps 7,000 to 10,000 souls.  They too went with Jacob to his son Joseph in Egypt (Ge.47:11-12) c 1827 BC.  There they intermarried with Egyptians & other peoples, and “multiplied exceedingly” (Ge.47:27 KJV).

Jacob died 17 years after moving to Egypt (see Part 1 timeline).  A great funeral cavalcade, including Egyptian dignitaries, then traveled 300 miles to bury him east of the Jordan River (Ge.50:7-10).

The people multiplied in Egypt (Ex.1:5-9, 12, 20).  They became a great mixed nation (De.26:5).  The exodus “nation” of ancient Israel/mixed multitude was comprised of a motley group of people, not one pure race.  They’d increased to 603,550 soldiers, excluding Levites, early in the wilderness (Nu.1:46).

As for question #3 posed at the beginning: With mixed marriages, the assimilation of servants, concubines to bear children, Egyptians and others who left Egypt in the exodus…the 603,550 number of males early in the wilderness seems feasible.

The apostle Paul wrote in 1Co.10:1-5, “All were baptized into Moses in the cloud and the sea”.  The entire mixed multitude, and their children, were symbolically “baptized” in the Reed Sea.  They ate the manna in the wilderness.  (Nu.11:4 is the last direct reference in the Pentateuch to the mixed group.)

There were 601,730 males 39 years later (Nu.26:51), after those over age 20 had died in the wilderness.

That younger generation of motley peoples (children of the mixed multitude) born during the 40 years in the wilderness, weren’t circumcised.  So after crossing the Jordan River, Joshua had all the males circumcised at Gilgál (Jsh.5:2-8).  Whatever their ancestry, the 601,730 males all became circumcised!  cf. Ge.17:26-27 Abraham’s large household of servants, etc., not of his ancestry, had all become circumcised.  (see the topic “Circumcision in the Bible”.)

The children of the circumcised mixed multitude then received tribal territory when Joshua apportioned the Land of Canaan for the tribes of Israel (Jsh.13–19).  There, more intermarriage ensued among tribes.

As for questions #2 and #1 about the number of Levites and Kohathites: With past servants and other peoples having been assimilated into Levite and Kohathite households (in Egypt)…it seems feasible the males among them could total approximately 22,000 and 8,600 respectively (Nu.3:27-28, 39).

In the Land of Canaan, the Levites/Kohathites (including Aaronide priests) would live within the various tribal areas (Jsh.21).  There, Levites intermarried with those tribes.  Samuel was a Kohathite (fostered or ‘adopted’ by the high priest Eli) who lived in Ephraim c 1100 BC (1Sm.1:1, 25-28, 1Ch.6:22, 26-28).  When the Lord split the united monarchy (1Ki.12:20-24) in the 900s BC, most Levites joined with Judah & Benjamin as the southern kingdom of Judah…the Jews.

Ro.3:29-30 Paul said that God is the God of both Jews and gentiles, circumcised and uncircumcised.  Again, Israel with the mixed multitude were all “baptized” in the Sea, and they all ate the manna (1Co.10:1-3).  The Lord didn’t discriminate in that regard.  Ga.3:27-29 “There is neither Jew nor Greek…you are all one in Christ Jesus. And if you be Christ’s, then you are Abraham’s seed.”

Today Jewish Christians and gentile Christians are to be as one, all baptized in the name of Jesus.

As was the large ancestral mixture of peoples who exited Egypt, Christians today are a racial mixture. (see “Gentiles in the Bible”.)  And our numbers are increasing.

Re.7:9-12 “I looked, and behold, a great multitude, which no one could count, from every nation, and tribe, people and tongue, standing before the throne and before the Lamb.”  A mixed multitude from all nations cries out loudly, “Salvation to our God who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb. Amen.”

The mixed multitude with ancient Israel was a historical type of the great mixed multitude of humanity to whom our God is giving salvation.  Praise God!

Levites and the Exodus Multitude (1)

This topic traces the ancient Israelites – starting with Jacob’s relocation from the Land of Canáan to Egypt, their population growth…into the exodus & wilderness with the mixed multitude.  My focus here is on the growth of the Levites and, in detail, the descendants of Levi’s son Koháth, the Kohathites.

The Bible characters in this topic lived far back in history.  Dating for their births & deaths is inexact.  The dates used are approximate, to place the Levite lineage in historical perspective.  The chronological framework is taken from Dr. Martin Anstey The Romance of Bible Chronology, v.2.

The patriarch Jacob, whose name God changed to Israel (Ge.32:28), had 12 sons (Ge.35:23-26).  Reuben, Simeon, Levi, Judah, etc…Joseph, Benjamin.  The descendants of those 12 became the 12 tribes of Israel.  (also see the topics “Chronology: Abraham to the Exodus” and “Israelites Identification”.)

Jacob’s 3^rd son was Levi.  Levi himself had 3 sons.  Ge.46:11 “The sons of Levi: Gershón, Kohath and Merarí.”  These 3 sons and their descendants became the Levites, descended from Levi.

Moses and his brother Aaron descended from Levi & Kohath.  They were Kohathites.  Moses was a priest (Ex.24:6, 29:26, Nu.7:1, Ps.99:6).  Later, only Aaron and his descendants among the Levites were priests.  Not all Levites or Kohathites became priests (Nu.4:17-20, 16:1-3); only the clan of Aaron did.

Ge.41:41 Jacob’s 11^th son Joseph became ruler of Egypt under Pharaoh.  Ge.46:5-27 Jacob, his sons and their families, went to join Joseph in Egypt circa (c) 1827 BC.  Ge.41:27 Septúagint/LXX “The sons of Joseph, born to him in Egypt, were 9; all the souls of the house of Jacob who came with Joseph into Egypt, were 75.”  Ac.7:14 has “75 souls”.  (Males, not counting wives.)  Ge.47:9 Jacob was 130 years old then.  His son Joseph was 39 or 40 (cf. Ge.41:46-47 with Ge.45:6), having been born c 1867 BC.

Ge.46:8, 11 Levi’s young 2^nd son Kohath and his two brothers (Gershon & Merari) went to Egypt with their father Levi & grandfather Jacob.  Joseph, age 40, would live on for 70 more years, until age 110 (Ge.50:26), until c 1757 BC.  Kohath was in Egypt during those 70 years that Joseph was still alive.

Nu.26:57-59 “Kohath became the father of Amrám…Jochébed bore to Amram: Aaron and Moses and their sister Miriám.”  Kohath was Moses’ grandfather!  Kohath wasn’t a distant ancestor.  So Moses wasn’t born all that long after Joseph’s death.

Ex.2:1 “A man [Amram] from the house of Levi married a daughter of Levi.”  This may reflect the line of Levi as ancestral, not Levi as her immediate father.  Ellicott Commentary “A descendant of Levi, not a daughter in the literal sense.”  However, cf. Zec.1:1 “Zecharíah, the prophet, the son of Berechíah, the son of Iddó”, versus Ezr.5:1 “Zechariah the son of Iddo”.  Ezra’s account skipped one generation.  Moses’ Exodus account could’ve skipped generations, but it seems unlikely (as we’ll see below).

In scripture, Moses & Aaron were the great-great grandsons of Jacob.  Josephus Antiquities of the Jews 2:9:6 “Moses….Abraham was his ancestor, of the 7^th generation.”  Philo On the Life of Moses 1:2:7 “Moses is the 7^th generation from the original settler in the country [Abraham].”

Abraham–Isaac–Jacob–Levi/Joseph–Kohath–Amram–Moses/Aaron…the 7 generations.  No skips.

1Ch.23:15 Moses had 2 sons, Gershóm (not Gershon) and Eliézer.  Ex.6:23 Moses’ brother Aaron had 4 sons: Nadáb, Abihú, Eleazár, Ithamár.  When Aaron later died in the wilderness, Eleazar replaced him as the high priest (Nu.20:28).  Eleazar’s son was Phinehás (Ex.6:25).

(Kohath)–Amram–Aaron/Moses–Eleazar–Phinehas…that’s only 4 generations of Kohathites, born after Jacob or Israel moved to Egypt.  Ex.18:1-6 soon after the exodus, Moses’ Midianite wife Zipporáh and their 2 sons rejoined Moses in the wilderness.  Moses’ sons Gershom & Eliezer were half-Midianite.

After the exodus, Nu.3:27-28 is early in the wilderness. “Of Kohath…the number of all the males from one month old and upwards, was 8,600.”  What!?  That’s an astounding increase in so few generations!

Here’s a question: How could the branch of Kohath (Levi’s son), reckoned from that 1 man, increase to 8,600 male descendants…after only 4 generations?!  Continuing with the Levite Kohathites….

Ex.6:18, 20 “The sons of Kohath: Amram, Izhár, Hebrón, Uzziél. The years of Kohath’s life were 133 years….Amram married Jochebed, and she bore him Aaron and Moses.”  Moses’ mother Jochebed was a relative (LXX 1^st cousin) of her husband Amram.  “The years of Amram’s life were 137 years [LXX NETS 136].”  Levi/Joseph–Kohath–Amram–Moses…that’s 4 generations.  1Ch.6:1-3 confirms those 4.

Humans were longer-lived in those days than now.  Of Kohath’s 133 years, again, 70 of them were spent with Joseph in Egypt (c 1827–1757 BC).  The traditional (supposed) Book of Jasher 68:29 indicates that elderly Kohath was still alive in the 1690s BC (when Moses was named)!  So perhaps Kohath was born c 1830 BC.  If so, he would’ve been age 3 when they went from Canaan to Egypt c 1827 BC.  That would make Kohath age 73 when his uncle Joseph died c 1757 BC.

Kohath’s firstborn son Amram (Moses’ father) may have been born c 1811 BC, when Kohath was 19.  If so, Amram’s death at age 136 or 137 was c 1675 BC (still decades prior to the exodus).  Amram would’ve been age 54 when Joseph died c 1757 BC.  Pulpit Commentary Ex.6:18 “Amram would have been contemporary with Joseph for above 50 years.”

Dead Sea Scrolls 4Q545 “The writing of the words of the vision of Amram, son of Qahat [Kohath], son of Levi, all that he has explained to his sons…on the day of his death in the year 136 – the year of his death [Amram’s]. In the year 152 of the exile of Israel in Egypt. Also it came to him to call Uzziel, his younger brother, and gave him Miriam his 30-year-old daughter for wife. He sent to call Aaron his 20-year-old son [3 years older than Moses]…I will explain to you your names that he wrote for Moses.”  Accordingly, 152 years after the 1827 BC relocation from Canaan to Egypt was 1675 BC.

The birth of Moses, Amram’s youngest child, c 1692 BC, was only 65 years after Joseph died (c 1757 BC)!  Philip Mauro The Wonders of Bible Chronology, p.40 “The interval between the death of Joseph and the birth of Moses was 64 years.”  Calculating the above 4Q545 elapsed time, Amram would’ve been age 106 when Miriam was born, 116 at Aaron’s birth, 119 at Moses’ birth!  Miriam was around 13 when she spoke with Pharaoh’s daughter at the Nile River regarding baby Moses, Ex.2:1-10.

For those ancient Levites to father children at such advanced ages seems too old by today’s standards.  But people lived longer in those days, and could maintain their life force.  Jacob died at age 147, Levi at age 137 (Ex.6:16), Kohath at age 133, Amram at 136 or 137, Aaron at 123 (Nu.33:39).  De.34:7 “Moses was 120 years old when he died; his eye was not dim nor his vigor abated.”  Even at age 120, Moses didn’t experience the infirmities of age that are prevalent today.  He maintained his vigor!  For that matter, Isaac was 60 when his twins Jacob & Esau were born (Ge.25:26).  Jacob was 90 when he fathered Joseph, and near 100 when he fathered Benjamin!  (ref Ge.47:9 Joseph was near 40 when his father Jacob, at age 130, came to Egypt.)

Ex.12:40 LXX “The children of Israel, while they sojourned in the land of Egypt and the land of Canaan, was 430 years.”  The Masoretic text omits “and the land of Canaan”.  But the accounts in the Samaritan Pentateuch, the Talmud and Josephus all agree with the LXX.  Josephus op. cit. 2:15:2 “They left Egypt 430 years after Abraham came into Canaan, but 215 years only after Jacob removed into Egypt. It [the exodus] was the 80^th year of Moses.”  They stayed 215 years in Canaan and 215 years in Egypt.

Gill Exposition “Certain it is, that Israel did not dwell in Egypt 430 years.”  JFB Commentary “The period of sojourn in Egypt did not exceed 215 years.”  Mauro op. cit., p.34 “The 430 years began with God’s promise to Abram, made at the time he entered into Canaan at the age of 75 (Gen.12:1-4).”

Since lives were longer back then, producing 4 generations over 215 years may be believable.  But producing only 4 generations over 430 years is unbelievable!

If Abrám was born c 2117 BC, he arrived in Canaan in 2042 BC at age 75 (Ge.12:4-5).  At age 100, Abraham fathered Isaac (Ge.21:5), c 2017 BC.  At age 60, Isaac fathered Jacob & Esau (Ge.25:26), c 1957 BC.  When Jacob was 130 (Ge.47:9), he and his moved from Canaan to Egypt, c 1827 BC.

Abram’s arrival in Canaan (c 2042 BC) until Jacob’s departure from Canaan (c 1827 BC) = 215 years in Canaan.  And Jacob/Israel’s arrival in Egypt (c 1827 BC) until the exodus (c 1612 BC) = 215 years in Egypt.  The total of both = 430 years…2042–1612 BC.  (see “Chronology: Abraham to the Exodus”.)

Also, 4 generations of Kohathites lived during the 215 years in Egypt.  Kohath–Amram–Aaron/Moses–Eleazar (and into the wilderness).  Returning to the Levite/Kohathites….

Nu.3:19 “The sons of Kohath: Amram and Izhar, Hebron and Uzziel.”  Besides Amram (the father of Moses & Aaron), Kohath had 3 other sons.  Kohath’s 2^nd son was Izhar (uncle to Moses & Aaron).

Nu.16:1-4 also confirms 4 generations.  (No skips.)  “Now Kórah, the son of Izhar, the son of Kohath, the son of Levi…incited rebellion against Moses and Aaron, and said, ‘Why do you exalt yourselves?”  Izhar’s son Korah was Moses’ 1^st cousin!  Korah, being a near relative, thought he should have more input or authority.  But because of his insurrection, Korah died in an earthquake or sinkhole (Nu.16:32).

Nu.3:27-29 “Of Kohath was the family of the Amramites, the family of the Izharites, the family of the Hebronites and the family of the Uzzielites.”  To repeat, Kohath’s 4 sons (born in Egypt) were: Amram, Izhar, Hebron, Uzziel.  Kohath’s grandsons, which include Moses & Aaron, were also born in Egypt.  Kohath’s great-grandsons, which include the 6 sons of Moses/Aaron, also were born before the exodus.

Again, the (priestly) line in 1Ch.6:1-3 confirms the generations of descent from Levi & Kohath. “The sons of Levi were Gershon, Kohath and Merari.  The sons of Kohath were Amram, Izhar, Hebron and Uzziel. The children of Amram were Aaron, Moses and Miriam. And the sons of Aaron were Nadab, Abihu, Eleazar and Ithamar.”  The Kohathite Aaron and his descendants became the priests in Israel.

So these genealogies in Genesis, Exodus, Numbers, 1Chronicles agree.  It appears that no generations were skipped in those scriptural accounts.

Early in the wilderness, the Kohathites from the ages of 30 to 50 totaled 2,750 men (Nu.4:34-37).  And Kohathites from the age of one month and up totaled 8,600 men (Nu.3:27-28).  Again, Kohath’s branch (which included Aaron & the priests) had increased from 1 to 8,600 males after only 4 generations!

Tracing further the Levite Kohath’s descendants…Ex.6:20-21 Moses/Aaron’s uncle Izhar had 3 sons; Korah (Nu.16:1), Népheg, Zichrí.  Ex.6:22 & Le.10:4 Moses/Aaron’s uncle Uzziel had 3 sons; Mishaél or Micháh, Elzaphán, Sithrí.  Perhaps a 4^th son of Uzziel was Issiáh (1Ch.23:20)?  I’ll include him in the count.  1Ch.23:19 Moses/Aaron’s uncle Hebron had 4 sons; Jeriáh, Amariáh, Jahaziél, Jekámeam.

So Moses & Aaron had 11 male paternal first cousins, most or all of whom lived into the exodus.

Including Moses & Aaron, this would result in only 13 male Kohathites in Moses/Aaron’s generation!  Kohath was their grandfather.  The 13 male first cousins were: Moses, Aaron, Korah, Nepheg, Zichri, Mishael or Michah, Elzaphan, Sithri, Issiah (possibly), Jeriah, Amariah, Jahaziel, Jekameam.

Female paternal cousins, daughters of one’s father’s siblings, would become part of whatever clan they married into (unless she married her own cousin, a grandson of Kohath).  Female maternal cousins, daughters of one’s mother’s siblings, wouldn’t be Kohathites (unless an aunt married one of Kohath’s four sons).

The Bible uses patrilineal reckoning from the fathers (not the traditional Jewish matrilineal reckoning from mothers).  Nu.1:18 “They registered by ancestry in their families, by their father’s households, according to the number of names.”  Not according to the mothers.

Again, the Kohathite generation previous to Moses/Aaron consisted of Amram, Izhar, Uzziel, Hebron.  Those 4 brothers most likely died in Egypt; none of them living into the exodus & wilderness.

The 13 male Kohathites in Moses & Aaron’s generation had sons.  1Ch.23:15 Moses had 2 sons; Gershom, Eliezer.  Ex.6:23 Aaron had 4 sons; Nadab, Abihu, Eleazar, Ithamar.  Ex.6:24 cousin Korah had 3 sons; Assír, Elkanáh, Abiasáph.

The cousins Moses, Aaron, Korah had 9 sons between them.  Scripture doesn’t tell us the number of sons had by the other 10 first cousins.  We can speculate or estimate that 10 other cousins had maybe 40 sons between them?  If so, there were close to 50 males in the next generation of Kohathites.

Possibly the 13 males in Moses/Aaron’s generation all lived into the wilderness.  (Nu.16:32 Korah died in the wilderness earthquake or sinkhole.)  Add to the 13 the perhaps 50 sons they had…the males still alive from 3 generations of Kohathites then totaled only 63.  Amram’s generation = 0; Aaron/Moses’ generation = 13; Eleazar/Gershom’s generation = est. 50.  Total = est. 63.

We don’t know how many grandsons Moses, Aaron and the other 11 first cousins had.  Ex.6:25 Aaron’s son Eleazar had a son named Phinehas.  Nu.25:7 “Phinehas the son of Eleazar the son of Aaron the priest.”  Only a few grandsons of the 13 Kohathite cousins are identified in scripture.

Even if the 13 first cousins had 50 sons who had 350 sons of their own (7 sons each!)…that’s only 413 total Kohathites.  413 = 8,187 less than the 8,600 male Kohathites of Nu.3:28, early in the wilderness!

Let’s now look at the other two Levite branches, besides the Kohathites.  Again, Ge.46:11 Kohath had two brothers…Gershon (not Gershom) and Merari, sons of Levi.  There were 3 branches of Levites.

{Sidelight: The 3 branches of Levites later had specific duties in the wilderness.  The Gershonites were on the west side of the tabernacle and carried its tapestry (Nu.3:23-26).  The Merarites camped on the north side and transported the tabernacle frames & support system (Nu.3:35-37).  The Kohathites were on the south side and transported the holy furnishings (Nu.3:29-31).  Moses and the priests (Aaron and his sons) camped to the east and served the sanctuary (Nu.3:38).}

Nu.3:18 “These were the names of the sons of Gershon by their clans, Libní and Shiméi.”  Gershon had  2 sons.  Nu.3:20 “The sons of Merari by their clans, Mahlí and Mushí.”  Merari also had only 2 sons.  Nu.3:19 again, Kohath had 4 sons.  All the Levites named here in Nu.3:17-20 died prior to the exodus.

I won’t trace the lesser lineages of Gershon and Merari.  (ref e.g. 1Ch.23:6-24.)  Yet early in the wilderness the total male Gershonites were 7,500 (Nu.3:21-22).  And the total male Merarites were 6,200 (Nu.3:33-34).  Adding in the 8,600 Kohathite males…there were 22,000 (or 22,300) total Levite males.  Nu.3:39 “All the numbered men of the Levites…from a month old and upward, were 22,000.”

Another question: How did the tribe of Levi, tracking from his 3 sons, become 22,000 or 22,300 males from age one month and up, during that same period (215 years)?!  What an increase from only 3 men!

Furthermore, during the same period of time, the 75-85 males (Ge.46:27 LXX) who were in Egypt with Jacob/Joseph increased to 603,550 non-Levite warriors age 20 and up, early in the wilderness (Nu.1:45-47)!  Josephus op. cit. 2:15:1 “The entire multitude of those who went out [from Egypt], including the women and children, that were of a fit age for war, were 600,000.”  Philo On the Life of Moses 1:27:147 “The men of age to bear arms were more than 600,000 men.”

So a related third question: How could the 75-85 males increase to more than 600,000 after only 4 generations?!

Were there strong aphrodisiacs in Egypt to heighten libido?!  Did each woman have dozens of children?

This topic about the Levites/Kohathites and the number of mixed multitude who comprised the exodus from Egypt is continued in “Levites and the Exodus Multitude (2)”.

 

Chronology: Abraham to the Exodus

Knowing the time when Biblical events occurred and the chronology of Bible characters helps us see the word of God in its historical context.  Also we learn the time frame of His ancient people in their generations.  My basic position is the so-called maximalist view, that Bible history is correct unless archaeology clearly proves it wrong.  This topic traces Bible chronology from Abraham to the exodus of ancient Israel from Egypt.  (For pre-Abraham, see “Chronology: Septuagint versus Masoretic Text”.)

Exact dates for the births and deaths of the Bible patriarchs are unknown.  The dates for the birth of Abrám/Abraham and the exodus from Egypt are taken in part from Martin Anstey’s The Romance of Bible Chronology, v.2.  His chart placed the birth of Abram in 2117 BC, the exodus in 1612 BC.

If Abram was born in 2117 BC, he moved from Harrán to Canáan at age 75 (Ge.12:4-5) in 2042 BC.  Ex.12:40 LXX “The children of Israel sojourned in the land of Egypt and the land of Canaan for 430 years.”  The Masorétic text omits “and the land of Canaan”.  But the accounts in the Samaritan Péntateuch, the Talmud and Josephus agree with the LXX.  Josephus Antiquities of the Jews 2:15:2 “They left Egypt 430 years after Abraham came into Canaan, but 215 years only after Jacob removed into Egypt. It was the 80^th year of Moses.”  They stayed 215 years in Canaan and 215 years in Egypt.

John Gill Exposition “Certain it is, that Israel did not dwell in Egypt 430 years.”  JFB Commentary “The period of sojourn in Egypt did not exceed 215 years.”  Philip Mauro The Wonders of Bible Chronology, p.34 “The 430 years began with God’s promise to Abram, made at the time he entered into Canaan at the age of 75 (Gen.12:1-4).”  And the apostle Paul confirms a period of 430 years (Ga.3:16-17).

A date of 1612 BC for the exodus…that’s 430 years after 2042 BC (when Abram was age 75).

He.11:8-9 “By faith he [Abraham] sojourned in the land of promise, as in a strange country.”  Ge.15:1-7 after Abram had sojourned in Canaan for around 10 years to age 85, God promised him a son, Isaac.

But before Isaac, Abram’s son Ishmaél was born when Abram was 86 (Ge.16:16), around 2031 BC.

Ge.17:24-25 around (circa or c) 2018 BC, Abraham is circumcised at age 99, Ishmael at age 13.

Ge.21:5 Abraham is 100 years old when his promised son Isaac is born, c 2017 BC.  Ge.17:17 Isaac’s mother Sarah is 90 (born c 2107 BC).  Ishmael is 14.

The Lord said to Abram in Ge.15:13, “Your seed will be sojourners in a land not their own; and they shall afflict them 400 years”.  Ge.21:8-9 after Isaac was weaned, he was mocked by Ishmael.  If Isaac was around 5 years old at the time of the mocking, it’s 2012 BC (Ishmael was 19).  The exodus from bondage in Egypt was 400 years later, c 1612 BC.  Benson Commentary Ge.15:13 “This persecution began with mocking, when Ishmael, the son of an Egyptian [Hagár, Ge.16:3], persecuted Isaac.”

This 400–year period doesn’t contradict the 430 years of Ex.12:40.

Again, if Abram was born c 2117 BC, he arrived in Canaan at age 75 in 2042 BC.  Isaac was born when Abraham was 100, c 2017 BC.  At age 60, Isaac fathered the twins Jacob & Esau (Ge.25:26) c 1957 BC.  Then when Jacob was age 130 (Ge.47:9), he and his moved from Canaan to Egypt c 1827 BC.

Abram’s sojourn in Canaan (c 2042 BC) until Jacob’s move from Canaan (c 1827 BC) = 215 years in Canaan.  And Jacob’s move to Egypt (c 1827 BC) until the exodus (c 1612 BC) = 215 years in Egypt.  The total of both = 430 years…2042–1612 BC.  As per the LXX/Septúagint, Josephus, Eusebius, etc.

Following is the chronology from Abraham and the persecution of Isaac (c 2012 BC), in more detail:

Ge.23:1-2 Abraham’s wife Sarah dies c 1980 BC at age 127.  Abraham is 137, Isaac is 37, Ishmael 51.

Ge.25:20 Isaac marries his cousin Rebekah c 1977 BC.  Isaac is 40, Abraham is 140, Ishmael 54.

Ge.25:25-26 Isaac is 60 when his sons Jacob & Esau are born c 1957 BC.  Abraham is 160, Ishmael 74.

Ge.25:7 Abraham dies at age 175, c 1942 BC.  Ishmael is 89, Isaac is 75, Jacob & Esau are 15.

Ge.26:34 Esau marries two Hittite wives c 1917 BC.  He and Jacob are age 40, Isaac is 100.

Ge.25:17 Ishmael died at age 137, c 1894 BC.  Isaac was age 123, Jacob & Esau were 63.

Ge.28:5 Isaac sends Jacob to Padán-Arám in Mesopotámia, to escape from Jacob’s twin brother Esau.  This was sometime around 1886 BC.  Jacob & Esau are age 70 or 71, Isaac is 131.

It is uncertain at exactly what age Jacob left the land of Canaan for Padan-Aram, fleeing from Esau.  There, Jacob would marry his first cousins Leáh & Rachél, daughters of his uncle Labán (Rebekah’s brother).  Jacob served Laban for at least 20 years (Ge.31:38-41), part of which was the bride price for Leah & Rachel (Ge.29:16-ff).  Initially, Jacob contracted to work only 7 years…for Rachel (Ge.29:18).

Jacob worked for Laban for 7 years, and in return was given…Leah, not Rachel!  Jacob then agreed to work 7 more years for Rachel.  Ancient sources differ in regards to when Rachel actually became his wife.  Josephus op. cit. 1:19:7, Philo The Works of Philo p.211, the Orthodox Bible LXX Ge.29:27 Note…they indicate that Rachel became Jacob’s wife after he’d worked the entire second 7-year period.  But the more recent Hebrew Masoretic text Ge.29:27-28, the (supposed) Book of Jasher 31:12-13, the traditional Book of Jubilees (Jub) 28:8-9…they indicate that Rachel became Jacob’s wife only one week following Leah, before he worked the second 7-year period.  The historical sources differ.

Jacob fathered 12 sons (11 born in Padan-Aram), Ge.35:23-26.  Their descendants would become the 12 tribes of Israel.  God changed Jacob’s name to Israel (Ge.32:28).

Ge.29:31-35 Jacob/Israel’s first 4 sons…Reuben, Simeon, Levi, Judah…were born to Leah.  see the topic “Levites and the Exodus Multitude (1)” for the lineage chronology of Jacob’s 3^rd son Levi.

Ge.30:4-8 Dan and Naphtalí are born to Rachel’s maidservant Bilháh (Jacob’s concubine wife).

Ge.30:9-13 Gad and Ashér are then born to Leah’s maidservant Zilpah (Jacob’s other concubine wife).

Ge.30:16-20 Leah resumes childbearing; she gives birth to Issachár, then Zebulún.

Ge.30:21 a daughter, Dinah, was also born to Leah.  Some think Zebulun and Dinah were twins (the scripture doesn’t say Leah ‘conceived’ for Dinah’s birth).  Written c 150 BC, Jub.28:23 “She [Leah] conceived, and bare two children, a son and a daughter. Zebulun and Dinah in the 7^th of the 7^th month.”

Ge.30:22-24 Rachel finally gives birth to her first child, Joseph, c 1867 BC.  Jacob (and Esau) was 90, Isaac 150.  Joseph is called the son of Jacob’s old age (Ge.37:3), and Jacob loved him the most.

Ge.30:25, 31:20-21 Jacob & family flee Laban/Padan-Aram, having been there 20 years or more.

Ge.33:1-16 while returning to Canaan, Jacob meets his twin Esau en route.  They’re in their early 90s.  Isaac is over 150.  v.17-20 Jacob journeys to Succóth, and afterwards settles in the town of Shechém.

Ge.34:1-31 Dinah, near age 12 (ref Jub.30:3), is taken by Shechém the son of Hamór.  Her brothers Levi, age 18 (ref Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs (T12P) Levi 12:5), and Simeon, age 20, kill every male in the town and loot it.  Jacob is near age 100.

Ge.35:1-15 as a result, Jacob must then depart Shechem.  He goes to Bethél and elsewhere.

The time frame in which Jacob’s 13 children were born (12 in Padan-Aram) is a narrow fit.  Having returned to Canaan c 1865 BC, Jacob’s daughter Dinah wasn’t taken at age 3 or 4!  Enough years must have elapsed for her to be at least 10–12.  And her brothers Levi & Simeon weren’t only age 8 or 10 when they killed the men of Shechem!

Ge.35:16-20 Rachel dies near Ephráth (Bethlehem) while giving birth to Jacob’s 12^th son, Benjamin, c 1857 BC.  Jacob is 100 or so, his son Judah is 16, Joseph is close to 10, Isaac is near 160.

Ge.37:1-2, 26-36 Joseph’s older brothers sell him into slavery at age 17, c 1850 BC.  Joseph is taken to Egypt.  Judah is near age 23, Jacob age 107, Isaac 167.

Ge.35:28-29 Isaac will die at age 180, c 1837 BC.  Jacob & Esau are 120, Judah is 36, Joseph 30.

Ge.38:1-30 after Jacob had returned to Canaan c 1865 BC, Judah at age 20 married Shúa c 1853 BC.  (ref T12P Judah 7:10, 8:1-2, 9:1-3.)  Judah fathered 3 sons – Er, Onán, Sheláh.  Er and Onan (successively) married Tamár, and each died shortly thereafter.  Then Judah fathered the twins Pérez & Zérah (v.29-30) by his daughter-in-law Tamar.  Ge.46:12 Perez later fathered Hezrón & Hamúl, probably in Egypt, near 1827 BC.  Barnes Notes Ge.46:12 “Hezron and Hamul may have been born at the arrival of Jacob’s household in Egypt.”  Poole Commentary “Hezron and Hamul seem to have born in Egypt.”  Jacob and his descendants go to Egypt c 1827 BC.

Only 40 years elapsed from the birth of Judah’s brother Joseph (Jacob’s 11^th son) in Padan-Aram, c 1867 BC, until Judah went to Egypt with Jacob c 1827 BC.  Judah must have been close to 6 years older than Joseph.  And Jacob had fathered 3 sons prior to Judah (in Padan-Aram)!  Benson Commentary Ge.38:1 “This chapter must here be placed out of the order of time.”  JFB Commentary Ge.38:1-30 “Judah was married some years before the selling of Joseph. Judah was now about 20 years old when he married, and the 3 first years he hath 3 sons, Er, Onan, and Shelah. The two first marry each when they were about 17 years old. Three years after both their deaths, and when Shelah had been marriageable a year or two, and was not [levirate marriage] given to Tamar, Judah lies with Tamar and begets upon her Pharez.”  T12P Judah 12:1 she conceived Pharez two years after she became a widow.

Ge.41:38-46 in the year Isaac died, c 1837 BC, Pharaoh made Joseph prime minister of Egypt at age 30 (cf. Jub.40:12).

Ge.41:47 for the first 7 years that Joseph was prime minister, Egypt experienced great abundance.  This period would be followed by 7 years of famine (Ge.41:29-30).  Ge.45:6 by this time, 2 years of famine had elapsed.  Joseph is now age 39, Jacob is 129.

Ge.47:9 then Jacob/Israel, at age 130, goes to Egypt to join Joseph c 1827 BC.  Levi was age 48 (T12P Levi 12:5), Judah age 46 (T12P Judah 12:11-12).  Ge.41:46-47 & 45:6 Joseph was age 39 or 40.  That places Joseph’s birth c 1867 BC, when Jacob (and Esau) was age 90 or 91.

Jacob’s move to Egypt culminates the 215 years he and his ancestors spent in the Land of Canaan.

Recap: Ge.12:4 Abram is age 75; Ge.21:5 he’s age 100 when Isaac is born…25 years had elapsed.  Ge.25:26 Isaac is age 60 when Jacob and Esau are born…60 years more.  Ge.47:1, 9 Jacob is age 130 when he and the family all went to Egypt…130 years more.  25 + 60 + 130 = 215 years in Canaan.

Now follows the 215-year period during which the Israelites dwelt in Egypt, until the exodus:

Again, when Jacob moved to Egypt at age 130, c 1827 BC, Joseph is 40 (Ge.41:46-47, 45:6, 47:1, 9).

Ge.46:1-34 lists Jacob’s seed who went with him to Egypt.  v.8-12 Reuben, Simeon, Levi, Judah are age 46–51.  Levi’s son Koháth (Jacob’s grandson) had been born.  (Kohath is Moses’ grandfather!)  v.21-22 Benjamin must be at least 30 (John Gill “10 sons are in his loins”).  All go to join Joseph in Egypt.

Ge.47:28 Jacob lived 17 years in Egypt.  Jacob dies in Egypt at age 147, c 1810 BC.  Joseph is age 57.

Twin Esau was slain in Canaan at the time of Jacob’s burial there, traditionally (Jasher 57:64-66)!

Amrám, the son of Kohath and the father of Moses & Aaron, is born in Egypt sometime between c 1827 and c 1757 BC (1Ch.6:1-3); perhaps around 1811 BC.  cf. Ex.6:18-20.

Ge.50:26 Joseph dies in Egypt at age 110, c 1757 BC, 70 years after Jacob & family moved to Egypt.

Ex.1:8 “A new king [pharaoh] arose who didn’t know Joseph.”  Joseph had been dead for some years.

Aaron, the son of Amram and elder brother of Moses (Nu.26:57-59), is born in Egypt c 1695 BC.

Moses is born c 1692 BC.  P.J. Wiseman Ancient Records and the Structure of Genesis, p.99 “He was born 64 years after Joseph had died.”  Moses is the son of Amram and grandson of Kohath (young Kohath had gone to Egypt with Jacob).  Amram was born in Egypt, while Joseph was still alive!

Moses fled to Midian (at age 40, c 1652 BC; ref Ex.2:15, Ac.7:23-29).  Josephus ibid 2:10-11 adds an account of Moses as general of the Egyptian army against Ethiopia/Cush, and his marriage to a Cushite princess.  Jasher 73:1-2 traditionally says that Moses even then reigned for a few decades in Cush.

Caleb was born in Egypt c 1651 BC…cf. Nu.13:26-30 (the 2^nd year of the exodus) with Josh.14:7-10.

Moses is age 80 when he returns to Egypt from Midian, c 1612 BC.  The exodus from Egypt occurs then.  Ex.7:7 “Moses was 80 years old, and Aaron 83, at the time they spoke to Pharaoh.”

Ex.12:40 LXX “The children of Israel, while they sojourned in the land of Egypt and the land of Canaan, was 430 years.”  Breakdown of the 430 years: 215 years in Canaan til Jacob’s move (with Moses’ grandfather Kohath) to Egypt, 70 years til Joseph’s death, Moses’ age of 80 at the exodus…65 years remain.  So Moses was born nearly 65 years after Joseph died.  Mauro op. cit., p.40, “The interval between the death of Joseph and the birth of Moses was 64 years.”  70 + 65 + 80 = 215 years in Egypt.

{Sidelight: The original Ípuwer Papýrus recorded calamities that were occurring in ancient Egypt.  In it, Ipuwer was speaking to the Lord of All, ‘a term used for the king and the creator god’.  Free-online-bible-study.org “The Ipuwer Papyrus is a single papyrus holding an ancient Egyptian poem, called The Admonitions of Ipuwer. It describes the affliction of Egypt by natural disasters and by a state of chaos in which the poor have become rich, and the rich poor; violence, famine and death are everywhere. A symptom of this chaos is the lament that servants are leaving their servitude and acting rebelliously. The probable date of the composition of the Papyrus, 1850 BCE and 1600 BCE.”  Egyptology.org.uk “The date for the Ipuwer Papyrus is not certain. Van Seeter dated it to around the end of the Middle Kingdom (c 1600 BCE). Most scholars generally agree to this dating.”

The enormous Minoan volcano eruption of Thera (now called Santorini) anciently happened 120 miles SE of Greece in the southern Aegean Sea.  Some geologists think it was the most powerful explosion on earth.  It altered the course of the Mediterranean Sea.  Wikipedia “Radiocarbon dates, including analysis of an olive branch buried beneath a lava flow from the volcano gave a date between 1627 BCE and 1600 BCE (95% confidence interval).”  Live Science: How the Eruption of Thera Changed the World “The eruption has also been loosely linked with the Biblical story of Moses and the exodus from Egypt. The effects of Thera’s eruption could have explained many of the plagues described in the Old Testament, including the days of darkness and polluting of the rivers, according to some theories.”

Whether or not the Ipuwer Papyrus and the Santorini eruption do directly relate to Israel’s exodus from Egypt, is beyond the scope here.}

Eusébius (265–340 AD) was a bishop and church historian. Chronicle [30] “All versions agree that 505 years transpired from Abraham until Moses and the exodus of the Jews from Egypt. It is calculated as follows. When Abraham was 75 years of age, God appeared to him and said that He would give the promised land to his descendants. For it is written [Ge.12:4-5]: ‘Abraham was 75 years old when he departed from Harran.’ In the same passage, further on [Ge.12:7] it states: ‘Then the Lord appeared to Abraham and said, ‘To your descendants I will give this land.’ Thus 75 years of Abraham plus 430 years [from God’s promise] until the exodus of the Jews from Egypt. The Apostle Paul confirms this [Ga.3.17-18]: ‘The law, which came 430 years afterward, does not annul a covenant previously ratified by God, so as to make the promise void.’ Then he adds: ‘God gave it to Abraham by a promise.’ When Abraham was 100 years of age his son Isaac was born, 25 years after God’s promise.  405 years transpired from that event until the exodus from Egypt. Consequently, from the promise [until the exodus] 430 years elapsed.”  75 + 430 = 505 years.

Placing the birth of Abram in 2117 BC…505 years later is 1612 BC for the exodus from Egypt.

In this topic, the ages of the patriarchs and the sequence of their lives are according to scripture.  The chronological dates are approximate.  Exact dates cannot be proven as of now.

My other topics about the timeline are “Chronology: the Exodus to Samuel”, “Chronology: Samuel to Rehoboam”, “Chronology: Septuagint versus Masoretic Text”.

 

Jesus’ Genealogy

Jesus’ divine genealogy was seen in “Godhead in Prehistory” and “Jesus’ Virgin Birth”.  Here we’ll look at Jesus’ human genealogy from the Davidic covenant, and study the so-called ‘curse of Jeconiáh’.

God freed ancient Israel from Egypt.  He was Israel’s invisible Ruler; later they would have a human king (De.17:14-15, Jg.8:23, 1Sm.8:5-7, 12:12).  Ending the period of the judges, the last judge Samuel anointed Saul as the first king of Israel (1Sm.9:15-17).  But Saul was disobedient, so the Lord rejected him from being king (1Sm.15:23-28).  God replaced Saul with David (1Sm.16:12-13).  2Sm.2:4 at first David was king over the tribe of Judah only (for 7 years).  But God had promised David he would be king over all Israel, not just Judah (2Sm.3:9-10).  2Sm.5:12 David became king of Israel (2Sm.12:7).  1Ki.2:11-12 after David died, his son Solomon sat on David’s throne as king over Israel (1Ki.4:1).

Saul, David, Solomon…these three were the only kings who ruled over the 12 tribes of Israel.

After God had rejected Saul, God promised David that his throne and kingdom would last forever.  We read of the Davidic covenant and the dynasty God promised him in the following passages: 2Sm.7:12-19 is the initial dynastic promise to David. “Your throne will be established forever.”  Matthew Poole Commentary 2Sm.7:13 “This is meant immediately of Solomon.”  Benson Commentary “Forever’ is not meant of Solomon, but of David’s posterity in general.”  1Ch.3:1-9 David had many sons besides Solomon, including Nathan.  Ps.132:11-12 “The Lord has sworn to David, ‘If your sons keep My covenant, their sons also shall sit upon your throne forever.”  If…it’s partly conditional!  1Ki.2:1-4 before he died, David also told Solomon it was conditional to David’s sons.  1Ki.8:22-26 in prayer, Solomon reiterates to God the conditional promise.  1Ki.9:1-7 God heard Solomon’s prayer, and told him the Davidic dynasty on the throne of Israel would continue through Solomon, if Solomon was obedient.  (2Ch.6:16 clarifies 1Ch.22:9-10 as to the conditional nature of the covenant through Solomon’s line.)

But Solomon didn’t remain obedient to the Lord, thus breaking the conditional part of the covenant.  1Ki.11:11 “The Lord said to Solomon, ‘Because you have not kept My covenant which I commanded you, I will surely tear the kingdom from you, and will give it to your servant.”  (1Ki.11:26 Jeroboám was one of Solomon’s official servants.)  Ne.13:26 Solomon had been king over all Israel.

After Solomon, the monarchy was divided into…the kingdom of Israel in the north (1Ki.11:30-32 under Jeroboam, who wasn’t of the Davidic line)…the kingdom of Judah in the south (under Solomon’s son Rehoboám).  None of the kings of Israel in the north were from the house of David!  e.g. 2Ki.10:30 the Lord told Jehú his line (non-Davidic) would succeed him on the throne of Israel in the north for four generations.  2Ki.17:1, 6 Hoshéa was the last king of Israel.  The kingdom of Judah in the south had Davidic kings (e.g. Aház, Hezekiah, Josiah).  But the kings of Judah didn’t rule over Israel.  Judah’s last two kings were Jeconiah/Coniah and Zedekiáh.  (see “Israelite Deportations by Assyria”.)

Yet part of the Davidic covenant is unconditional.  Ps.89:34-37 “My covenant I will not break. I have sworn by My holiness; I will not lie to David. His seed shall endure forever, and his throne as the sun before Me.”  Also Je.33:19-26 “Thus says the Lord, ‘If My covenant for day and night stand not, then I would reject the seed of Jacob and David My servant, not taking from his seed rulers.”  Unconditional.

1Ch.17:11-15 “I will set up one of your seed after you, who shall be of your sons, and I will establish his kingdom. He shall build for Me a house, and I will establish his throne forever. I will be his father, and he will be My Son. I will set him in My house and in My kingdom forever, and his throne shall be established forever.”  This passage begins with David’s son Solomon in mind.  But it ends with God’s eternal Son established on His throne in God’s kingdom forever.

The promise of David’s dynasty is forevermore.  It began with a promise that David’s son Solomon would build God’s temple and rule.  Yet it’s the Davidic covenant, not the Solomonic covenant.  The throne of Israel is referred to prophetically as the “throne of David”, not the “throne of Solomon”.  It’s not unconditionally through Solomon forever.  If David’s descendants sin, they’ll be punished or made captive; the dynastic rule suspended temporarily.  The monarchy could be broken, but not the line of descendants from David.  Within David’s descendants was the unconditional promise of a restored everlasting kingdom.  Another Son of David would rule forever as a lasting house over Israel.  Ho.3:5 “The children of Israel shall return and seek the Lord their God and David their king in the latter days.”

That refers to the Messiah, the Son of David.  Je.23:5-6 “Declares the Lord, ‘I will raise up for David a righteous Branch. He will reign as King. This is The Name by which He will be called, ‘YHVH our righteousness.”  Jeremiah prophesied that the Branch, King Messiah (ref Targum Jonathán), would be a descendant of David…and YHVH/God!  David’s line and the official genealogical record wouldn’t end before the Branch/Messiah appeared.  He came before the 70 AD destruction of Jerusalem and priesthood.

Is.9:6-7 the Child, the Wonderful, the Mighty God, would sit on the throne of David forever.

Lk.1:30-33 the angel Gabriel told Mary that Jesus, the Son of the Most High, would be given David’s throne.  “He will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and His kingdom will have no end.”  (Ge.32:28 God had changed Jacob’s name to Israel.)  Jesus was born in Bethlehem, the city of David (Lk.2:3-7, 1Sa.20:6).  Joseph & Mary must travel to Joseph’s ancestral city to register for the census, because, “he was from the house of David”.  Jesus is called the son of David (Lk.18:38, Mt.21:9).  Nathanaél said to Jesus in Jn.1:49, “You are the Son of God, the King of Israel”.  As the Lord said in Je.23:5-6, King Messiah would be God and a son of David.  Jesus is called the King of Israel (Jn.12:12-13, Mk.15:32).

The kings of Israel & Judah had secretaries, recorders, historiographers, who maintained public records and genealogies (e.g. 1Ki.4:3).  1Ch.9:1 “All Israel was reckoned by genealogies; they’re written in the book of the kings of Israel and Judah, with the names of those who were carried away to Babylon.”  Individuals were registered according to their family and tribe.  Ezr.8:1 “These are the heads of their fathers’ households and the genealogical records of those who went up with me from Babylon in the reign of King Artaxérxes.”  They’re returning exiles, companions of Ezra.  Nehemiah later wrote in the 400s BC in Ne.7:5-7, “God put it into my heart to enroll the people by genealogies. Then I found the book of the genealogy of those who were first to return….who came with Zerubabbél.”  Those had returned in an earlier wave (Ezr.2:1-2-ff), prior to Ezra’s group.  (see “Temple of Zerubbabel”.)

Genealogical records were necessary!  Smith’s Bible Dictionary: “When Zerubbabel brought back the captivity from Babylon, one of his first cares seems to have been to take a census of those that returned, and to settle them according to their genealogies. Passing on to the time of the birth of Christ, we have a striking incidental proof of the continuance of the Jewish genealogical economy, that when Augustus ordered the census of the empire to be taken, the Jews immediately went each one to his own city. The Jewish genealogical records continued to be kept till near the destruction of Jerusalem.”

Now we’ll look at Jesus’ human lineage, through Joseph and Mary.  Mt.1:1-18 is Joseph’s lineage; Lk.3:22-38 is considered Mary’s lineage.  Possible levirate marriages within their lines, and (Jewish) ancestors who may have been known by two names, won’t be guessed at here.

Lk.3:23 “Jesus being supposedly the son of Joseph, the son of Elí [Helí].”  Joseph was Jesus’ legal father (but not His biological father).  Jn.1:45 “Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph.”  Genealogists indicate Mary was Eli/Heli’s daughter.  geni.com Heli ben Matat “Father of Maria.”  Mary’s husband Joseph was Eli’s son-in-law.  (There was no Greek word for ‘son-in-law’.)  Some disbelieving Jews hated the memory of Mary.  Did Talmudists think Mary was Heli’s daughter?  John Lightfoot (1602-1675) From the Talmud and Hebraica, Luke 3:23 “He saw Mary the daughter of Heli amongst the shades, hanging by the fibers of her breasts; the great bar of hell’s gate hung at her ear.”  Lightfoot’s footnoted source was Hieros. Chagigah 77.4.  (since expunged, veiled in Sanhedrin 6.6 “Onion-leaf”?)

Many rabbis spoke of two Messiahs.  Messiah ben David is the ‘Conquering King’, whereas Messiah ben Joseph is the ‘Suffering Servant’.  Interestingly, Jesus is the son (“ben” in Hebrew) of both…He’s the son of David via Mary’s ancestry (Lk.1:30-32), and legally the son of Joseph her husband!

David is in the lines of both Joseph (Mt.1:6), and Mary/Miriám (Lk.3:31).  But after David, we see that Joseph descended from David’s son Solomon, whereas Mary descended from David’s son Nathan.  Both Solomon and Nathan were sons of Bathsheba (1Ch.3:5), David’s best-known wife.  Solomon is in Joseph’s line of Jesus’ legal descent, but Solomon isn’t in Mary’s line of Jesus’ physical descent.

Nathan is in Mary’s line.  Her line reflects the “seed of the woman”, Ge.3:15.  The prophetic passage of Zec.12:10-12 has genealogical significance. “I will pour out on the house of David the Spirit of grace. They will look upon Me whom they have pierced, and they will mourn for Him, as one mourns for an only Son. The family of the house of David and their wives; the family of the house of Nathan and their wives.”  The wives of the branch of Nathan will mourn.  At Jesus’ crucifixion, Mary looked upon Jesus (Jn.19:26), who was pierced with a spear (Jn.19:34).  Mary, one of the wives from the house of Nathan.

After David, the lines of Joseph and Mary became separate via Solomon and Nathan.  Between David and Jesus, the only names common to the genealogies of both Joseph and Mary are Shealtiel (Salathiel in Greek) and his son Zerubabbel: Mt.1:12, Lk.3:27, Ezr.3:2, 3:8, 5:2, Hag.1:1, 12, 14, 2:2, 23.  Ne.12:1 “Zerubabbel the son of Shealtiel.”  Seemingly at odds with those 11 verses is 1Ch.3:16-19, which says Zerubabbel was the son of Pedaiáh.  However, LXX Nets 1Ch.3:19 Zerubabbel was the son of Salathiel.  Perhaps Pedaiah died childless and his brother Shealtiel married Pedaiah’s widow as levirate and had Zerubabbel.  Less likely, the Zerubabbel & Shealtiel in Lk.3:27 differ from the pair in Mt.1:12.

Now let’s examine the ‘curse of Jeconiah’, so-called.  Preceding the Babylonian captivity, the son of King Josiah of Judah was Jehoaház/Shallúm; he ruled for 3 months.  Then Jehoiákim/Eliakím, brother of Jehoahaz, ruled for 11 years (608-597 BC).  The son of Jehoiakim was Jehoiachín/Jeconiah/Coniah; he ruled for 100 days.  ref 2Ch.36:1-11, 1Ch.3:15-18, 2Ki.24:5-12, Est.2:6.  These were all kings of Judah, not Israel.  Nebuchadnézzar deported Coniah to Babylon, where he died 37 years later (560 BC), after being given favor & honor, Je.52:30-34!  Jeconiah’s uncle Zedekiah/Mattaniah (brother to Jehoahaz and Jehoiakim) became the final king of Judah, ruling 11 years (597-586 BC).  Je.52:1-2, 10-11 all Zedekiah’s sons were killed.  He died childless in Babylon.  Zedekiah’s line was terminated.

Je.21:1-14 Jeremiah told Zedekiah that the Lord would destroy Jerusalem.  In Je.22:1-10, Zedekiah is warned to change his ways.  v.11-28 Zedekiah is reminded of the fate of his three predecessors, Shallum/Jehoahaz, Jehoiakim, and Jeconiah/Coniah.  (Jehoiakim was the worst of Zedekiah’s three predecessors.  He burned Jeremiah’s scroll, and his dead body later rotted under the sun without burial, Je.36:22-32.)

Je.22.29-30 has been called the ‘curse of Jeconiah’.  But was Jeremiah here still referring to Coniah the preceding king, or now to Zedekiah the current king?  KJV Je.22:29-30 “O earth, earth, earth, Hear the word of the Lord! ‘Write you this man childless, a man who shall not prosper in his days; for no man of his seed shall prosper sitting upon the throne of David or ruling any more in Judah.”

LXX Je.22:30 “Write you this man an outcast; for there shall none of his seed at all grow up to sit on the throne of David a prince (Strongs g758, Greek) in Judah.”  LXX Nets Je.22:30 “Record this man as a banished person, because none of his offspring shall grow up to sit on the throne of David as ruler again in Judah.”  Was Jeconiah/Coniah/Jehoiachin meant…or was Zedekiah?

Coniah wasn’t literally “childless”.  He had at least six sons (1Ch.3:17-18).  Whereas Zedekiah died childless.  His sons were slaughtered (Je.52:10-11).  TSK Je.22:30 “Zedekiah was taken prisoner, his sons slain before his eyes; and his eyes being put out, he was carried to Babylon.”  Therefore King Zedekiah doesn’t appear in the genealogy of either Joseph or Mary.  Jesus isn’t of Zedekiah’s descent.

The Lord declared that no seed of Zedekiah (or Coniah?) would sit on David’s throne or rule Judah.  Jeconiah and his children were taken to Babylon and died in captivity.  But his grandson Zerubabbel returned in the 530s BC…as governor in Judea, Hag.1:1!  In Je.22:24, Jeremiah had said to Zedekiah, “Declares the Lord, ‘Even though Coniah the son of Jehoiakim king of Judah were a signet ring (h2368, Hebrew) on My right hand, yet I would pull it off.”  A signet ring or seal was held by the sovereign or legal authority.  Hag.2:23 “Declares the Lord, ‘I will take you Zerubabbel, son of Shealtiel, and make you like a signet ring (h2368), for I have chosen you.”  Barnes Notes Hag.2:23 “Cyrus entrusted him with the return of his people, and made him (who would have been the successor to the throne of Judah, had the throne been re-established) his governor over the people.”  Pulpit Commentary “Zerubbabel is set at the head of the nation in the place of his grandfather Jeconiah.”  Although Zerubabbel wasn’t made king, he was as a signet ring, as was Coniah.  Zerubabbel or Sheshbazzár, as it is thought he was also known, was the ruling “prince of Judah” cf. Ezr.1:8-11 (LXX g758), 2:1-2, 3:8, 5:14-16.  It doesn’t seem that Coniah’s grandson Zerubabbel was indicative of, or the recipient of, a curse.

Je.24:1-2, 5 Jeconiah and the other captives in Babylon were portrayed by the good figs.  (2Ch.36:9 although he too did evil during his short 100-day reign, he lived for 37 years afterwards.)  v.8-10 but Zedekiah was a curse, portrayed by the bad/evil figs.  Also Zedekiah and the remaining dwellers in Jerusalem would be a curse in Je.29:1-2, 16-19. “Thus says the Lord to the king who sits on the throne of David and concerning all the people who dwell in this city. I will make them a curse and reproach.”  Cambridge Bible Je.29:16 “The king, Zedekiah.”  Gill Exposition “That is, King Zedekiah.”  So a case can be made that the Je.22:29-30 ‘curse of Jeconiah’ was more aptly the ‘curse of Zedekiah’.

Mt.1:1-18 omits some generations of Joseph’s line, ending with Jesus.  But Jeconiah and Zerubabbel are included (v.12).  It seems Matthew wasn’t concerned with any ongoing ‘curse of Jeconiah’.  Rabbi A. J. Rosenberg on Je.22:24 “In the prophecy Hag.2:23, God says, ‘On that day I will take you, Zerubbabel, and I will make you like a signet,’ for the King Messiah will be like a signet ring on God’s right hand. Coniah will be the signet on My right hand, for the Messiah will spring from his seed.”  That rabbi didn’t think a ‘curse of Jeconiah’ would prevent Messiah from inheriting David’s throne!

Some think Jeconiah was cursed by God, but repented in captivity.  So God removed the curse.  Jewish Encyclopedia “Jehoiachin’s sad experiences changed his nature entirely, and as he repented of the sins he committed as king, he was pardoned by God, who revoked the decree to the effect that none of his descendants should ever become king: he even became the ancestor of the Messiah.” (Tan., Toledot, 20).

Joseph wasn’t Jesus’ biological father.  In a sense, Joseph adopted Jesus as the firstborn son of Mary and himself.  Thus Jesus became a legal heir of the line that went through David, Solomon, Zerubabbel, Jacob, Joseph.  And Jesus was seed heir of the line that went through David, Nathan, Zerubabbel, Eli, Mary.  Even if it was Jeconiah who God cursed (Je.22:29-30)…Jesus isn’t in the seed line of Jeconiah!  Any curse on Jeconiah’s seed wouldn’t apply to Jesus!

Mary had a sister named Salóme.  cf. Mk.15:40, Mt.27:56, Jn.19:25.  (Biological sisters wouldn’t both be named Mary.)  But no brothers.  Joseph was probably deceased.  Jn.19:25-27 Jesus gave His cousin John the responsibility of caring for Mary (she’d first be the responsibility of her: husband, son, brother).  Jn.19:25 Bengel’s Gnomen “No brother of Mary is mentioned. She herself was heir of her father, and was therefore transmitting to Jesus the right to the kingdom of David.”  All inheritances went through the males.  But a daughter with no brothers could inherit her father’s possessions/rights, if she married within her father’s tribe, Nu.27:8 & 36:7-10.  Except Levite women could freely intermarry, because Levites had no land inheritance to preserve, De.18:1-2.  Eli (Mary’s father) and Joseph (Mary’s husband) were both from the tribe of Judah.  In that sense, Joseph became Eli’s heir through marriage.

{Sidelight: Lk.1:5-7 Zacharías and Elizabeth were Levites descended from Aaron (their fathers were priests).  They were elderly when she became pregnant with John the Baptizer (v.24).  Elizabeth was probably young Mary’s aunt (v.36).  Perhaps Mary’s father Eli of the tribe of Judah (Lk.3:23) had wed Elizabeth’s Aaronide sister.  Though Eli’s daughters Mary & Salome were of Judah, their mother was a “daughter of Aaron” (priestly lineage).  Mary wed Jacob’s son Joseph of Judah (Mt.1:16).  Salome married Zebedee (cf. Mk.15:40, Mt.27:56, Jn.19:25), a well-to-do Galilean fisherman (Mk.1:19-20), who was of Aaron or Judah.  Salome was Jesus’ aunt.  Zebedee’s sons, James & John, were Jesus’ first cousins.  Jesus was closest to James & John, and Peter (e.g. Mt.17:1-9 Transfiguration, Mt.26:37).}

Jesus, the “Branch” of David, was completely obedient.  (see “Jesus Obeyed God’s Written Laws”.)  Jesus didn’t break covenant, unlike the last four kings of Judah prior to the captivity, to which Jeremiah referred in Je.22.  They were kings of Judah only.  Jesus, Messiah ben David, inherits the throne of David as King of Israel (Jn.1:41, 49).

At creation in Ge.1:26-28, God gave dominion on earth to mankind.  Jesus came in the flesh as a man, the “seed of the woman”.  He never sinned (He.4:15, 1Pe.2:21-22).  Jesus is fully qualified to rule over the earth, including all Israel.  Ps.47:6-8 “Sing praises to our King. For God is the King of all the earth. God reigns over the nations.”  Re.19:16 “He has a name written, ‘KING OF KINGS AND LORD OF LORDS.”  Jesus/Yeshúa is the Emperor in the Kingdom of God.  Praise the Lord!

Jesus’ Virgin Birth

There are some who teach the New Testament (NT), but don’t fully believe a basic gospel truth…the virgin birth of Jesus Christ.  That includes some who have knowledge of Bible Hebrew and Greek.

There was uncertainty about Jesus’ birth in 1^st century Judaism.  The Jews said to Jesus/Yeshúa in Jn.8:41, 48 “We weren’t born from sexual immorality. You’re a Samaritan and have a demon.”  Those disbelieving Jews implied that Jesus was racially variant and demented.  There was hostility between Jews and the mongrel Samaritan people.  Samaritans resembled Jews but were considered imposters.  v.42-44 Jesus’ reply was, He came from God and the father of those Jews was the devil.

In 178 AD, the Greek philosopher Célsus spread the false Jewish story that a Roman soldier called Pantéra (‘panther’) had an affair with Mary, and was Jesus’ biological father.  Rabbinic writings of the Middle Ages called Jesus/Yeshua, ‘Yeshu ben Pantera’.  Let’s see what the Bible says about Jesus’ birth.

The supposed parents of Jesus, Joseph and Mary, were Galileans betrothed.  But they hadn’t yet come together.  God sent the angel Gabriel to inform Mary in Lk.1:26-34. “You will bear a Son, and you shall name Him Jesus [Yeshua]. He will be the Son of the Most High; and the Lord God will give Him the throne of His father David.’ Mary replied, ‘How can this occur, since I’m a virgin?”  Mary hadn’t had sexual relations with Joseph or any other man.

Mary went to visit her pregnant aunt Elizabeth for 3 months, 75 miles to the south (Lk.1:36-56).  When Mary returns to Galilee, Joseph sees she is 3–4 months pregnant.  What?!  Mt.1:18-19 “She was found to be with child by the Holy Spirit [HS]. Joseph, being a just man, didn’t want to disgrace her publically, so he intended to divorce her privately.”  Divorce annulled a betrothal.  If a betrothed woman has sexual relations with another man, it was adultery (De.22:13-14, 20-27).  Although stoning for adultery was a neglected law, Joseph could have thrown the first stone (De.17:7).  Or Joseph could put Mary away privately by giving her a writ of divorce (De.24:1), and paying the legal cost.

Before Joseph could divorce her, an angel came to him in a dream.  Mt.1:20-21 “Joseph, son of David, don’t be afraid to take Mary as your wife, for the One conceived in her is by the Holy Spirit. She will bear a Son and you shall name Him Jesus [Yeshua], for He will save His people from their sins.”  Joseph knew then that Mary hadn’t been impregnated by another man.  And Mary knew she hadn’t.

Gabriel had also informed Mary 3–4 months earlier in Lk.1:35. “The angel [Gabriel] said, ‘The Holy Spirit will come, and the power of The Highest will overshadow you [Mary]; therefore the Holy One to be born shall be called Son of God.”  Orthodox Study Bible Lk.1:35 “Note the revelation of the Holy Trinity: The Father (The Highest), the Son, and the Holy Spirit.”  The Father overshadows the HS upon Mary, and God’s Son Jesus is conceived.  Chinese preacher Witness Lee was part of the Christian work started by Watchman Nee.  Lee’s Living With and In the Divine Trinity, p.39 “Lk.1:35 shows the Holy Spirit coming upon Mary…the Most High, God the Father, overshadows Mary…and the birth of the holy thing, the Son of God. Thus the entire Divine Trinity was involved in the conception.”  The Son was conceived into Mary by His Parents, who are God!  (See the topics “Holy Spirit versus Mariolatry”, “Holy Spirit Personification”, and “Holy Spirit’s Identity”.)

Jesus was Fathered by God Most High.  Jesus said in Jn.16:28, “I came forth from the Father”.  Mary gave birth to Jesus, and her husband Joseph became Jesus’ legal father.  Lk.3:23 “Jesus, supposedly the son of Joseph.”  Joseph wasn’t Jesus’ biological father.  Mary & Joseph both knew that Joseph didn’t father Jesus.  Mt.1:24-25 Joseph married her and “kept her a virgin until she gave birth to Jesus”.  Jesus was carried and birthed by a virgin, Mary/Miriam.

Father God is Jesus’ Father.  Jesus referred to Himself as the Child of Wisdom (Lk.7:35), His Mother.  In the NT, nowhere did Jesus call Mary, “mother”!  Jesus referred to the surrogate Mary tenderly as “woman”.  Jn.2:4 “Jesus said to her, ‘Woman, what have I to do with you?”  Jn.19:26 “When Jesus saw His mother and the disciple He loved standing nearby, He said to His mother, ‘Woman, behold your son!”  John and other writers customarily referred to Joseph & Mary as Jesus’ father & mother, his parents.  But Jesus didn’t.  Jesus indicated His Mother is Wisdom, the HS.  (Connect in order seven verses to identify the HS: Jl.2:28a, Pr.1:20, 23, De.34:9a, Nu.27:18, Mt.1:18b, Lk.7:35.)

Father God didn’t somehow have sexual relations with Mary, who was engaged to the man Joseph (Mt.1:18).  It would’ve been adultery to have relations with a married or betrothed woman.  De.22:23-27 God’s penalty for such adultery was severe!  Needless to say, Father God (or the HS) didn’t commit adultery!  Furthermore, Mary was of a different kind…she was of the human kind, not the Godkind.  Father God is Spirit, not flesh (Jn.4:23-24).  The term incubus pertains to a spirit having sex with a human woman.  Heathen mythological gods, such as Zeus/Jupiter, had sex with mortal women and produced offspring.  Le.20:15-16 the penalty for beastiality (sex with a different kind) was death!

Jesus was fully God in the flesh…both His Father and Mother are God!  The womb of Mary, the “woman” as Jesus called her, served to form Him in the flesh to become the God–Man.  The 300s AD Apostles Creed has it: “I believe in Jesus Christ, who was conceived by the Holy Spirit, born of the virgin Mary.”  Mary birthed Jesus.  Paul knew of the virgin birth, writing in Ga.4:4, “God sent forth His Son, born of a woman”.  We already read where Matthew and Luke knew.

In Mk.6:3, Mark calls Jesus the “son of Mary”.  A matrilineal reckoning isn’t the usual practice seen in scripture.  So it seems Mark also knew of the virgin birth.  Jesus in the flesh most often referred to Himself as the Son of Man/humanity/ánthropos (Strongs g444, Greek)…not the Son of Male/áner (g435).

The first Bible prophecy is Ge.3:15, where God told the serpent, “I will put hostility between your seed and her seed”.  Her seed, not the male Adam’s.  Yet Bible genealogies are almost always patrilineal, not through females.  (e.g. Ac.16:1-3 Timothy hadn’t been circumcised because his father was Greek.)

The prophecy of Is.7:14 foretold the Lord’s virgin birth. “The Lord Himself will give you a sign. Behold! The virgin shall be with child and she will call His name Emmanuel.”  The “Lord Himself” would be the sign!  (also ref Ge.22:8, “God Himself the lamb”.)  And a pregnant virgin would be so remarkable…something to “behold”!  Whereas a non-virgin who is with child is commonplace; it happens every day in every city.  It seems Is.7:14 cannot refer to King Hezekiah.  When Isaiah visited King Aház (Is.7:3-14-ff) and spoke of the future virgin birth of the Child, Hezekiah was already 8 years old or so (when Ahaz was age 20–21).  cf. 2Ki.16:2, 18:2.

The Greek term translated as “virgin” in the Septúagint/LXX Is.7:14 is parthénos (g3933).  In Greek, this term meant virgin.  The temple shrine of the mythological Greek virgin goddess Athena in Athens was called the Parthenon.  LXX Ge.24:16 of Rebekah, “She was a virgin [parthenos], no man had known her”.  LXX Jg.21:12 “Young virgins [parthenos] who had not known a man by lying with him.”

Matthew quoted the old Greek in his Mt.1:22-23 passage about Mary’s virgin pregnancy. “This was done to fulfill what was spoken by the Lord through the prophet, ‘Behold! The virgin [parthenos LXX] shall bear a Son, and they shall call His name Emmanuel, meaning “God (is) with us.”  Yeshua/Jesus is God.  (see “Jesus Is God…Jesus Has A God”.)

Another prophecy about Jesus is Je.23:5-6. “Declares the Lord, ‘I will raise up for David a righteous Branch. He will reign as King. This is The Name by which He will be called, “YHVH our righteousness.”  Jeremiah indicated the Branch/Messiah will be both a descendant of David and…YHVH/God!  Je.30:9 “They will serve the Lord their God, and David their king, whom I will raise up for them.”  The Messiah was referred to as David or the son of David (e.g. Lk.18:38).

Also Is.9:6-7, “A Child will be born to us. His name will be called Wonderful, Mighty God…on the throne of David forevermore.”  As Is.7 & Je.23, the Child to rule as ‘God with us’, on David’s throne.

Note: Other subjects connected to the virgin birth are the Davidic covenant (it’s not the Solomonic), the so-called curse of Jeconiah (some think Zedekiah is meant), Jesus’ genealogy.  see “Jesus’ Genealogy”.

Fathers name their own sons.  Mt.1:21 God chose the name Yeshua/Iesoús/Jesus for the Son of God.  The name wasn’t of Joseph or Mary’s own choosing.  The Greek name Iesous/Jesus is from the Hebrew Yehoshúa/Joshua (h3091), meaning ‘salvation’.  “He will save His people from their sins.”  Nu.13:16 “Moses called Hoshéa the son of Nun, Yehoshua [h3091 Joshua].”  The name Yeshua/(Iesous/Jesus) is the shortened form of the name of Moses’ successor in the Old Testament (OT), Yehoshua/Joshua.  They had the same name.  And phonetically, Jesus the Savior also was a ‘son of Nun/none’, since He wasn’t the son of human parents in the normal sense!

We see in Zec.6:11-13 another OT type who had the same name as Jesus. “Make an ornate crown and set it on the head of Jehoshua [Joshua, LXX Iesous/Jesus] the high priest. Thus says the Lord of hosts, ‘Behold a man whose name is the Branch.”  Around 520 BC, God raised up a high priest whose name was the same name the Branch/Messiah would have (ref Je.23:5).  God had predetermined to name the Son of God…Yeshua/Jesus!  (See the topic “Savior’s Name in Bible Languages”.)

1Jn.4:9 “God has sent His only begotten Son into the world.”  Jesus is the monogenés (g3439) Son, the unique one-of-a-kind Son of the Most High.  He had heavenly genes, if you will.  Jesus is Deity!  He.1:8 “Of the Son, ‘Thy throne, O God, is forever.”  Jn.20:28 “Thomas said to Him [Jesus], “My Lord and my God.”  Jesus was the Lord God of ancient Israel.  see “Jesus Was The Old Testament God”.

There is another very significant purpose for Jesus to have been born from a virgin!  It pertains to His DNA (the self-replicating material that contains genetic characteristics), and His blood.  Blood has great significance throughout the Bible!  Le.17:11 the life or soul is in the blood.  De.12:23 the blood is the soul/life.  Ge.9:4 the soul/life is the blood.  It was prophesied in Is.53:12, “He [Jesus] poured out His life unto death”.  The Lord God Jesus poured out His soul/lifeblood for our sins!

1Pe.1:18-19 “You weren’t redeemed with corruptible things like silver or gold, but with the precious [g5093] blood of Christ.”  Silver & gold are closer to being incorruptible than are other substances.  Yet even they are corruptible.  Ellicott Commentary 1Pe.1:18 “By contrast, the blood of Christ is implied to be not corruptible.”  Pulpit Commentary 1Pe.1:19 “As opposed to the corruptible things of v.18; it is precious, because it is the blood of Christ. Christ’s holy body saw not corruption; the precious blood in its virtue and efficacy abides evermore.”  Bengel’s Gnomen “The blood of Christ is incorruptible.”  Ac.13:37 “He [Jesus] whom God raised saw no corruption.”  Pr.3:15 LXX “Wisdom is more precious [g5093] than precious stones.”  Lk.7:35 Jesus is Wisdom’s Child.  She and His blood are so precious!

As the God-Man, Jesus was flesh and blood (He.2:14).  The life is in the blood.  For Jesus, that life was the eternal Life of God in His blood!  Jesus’ blood speaks better things than that of Abel (He.12:24).  We’re saved by Jesus’ transcendent blood.  And His blood figuratively never loses its effectiveness.

Jesus said in Jn.6:54, “He who eats My flesh and drinks My blood has eternal Life”.  v.66 but after Jesus uttered those figurative words, many quit on Him.  His wasn’t just a man’s blood…Jesus’ perfect Life was in His blood!  Ac.20:28 “The church of God which He purchased with His own blood.”  God’s own blood!  Ellicott Commentary “The ‘blood of God’, which this passage suggests.”  Benson Commentary “How precious it is! Here the blood of Christ is termed the blood of God.”  Matthew Poole Commentary “The blood of Christ, called truly the blood of God.”  Jesus’ blood is incomparable!

There are those who even say that the ascended Jesus as High Priest sprinkled some of His shed blood on the mercy seat of the ark in heaven (as they interpret He.9:11-12, 23-24, 12:24, Re.11:19), where it remains forever.  JFB Commentary He.12:24 “He entered the heavenly holiest place ‘by His own blood’, carrying it separately from his body.”  Bengel’s Gnomen “This Priest Himself carried into the sanctuary His own blood separately.”

Geneticists understand that the DNA of the father and mother is passed on to the fetus, half from each.  Geneticists say that very little, if any, of a surrogate mother’s DNA is absorbed by the fetus (and vice versa).  None of the surrogate’s characteristics significantly affect the fetus.  (ref e.g., Dr. Julie Granka Does A Surrogate Mom Contribute DNA to the Child?.)  An expectant mother’s cells and the blood circulating in her body cannot penetrate the placenta screen or reach her unborn baby.  The baby’s own blood is formed in its little body.  However, nutrients do pass to the unborn through the placenta.

Mt.1:18-20 since Jesus’ Father is Father God, and the HS is Jesus’ Mother…there was divine DNA, so to speak, in Jesus’ blood (or soul or life)!  He received mitochondria DNA from His divine Parents.  Perhaps God miraculously placed the zygote of Jesus within Mary?  (I’m not a biogeneticist.)  Jesus said in He.10:5, “A body you [God] have prepared Me”.  And Jn.5:26 “As the Father has life in Himself, so He gave to the Son to have life in Himself.”  Eternal Life (zoé g2222) was within the Son Jesus!  That point is missed by people who don’t believe the great miracle of the virgin birth.  So Jesus, having divine DNA, didn’t reproduce while on earth.  A woman, having human DNA, would’ve been a different kind.  And any offspring they had would be a hybrid, with DNA part God and part human!

The life is in the blood (Le.17:11, De.12:23), and all men have sinned (Ro.3:23).  Jesus wasn’t a man with corruptible human blood/life as we, yet was somehow able to obediently live a sinless life and become the Savior of mankind.  His blood/Life was unequaled, having no corrupted sin nature!  Mary contributed nutrients, but no blood, cells, or DNA to Jesus.  Paul referred to Jesus as the last Adam (1Co.15:45).  The first Adam didn’t receive DNA from a human mother either!  If Jesus was only a good man/martyr who obeyed God fully, then others (with the HS) could too!  We wouldn’t need a Savior.  But we’ve sinned and do so need the Savior…Yeshua/Jesus!

Jesus wasn’t solely man in the flesh.  He was also Deity.  Col.2:9 “In Him [Christ] all the fullness of Deity dwells in bodily form.”  Both of His Parents are God.  Jesus was the fullness of Deity in a human body (as was glimpsed in Je.23:5-6).  He was Emmanuel, “God (is) with us”.  Jesus’ deity was veiled with flesh (He.10:19-20).  The primordial Word of God was fully God (Jn.1:1-3, 14), and was the Son of God by the Father/HS/blood/birth.  Thereby, Christ didn’t inherit a sin nature.  (Yet He wasn’t a docétic phantom.  Jesus’ fleshly body had nerve endings; He experienced pain/suffering on the cross.)

So Jesus’ virgin birth affirms that divinity was in His precious blood; which enabled only Him, of all men, to obey God completely.  His divine nature wouldn’t allow Him to submit to sin.  Though Jesus looked like other men, He (and His blood) was unlike any other person born of woman.

The virgin birth is crucial to the salvation of mankind!  As the song goes, Nothing But The Blood Of Jesus.  Ac.4:12 “There is no other name under heaven, by which we must be saved.”  Yeshua/Jesus is His name.  Thanks be to God for His indescribable gift (2Co.9:15)!

Israelites Identification (1)

Who were the ancient Israelites and the Jews?  The land area known as modern Israel is disputed.  For decades, even centuries, the Holy Land has been an area of strife & warfare over who are the rightful inhabitants.  This topic will trace the identity of the Israelite people from the Bible.

We’ll begin with Abraham the Hebrew.  God promised Abraham ca 2000 BC, Ge.17:3-5 “I will make you the father of many nations”.  (In Ro.4:13, 17-18 Paul referred to God’s covenant with Abraham.)

In Ge.25:8-9, 1-2 are recorded Abraham’s sons.  Isaac, Ishmaél…also Zimrán, Jokshán, Medán, Midián, Ishbák, Shúah (perhaps Eliézer, Ge.15:1-2 Septúagint/LXX).

Isaac then had twin sons, Jacob and Esau.  God’s covenant with Abraham passed down through Isaac, and then Jacob.  (see the topic “Circumcision in the Bible”.)

Ge.35:10-12 “God appeared to Jacob, ‘Israel shall be your name. A nation and an assembly of nations will descend from you.”  God ‘changed’ Jacob’s name to Israel.  Jacob thereby became the first Israelite.  There were no Israelites prior to Jacob.  Abraham and Isaac weren’t Israelites.

The man Jacob/Israel had 12 sons, whose descendants grew into the 12 tribes of Israel.  Ge.35:22b-26 “The twelve sons of Jacob: Reuben, Simeon, Levi, Judah, Issachár, Zebulún, Joseph, Benjamin, Dan, Naphtalí, Gad, Ashér.”  Jacob/Israel’s 4^th son was Judah (Yehoodáh, Strongs h3063 Hebrew).  Judah was the first Jew.  There were no Jews prior to the man Judah.  And Judah’s brothers weren’t Jews.

In Bible genealogy: Abraham, Ishmael, Isaac, Midian, the twins Esau & Jacob/Israel…none of them were Jews.  But they were all Hebrews, descendants of Héber (LXX Ge.10:21, 11:14-17).  Josephus Antiquities of the Jews 1:6:4 “Heber, from whom they originally called the Jews, Hebrews.”  Ge.14:13 Abraham “the Hebrew” has been called the ‘first Jew’ by tradition, but not by scripture.

In scripture, all Jews are Israelites (Judah descended from Jacob/Israel); but not all Israelites are Jews.  Again, Judah’s 11 brothers weren’t Jews.  Joseph wasn’t Jewish, nor was Reuben, Zebulun, Gad, etc.

Ge.46:2-4 “God spoke to Israel [Jacob], ‘In Egypt I will make of you a great nation [goy].”  (goy h1471 is the Hebrew term.)  Israel’s descendants would become a great nation!  (see “Gentiles in the Bible”.)

Ge.37:3, 9 Israel’s son Joseph is to have preeminence over his 11 brothers, including Judah.  Ge.49:10 the Messiah Yeshúa/Jesus and kings would come from the tribe of Judah.  v.22-26 but the blessing went to brother Joseph.  Ge.48:15-20 the name Israel would be upon Joseph’s sons Ephráim & Manasséh; they’d become a “multitude of nations [goyim]”.  1Ch.5:1-2 “Though from Judah came the leader, the birthright belonged to Joseph.”  Again, Joseph was distinct from Judah/the Jews.  Jewish Encyclopedia: Tribes, The Twelve “Joseph and Judah typify two distinct lines of descent.”

By the time of Moses & Joshua, the sons/tribes of Israel with a “mixed multitude” had become a large people, 1550 BC.  (Ex.12:37-38, see “Levites and the Exodus Multitude”.)  The unified kingdom of Israel would achieve prominence in the Land during the reigns of David and Solomon (Jewish kings).

1Ki.11:11-13 after Solomon’s death, in the 900s BC Christ split the united nation of Israel into two (v.28-32).  See 1Ki.12:15, 20-24.  Thereafter the northern kingdom, consisting of 10 tribes, retained the name Israel.  The southern kingdom of Judah, consisting of the other 2–3 tribes, became known as the Jews.  The tribal territory of Benjamin (and most of the Levites) was given to Judah.

Donald Kauffman Dictionary of Religious Terms “The name Jew derives from Judah, the Israelite tribe whose name was transferred to the Southern Kingdom.”  2Ki.16:5-6 the first time the term “Jew” (Yehoodeé h3064) occurs in the Bible, they’re fighting against…Israel (and Syria)!  After Solomon, Israel and the Jews/Judah became separate nations.

Later, the kingdom of Israel was conquered by Assyria. (see “Israelite Deportations by Assyria”.)  2Ki.17:19-24 “Israel was carried away into exile from their own Land to Assyria until this day.”  v.6 “In the ninth year of Hoshéa, the king of Assyria settled them in Haláh and Habór, on the river of Gozán, and in cities of the Medes.”  Israel (also called Samaria) in the north, the 10 tribes, was removed from the Land (721 BC).  They were resettled in the area of old Mesopotamia, at the Tigris & Euphrates, and beyond.  They became the so-called ‘Lost 10 Tribes’ of Israel, living far away to the (north) east.  The northern kingdom of Israel ceased as a nation.  Samaria became an Assyrian province.

2Esdras 13:40 KJV 1611 edition “Those are the ten tribes, which were carried away prisoners out of their owne land in the time of Osea the king, whom Salmanasar the king of Assyria ledde away captive, and hee carried them ouer the waters, and so came they into another land.” (KJV Middle English spelling.)  cf. Tob.1:1 Tobit, from the tribe of Naphtali, was taken captive.

Josephus op. cit. 9:14:1 “Shalmanéser, the king of Assyria, besieged Samaria, and transplanted all the people into Média and Persia, among whom he took King Hoshea alive; and when he had removed these people out of this their land, he transplanted other nations into Samaria, into the country of the Israelites.”  The other peoples transplanted into the Land became known as Samaritans.

Assyria placed heathen foreigners into Israel to replace the Israelites (2Ki.17:24).  Probably not every last Israelite was removed from the Land.  (Earlier some had fled south to Judah to escape the Assyrian invaders.)  Over the decades, the imported foreigners were assimilated with any few remaining Israelites…as Samaritans.  Those Samaritans held pagan beliefs mixed with God’s ways (ref Je.41:5).

Over 100 years later, the southern kingdom of Judah went into captivity to Babylon.  The prophet/priest Ezekiel was taken captive in 597 BC.  In Ezk.8:1 & 20:1, Ezekiel interchangeably called the captive elders the “elders of Israel” and the “elders of Judah” (592–591 BC).  By this time, these descendants from the southern kingdom Judah were being referred to as descendants of Israel.  Since Judah/Jews did descend from Jacob/Israel, ancestrally Jews are Israelites too.  (But not all Israelites are Jews.)  Babylon went on to sack Jerusalem in 586 BC.  The southern kingdom of Judah ceased as a nation.

Some Jews were allowed to return to the Land of Judah with Zerubabbél ca 538 BC.  More returned with Ezra & Nehemiah between 460–440 BC.  From which tribes of Israel were those returning Jews?

Ezr.1:5 “Judah and Benjamin and the priests and Levites, everyone God had stirred to rebuild the house of the Lord in Jerusalem.”  Ezr.4:1 “The enemies of Judah and Benjamin heard that the people of the exile were building a temple to the Lord.”  Ezr.2:64, 70 “The whole assembly together 42,360.”  In Ezra, the only tribes who returned were Judah, Benjamin, and the priestly tribe of Levi…the Jews.  Ne.11:3-4, 7 “In the cities of Judah lived each on his own property, Israelites, priests, Levites. And some of the sons of Judah and sons of Benjamin lived in Jerusalem. From the sons of Judah…From the sons of Benjamin.”  v.36 “From the Levites, some divisions in Judah belonged to Benjamin.”  In Nehemiah, as in Ezra, the only tribes of Israel mentioned are Judah, Benjamin, Levi!  Non-priests or laymen were referred to as common “Israelites”…Ezekiel too had referred to Jewish elders as “Israel”.

None of the other 10 tribes returned from deportation/captivity…not Reuben, Simeon (other than those who’d moved to Judah centuries earlier & intermarried), Dan, Naphtali, Gad, Asher, Issachar, Zebulun, nor Joseph (Ephraim & Manasseh).  Those tribes weren’t Jews.  They remained long gone from the Land!

However, after the Babylonian captivity, many Jews were living east in Persia.  They were descendants of Judah/Benjamin/Levi from the southern kingdom.  It’s likely some descendants of the resettled 10 tribes (and others) living in Medes cities and Persia intermarried with Jews there in the days of the Jewess Esther (400s BC).  The Persian king married her (Est.4:13-14).  Est.8:17 “Many among the peoples of the land (Persia) became Jews.”

In New Testament (NT) times, Judaea was a Roman province.  Few tribes of Israel are identified in the NT.  He.7:14 Yeshua/Jesus is from the tribe of Judah.  Lk.1:26-33 His mother Mary/Miriam and legal father Joseph were Jews descended from David.  Lk.1:5, 13 John the Baptizer was from the priestly tribe of Levi.  Ro.11:1 the apostle Paul was a Jew from the tribe of Benjamin.  Those were the 3 tribes (comprising the old southern kingdom of Judah, the Jews) who’d returned from Babylonian captivity.

However, Anna was from the tribe of Asher (Lk.2:36).  Asher had been part of the northern kingdom of Israel (one of the 10 tribes), not aligned with the Jews of the southern kingdom.  Lk.2:36 Cambridge Commentary indicates some individuals from the lost 10 tribes had preserved their old genealogies.  Ellicott Commentary “Some, at least, of its [the ten tribes] members survived and cherished the genealogies of their descent.”  Sometime in the past, Anna’s ancestors of Asher had begun dwelling with Jews.  But the vast majority of the 10 tribes were gone from the Land.  Ac.2:22 Peter addressed diaspora Jews as Israel.  Such verses don’t mean all Israelite tribes had returned or mixed with the Jews.

Josephus op. cit. 11:5:2 (written 93–94 AD) “Wherefore there are but two tribes in Asia and Europe subject to the Romans, while the 10 tribes are beyond Euphrates till now, and are an immense multitude, and not to be estimated by numbers.”  In 94 AD, the 10 tribes were still gone!  Talmud Yebamot 17b “The 10 tribes of scattered Israel in their places of exile are legally gentiles for all intents and purposes.”  As Hoséa had foretold, 755–725 BC…Ho.8:8 “Israel is swallowed up; they are now among the nations.”  It happened.  The bulk of Israel remained in lands of the gentiles/nations.

Let’s tie-in more Old Testament prophecies which help to further identify NT Israel.  Am.1:1 Amos was a Jew in Judah who the Lord had sent to prophesy to the northern kingdom of Israel around 750 BC.  Am.7:10-17 Amaziah, the “priest” at the Bethél shrine in Israel, expressed animosity and told Amos to leave Israel and return to his people in Judah, the Jews.  Am.9:8-12 LXX Amos prophesied the future of the northern kingdom. “Saith the Lord, ‘I will sift the house of Israel among all nations [gentiles]. In that day I will raise up the tabernacle of David which is fallen, and will rebuild the ruins of it. That the remnant of men and the gentiles upon whom My name is called may earnestly seek Me.”

The breach of the ancient divided kingdom is to be closed. (cf. KJV Jdg.21:15.)  see “Tent/Tabernacle of David”.

James spoke of the above old Greek/LXX passage regarding the northern kingdom Israel by referring to God having now taken from among the gentiles/nations a people for His name and salvation.  Ac.15:13-18 “I will rebuild the tabernacle of David. That the rest of men may seek the Lord, and all the gentiles upon whom My name is called,’ saith the Lord.”  Acts 15 council leaders tied ancient Israel to…gentiles!

Ezk.37:15-22 “The word of the Lord came to me saying, ‘Take one stick for Judah, for the sons of Israel his companions; then take another stick for Joseph, the stick of Ephraim [Joseph’s son, to whom was given Jacob’s name Israel, Ge.48:16] and all the house of Israel, his companions. Then join them, that they may become one.”  Again, Joseph wasn’t Jewish.  Yet Judah and Joseph…the Jews (who also are Israelites) and the northern kingdom of Israel/Ephraim…are to be reunited under King Jesus!

The Lord told Hosea to prophesy to the northern kingdom of Israel.  Ho.1:4-11 “I will put an end to the kingdom of the house of Israel. For you are not My people and I Am not your God. Yet the number of the sons of Israel will be like the sands of the sea which cannot be measured or numbered. And it will come about that it will be said to them, ‘You are the sons of the living God.’ And the sons of Judah and the sons of Israel will be gathered together.”

The disobedient 10 tribes would be exiled from the Land, and become a multitude in Assyria, Persia, and elsewhere.  But then Ho.2:23, “And I will say to those who were not My people, ‘You are My people!’ And they shall say, ‘You are my God!”

Eventually in the future, descendants of the 10 tribes would become people of God again!  Israel gathered together to Christ with the descendants of Judah.  Praise the Lord!

This topic is continued and concluded in “Israelites Identification (2)”.

Holy Spirit versus Mariolatry

This topic further discusses the Holy Spirit (HS), and links & contrasts the HS to the virgin Mary who bore Jesus.  My other topics about the Godhead or God Family are: “Holy Spirit Personification”, Holy Spirit’s Identity”, “Godhead in Prehistory”, “Tri-unity of God”, “Jesus Was the Old Testament God”, “Jesus Is God…Jesus Has a God”.

Jesus said of Himself in Lk.7:35, “Wisdom is justified by her children”.  Jesus indicated He is the Child of Wisdom…“her”.  (Pr.7:4 wisdom is sister, not brother.)  The New Testament (NT) and the Old Testament (OT) Septúagint/LXX Greek term for Wisdom is sophía (Strongs g4678).  Nowhere in the NT did Jesus call Mary His ‘mother’ (or call Joseph His ‘father’)!

The gospel writers naturally refer to Mary & Joseph as Jesus’ mother & father, His parents.  Lk.2:27 “The parents brought in the child Jesus.”  Mt.13:55 “Is not this the carpenter’s son, and His mother called Mary?”  Jn.6:42 “Is not this Jesus, the son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know?”  Mary even refers to Joseph as Jesus’ father.  After finding Jesus at the temple, Lk.2:48 “His mother said to Him, ‘Son, Your father and I have been anxiously looking for you”.  But Jesus replied to her in v.49, “Didn’t you realize that I must be in My Father’s affairs?”  Jesus was Fathered by God.

Jesus said in Jn.16:28, “I came forth from the Father”.  Mary gave birth to Jesus, and her husband Joseph was Jesus’ legal father.  Lk.3:23 “Jesus, being supposedly the son of Joseph.”  Joseph wasn’t Jesus’ biological father.  Mt.1:18 “When His mother Mary had been betrothed to Joseph, before they came together she was found to be with Child by the Holy Spirit.”  Jesus’ virgin birth!  Mary & Joseph knew that Joseph didn’t father Jesus/Yeshúa.  (also see the topic, “Jesus’ Virgin Birth”.)

Father God is Jesus’ Father, and Jesus referred to Himself as the Child of Wisdom (Lk.7:35), His Mother.  Rather than calling Mary, ‘mother’, Jesus referred to the surrogate Mary as “woman”.  Jn.2:4 “Jesus said to her, ‘Woman, what have I to do with you?”  Jn.19:26 “When Jesus saw His mother and the disciple He loved standing nearby, He said to His mother, ‘Woman, behold your son!”

Jesus was completely God in the flesh…both His Father and Mother are God!  The womb of Mary, the “woman” as Jesus lovingly called her, served to form Him in the flesh to become the God-Man.  The 300s AD Apostles Creed, “I believe in Jesus Christ, who was conceived by the Holy Spirit, born of the virgin Mary”.  Mary birthed Jesus.  Ga.4:4 “God sent forth His Son, born of a woman.”

Lk.1:35 “The angel said, ‘The Holy Spirit will come, and the power of The Highest will overshadow you [Mary]; therefore the Holy One to be born shall be called Son of God.”  Orthodox Study Bible Lk.1:35 “Note the revelation of the Holy Trinity: The Father (The Highest), the Son, and the Holy Spirit.”  The Father overshadowed the HS upon Mary, and God’s Son Jesus was conceived.

Chinese preacher Witness Lee was part of the Christian work started by Watchman Nee.  Lee’s Living With and In the Divine Trinity”, p.39 “Lk.1:35 shows the Holy Spirit coming upon Mary…the Most High, God the Father, overshadowing Mary…and the birth of the holy thing, the Son of God. Thus the entire Divine Trinity was involved in the conception.”  The Son was conceived into Mary by His Parents, who are both God.

So Jesus is also God!  His blood factors, so to speak, were only Divine.  As Jesus grew in Mary’s womb, Mary’s own blood didn’t penetrate her fetal wall.  In 1Pe.1:19, Peter wrote of “The precious blood of Christ”.  God’s “own blood” (Ac.20:27-28)…formed from the Father and the HS!

Father God didn’t somehow have sex with Mary, who was engaged to the man Joseph (Mt.1:18).  It would’ve been adultery to have sex with a married or betrothed woman.  De.22:23-27 God’s penalty for such adultery was severe.  Surely, Father God wasn’t an adulterer!

Furthermore, Mary was of a different kind…she was the human kind, not the Godkind.  God’s principle of biogenesis reflects each creation reproducing only according to its kind (ref Ge.1:11-12, 21, 24-25, 6:19-21, Mt.7:16, 1Co.15:38-39).  Father God is Spirit, not flesh, Jn.4:23-24.  The term incubus pertains to a spirit having sex with a human woman.  Heathen gods, such as Zeus/Jupiter, supposedly had sex with mortal women and produced offspring.

Jesus wasn’t some Nephílim type of offspring (Ge.6:1-4, 1Enoch 6:1-4, Jude 6-7)!  see “Watchers and Gen. 6 ‘Sons of God”.  Father God didn’t go after strange flesh of another kind (Mary) and commit sin.  Ge.19:4-5, 24 God destroyed the Sodomites who desired perverse sex with the two angels who visited Lot.  Le.20:15-16 God’s penalty for beastiality (sex with a different kind) was severe!

Let’s look at the early church understanding of the feminine prototype in God…before the Roman Catholic Church (RCC) became dominant.

But first, Philo Judaeus (25 BC–50 AD), The Works of Philo, AI2:14:49 “The mother of all things…the wisdom of God”.  Again, Jesus indicated He was the Child of her, Wisdom/Sophia (Mt.11:19 KJV).  Pr.1:20-23 “Wisdom lifts her voice, ‘I will pour out My Spirit upon you.”  She is the Holy Spirit.

Early church writings in various countries attest to the feminine (fem) HS.  The fragmentary Gospel to the Hebrews was written in Greek (probably at Alexandria) in the early 100s AD for Jewish Christians.  The HS is Jesus’ Divine Mother in its Christology.  In one quotation Jesus declared, “My mother, the Holy Spirit took Me, and conveyed Me to the great mount Tabor”.

Odes of Solomon, the earliest Christian hymnbook (probably written in Aramaic Syriac, pre-125 AD), translated by James H. Charlesworth, p.33-34 Introduction “Among Christians who worshiped in Aramaic and Syriac, the Holy Spirit was perceived to be feminine. The Odist may serve us well in recovering the feminine in our lives and worship”.  Two sample Odes:  Ode 28 “And from that (Life) is the Spirit that is within Me. And it cannot die because She is life.”  Ode 36 “I rested on the Spirit of the Lord, and She raised me up to heaven. And She caused me to stand on my feet in the Lord’s high place. [Christ speaks now] For according to the greatness of the Most High, so She made Me.”

Hippólytus of Rome (170–235 AD), in a fragment written in Greek, depicted “Isaac as an image of God the Father, wife Rebecca an image of the Holy Spirit, son Jacob an image of the church and of Christ”.

Marius Victórinus of Rome (360 AD) Advérsus Áruim 1:58 (Latin) said the Spirit was Jesus’ Mother.

Robert Murray Symbols of Church and Kingdom, p.25 “The Syriac Fathers, as is well known, attributed female gender to the Holy Spirit in the first centuries after Christ; seeing the Holy Spirit especially as ‘Mother.”  Following are writings reflecting the fem HS from a few ‘fathers’ of the Eastern Church:

Áphrahat (280–345 AD) wrote in Syriac in Persia. Demonstrations VI “The Spirit, She opens the heavens and descends, and hovers over the waters; and those who are baptized put Her on.”

Éphrem the Syrian (306–373 AD) was perhaps the most significant of all the Syriac language fathers, called the “greatest poet of the patristic age”.  In Hymnén de Ecclésia, he identified the Spirit as feminine.

Macarían Homilies (late 300s) were written in Greek at Edessa in Turkey. “Instead of an earthly father you are seeking the heavenly Father, and instead of a mother who is subject to corruption, you have as Mother the excellent Spirit of God, and the heavenly Jerusalem.” (ref Ga.4:26)

Martyríus Sáhdona (630 AD) Book of Perfection 1:3:13.  This Syrian theologian writes of the person “Who has been held worthy of the hovering of the all-holy Spirit [Ge.1:2], who, like a mother, hovers over us as she gives sanctification; and through her hovering over us, we are made worthy of sonship”.

John of Dályatha (700s) wrote in east Syria, calling the Spirit the mother and begetter (Letters 51:11).

Moses bar Képha (813–903), celebrated bishop near the Tigris River, wrote in a Syriac homily, “The Holy Spirit hovered over John the Baptist, and brought him up like a compassionate mother”.

The early Eastern Church originally believed the HS was She/Her.  But after some time, the Syriac church lost or suppressed the original OT & apocryphal Jewish concept of the fem HS or shekínah.  By the 500s AD, a masculine (masc) HS was becoming more the norm.  Possibly this was due to Western influence, and because some heretical groups misused the feminine imagery.

Russian Orthodox author Sergei Búlgakov (1891–1944) Sophia The Wisdom of God, p.1. “The church of St. Sophia in Constantinople. The grace, lightness, wonderful symmetry of the structure; an ocean of light pours in from above and dominates the whole space below…is artistic proof of Her existence.”  p.5-6 “The time has come for us to sweep away the dust of the ages and to decipher the sacred script. The theme of Sophia never had any place in Western theology. Protestantism showed itself particularly barren in this sphere. Unfortunately, the sophialógical barrenness of Western theology influenced Eastern theology also in a negative direction…a divergence from the true wisdom of the church.”

Unlike the Eastern Church, the RCC claims, “At no time has the Church referred to the Holy Spirit as ‘She’ when speaking of the person of the Holy Spirit”. (The Catholic Exchange 2006)  The RCC insists the HS be referred to as ‘He’.

Instead of a fem HS…the RCC developed excessive veneration of the virgin Mary.  Their Mariology is quasi-idolatry/Mariolatry.  They greatly reverence Mary, say she never sinned, and some pray to her.

Official Mary veneration is seen from the 430 AD Council of Ephesus, when Mary was given the title Theotókos/“God-bearer”, or Mother of God.  (Yet nowhere in the NT did Jesus call Mary, ‘mother’.)

Earlier, Irenaeus (130–200 AD) of France had called Mary the new/second Eve.  In his analogy, the pregnant Mary and Jesus the 2^nd Adam (1Co.15:45) were of the same body…as Eve & Adam were of the same body, before Eve was separated (Advérsus Háereses 3).  But Irenaeus’ comparison doesn’t overly venerate Mary.  (Irenaeus also wrote, “The Son is rightly called Word, the Spirit is called the Wisdom”.)

Peter Damian (1007–1073) was an Italian cardinal.  He connected Mary with Wisdom/Sophia as the omnipotent Throne of Wisdom. “The blessed virgin can do whatever she pleases, both in heaven and on earth. All power is given to thee [Mary]…nothing is impossible to thee.” (Serm.1 de Nat. B. Virg.)

Bernard of Clairvaux (1090–1153) was a French abbot.  To Bernard, Mary is the mother of humankind!  “At the command of Mary, all obey, even God.” (De Excel Virg, cap 12)  “Mary is our Mediatrix.”  (Second Sermon for the Feast of the Assumption) “Let us cast ourselves at the feet of this good Mother.”

St. Bonaventure (1221–1274) was an Italian of the Franciscan order.  To him, Mary is Co-Redemptrix (Psalter of the Blessed Virgin Mary). “The Virgin Mary, the Queen of Heaven.”  “The Holy Spirit intends Solomon’s words about Wisdom [in Proverbs, Wisdom of Solomon] to be understood of the most excellent Virgin Mary.”  Bonaventure transposed Jesus’ real Mother, Wisdom (the HS)…to Mary!  Bonaventure also wrote, “That woman (namely Eve), drove us out of Paradise and sold us; but this one (Mary) brought us back again and bought us”. (de don. Sp. 6; 14 Bonaventure)

As a child, the Beatles’ Paul McCartney was baptized a Roman Catholic.  Later, in 1970 even he sang, “In my hour of darkness, mother Mary comes to me; speaking words of wisdom…Let It Be”.

Over the centuries, the RCC has made Mary/Mariolatry a counterfeit or substitute for the scriptural position of Wisdom/Sophia/Mother.  Yet a counterfeit presumes a prior genuine!  It was Wisdom who sat beside God’s throne as Queen. Wisdom of Solomon 9:4 “Wisdom that sits by Your throne.”  She was beside YHVH at the beginning. Pr.8:22, 30 “I [Wisdom] was beside Him, daily His delight.”  The real Queen of Heaven (Je.7:18) wasn’t a counterfeit Astárte…not Deméter…not Isis…not Mary!

The surrogate Mary carried and birthed Jesus the Son of God.  She’s a godly woman.  But not a co-redemptrix or mediatrix, not due near-goddess status!  The RCC believes Mary was always sinless.  However, Mary herself indicated that she too needs a Savior!  Lk.1:46-47 Mary exulted, “My spirit has rejoiced in God my Savior”.  Mary knew she was a sinner needing a Savior, just like all of humanity.

Christians believe we are born-again (“from above”).  But most today give little thought to the Mother such birth implies.  John saw in Re.12:1, 5, 14 “In heaven a Woman clothed with the sun and the moon under her feet. She gave birth to a Son to rule all nations. And two wings of a great eagle were given to the woman, that she might fly.”  (God said in Ps.2:7, “You are My Son, Today I have begotten Thee. I will give the nations as Your inheritance.”)  Re.12:17 “The dragon made war the with the rest of Her offspring.”  The Woman isn’t Mary.  Re.12 reflects the begetting HS and Spirit-filled church/offspring.

Is.66:7 “Before she travailed, she brought forth a man child.”  v.13 “As one who his Mother comforts, so I will comfort you.”  The HS is the Comforter/Helper.  Jesus said in Jn.14:26, “The Comforter, the Holy Spirit, who the Father will send in My name”.  In the Old Syriac Jn.14:26, the Comforter/HS is “She” (as YHVH is as Mother in Is.66:13).  Also Ac.9:31 “In the comfort of the Holy Spirit, the church multiplied.”

The early Syriac writers quoted above didn’t present the HS as a literal woman.  But by the 500s AD she became masculine.  It seems the concept of a fem HS became dangerous to the structure of the church.  By the time the HS became a confirmed member of the trinity (Council of Constantinople in 381 AD), the HS was described as masc, despite having nurturing fem qualities!  But Ge.1:2, 26-27 females too embody God’s image!  Male and female both are created in the image and likeness of God.

Martin Luther was reportedly “not ashamed of speaking of the Holy Spirit in feminine terms”.

Count Zínzendorf (1700–1760), leader of the Moravian church, wrote of himself: “I have during my lifetime not eaten of the foods which were formerly forbidden them; I have employed the Sabbath for rest many years already, and our Sunday for the proclamation of the gospel – that I have done without design, and in simplicity of heart.” (Budingsche Sammlung, Leipzig, 1742, sec. 8, 224, letter written in 1738.)  To Zinzendorf, the HS was Creator (Ge.1:2, 26 “Us”) and Mother. “She has created the world with the Savior and now is remaking every child until it is a new creation, and becomes one in the spirit with him; She nurses and watches until it is grown.”

God said of Jesus in Lk.3:22, “You are My beloved Son”.  The apostle Paul quoted Ge.2:24 regarding Adam & Eve in Ep.5:23-33.  Paul midrashed that Christ will marry the HS-filled church.  v.30-32 “For this cause a man shall leave his father and mother, and shall cleave to His wife. This mystery is great, but I speak concerning Christ and the church.”  The ascended and betrothed Jesus leaves His Father and Mother (HS/Wisdom) to marry the church/Bride!  And Adam had left God, with Eve (Ge.2:24-25, 3:23).

From Aphrahat’s Demonstration X, “As long as a man hasn’t taken a wife, he loves and reveres God his Father and the Holy Spirit his Mother”.  Re.19:7-9 is Jesus’ metaphorical marriage to Christians.

As part of the collective future “Bride” of Christ, male Christians may feel uncomfortable singing love songs of praise to Jesus.  Eventually we’ll be with Him, together forever.  Re.22:17 “The Spirit and the Bride say, ‘Come.”  We can be Jesus’ Bride because we’re all begotten by the fem (Mother) Spirit.  In Jn.3:3-8, Jesus said you must be born again of the Spirit.  The “offspring” of the HS (again Re.12:17).

Ro.8:29 Jesus the Son of God is the “firstborn of many brothers and sisters”.  Jesus is also the brother of all who are children of God via the HS.  v.11 “He who raised Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit who dwells in you.”  v.15 “You have received the Spirit of adoption as sons, we cry out ‘Abbá, Father.”  Christians are adopted children of Father God and Mother HS.  Jesus is our elder Brother.  2Co.6:18 “You shall be sons and daughters to Me’, says the Lord Almighty.”  (That’s not to say that Christians become God as the Creator God is God.)

Jesus said in Jn.5:19, “The Son can do nothing of Himself”.  Yet Jesus the Son personified the virtues & attributes of Father God and Mother HS/Wisdom.  (see “Holy Spirit Personification”.)  Paul saw the Spirit-filled Jesus too as wisdom.  Col.2:2-3 “Christ, in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.”  Jesus is the Son and emissary of Wisdom the HS.  Paul wrote in 1Co.1:24, “Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God”.  Wisdom originally was “brought forth” a she in Proverbs (8:1, 24).  And in Lk.7:35, Jesus said He’s the Child of Wisdom/“her”.  Lk.4:14 “Jesus returned to Galilee in the power of the Spirit.”  Jn.3:34 “God gives Him [Jesus] the Spirit without limit.”

Though Jesus could do nothing of Himself, His power & wisdom came from His Divine DNA, so to speak, from His Parents.  Mt.13:54 “Coming to His home town they were amazed and said, ‘Where did this man get this wisdom, and these wondrous powers?”  Jesus the Son as God inherited wisdom & power from God!  (Lk.13:34 Jesus isn’t effeminate, yet the HS in Him could even empathize as a mother hen.)

God is one/echád (De.6:4, Jn.10:30).  The Father, HS, Son are one…all three of the God kind & Family.

In the NT, Jesus never referred to Mary as His mother (or Joseph as His father).  By the early 300s AD, the church was embroiled in the Arian controversies.  Many didn’t want Jesus begotten before time began.  But in the 300s AD, many did want women suppressed.  A quandary existed.  So they hushed scriptures which related to Wisdom/sophia the HS having been “brought forth” in past eternity…though Wisdom herself says in Pr.8:25 LXX, “He begets [gennáo g1080] Me”. (see “Godhead in Prehistory”.)

Over the centuries AD, Mother Wisdom/Sophia became assimilated into the cult of the virgin Mary.  Mary, the counterfeit or replacement for Wisdom, was elevated.  Mariolatry ensued in the RCC.

 

Jesus Obeyed God’s Written Laws

In the Old Testament (OT), the Hebrew term which is usually translated “law” in our Bibles is toráh (Strongs h8451).  It occurs 220 times.  Torah is instructive teaching with a wide range of meaning.  The BC Jewish translators of the OT into Greek (now become the Septúagint/LXX) translated torah as nómos (g3551), which means ‘law’.  Nomos occurs 240 times in the LXX, and 200 times in the New Testament (NT) where it usually refers to a body of law or the first five books (Péntateuch) of the OT.

God’s OT written word includes: laws, the Lord’s Testimony (edúth h5715) Decalogue on Mt Sinai, commandments (mitzváh h4687), judgments/legal decisions (mishpát h4941), ceremonial statutes or ordinances & civil decrees (choq h2706 & chuqqáh h2708).  Ne.9:13 the Lord God “Came down on Mt Sinai and spoke to them from heaven; and gave them right judgments, and true laws, good statutes and commandments”.  In De.4:8, “this whole law” includes all the above. However, by NT times most of God’s precepts were generally called commandments (entoláy g1785, Greek).

According to Jewish rabbinic tradition, there are 613 laws or commandments in the Pentateuch.  Of these, 248 are positive ‘do’s’ and 365 are negative ‘don’ts’.  Rámbam (1138-1204 AD) listed 613.  That number is disputed.  Wikipedia: 613 Commandments “Some rabbis declared…that it was not logically possible to come up with a systematic count. A number of authorities denied that it was normative.”

Theologians have divided God’s laws into three broad categories: moral, civil or judicial, ceremonial.  There’s some overlap.  Did Jesus disobey any of the Lord’s written injunctions, His requirements?

God’s foundational moral code was the Testimony of Ex.20 & De.5, the ‘10 Commandments’ so-called.  Actually, the expression ‘10 Commandments/10 Mitzvót’ (h4687) never occurs in the Hebrew Masoretic text!  The Decalogue was the ‘10 Words’ (dabár h1697) or ’10 Sayings’.  ref De.4:13.

From the Decalogue the Lord gave to Israel…Jesus affirmed in Mt.19:18-19 that you shouldn’t commit murder or adultery, you shouldn’t steal or bear false witness; and honor your father & mother.

Jesus honored His heavenly Father.  Jn.8:29 “I do always those things which please Him.”  Lk.2:49-51 Jesus said He must be about His heavenly Father’s house/affairs/business.  Yet Jesus continued to be in subjection to Mary & Joseph, His earthly parents.  Jn.19:26-27 while hanging on the cross, Jesus entrusted the care of Mary to His cousin the apostle John.

Jesus didn’t commit murder or adultery.  Jesus didn’t steal.  Lk.19:30-35 Jesus needed a colt.  Without objecting, the colt’s owners let two of Jesus’ disciples take the colt.  It wasn’t a criminal act.

Jesus didn’t lie.  Jn.7:8-10 although Jesus delayed leaving for the Feast right then with them, He did go to it.  Gill Exposition Jn.7:10 “The Ethiopic version reads, ‘He went up that day’; which is very likely, Jn.7:14 though He didn’t go to the temple to teach till the middle of the feast.”  He is the truth, Jn.14:6.

Neither did Jesus wrongly covet/desire.  Ex.20:17 “You shall not covet.”  Jn.6:15 Jesus even withdrew from the multitude who wanted to make Him a temporal King Messiah then.

It doesn’t appear that Jesus disobeyed any of God’s Testimony, the 10 Words, the 10 Commandments!

Some may think that Jesus neglected to perform all the applicable ceremonial or sacrificial aspects of God’s written word given to Moses/Israel.  Most Christians aren’t knowledgeable about details of ancient Israel’s ritualistic practices, though we do see references & glimpses of them in the NT.

Jesus Christ wasn’t remiss in ceremonial aspects of the Mosaic Law.  Christ Himself, as the Word of God (Jn.1:1, 14) and Rock of Israel (De.32:18 & 1Co.10:4), had sanctioned it for Israel!  (see the topic “Jesus Was the Old Testament God”.)  There’s no scriptural evidence which indicates that Jesus sinned or violated this aspect of His written Law or torah.

What is sin?  Scriptural ‘definitions’ of sin:  Ro.14:23 “Whatever is not of faith is sin [hamartía g266].”  Ja.4:17 “The person who knows the right thing to do, and does it not, to him it is sin.”  1Jn.5:17 “All unrighteousness is sin.”  And 1Jn.3:4, “Sin is the transgression of the Law [or lawlessness].”  That’s four NT descriptions of sin.  Also Pr.24:9 “The thought of foolishness is sin [chattáh h2403].”

Did Jesus the Christ commit any sins?  The Jewish NT writers said Jesus didn’t sin in any manner!  The apostle Peter wrote in 1Pe.2:22, “Christ did no sin, neither was guile found in His mouth”.  John wrote in 1Jn.3:5, “In Him is no sin”.  He.4:15 “Jesus was in all points tempted as we are, yet without sin.”  That’s the assertion coming down to us from three Jewish Christian writers!  Jesus didn’t transgress the Lord’s written Law/torah.

And well Jesus should have obeyed written torah.  Mary/Miriám, the young woman who bore Him, was a Jewess from the Israelite tribe of Judah.  He.7:14 “It is evident that our Lord [Jesus] sprang from Judah.”  In Jn.4:22, Jesus Himself indicated He was a Jew. “We worship that which we know, for salvation is of the Jews.”  God’s written laws were for Israelites, including the Jewish Mary and Jesus.

Jesus/Yeshúa must obey the laws for male non-Levites, that is.  Laws which applied only to females, or to the service of Levites and priests, didn’t apply to Jesus.  Jesus wasn’t a priest from the tribe of Levi.

Let’s examine the gospel narratives in some detail, and in so doing compare Jesus’ words & actions with other laws of God which were given to Moses/Israel.  The following is from the scriptural record:

Beginning with the family of the infant Jesus before His human birth, His Uncle Zacharias and Aunt Elizabeth were blameless (Lk.1:5-6).  Mary was favored by God, and she believed the amazing words of the angel Gabriel spoken to her about her Son (Lk.1:30-38)!  Her husband Joseph, Jesus’ Jewish legal father, was a just man (Mt.1:18-19).  These relatives weren’t habitual breakers of written torah.

After Jesus was born, Joseph & Mary had Him physically circumcised on the 8^th day (Lk.2:21).  This was in obedience to the command given to Moses in Le.12:3 for Israelite male newborns. “On the 8^th day the flesh of his foreskin shall be circumcised.”

Lk.2:22 after the male birth, Mary was away from the temple during her required days of purification, in obedience to Le.12:4.  Then appearing at the temple, in Lk.2:23-24 they offered a required sacrifice to obey Le.12:8. “She shall take two turtledoves or two young pigeons.”  Jesus the firstborn son was presented to the Lord (Lk.2:22) in accordance with Ex.13:2. “Sanctify to Me every firstborn among the sons of Israel.”  Written torah was closely adhered to by them.

Then during Jesus’ childhood, Lk.2:41-42 “His parents used to go to Jerusalem every year for the Passover”.  This in obedience to De.16:5-6. “You are not allowed to sacrifice the Passover in any of your towns; but at the place where the Lord chooses to establish His name.”  Later as an adult, Jesus’ disciples made preparation in Mk.14:12 to eat the sacrificial Passover with Him as commanded. “When the Passover was being sacrificed.”  In Jerusalem, not in Galilee.  Another ceremonial observance was reflected in Jn.7:2, 10-14 where Jesus was attending the Feast of Tabernacles or Sukkót at Jerusalem.  In obedience to De.16:16, “All your males shall appear” at the one singular place of the Lord’s choice.

Some Bible readers regard God’s dietary laws as a mixture of moral and ceremonial directives.  It’s not loving one’s neighbor to feed them unclean parasitic or carcinogenic creatures.  (see the topic “Unclean versus Clean Food”.)  Jesus said in His parable of Mt.13:47-48 that they gathered-in the good fish but cast away the bad fish.  Pulpit Commentary Mt.13:48 “This included the legally unclean.”  Obeying the Lord’s guidelines of Le.11:9-10 which defined clean & unclean, “All [sea creatures] that have fins and scales you may eat”.

In Mt.17:24-27, Jesus paid the poll/temple tax for Peter (and Himself).  Ex.30:13-14 had required this tax.  And in Mt.23:23, Jesus told Jewish Pharisees they should pay tithes stipulated by written torah, even on their garden crops…tithes holy to God (Le.27:30).

What about sacrifices?  Some OT sacrifices were voluntary options, others were commanded.  In Mk.7:11-13, Jesus reprimanded scribes & Pharisees for their having chosen to do voluntary sacrifice (korbán, Hebrew, e.g. Le.1:2) to God, instead of responsibly honoring their aging parents (Ex.20:12).  Individual burnt offerings were voluntary (Le.1).  Many grain offerings were voluntary (Le.2).  Many peace offerings were voluntary (Le.3).  Three types of peace offerings are identified in Le.7:11-ff; thank, votive, freewill.  (also see “Passover and Peace Offerings”.)

As to whether or not Jesus brought such individual offerings…is a non-issue.  Because…those offerings were voluntary, not commanded.  (That is, unless some incidental matter such as a Nazarite vow was involved, of which there’s no NT account of Jesus ever taking such a vow.)

The individual sacrifices of Le.4-6 for sin & guilt weren’t voluntary or optional in the sense other types were.  These were offered by the offending Israelite for atonement and forgiveness, e.g. Le.6:1-7!  (see “Day of Atonement”.)  Although sin & guilt offerings were expiatory for forgiveness, they too were a personal non-issue for the person who hadn’t sinned.  And the NT writers said Jesus never sinned.

In Nu.15:37-39, the Lord commanded Israelite men to wear fringe or tassels (g2899 LXX) on their garment hem.  (ref De.22:12, Zec.8:23.)  This was to help them remember His commandments/mitzvot.  Mt.23:5 scribes & Pharisees pridefully lengthened their tassels (g2899), perhaps to show their supposed ‘rank’.  In Mt.9:20-22, a woman diseased with an issue of blood touched the tassels (g2899) on Jesus’ garment.  Jesus didn’t disobey this ceremonial tassels requirement.  And He healed the woman.  (cf. Lk.8:44, Mt.14:36, Mk.6:56.)

If Jesus had close physical contact with someone He healed from an issue of blood, then perhaps He became ritually unclean…until He washed at evening (Le.15:25-27).  But such ritual uncleanness wasn’t sin.  Becoming ritually unclean could even be mandatory!  A man must properly attend to his father’s dead body, for example.  Even priests did so (Le.21:1-3).  A corpse is unclean (Nu.19:11).  Attending to a close relative’s corpse reflects compassion and honor for the deceased…which isn’t sin.

In Mk.1:40-44, Jesus healed a leper and told the healed leper to “Go show yourself to the priest and offer for your cleansing what Moses commanded”.  This was to obey that which God had instructed Moses in Le.13:1-2, 17. “If the infection has turned white, then the priest shall pronounce him clean”.

Leprosy was infectious and lepers were to be quarantined (ref Le.13:44-46, 5:3).  The priest was a type of ‘health inspector’.  However, I know of no written torah which clearly forbad touching a leper.  Again, it wasn’t always a violation to touch an unclean person.  Doing so could just make you unclean until you went through the proper ceremonial procedure and the required time elapsed.

In the OT, only two individuals are named who were healed of leprosy…Miriam the Israelitess (Nu.12:10-15) and the gentile Naamán, general of the opposing Syrian army (2Ki.5:1-14).  But not one Israelite man!  (Moses’ brief ordeal was a sign, Ex.4:5-7.)  Bible historians say 1^st century Jews therefore came to believe that only the Messiah could heal an Israelite man from leprosy.  Jesus did so!

Also 1^st century Jews believed only the Messiah could heal a man blind from birth.  In Jn.9:1-7 there was a man blind from birth.  Jesus’ disciples thought the man was born blind because he’d sinned in a prior life, or else his parents had sinned.  But Jesus said this blindness was so the works of God would be displayed in him.  Perhaps the man had blind faith…the Son of God healed him!  Praise God!

But it is understood that Jesus didn’t observe all the Jews’ oral law traditions.  And in Mk.7:7-9, Jesus castigated scribes & Pharisees for favoring the traditions of men above the written commands of God!

Returning to the account of the man born blind…out of love and compassion, Jesus gave him sight, applying clay & spittle.  But after questioning the man who now could see, Pharisees said in Jn.9:13-16, “This man [Jesus] is not from God, because He doesn’t keep the Sabbath”.  Because Jesus had “made” clay on the sabbath (v.6, 14), those Pharisees viewed His act as a breach of rabbinic sabbath laws.  T. Hieros Sabbat 14.4 “It is forbidden to put fasting spittle even on the eyelid on a sabbath day.”

Historians say the Jews had 39 categories of burdensome man-made sabbath laws (with even further detail)!  But those were merely the commandments of men.  Jesus’ action didn’t violate the written law of God.  And even the famous 1^st century rabbinic schools of Hillél and Shammái differed over points of traditional observance.  (Ti.1:14 Paul too warned about Jewish “commandments of men”.)

Jesus healed a man with a withered hand in the synagogue on the Sabbath.  Jesus asked those who would accuse Him in Mk.3:1-5, “Is it lawful on the Sabbath to do good or to do harm, to save life or to kill?’ But they kept silent.”  They failed to give Jesus a good answer.  Matthew Henry Commentary Jn.9:16 “On the sabbath…works of necessity and mercy are allowed.”

Jesus customarily went to synagogue on the sabbath day.  Le.23:3 “On the seventh day there is a sabbath of complete rest, a holy convocation.”  Jesus obeyed God’s Decalogue sabbath command.  And of Jesus’ commitment in Lk.4:16, “As was His custom, He entered the synagogue on the Sabbath, and stood up to read”.  Jesus regularly attended synagogue on the 7^th day sabbath.

It’s not that all traditional observances are wrong.  Most every culture has some good traditions.  In Jn.10:22-23 e.g., Jesus is seen in Jerusalem at the temple during the man-made festival of Hánukkah.  This “Feast of Dedication” or ‘Festival of Lights’ was ordained by the Jews in the 160s BC to commemorate the re-dedication of the temple.  Hanukkah is a tradition which doesn’t contradict God’s written word.  So Jesus the “Light of the World” (Jn.8:12) was at the ‘Festival of Lights’.

To conclude…I find nothing in the Bible that clearly indicates Jesus ever sinned by violating God’s written word or torah/Law.  And Jesus Himself said in Jn.15:10, “I have kept My Father’s commandments, and abide in His love”.

Previously I quoted Jewish NT writers who said Jesus never sinned.  Also Paul wrote in 2Co.5:21 that God…“Made Him [Jesus] who knew no sin to be sin for us”.  Jesus knew no sin.  So Christ became that which He did not know…sin!  He became a sin offering.  Jesus became sin and the offering for sin…both.  For our sake.  In the OT type, the substitute animal sacrifice was regarded as sin-bearing.

OT sacrifices have ended (He.10:5).  They, and ceremonial rituals of the Mosaic law, are unnecessary for Christians!  Without a physical temple, it’s no longer possible to perform most rituals correctly.

The Bible indicates Jesus didn’t break any of God’s written laws!  Jesus affirmed them.  Jesus didn’t disobey God’s written torah or Father God.  The fact that Jesus never sinned is crucial to our salvation!  If Jesus had transgressed God’s law and sinned, we’d have no Savior.  But we have a legitimate Savior!  The sinless Christ died for the sins of the Israelites, and for the sins of all mankind.  Thanks be to God for His Son!

Christmas and Jesus’ Birth Month

Christmas is the USA’s most popular holiday, annually celebrated by more than 90% of the populace.  Yet some people who believe in Jesus as Savior don’t feel they should celebrate His birthday, or not at the generally accepted season.  Maybe they don’t think December 25 was really His human birth date.  Maybe they disapprove of the ungodly heathen or wrong trappings which became attached to the celebration.  Or they don’t see the celebration commanded by God in the Bible.  And ‘Christmas Break’ is now called ‘Winter Break’.  This topic examines these issues, and offers a reasonable conclusion.

Many myths and legends began with an element of real truth or fact…where there’s smoke there’s fire.  That’s the case with Christmas traditions.  That Jesus was born and lived as a human is truth/fact.  The historians Josephus, Tacitus, Pliny refer to Him, all writing prior to 120 AD.  But then…questionable or objectionable customs and embellishments were added over the centuries.  e.g. Santa Claus, holly & mistletoe, wass-ale-ing, party spirit, xmas ham, excess materialism or greed.

Before Christ, religious sects in Israel also attached ritual customs to the Lord’s holydays.  And religious activity such as prayer, immersion in water, waving tree/palm branches, e.g…were customs of pagans too!  Should Christians avoid these practices just because the heathen did them for their gods?  The observance of Jesus’ birth spread among countries & cultures which attached pagan elements to His birth.  But did these early Christians remain heathens at heart?

The Bible also reflects occasions which were added, not commanded by God.  ref Est.9:19 Purim; Jg.11:39-40; Zec.8:19.  Hánukkah was attended by Jesus (Jn.10:22-23).  It commemorated the defeat of Antíochus Epíphanes in the 160s BC, rededicating the altar and cleansing the temple.  1Mac.4:52-59 & 2Mac.10:5-9 the Jewish people (not God) ordained Hanukkah by common statute (2Mac.10:8).  This man-ordained occasion begins on Kíslev 25 (in our Nov-Dec)!  Perhaps Jesus was born or conceived during Hanukkah, the eight-day ‘Festival of Lights’.  Let’s closely examine His time of birth.

The supposed old Jewish tradition of ‘integral age’ said a great prophet was born or conceived and died on the same date.  Jesus died during Passover week, around Apr 1.

Historically, Jesus’ human birth was set at: May 20, Apr 17, Mar 28, and Jan 6 (‘12 days of Christmas’ after Dec 25?) in the early Eastern church, Armenian, Coptic, Russian Orthodox.

Some think Jesus was born near a Sep 25 Rosh Hashánah, His conception being the previous Dec 25 Hanukkah.  But Rosh Hashanah was still the time of grape and fig processing, and for regional dates and pomegranates.  Agriculture provided tax revenues to Rome!  It seems unlikely that Rome would purposely antagonize Jews by requiring an agricultural society to travel to their old ancestral locales for a census (Lk.2:1-6) at this busy season.  The slow period for plowing, sowing, reaping was Dec–Feb.

Following is a capsule review of Jesus’ Nativity, tying together the accounts of Luke and Matthew.  Lk.1:5-25 the angel Gabriel appeared to Zacharias, who was serving in the temple.  He tells Zacharias that his elderly wife Elizabeth will bear a son named John.  Zacharias was of the priestly course of Abijáh.  1Ch.24:1, 5, 7, 10 Jehoiaríb’s was the 1^st weekly course, Abijáh’s the 8^th; each was sabbath-to-sabbath.  If Zacharias saw Gabriel in June, then that could place the birth of John the Baptizer near Passover (customarily set a plate for Elijah), with Jesus’ birth 6 months later near September 25.  But if he saw Gabriel October 1, then John was born 9 months later near July 1, and Jesus near January 1.

Lk.1:26-60 Gabriel’s Annunciation to Mary.  Mary becomes pregnant with Jesus and travels 75 miles south from Nazareth of Galilee to visit her elderly aunt Elizabeth, who is 6 months pregnant with John (near Bethlehem or Hebrón in Judea).  Mary stays with Elizabeth for 3 months and John is born.  Upon Mary’s return to Galilee, her fiancée Joseph now sees she is 3-4 months pregnant.  What?!  Mt.1:18-25 in a dream an angel tells Joseph of the forthcoming miraculous virgin birth, and Joseph will wed Mary.

Lk.2:1-8 just before Mary goes into labor, she and Joseph travel 4 days south to Bethlehem, which is 6 miles south of Jerusalem.  They must go to this rather distant town of Joseph’s ancestors to register for Augustus’ census.  v.3 “All were proceeding to register for the census, everyone to his own city.”

{Sidelight: This most likely wasn’t Feast of Tabernacles (FOT) time.  At FOT time, Joseph, their male relatives (and the shepherds too, Lk.2:8) would’ve gone to Jerusalem as commanded by God…not to Bethlehem or other original Israelite tribal areas/towns for census purposes.  ref De.16:11, 16, 12:11, 14:23-25; Je.7:12; 1Ki.14:21; Lk.2:41.  From the days of Solomon, the only location where God authorized pilgrim feasts be kept is Jerusalem, where the central sanctuary was…and never at two or more locations simultaneously! (see “Feasts of the Lord and the Jews”.)  Ellicott Commentary Lk.2:7 “There was no room for them at the inn’. The town was crowded with persons who had come to be registered.”}

Lk.2:9-38 as Jesus is born, the shepherds witness His glorious Birth-day celebration in the heavens!  v.13-14 “Suddenly there appeared with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God and saying, ‘Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace among men.”  Then while staying at a (relative’s?) house in Bethlehem, Jesus’ ‘parents’ bring Him to the temple for circumcision, and then for Mary’s purification 40 days after giving birth (Lk.2:21-24, ref Le.12:1-8).

Probably the wise men/mági haven’t arrived yet with their expensive gifts, since Mary could only afford to offer two turtledoves (Lk.2:24), not a more expensive lamb.  Anna and witnesses begin to make knowledge of Jesus public.  (Lk.2:39 Luke’s account skips the magi visit and the holy family’s soon-coming flight to Egypt before returning home to Galilee.)

Mt.2:1-11 perhaps very soon after the purification offering, wise men or magi arrive at the Bethlehem house, bringing expensive gifts.  They came from Arabia (ref Is.60:6 gold & frankincense), or Babylon (ref Da.5:11 the Jewish prophet Daniel had been appointed chief of the wise men in Babylon) or Persia.  Joseph likely was needing to return to his Nazareth business…supposedly he’s of modest means.

Opinions vary about what the ‘Star of Bethlehem’ was…a great comet, supernova, visible conjunction of heavenly bodies, an angel, the shekínah glory returning after 500 years to conceive Jesus, or something else supernatural?  ref Nu.24:17, Is.9:1-2, Ezk.11:23.  Maybe the wise men saw the “star” 10 months previously, or maybe only 41 days previously?  It is thought that a small camel caravan could travel 15–20 miles a day, each carrying 200–300 lbs.  At that rate, a 700-mile journey could take 35–45 days.

After giving gifts, the magi depart.  Mary will treasure in her heart (Lk.2:19) the circumstances surrounding Jesus’ miraculous birth…the shepherd’s vision (Lk.2:8-20), the magi visit and their account of seeing the star, etc.  Mary will pass it on to Jesus’ disciples and others.  (see “Jesus’ Virgin Birth”.)

Mt.2:12-18 upon the magi’s departure, the family will leave Bethlehem.  But in a dream an angel warns Joseph not to travel 75 miles north to Nazareth…but instead take a (200-mile?) detour WSW to Egypt, to avoid Herod the Great.  Very soon Herod will murder all Bethlehem infants who are in their second year or under…7 to 20 infants, based upon population estimates.  Having just received valuable gifts from the wise men, the family now has the wherewithal to afford the sojourn in Egypt (whereas they could only afford to sacrifice two turtledoves on the 40^th day of purification, Lk.2:22-24).

Mt.2:19-23 an angel in another dream tells Joseph of Herod’s death.  (Josephs had significant dreams, cf. Ge.37:5-ff!)  The family returns home to Nazareth…perhaps via the Way of the Sea, to avoid ethnarch Archeláus in Judea.

In what calendar month was Jesus born?  Early Christians ‘fathers’ wrote:

Justin Mártyr (100–165 AD) said Jesus was born at Bethlehem, “As you can ascertain also from the registers of the taxing made under [Quirínius] your first procurator in Judea”. (First Apology, 34)

Tertullian (160–250 AD) “His [Joseph’s] enrollment in the census of Augustus, that most faithful witness of the Lord’s nativity, kept in the archives at Rome.” (Against Marcion 4:7:7)  The census of Lk.2:1-5 was documented.

Hippólytus (165–236 AD) “The first advent of our Lord in the flesh, born in Bethlehem eight days before the kalends [1^st] of January.” (Commentary on Daniel 4:23:3)  That was inclusively Dec 25.

Cyril of Jerusalem (348–386 AD) reportedly asked Julius, bishop of Rome, to assign the true date of Jesus’ birth “from census documents brought by Titus to Rome”.  Julius assigned Dec 25.  That would place Jesus’ conception near the previous Passover (which corresponds to ‘integral age’ tradition).

Wikipedia: Christmas “A traditional Jewish belief [was] that great men were born and died on the same day. Jesus was therefore considered to have been conceived on March 25, as He died on March 25 [Tertullian].  In 221 AD, Sextus Julius Africánus gave March 25 as the day of…the conception of Jesus in his universal history.  St Ephráim [306-373 AD] taught that the date of the conception of Jesus Christ fell on 10 Nisán of the Hebrew calendar, the day in which the passover lamb was selected according to Exodus 12. Some years 10 Nisan falls on March 25 [Apr 6 old Julian calendar].”

Chrýsostom (347–407 AD) said a Dec 25 date was verified by actual census/tax records of Joseph registering in Bethlehem.  Chrysostom taught that John the Baptizer’s father Zacharias was serving on the Day of Atonement (late Sep/early Oct) when Gabriel appeared to him.  Lk.1:10 a “multitude” at the temple indicates it was a sabbath or a feast day.  That would place the birth of John the Baptizer around July 1 (and Jesus’ birth six months later, around Jan 1).

In 70 AD Sunday Aug 5 (the 9^th of Av) the temple was destroyed.  The 1^st priestly course of Jehoiarib was serving then (ref Talmud Olam Rabbah and Alfred Edersheim).  If the priestly service order had remained unbroken for decades, 70 years earlier was Zacharias’ service course of Abijah in early Oct?

The Jewish Christian historian Alfred Edersheim wrote in The Life and Times of Jesus the Messiah, p.131, There are temple flocks (at Bethlehem) that “remain in the open alike in the hottest days and the rainy season, i.e. all year round”.  Winter temperatures there are similar to those in Houston, TX.

Shepherds witnessed the heavenly Birth-day celebration!  Wise men gave gifts to the infant King Jesus (birthdays of kings were celebrated).  Christ’s spirit is within Christians via the Holy Spirit.  Col.1:27 “Christ in you, the hope of glory.”  Many Christians celebrate Christmas by exchanging gifts.

However, an eternal Santa Claus (with hair white like wool, like snow, cf. Re.1:14) annually bringing gifts is a lie and counterfeits the glorified Jesus Christ.  Commercialism obscures and detracts from the proclaimed ‘reason for the season’.  Purchasers suffer too much credit card debt, sometimes the result of trying to outdo others in gift-giving.  And those old census records no longer survive.  Nevertheless….

If it wasn’t for Christ’s life…there would be no Christmas bearing His title!  Mal.4:2 the Sun/Son of Righteousness so far outshines former sun-gods, those pagan gods don’t even come to the minds of Christians who annually celebrate Christmas!  The origin of a custom doesn’t always determine its present meaning.  Celebrating Jesus’ birth is not only for the Roman Catholic Christ-mass (the mass began 1000 AD).  A Chicago suburban “Calvary Church” isn’t accused of worshiping a skull and the goddess Círce!  1Co.3:5 Apollos, in spite of his heathen god name, was the Lord’s servant.

Obsolete meanings don’t apply.  Our worshiping God/Christ on Saturday or Sunday or Monday doesn’t make us Saturn or Sun or Moon worshipers!  ref Ralph Woodrow’s Christmas Reconsidered (recommended reading).  He notes that it would be futile to spend our lives trying to eradicate pagan terms which permeate all of society!  e.g. the term “janitor” is from the god Jánus.  Ezk.8:14 Támmuz was anciently a pagan god.  Yet the month of Tammuz is Jun-Jul on the present Jewish calendar.  It’s from the Babylonian exile (cf. the month Nisan occurs Mar-Apr).

The designations BC/AD and BCE/CE, relating to our calendar, pivot around Christ’s birth!  Truth be told…He was born sometime, praise God…although we don’t know exactly when!

What about the Christmas tree custom?  Je.10:3-5 “They cut down a tree. The work of the hands of a craftsman with a cutting tool. They beautify it with silver and gold. They fasten it, it does not stumble. Like a scarecrow in a cucumber field (upright as a palm tree), they cannot speak, they cannot walk.”  This is about idol worship, not a Christmas tree!  A scarecrow is a man’s image, not a tree’s image.  A scarecrow scares away birds, whereas a tree attracts birds…the opposite!  Gill Exposition Je.10:3 “A tree cut down with an axe, planed with a plane and formed into the image of a man or some creature.”  Life Application Bible Note “Those who put their trust in a chunk of wood, even though it is carved well and clothed beautifully, are foolish.”  Scarecrows and metal-plated gods can’t talk or walk.

Compare the Epistle of Jeremiah 1:70 “Like a scarecrow in a cucumber garden, guarding nothing, so are their wooden gods, plated with silver and gold.”  v.7-10 “These gods of silver, gold and wood with clothing like humans, but they cannot preserve themselves.”  The book of Jeremiah and the epistle of Jeremiah both refer to the same idols.

Is.44:13 “Another shapes wood, works it with planes, and makes it like the form of a man.” (also Is.40:19-20)  Ps.115:4-7 “Their idols are silver and gold, the work of man’s hands. They have mouths but they cannot speak; eyes but they cannot see; ears but they cannot hear, feet but they cannot walk.” (Je.10:5 is in the center margin xref!)  cf. De.4:28.  Such graven images were figurines or teraphím household gods (Ge.31:19, 34-35; 1Sm.19:13)…idols in human shape.  They weren’t Christmas trees.

Who today really worships a Christmas tree anyway?  Some few.  Yet it has symbolic meaning.

Re.22:1-2 “The tree of life, bearing twelve kinds of fruit.”  An ever-green Christmas tree became symbolic of the tree of life, which was traditionally decorated with fruits & nuts.  (see the topic, “Tree Symbolism in Scripture”.)  The USA began the tree custom after 1830 AD.  Churches that put up a tree, with lights and a figurative Star of Bethlehem at the top…they and other organizations may also feed or give gifts to the needy then!  The magi gave gifts; and Hanukkah too is a time of gift-giving.

Many, if not most, customs aren’t evil.  Some secular radio stations play hymns only in December at Christmas time…and the Name of Jesus spreads!  Praise the Lord!  Many Christmas carols are inspiring.  Php.1:15-18 Paul rejoiced because Christ is preached, even when their motives were questionable!  The old Jimmy Stewart Christmas movie, It’s A Wonderful Life, is a heartwarming story.

The Bible account of Christ’s birth isn’t pagan.  Matthew was Jewish, possibly Luke too.  Jesus’ birth-date observance isn’t a salvation issue.  Family relatives may keep it in faith.  Romans 14 indicates we shouldn’t judge other Christians in regards to non-essentials (e.g. the market where meat came from), thereby avoiding needless strife & division.  By honoring Christmas, Christian sabbathkeepers too can distinguish themselves from disbelieving Jews who also may keep a weekly sabbath.

It seems there wasn’t much question about the general season of Jesus’ birth in the early Eastern church (though its calendar differed a little).  The date/season is being challenged in recent years.  And since the early Christians didn’t customarily celebrate birthdays, early documentation is rather scant.

Christian families can annually honor their Savior’s birth, praising the Lord with uplifting Christmas carols & hymns…without doing the heathen customs of Santa Claus, holly & mistletoe, wassailing, party spirit, xmas ham, or engaging in excessive materialism.  Just throw out the bath water, not the Baby!  Omit wrongs stemming from carnality & paganism which can be divisive.

This concludes my apology (and ‘semi-polemic’) for celebrating Jesus’ birth, Christmas.

We don’t know for sure the date of Jesus’ human birth.  Yet from scriptural accounts and early writings, the weight of evidence seems to indicate December or early January.  Perhaps Jesus, the “Light of the World” (Jn.8:12), did come into this world during the traditional ‘Festival of Lights’…Hanukkah, Kislev 25!  And in 2016, Hanukkah (Kislev 25) again begins on December 25 of our calendar.