Jesus: The Son of Who?

Again, since it's Christmas time, I'll be turning my attention to the birth stories of Jesus of Nazareth and the genealogies recorded in Matthew and Luke. The first genealogy, going in canonical order, is found in Matthew 1:1-17 and the second genealogy is found in Luke 3:23-38.*

Now, the author of Matthew traces Jesus' supposed lineage back to Abraham and before it starts, it states "An account of the genealogy of Jesus the Messiah, the son of David, the son of Abraham" (1:1). Alright, well, that shouldn't be so hard to construct except there seems to be a hiccup at the end of the genealogy. When we get to verse 16, it states, "and Jacob the father of Joseph the husband of Mary, of whom Jesus was born, who is called the Messiah."

A funny incident happens in the Greek at this verse that is only subtly present in the English translation. The genealogy preceding this always has a father actively producing an heir as a biological father. However, when it gets to Joseph, the verb that was actively designating the son as of the human father changes from an active verb (egennesen) to a passive verb (egennethe), indicating that Joseph did not take an active part in the fathering of Jesus. Also, the particle pronoun that is translated as "of whom" in the English, is a feminine particle pronoun which indicates that Jesus was born of Mary and was not in any relation to Joseph.

If this is so, then how is Jesus of Davidic lineage? If the Davidic lineage is traced through Joseph and Jesus is not of Joseph, then how is this so? One fellow suggested that perhaps Joseph "adopted" Jesus and that Jesus got all the rights of the household, including Joseph's lineage. But how is this so, if there were no legalities or papers involved? Does anyone have record of Jewish Laws of Adoption regarding a divine child in late antiquity? I think not.

The reason that Matthew seemingly writes this "tension" into his text is because he is trying to make Jesus of Davidic lineage (thus, worthy of the throne of Israel) and attempting to perserve the virgin birth of Christ by indicating that Joseph had nothing to do with the conception of Jesus. By attempting to do so, the author of Matthew seemingly ties his hands together.

When we look at the genealogy of Luke, one sees that Luke traces Jesus' lineage back through Adam and thus, God. However, Luke attempts to preserve the virgin birth as well but does a seemingly better job than Matthew does.

"Jesus was about thirty years old when he began his work. He was the son (as was thought) of Joseph son of Heli." (Luke 3:23)

Now, while Luke preserves the "virgin birth" of Jesus by not attempting to link Jesus' lineage to Abraham and David through Joseph (Luke was a gentile, this didn't matter much to him), there is an apparent flaw when one compares the father of Joseph in Luke with the father of Joseph in Matthew. Luke states that Heli was the father of Joseph and Matthew states that Jacob was the father of Joseph (look above, if you don't believe me), so how is this so?

One answer is that Matthew's genealogy of Jesus is traced through Mary but this is not possible because of the grammatical translation I laid out in Greek above.

Another answer is that faith overrides tensions or flaws in the text. Tell me, how is this so if "faith comes from hearing the message?" (Romans 10:17) Isn't the text where the "message" comes from?

Therefore, can Jesus be the Son of God without being born of a virgin? Sure he can; in the say way that he is the "Christ" or the "Messiah" without having to be born of a virgin. The Gospel According to Mark doesn't even have a story of a virgin birth and how do some manuscripts of Mark begin? "This is the beginning of the good news (euangelion) of Jesus Christ, the Son of God" (Mark 1:1).

Therefore, I would argue that Jesus does not have to be born of a virgin to still be considered "Son of God" and at the center of the Christian religion.

How is this so? That is for the next post.

*All translations are NRSV unless otherwise noted.

The Christmas Story...I mean stories

Today, the service at my home church was pretty cute and very enlightening to my sense of the myths and stories that give meaning to the lifes of Christians, particularly the Christmas story.

The pastor was sitting on the stage and was reading the story of Jesus' birth from Luke 2 on stage. The kids were fairly talkative and kept popping up their hands to make remarks or ask questions. When he got to the part about the sheperds visiting the new-born Jesus, one of the kids said "I know what they brought; they brought gold, frankincense, and myrrh." The pastor replied to the kid, "No, that's the wise men, that's found in the other story."

At this moment, I realized that a lot of Christians would not realize this difference between the two stories. This difference is utterly defeated by the nativity scene that pops up all around churches and in Christian households through out the Christmas season depicting both shepherds and wisemen gathered around the family with the animals looking on with keen interest.

Some may explain this difference because of the different perspectives of the author. However, the term "different perspectives" insinuates that the authors were actually there and saw the shepherds or wisemen entering the barn. This is simply not true for various reasons (how could they of been alive, the Gospels are written in Greek and Jesus' disciples spoke aramaic, etc.). What is true, however, is that Matthew and Luke wrote independent birth stories with the only sharing factor perhaps being the Gospel of Mark (with no birth story) and the elusive "Q" source, which supposedly only contained tales of Jesus' miracles and signs.

Most scholars believe that Luke was written to a primarly Gentile audience and that Matthew was writing to a primarly Jewish-Christian audience. Also, for a compromise between the liberal and conservative estimates of the dating of Matthew and Luke, they were probably composed between the mid 70's and 90 CE. Hence, the authors of Matthew and Luke were writing to different audiences but within the same 15 year old range.

However, because both "gospels" are found in between the same covers and are only seperated by Mark in canonical order, most people assume the stories can be combined and that the gospels would not be compromised but they can't. The authors of Matthew and Luke did not write with each other mind and composed their birth stories using different sources. So, who is modern man to combine them and not perserve them for what they are?

"Cat's Cradle:" It May Be All Foma!

Well, I have this list that I compiled for reading over Christmas break and I just finished one of the books on the list. The book is titled Cat's Cradle and it is written by the famous dark satirist, Kurt Vonnegut.

Now, as a warning in advance, this book will be part review and part reflection, so don't expect a complete scholarly analysis of this rather impressive work.

In connection with my last post and the title of this post, what happens after death is a complete mystery and the different religions and worldviews offer different suggestions or ideas. But the truth is, nobody really knows what happens after we cease our biological functions.

I believe Vonnegut understood this and realized several aspects of a good religion:

1) All religions could be considered to be composed of "foma" or lies. They may speak about to a fundamental truth of what we as humans experience but the "myth" or story that is made up to describe could very well be considered an objective "lie." It is the subjectivity of human experience that attributes any "truth" to these religions. In Vonnegut's work, Bokonon (the founder of the principle religion in this book) states at the book of his work, that it is all "foma" or lies. However, what Bokonon considers to be lies, resonates very much with the people who follow his religion, Bokononism.

2) That a really good religion is form of treason. What more does a good religion, a religion that will survive, inevitably end up doing? Going against government, i.e. some form of treason.* The Christians wouldn't worship the Roman gods or Caesar, hence they were executed for treason. Jesus taught subversive politics (read the sermon on the mount, Matthew 5) and challenged those in charge of the principle "religion" who in turned worked for the government, so he in turn was executed for "treason." See page 143 of the book for this poem:

So I said good-bye to government,

And I gave my reason;

That a really good religion

Is a form of treason.

3) People need meaning and humanity seems to be the only creature pondering this question. Vonnegut puts it like the following through Bokonon by writing:

Tiger got to hunt.

Bird got to fly.

Man got ask himself, "Why, why, why?"

Tiger got to sleep.

Bird go to land.

Man got tell himself, "He understand."

I suppose, that in the end, we have to understand something and I think this is expressed when Vonnegut has a doctor and scientist adminster the Bokonist last rites to the dying President of the Island that the last half of the book takes place on. The dialogue takes place like the following:

"Will this bother you as a scientist," I inquired, "to go through a ritual like this?"

"I am a very bad scientist. I will do anything to make a human being feel better, even if it's unscientific. No scientist worthy of the name could say such a thing."

(Pg. 179-180)

However, this does make the "scientist" a very good human being. In the end we don't know but we do know we exist with each other and because of each other. Therefore, "Love thy fellow human being."

*Although, most religions do not maintain "treason" but are sublimated and corrupted by the government. See Christianity and what happened when it became the official religion of Rome.

Life! Death! Truth?!?

Today, I found myself playing hymns for the elderly and attempting to sing along...

Then, I realized, these songs make me quite uncomfortable. Especially, the one hymn dealing with the end of the world and the afterlife.

Why, ever since I've been a kid, all of this talk of everlasting life, heaven, sin, and all that related-jazz has made me quite uncomfortable. Some say nature points to God and God came to find us by revealing himself in Jesus and did so best of all on the cross. The texts in which all of this is located is rather full of "tensions" about the details of all this business and Jesus is barely mentioned outside of the New Testament in the writings of other historians.

So, what is the truth? What happens after we die? I'm just trying to live life the best I can and to how my conscience, inner voice, divine sign indicates...

I'm rather frustrated at times...

God? Dog? Baloney?

No question about it, but one cannot describe God! One would be the biggest phony-baloney if one tried to describe God. We can come close to it, but words can never describe it. -Dr. Elisabeth Kubler-Ross

"God is a comedian, playing to an audience too afraid to laugh.

-Voltaire

I'm a big fan of quotes that throw people off kilter and make them think. That's part of what I do: ask the questions and get other people to ask them. For in the questions, there are plenty of answers...

But enough about me. What about this dude in the sky that people make such a big deal about? What do they call it? God? Dog? If people stopped running their mouths about "God" and attempted to realize the absurdity of calling "God," a "He" and acting if "God" was something they could petition and influence, then the world just might be a better place. Perhaps, people would take more responsbility for their actions and have greater compassion on those they don't understand, those who are different but suffer and come from the same source on the same hands.

Can you really pretend to honor some great dude in the sky, aknowledge this "cosmic" omni-human in the place that you call "church" once a week and ignore your neighbor? Your gay neighbor? Your Buddhist, Islamic, Jewish, or Unitarian Univeralist neighbor?

Love God? You can't do that without loving people. Absolutely not.

Want to experience "God?"


Love those around you. Accept love from those around you.

Let go of your hatred or just keep pretending that your prejudices are shared by your cosmic "watchdog?"

All you need is love, love is all you need.

The Wandering Student

"Not all who wander are lost, in fact, we may be in the wonder of it all"

The other day before I went on Spring Break, it was noted that I was open to various religious and philosophical traditions by a close professor of mine and then I was asked if I had a particular tradition of which I followed.

I replied that the truth can be found in more than one place and than in the "Ocean of Truth," Christianity is my bathtub. Jesus is my home-base, if you will, the place where I come back to and decide what is right and wrong for me. Not doctrines, not creeds, not any of the formalized statements with a vengeance that riddles dead and decrepit traditions.

In that sense, I am a heretic. That's a dangerous word but, I confirm it because I refuse to buy into a standard set by others that I have nor will ever meet. So when you find a copy of the Apostolic Fathers, a book on Zen from a Comparative standpoint of a Trappist monk in my bag and the Koran sitting on my desk, don't worry, it's who I am but I know where I'm coming from.

These are just some thoughts on my mind.

-He who knows he doesn't know anything.

The Doctrine of Doubt

When I was a kid, I was brought to church nearly every Sunday and had the doctrine of Heaven and Hell pounded into me to the point of exhaustion by a certain preacher. This church also seemed to find every fiery evangelist they could find to lead mini-versions of the great awakening (I'm not sure if some of these people were awakened to anything positive, rather they were just scared out of Hell or had the hell scared out of them, for the x29392 time) .

The other basic doctrine I was "taught" (I'm not sure if you would call it teaching) was the doctrine of redemption through the blood of Jesus, the Son of God. While I'm still some form of a Christian, all of this punishment, persuasion, blood, and pain did not go over well with me as a kid and still doesn't.

Now, I believe in a different "doctrine," if you will, The Doctrine of Doubt. Doubt allowed me to escape the clutches of a church bent on everlasting damnation or salvation with a permantely crucified and bleeding savior as a way to a better afterlife. Doubt has allowed me to carve my own spiritual niche out of the Bible and other religions to find something that I will live and not just cower in front of. God is not in the business of damning everyone who doesn't say the right prayer or in condemning those who struggle, God is in the struggle with us. If I had to make sense from a human perspective about the crucifixion of Jesus, then it is a display of what happens when one stands up to the domination system of any culture, one gets killed by the system. However, from a divine (yet anthropomorphic) perspective, I believe God suffered in the crucifixion as well. However, I believe the majority of atonement theories are sure moot and made to damn people into doing what the church wants them to do and not is what healthy for the individual in any way.

The truth may set you free indeed, but you can never know what the truth is until you doubt and discover the "said" truth for yourself.

-The Christian Agnostic