Christs birth is considered divine… yet, in at least two of the gospels there is a clear importance set on the lineage from Abraham to Joseph… but Jospeh is only important, if he was the genetic father of christ, if god is the genetic father of christ, then not only are these genealogies useless they are contradictory.
Your thougts?
My thoughts:
Christs birth was clearly not immaculate, this is a pagan belief that was added later along with the trinitarian belief that christ is god. Let’s break down the beginning and end of the genealogy in matthew.
it starts out telling you that Jesus Christ is the son of David and the son of Abraham… but if god is the father, the christ would fit into a role more akin to either brother or father (if you are a believer in the trinity)
Notice it says “the husband of mary, of whom is born jesus”…
Joseph is ONLY important if he is the paternal father.
That hiccup is one of my favorite pieces of contradictory evidence disproving Christianity. They call him the King of the Jews, the descendent of King David, who was written to also be a “son of god.” Yet, when we look at the genealogy of Christ, we see a problem with Joseph presumably being the father. In regards to the four gospels, we don’t hear much of Joseph really. I sometimes wonder why that is, considering the fact that if Joseph was a descendent of David, wouldn’t that automatically make him king anyway in the line of succession? I find it odd that there really isn’t alot of information in the New Testament about Joseph. Maybe he was just another goodie-Jew and sonnie-Jesus rebelled against him, founding his own cult while enlisting the help of Peter and John.
The oddity here is the weirdo possibility that God took Joseph’s semen, genetically altered it, then, like an incubus, pumped Mary full of it. Of course that theory is even more bogus…more bogus than the old Greek and Roman tales of Gods coming down from Olympus to have sex with any woman they fancy, yeilding half god/half human offsprings.
Thus, according to the Talmud, Joseph, as the adoptive parent, is the father of Jesus. The actual blood doesn’t matter. Jesus’ identity as a Jew is gained from his mother (as with all Jews) and he attains an adoptive relationship to the line of David through Joseph who, for purposes of Jewish law, was the father of Jesus.
As for Joseph automatically being a king…do you know how many relatives there are wandering about who are related to Queen Victoria or some other monarch? Alot. Know how many rule England: 1? Rulers (especially ancient ones who tended to have many wives and 100s of kids) have a shitload of descendants and most of them do not keep a rank of even nobility as the line descends
jesus said " i am the son of god ". he also referred to others as brother or sister. to me, this means that he recognized his birth (as well as everyone elses) to be divine in nature and origin.
actually who am I, jesus never said that. I think you are thinking of the following:
Mk.12:35-37
“And Jesus answered and said, while he taught in the temple, How say the scribes that Christ is the son of David? For David himself said by the Holy Ghost, The LORD said to my Lord, Sit thou on my right hand, till I make thine enemies thy footstool. David therefore himself calleth him Lord; and whence is he then his son?”
which still contradicts what his apostles wrote about him:
Acts 2:30
“Therefore being a prophet [David], and knowing that God had sworn with an oath to him, that of the fruit of his loins, according to the flesh, he would raise up Christ to sit on his throne.”
now we have two possibilites. The writers of acts didnt’ have access to the scriptures Mk, or that Mk was based upon. or 2 several of the apostles didn’t believe that christ was of god.
Many more men have come since then saying they are from god. have we listened to them?
The talmud says no such thing about Joseph adopting jesus. It certainly doesn’t discuss any such adoption in the scriptures, some of the apostles believed in his divine birth and some didn’t it’s as simple as that.
if you clicked on the comparative link you’d see that the places where christs divine birth is confirmed is in the gospels, and the epistles and acts don’t mention it. (they state a more natural birth) Which again, means the gospels were written well after the fact, or changed to make christ more divine.
with regards to the Talmud, i did not say that it said anything about Joseph. I quoted a source that says the Talmud says “that he who raises someone else’s child is regarded as if he had actually brought him into the world physically.” [if this is incorrect, then forgive me for using a poor source] Scripture is very clear that Joseph was raising a son who wasn’t his. The gospels speak of him wanting to quietly divorce Mary when he finds she is with child. Thus, if the quote is accurate, Jesus was the adopted son of Joseph by the very fact that Joseph raised him and he was not his own son.
As for Acts, my translation gives:
“And so, because he was a prophet and knew that GOD HAD SWORN TO HIM WITH AN OATH TO SEAT one OF HIS DESCENDANTS ON HIS THRONE”
According to what I have quoted above, Jesus is, for all intensive purposes, the son of Joseph and thus a Descendant of David. I don’t have anything about “the flesh” here. By virtue of this translation, there doesn’t seem to be a problem… at least with that particular verse
what can I say imaginary man, you caught me in a loop hole, that atm I can’t think of a good argument against. Maybe someone else here can? I’m certainly researching that, to see if there is a valid counterpoint.
i wouldn’t call it a loophole, just a consideration of what the words mean in the context of ancient Jewish/Middle Eastern civilization. With regards to this particular question, I don’t think your argument has much ground to stand on.
I probably shouldn’t give you this, but if you really want to question Jesus’ divinity you should look into the term “Son of God”. First you need to completely ignore Paul’s epistles (most likely on the grounds that Paul never knew Jesus). Then look into the O.T. usage of the term (for example, i believe David was referred to as the Son of God, and often the term is used in a messianic context which does not imply divinity in the traditional idea). While there is evidence that Jesus is speaking of a different relationship with God that he has and that in his preaching he tended to use old ideas in new ways, I am sure you will find enough evidence (for yourself at least) to show that according to the Bible, there is not evidence for Jesus’ divinity.
If you want a brief synopsis with a few scriptural references of how the Catholic Church has dealt with this issue, check this site out: http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/14142b.htm
Its generally helpful on anything you could think to ask about Catholic belief. Keep in mind that this work is not definitive, there are much more detailed and scholarly works about every issue and nuance, but this give a general overview of various concepts. I seriously doubt you will buy any of its arguments, but at least you can see where the Catholic Church is coming from on various issues.
Jesus, since he was supposed to be born of a Virgin, isn’t supposed to have had a Father’s geneology. Unless you say that the supposible Xtian God has a geneology?
It baffles me why anyone would put Joseph’s geneology into the Bible. It should have been Mary’s ancestors and geneology, if anything. Doesn’t make sense. That is why the Bible is a bunce of bullshit.
I still say it’s a loophole, and as aviemus noted even if he was the “adoptive” father why include his bloodline? The only logical reason is to secure Jesus’ divine kingship. (they believed kingship was related to godhood at the time something we tend to forget.)
let’s look at some other contradictions about the genealogies.
let’s start with what the epistles 1 tim says about about it:
then titus:
so now we know that it was probably a general christian consensus that genealogies were foolish… yet they are in two of the gospels… let’s compare them.
as you can see from this list, it looks like TWO DIFFERENT families. How can you validate that as a christian? Both writers of the gospels should’ve been inspired by god. The simple answer is they weren’t and whoever wrote matthew was a numerologist (3 generations of 14)
well this goes with my god-king theory! remember they came out of egypt and took alot of the ideas from there.
I’ll look into it, but I seriously doubt they cover all the issues.
i do not think christianity has been worth much ever since the council of nicea
when constantine 1 hacked it apart, sewed it back together, and used it glue back together his crumbling empire at the same time instilling himself as supreme ruler of the whole enchillada. after that, there is a lot of contradictory stuff in the bible, as well as a lot of outright lies. it is a little known fact that constantine took anyone who told the storys he did not include in the bible where executed for heresy. with that kind of politicai twist is it any surprise when we begin do discover contradictions?
well the fact is I think the gospels were written in this order:
Q (similiar to “gospel of thomas”) about 40 - 50 years after christs death.
The Acts and epistles of Paul written about 60 - 75 years after christs death.
10 years later>Mark → Luke → Matthew -35 years later> John > revelation.
Johns “books” include things that cannot be found anywhere else and thus I think we should regard his books with high scrutiny.
Christianity is a mixture of several different orthodoxies including many “pagan” beliefs. (besides the obvious ones). Like baptism. Rebirth by water. very mysticism idea that being dunked in water renews you.
so in conclusion, the reason for the contradictrary ideas has nothing to do with constatine and has to do with the nature of the development of christianity, it’s based on alot of conflicting ideals.
but baptism has pagan origins through the essenes (what jesus was one of, and certainly john the baptist, who went around the country baptising jews and gentiles in preparation for the “end times” (being that century).
I was watching the history channel one day and a long series on the birth of Christ came on. The claim stated by the series was that Mary was raped by Roman Soldiers, which is why Jesus was born in a Manger (to be out of the public eye) and that he was not recognized by many of the Jewish population. The Virginity theory, as the series stated, refers to Mary, not as a literal virgin, but as a virgin in the sense that she lost it unwillingly–therefore did not lose her purity, for lack of a better word. To be honest, though, it isn’t important. Jesus is Jesus, even if he was just a person, he still existed either as a concept of a person.
This is in response to scythekain question way back in September.
The authors of the gospels starts out with the genealogy to first prove that the stories he is about to tell you are in fact about the Christ and Redeemer who was prophesied about in the Old Testament. A main part of the prophecies in Daniel( and other OT books) is that the Christ would be a descendent of David as well as a descendant of Abraham. THAT is why the genealogy is there. To prove the truthfulness of the account.
I agree with An Imaginary Man saying Joseph is the adoptive parent thus passing on to Jesus this lineage. The bible clearly says it is a virgin birth, (also part of the prophecy). Yet the culture was such that the liniage is taken from the father, in this case Joseph.
As far as the interpretation or misinterpretation of the wording of 1:16
This is NOT saying Jesus was born of Joseph, the husband of Mary. Rather it says Jacob begat Joseph, the husband of Mary. And Jesus was born of MARY.
yes to make “christ the king” proper. but if he came from god, the lineage of joseph doesn’t matter does it? I mean what’s more important coming from Abraham or coming from god? think about it.
As for Daniel, I don’t see how any of his whacked out visions could be related to christ, or any time after christ to the present.
again though, Josephs lineage is unimportant because he came from god! (or did he?)
no such prophecy about virgin birth exists.
and it says it’s a “virgin” birth in the NT after declaring jesus’ lineage for half a chapter… and which lineage should we believe only 3 names match between them.
uh, again “god the father.”
guess the line of man is more important the line of god, or the writers of the bible story didn’t think that through too clearly.
jesus was born of mary by way of joseph
it’s clear that’s what the verse is intending.
It just occured to me that the fools who wrote the Bible could have easily said something that wouldn’t have brought up controversy and validate the divinity of Jesus Christ…something like: “As David was a Son of God, so was Jesus.” But no…they had to have a genealogy in order to validate the claim that Jesus was the King of the Jews, being a rightful descendant of King David. Which makes me wonder…why didn’t Joseph or any other previous dudes step up to the plate and say “I am a descendant of David…you should treat me accordingly!” ??
