Talk:Genealogy of Jesus

Terminology

Strictly specking, the descents displayed in the article are pedigrees, not genealogies. Fergananim 21:55, 4 May 2006 (UTC)

Great article

Well done people! I guess there's more that can be done on this article, but basically, a lot of quite different theories are given fair treatment, and some guidelines for evaluating them are suggested in a helpful way. I'm really impressed, I hope we can achieve similar things with other articles. Alastair Haines 17:15, 31 October 2007 (UTC)

Merge with Desposyni

I think the separate article at Desposyni is a confusing overlap to this one. — Reinyday, 03:01, 3 December 2007 (UTC)

Keep separate. Desposyni are an encyclopaedic entry of their own.82.6.29.26 (talk) 22:29, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

I too disagree with the merge. Desposyni deals with the immediate relatives of Jesus, where as this article is dedicated to the bloodline and ancestry of Jesus. They do, of course, include some necesary overlap, but they address two diffeerent topics. A merge would be more confusing and create a cumbersome, disjoint article. BobertWABC (talk) 17:52, 11 March 2008 (UTC)

I think the two articles should remain seperate "Genealogy of Jesus" deals primarily with the ancestors of Jesus, whereas "Desposyni" deals with his contemporary relatives and their descendants. Besides, if we merged all of the info on Desposyni here it would make the article too long. The way the two articles stand now, with a brief mention of the Desposyni here and a link to that article is the best way to go. MishaPan (talk) 04:01, 24 March 2008 (UTC)

Overhaul & Archive

I archived most of the talk, which has mostly been dead for a year or more.

I gave the article a much-needed (IMHO) overhaul. Too many sections, a bloated introduction, pet theories and conjectures and "so-and-so thinks that" scattered everywhere (which inevitably accumulate in an article of this nature), duplications, and general disunity. Having done the deed, let me briefly explain my rationale.

In organizing the commentary on the two genealogies, I found remarkably that practically every topic was referring just to Matthew's gospel. If Luke was mentioned at all, it was usually along the lines of "Matthew's genealogy is much too short to be plausible, unlike Luke's." There is very little to say in comparing the two gospels. So I made a short section on Luke and a much longer section on Matthew, making clear what pertains to each.

A central issue for this article is the apparent contradiction between the two genealogies, and how that contradiction might be explained. There is the major contradiction of Joseph having two fathers, besides minor inconsistencies such as the omissions in Matthew (which can be addressed separately). Clearly this is important, but the article discusses other topics too. So, let's keep discussion of the divergence and its possible explanations collected (with neutral treatment) in a single section.

Specifically—Though some say the divergence is unremarkable since the genealogies are obviously false, this is way too POV and ignores the importance of the controversy in history and scholarship. I'll illustrate the significance of the issue by reference to Augustine in the article. The Mary-daughter-of-Heli hypothesis has its fanboys who consider it an undisputed fact, but that view should not leak into the rest of the article. And the Levirate marriage, while important as a hypothesis, is also mentioned in the early sources as a tradition, so the content of this tradition is suitable for inclusion among other early extra-biblical traditions.

I left most of the article text intact, though reorganized, but I still think there is plenty of polishing to be done. Matthew, especially, is still a dumping ground, as is the Purpose and implications section I hastily added. I would like to trim down and balance some of the modern commentary, while documenting as many relevant facts as possible.

--SlothMcCarty (talk) 21:31, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

I've been looking through the archives, and found some peculiar history to this article. It was created in 2005 as a stub, with little progress. On 7 Apr 2006, Clinkophonist merged all of the individual articles for Matthew 1:1 through Matthew 1:17 into this article. These articles were originally written by the illustrious SimonP (Simon Pulsifer), drawing primarily from Albright, Brown, and Gundry.

200 verses of Matthew was a lengthy discussion, or the last stages thereof, on whether to do a merge of some two hundred of SimonP's individual verse articles into chapter articles. According to SimonP, the idea had been previously discussed many times and always rejected, until a coup emerged that somehow met with little resistance. SimonP was particularly concerned that a merge would inevitably involve wholesale trimming down, which I must say is a fully justified concern. -Ril- (who has since been banned from Wikipedia) made an example merge of the Matthew 1:1–17 articles, comprising Mathew's genealogy of Jesus, on 5 Feb 2006. This example merge was apparently the basis of Clinkophonist's actual merge.

Now, you can see a number of consequences of this mode of development. The article, in its structure and content, was focused almost entirely on Matthew's text, rather than a well-planned and well-balanced treatment of the subject at hand. I like to respect the work of those who have gone before me, but in light of this, I think being bold is in order.

--SlothMcCarty (talk) 12:25, 31 March 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for the complimentary words. Since those deeply frustrating events I've avoided this subject area. I do still have them on my watchlist, and have remarked on the great work you have done with this article. The page has really improved. It's changed from a random collection of information on Matthew into a good overarching analysis. You know what you are doing, and should feel to proceed with whatever you feel is best for this article. - SimonP (talk) 12:41, 31 March 2009 (UTC)

Good to hear from you, SimonP, and I appreciate your kind words as well. --SlothMcCarty (talk) 18:10, 6 April 2009 (UTC)

Just a note: these were excellent articles which I believe demonstrated that any blanket - or near blanket - condemnation of an article on a bible verse, which was the agenda being pushed, is invalid. While some of the arguments for having, for example, this article, are sound, there is still value in detailed analysis. It is notable that after this wholesale merger even my attempts to set a series of verse-by-verse redirects to other parts of the bible met with opposition. Part of the presumption of several Wikipedia editors on re-ordering of biblical content into a thematic-only approach, is a recentist approach which fails to realise that the divisions of the biblical books and other associated texts into chapters and verses was a very well informed process. I happened on the debate at the time and made some small contribution to one of the articles Matthew 1:9, partly as an experiment to see how much could be written about what, on the face of it is one of the most boring verses of the bible .. X begat Y... - it turns out to be quite a lot, and reasonably interesting, even without going deeply into textual variations or having ready access to a theological library. Certainly most if not all the information I added was dumped - as the editors of the day put it "consensus was redirect, not merge and redirect." Ineidentaly the redirect was originally to Matthew 1, itself now a redirect. Rich Farmbrough, 14:30, 12 October 2009 (UTC).

Recent edit wars

1. Jesus vs. Jose (generation 49 in Luke)—Actually Jesus is correct. Jose is the reading of the KJV, while Jesus is the reading of the more critical NA27/UBS4. I have also seen it "translated" as Joshua, which is arguably valid, but obscures an interesting point. Bauckham, for example, sees immense schematic significance in another Jesus occupying the "jubliee" (49th) position.

2. The intro, regarding the Luke/Mary hypothesis—Firstly, the bit about "traditional since 1490" is rather off. AFAIK, Annius of Viterbo published this in 1498, in a notorious forgery. The work was accepted by many at first, held in suspicion by others, and thoroughly refuted a century later. In the meantime, the notion was accepted by so many influential theologians (Luther, etc.) that it took on a life of its own. In other words, it was thought that the forgery had stumbled upon the correct solution. And it was not so much a tradition as a popular, though still hotly contested, theory.

Now, why is this particular hypothesis singled out at the end of the intro (it does not belong in the second paragraph, which lists contrasts rather than focusing on harmonization)? For one thing, it is a service to the reader who may elsewhere (e.g. other Wikipedia articles I can think of) encounter the hypothesis stated as fact. It is also notable that among harmonizations—i.e., excluding the possibility that the Gospels are not both correct—this is by far the most widely accepted. Not that there is any firm consensus. Now, how do we cite this? I can cite a particular author who surveys the literature and notes the trend among worthy scholars (worthy in someone's opinion, anyway). The author's own opinion would not be terribly relevant, except that authors tend to disproportionately cite those with whom they agree.

Arguments against the hypothesis are out of place in the intro. In fact, the statements recently inserted are not so much against this particular harmonization as against harmonization in general. There is a "fabrication or error" section to address that, though ideally we should do more than quote an unsupported dismissal from one or two authors.

--SlothMcCarty (talk) 02:27, 14 August 2009 (UTC)

GA Review

This review is transcluded from Talk:Genealogy of Jesus/GA1. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.

Reviewer: Graeme Bartlett (talk) 10:39, 1 January 2010 (UTC)

• no cleanup banners
• writing
  • prose OK but some tricky language
  • wikilinks all correct, missing ones added mostly, see below. Y
  • no linked dates Y
  • consistent citation "cite" Y
  • no contractions Y
  • quotes are cited Y
  • Is ʻ correct style in Arabic names?
  • Section header caps correct Y
  • Lead is a summary Y
  • Lead content is in article Y
  • Image size spec removed Y
  • No text sandwich Y
  • Left aligned image not at section start Y
  • external links in external links (apart from Bible verse reference) Y
  • Images have captions Y
  • missing book publication dates:
    • De consensu evangelistarum (C 400); Y
    • On the Flesh of Christ; (De Carne Christi...best lead so far: http://www.nndb.com/people/741/000071528/)
    • Ignatius of Antioch, Epistle to the Ephesians;
    • Epiphanius of Salamis, Panarion; John of Damascus, De fide orthodoxa;
    • Bede, In Lucae evangelium expositio; Origen, Contra Celsum;
    • Anne Catherine Emmerich, The Life of the Blessed Virgin Mary;
    • Qur'an;
    • Julian the Apostate, Against the Galileans;
    • Augustine of Hippo, Contra Faustum (Reply to Faustus); Y (C 400 per http://www.ccjr.us/dialogika-resources/primary-texts-from-the-history-of-the-relationship/250-augustine-hippo#Faustus)
    • Augustine of Hippo, Sermon 1;
    • Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica;
    • Clement of Alexandria, Stromata; Irenaeus, Adversus haereses
  • Reference 66 and 77 and 78 are deficient and unclear
  • book publication locations are missing for
    • ref 43: Adversus Judaeos: a bird's-eye view of Christian apologiae until the Renaissance;
    • ref 91 Louis Finkelstein (1970), The Jews: Their History;
    • ref 82 Frederick Dale Bruner, Matthew: The Christbook, Matthew ;
    • ref 80 Pseudo-Hilary, Tractate 1, apud Angelo Mai, ed. (1852), Nova patrum bibliotheca;
    • ref 43 and 46 A. Lukyn Williams (1935), Adversus Judaeos: a bird's-eye view of Christian apologiae until the Renaissance;
    • ref 14 Géza Vermes (2006), The Nativity;
    • ref 14 as well: Raymond E. Brown (1973), The Virginal Conception and Bodily Resurrection of Jesus;
  • List problems; ref 73 John Lightfoot (1859) [1663], Horæ Hebraicæ et Talmudicæ; ref 68 Arthur Charles Hervey (1853), The Genealogies of Our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ; ref 11 Bruce Manning Metzger (1971), A textual commentary on the Greek New Testament;
    • Desposyni has unnumbered list that could be prose.
    • Explanations for divergence has numbered list that could be prose.
  • Century used correctly Y
  • Unclear abbreviation in "Goodyear, AZ" US centric.
  • Two unnecessary uses of "recent" should be removed
  • A couple of sentences that start with the words "There are" that should be made more active.
  • weasel words: "regarded by many"
  • informal wording: "though" ?
  • vague terms: 3 of "various"; 6 of many; over a dozen uses of "several" when a particular number should be used; 1 "long period"; 5 "a number of"
  • deprecated words: 1 "circa" ; 2 uses of "upon" ; 2 of "lack"
  • redundant wording: two of "in order to" replace with "to".

GA review (see here for criteria)

1. It is reasonably well written.

   a (prose): b (MoS):

2. It is factually accurate and verifiable.

   a (references): b (citations to reliable sources): c (OR):

   There is still one citation needed on the end of Genealogy of Jesus#Levirate marriage

   There is still one "who" explanation needed in Genealogy of Jesus#Levirate marriage

   Section on Luke paragraph 4 needs a ref to support idea of Jesus' universal mission

   Section on Women paragraph 2 needs a ref to support the idea why women were included

   Section on Women paragraph 3 needs 2 refs to support the idea that the women were sinful, and gentiles.

   Section on Women paragraph 4 needs a ref to support the idea of Matthew's emphasis on virgin birth, don't just rely on primary source self evidence.

   Is the Epiphanian view from Epiphanius of Salamis?

   Who created the Hieronymian view?

   Section on fulfillment needs a ref to support conclusion that there is no garantee that the Messiah descended from Solomon.

3. It is broad in its coverage.

   a (major aspects): b (focused):

4. It follows the neutral point of view policy.

   Fair representation without bias:

5. It is stable.

   No edit wars, etc.:

6. It is illustrated by images, where possible and appropriate.

   a (images are tagged and non-free images have fair use rationales): b (appropriate use with suitable captions):

7. Overall:

   Pass/Fail:

Comments on review

"Deprecated words"? I don't see what's wrong with using the words "circa", "upon", or "lack". I also feel that the word "though" is acceptable, though any suggested variation from WP:S&W could also work. Thanks for the review, Graeme Bartlett. ...but what do you think? ~BFizz 08:02, 3 January 2010 (UTC)

I don't care much for these deprecated words, it was just in the review instructions that I used. GA achievement is now far more difficult than it was a couple of years ago when I did the last review for GA. I feel that all these issues are minor and can be readily sorted out. Are you going to assist Mr Fizz? Graeme Bartlett (talk) 10:40, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

Assist in the review, or in fixing up the article? Probably a little bit of the latter. ...but what do you think? ~BFizz 14:40, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

Book publication dates

I started working on finding the publication dates for books listed here. How accurate do they need to be? For the early Christian books, or for the Qur'an, should we cite the book itself or an English translation with a more recent (and more easily determinable) publication date? For some of these, we should probably specify that the text is found in Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers. ...but what do you think? ~BFizz 03:11, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

I thin the original date, and if there is an online version that is a translation, then the info about the translation as well. Then the exact source can be determined, as well as its significance. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 04:36, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

Vandalism?

Not sure where to put this (since I think the virgin birth page (link from near top of this article) was vandalized, rather than this one), but the link to virgin birth of Jesus is redirecting to "Lie" 207.171.242.90 (talk) 02:35, 28 March 2010 (UTC)

Fabrication or Error section

I've been trying to add an item which keeps being undone. The point of the item being: the divergence between the two genealogies can be seen as part of a larger pattern of inconsistencies between the two birth narratives in which they appear, problems which have been well documented by mainstream scholars including the one I sourced. This would tend to strengthen the case that the genealogies are a result of fabrication or error, which is the subject of the section being edited. As this section is only one of five under the heading of "Explanations for divergence", expanding it should be seen as contributing to an overall NPOV. Pekoebrew (talk) 22:22, 23 April 2010 (UTC)

First, the material added only talked about other alleged inconsistencies, unrelated to genealogy. Furthermore, you've presented only one pov, scholars have also argued that the birth narratives are consistent.Flash 01:13, 24 April 2010 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by ReaverFlash (talk • contribs)

The genealogies are both parts of the two birth narratives. Mainstream scholars have long recognized other inconsistencies between the birth narratives, which raise doubts about their overall historicity. The divergence between the genealogies can thus be seen as part of a larger pattern. In a section titled "Fabrication or Error", what other POV would you expect? Several other sections provide NPOV balance. Pekoebrew (talk) 17:42, 29 April 2010 (UTC)

Mary before Joseph

The part right before Jesus should say "Mary and Joseph" not "Joseph and Mary"! I understand that this would make Mary the only female full member of the succession (by which I mean the main person at that point), but that is quite deliberate. Jesus was virgin born, which means Joseph was only Mary's husband and not actually Jesus' father. Jesus had no father except the Father. This is not a detail, but rather a main point. Because humans are incapable of parthenogenesis, no regular human can be born from a virgin. This is part of how we verify Jesus' divinity. The Mysterious El Willstro (talk) 03:59, 9 May 2010 (UTC)

Aramaic

Should it be mentiond that in Aramaic versions of Matthew there are indeed 14 generations?
Shealtiel, Zerubbabel, Abihud, Abner, Eliakim, Azor, Zadok, Achim, Eliud, Eliezer, Matthan, Jacob, Joseph, Jesus. 210.185.16.120 (talk) 13:16, 11 July 2010 (UTC)

Edits regarding Heli

The quote that I restored here comes legitimately from a very real book. The book was obviously republished many years after the author's death. (The book, according to google books, was published in 1987, while the author, John Gresham Machen, died in 1937.) The theologian's point of view regarding the discrepancy in the genealogies is perfectly germane to the article and should stay. ...comments? ~BFizz 05:39, 24 October 2010 (UTC)

Revert on "The Adam and Eve Family Tree"

When I came to this article, I was looking for an unabridged, fully compiled lineage of Christ. Instead, all I found was a list of criticisms against the chapters Matthew 1 and Luke 3. As I was contemplating this problem, I stumbled across the Good Things Company. There it was, everything I wanted, all I had to do was cite it in Wikipedia. As usual for me, some cynic feels it necessary to delete my edit, no matter how many references I give. Ah, well, some people are just like that I guess.--Nate5713 (talk) 14:29, 4 November 2010 (UTC)

Please see WP:RS. It is not a reliable source, and it is a commercial site and makes the article appear to be promoting the sale of their products. Dougweller (talk) 14:40, 4 November 2010 (UTC)