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The Curse of Jeconiah and the Genealogies of Jesus Assumptions: 1

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The Curse of Jeconiah and the Genealogies of Jesus Assumptions: 1 The Curse of Jeconiah and the Genealogies of Jesus Assumptions: 1. Jeremiah prophesied that no son of Jeconiah would ever sit on the throne of David in Jerusalem (Jer. 22:24-30). 2. Matthew’s genealogy of Jesus (Matt. 1:1-16) indicates that Joseph was descended from David by way of Jeconiah which would preclude him from being on the throne. 3. Luke’s genealogy of Jesus (Lk. 3:23-38) indicates that Mary was descended from David by way of Nathan, but the bloodlines converge at Shealtiel & Zerubbabel, so that Mary was also descended from Jeconiah, likewise preventing any of her children from sitting on the throne. • I am assuming that Luke is recording Mary’s genealogy while Matthew records Joseph’s. This view is not agreed on by all commentators, but there is no need to further complicate our discussion by going down that rabbit trail! :-) Initial Conclusions: 1. Matthew’s or Luke’s genealogies (or both) are incorrect in the details. • One clear objection to this conclusion is that the Jews in Jesus’ day and the 1st century A.D. would have been quick to point out problems with the genealogies to discredit Jesus’ claims, but there is no record of any such objections. 2. Jeremiah’s prophecy was incorrect. • In either case, we are questioning the reliability of Scripture or the truthfulness of the prophet or author. Theologically, this is a non-starter for those of us who take the Bible to be God’s inspired word. • Raymond Brown writes, “While Luke’s list may be less classically monarchical than Matthew’s, there is little likelihood that either is strictly historical.” • “Genealogy and cosmology seem to be the Achilles’ Heels of sciptural inerrancy!” - Anonymous online comment Proposed Solutions: 1. Did Jeremiah really curse Zedekiah instead of Jeconiah? • See the lengthy discussion of this view by Jon Gleason online at https://mindrenewers.com/2014/01/24/the- genealogies-of-christ-summary/ • He proposes that Zerubbabel’s legal father may have been Shealtiel, while his biological father was Pedaiah (1 Chron. 3:17-19) either through adoption or Levirite marriage. You can read more about Levirite marriage in Deuteronomy 25:5-10. • He also proposes that Shealtiel’s father was Assir (1 Chron. 3:17) and Neri (Luke 3:27) was actually his father- in-law. This would make Zerubbabel a descendant of David via both Solomon and Nathan, crossing the bloodlines in Matthew & Luke and disqualifying both Mary & Joseph in the curse was on Jeconiah. • He thus proposes that we have misunderstood Jeremiah’s prophecy and wrongly applied the curse of Jeconiah which was originally intended for Zedekiah. Read his post entitled “The Genealogies of Christ and ‘Jeconiah’s Curse’” for his detailed explanation. • While I appreciate Gleason’s argument upholding a high view of Scripture, I ultimately find his conclusions unconvincing, because the language of Jer. 22 does not support the application of the curse to Zedekiah in my view. This means we will have to consider other options. 2. Did Haggai 2:23 reverse the curse of Jeconiah? • This is the view proposed by David Levy at the Friends of Israel Ministry. He writes about it at https://israelmyglory.org/article/zerubbabel-man-with-a-mission/ • He proposes that when Haggai said Zerubbabel would be “like a signet ring” he “reversed the curse and judgment pronounced on Coniah….In other words, God renewed his promise that the Davidic line would not die out but would one day give birth to Israel’s Messiah.” He also believes that Pedaiah is likely Zerubbabel’s biological father via a Levirite marriage. • One objection that I have to this view is that both Jeremiah 22 and Haggai 2 use the idea of a signet ring figuratively rather than literally. In Jeremiah he says, “though Coniah...were the signet,” indicating that he is not, but that if he were God would still remove him and cast him away. In Haggai he says that Zerubbabel is “like a signet ring.” It is a simile, comparing Zerubbabel to a signet ring, not saying that he is in fact Yahweh’s signet. For these reasons I do not find Levy’s arguments comvincing. • This view is also argued by the Jews for Jesus organization at https://jewsforjesus.org/answers/the-problem-of- the-curse-on-jeconiah-in-relation-to-the-genealogy-of-jesus-issues-prophecy/ The author of that article is not named, but he musters a whole slew of Rabbinic sources to prove that the traditional Jewish view was that Jeconiah repented and was restored by God according to 2 Kings 25:27- 28. • My objection to this argument is simply that it is an argument from silence. There is no mention whatsoever of any repentance on the part of Jehoiachin (another name for Jeconiah) in that passage or in Jeremiah 52:31-34. Jon Gleason (view #1) argues very strongly that this restoration of Jeconiah to favor and the king’s table in Babylon proves that the curse could not have been directed at him in Jeremiah 22, because it shows he prospered during his lifetime, but I find his reading of Jeremiah 22 to be inaccurate. It does say that he would not succeed in his days (lifetime), but it goes on to clarify that that relates specifically to having his children sit on the throne of David. 3. Were the Zerubbabel and Shieltiel mentioned in Luke different than those named by Matthew? • If so, this would mean that Matthew’s genealogy shows that Joseph was excluded from being the king along with any biological son born to him (i.e. Jesus’ half brothers). Arnold Fruchtenbaum argues for this saying, “For this reason, Matthew starts his gospel with the genealogy, presents the Jeconiah problem, and then proceeds with the account of the virgin birth which, from Matthew’s viewpoint, is the solution to the Jeconiah problem.” You can read more about Fruchtenbaum’s view at https://jewsforjesus.org/publications/issues/issues-v05- n06/the-genealogy-of-the-messiah/ Fruchtenbaum explains, “It would not be all that unusual to have father and son names being the same without the persons being the same….I would say these are two different people or sets of people that probably come from the same time zone since the name ‘Zerubbabel’ means ‘the seed of Babylon.’ So it is obvious that both Zerubbabels were born in Babylon during the 70 years of captivity and the name was to commemorate the exile.” • This would then make Luke’s genealogy from David to Jesus through Nathan by way of Mary the actual royal lineage. 4. Some have suggested that ultimately it doesn’t make a difference. • After devoting several hundred words to discussing the problem, blogger Victoria Emily Jones writes, “I don’t know whether Jesus inherited the throne through Joseph or through Mary, and – perhaps controversially – I don’t think it matters, so long as we see that he is on the throne, the Son of David, the Root of Jesse. My response to this is simply that we cannot know that Christ is on David’s throne unless his lineage can be traced back to David! And the curse of Jeconiah must be explained in some way or another. It simply will not do to ignore issues that arise in the text because we don’t like them or we cannot answer them with absolute certainty. Our lack of certainty about the answer does not mean there is no answer (we have 3 acceptable proposals mentioned here already!), but it should encourage humility and spur us on to greater study. You can read Jones’ article in which she actually lays out the issues pretty clearly at https://thejesusquestion.org/2015/12/21/the-two-genealogies-of-jesus-the-curse-of-jeconiah-and-the-royal- line-of-david/ • John Nolland in his “New International Greek Testament Commentary” on Matthew’s Gospel writes, “Various attempts have been made at harmonization, none of which is better than speculative. Given the contradictions in OT and other ancient genealogies and the varied functions of genealogies, it is probably best to let each genealogy make its own contribution to an understanding of the significance of Jesus.” I hope you would recognize the foolishness of this kind of argumentation. If the text of Scripture is not reliable (i.e. supposed contradictions in the OT genealogies), then the genealogies cannot make any contribution to our understanding of the significance of Jesus other than to cast doubt as the genuineness of his claims to be Messiah and the Son of God. Our theology is built on the foundation of Scripture’s truthfulness and reliability. Anyone who says otherwise is simply ignoring reality. • An anonymous comment on one online discussion forum with the screen name “Deepter Thinker” concluded, “Men get so caught up in ‘this law’ or ‘that law,’ but God is overall, and He can do what he wants.” The implication being that God just picked Zerubbabel and his descendant, Jesus, because he wanted to, even if it contradicted his own expressed law, and he could do so without giving any explanation. But this makes God completely arbitrary (if he does not follow his own law), something that makes the careful fulfillment of OT prophecies impossible and this whole discussion pointless. Conclusion: • While I do not think we can answer the question conclusively or with certainty, it does not mean that the Gospel writers were incorrect, not to mention the prophets Jeremiah and Haggai or the writers of 2 Kings and 1 Chronicles.
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