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of David, to which the promise belonged. Even the choice made by the Evangelists between these two genealogies of Jesus, either of which would have been admissible, is most intimately connected with the spirit and character of their gospels. Matthew, as we have seen, has not only constructed his family-tree in accordance with the wants of the Jewish mind, but he also exhibits the descent of Jesus from David by the family of his legal father, because in Jewish family-trees the greatest importance was attached to the family of the father. The anti-Judaic design of the familytree in Luke moreover is obvious, not only from the absence of these marks, but also emphatically from the presence of criteria of an opposite kind; and more especially from this, that the descent of Jesus from David is exhibited in the way of nature through his mother Mary. In intimate connection with this is the fact that Matthew, in his history of the childhood of Jesus, gives great prominence to the apparent acting of Joseph and Mary in concert; while in Luke, on the other hand, Mary has more the appearance of acting alone. 3. Mary, in the Gospel according to Luke, is exhibited by all traces, irrespective even of this family-tree, as belonging to the family of David. This appears indirectly even from Luke ii. 4, 5. Strauss uses this passage as the strongest argument against the Davidic descent of Mary. He says in the second edition of the Life of Jesus (vol. i. p. 165): the clause, Luke ii. 4, ἀνέβη δὲ καὶ Ἰωσήφ, διὰ τὸ εἶναι αὐτὸν ἐξ οἴκου καὶ πατριᾶς Δαυΐδ ἀπογράψασθαι σὺν Μαριὰμ κ. τ. λ., when instead of αὐτὸν the author could so easily have written auroùs if he had entertained a single thought as to the descent of Mary from David, is decisive against the possibility of referring the genealogy of Luke to Mary.' It is not conceivable how aurous could have been placed here instead of avrov, as in this case the construction of the passage must have been altogether different. Instead of ἀνέβη δὲ καὶ Ἰωσήφ, Luke would have written ἀνέβησαν δὲ καὶ Ἰωσὴφ καὶ Μαρία. But while no inference can be drawn from the avrò, the verse itself proves we believe the descent of Mary from David. The census at that time was taken according to families; and it was only the descendants of David that had to assemble in Bethlehem (Luke ii. 4). Now as Mary went to Bethlehem, and as the woman, according to the principles of a foreign census, occupied an independent footing,' she must have been a member of the family of David. Luke i. 27, however, is still more decisive (comp. i. 69). The question is asked, with what is oxov here to be construed, with ανδρί ᾧ ὄνομα Ιωσήφ, or with the preceding παρθένον ? Strauss and others are in favour of the reference to the ανδρί ᾧ ὄνομα Ιωσηφ,

See the author's Synopsis, p. 108.

6

because

because this is the nearest noun. But in point of construction, the reference to zapbévov also is possible; and indeed, as far as the thought is concerned, is much more natural than the other.

According to the character of the history of the childhood of Jesus by Luke, it was necessary that the author should take more pains in narrating the descent of the main person in it, Mary, than that of Joseph. This remark applies especially to the paragraph of the annunciation of Mary, which is introduced by the words which we are now considering (Luke i. 26, 27). And how can it be conceived that he who had noted the family of Elizabeth (Luke i. 5) should suffer to pass unnoticed the family of Mary! Luke i. 32, however (comp. ver. 35), may be pronounced to be altogether decisive. In the first mentioned of these verses David is termed the father of Jesus; and yet in room of the human father of Jesus, according to verse 35, his immediately divine origin must be introduced. This in connection with the Gospel of Luke can in reality mean nothing else than that Jesus, according to him, was connected with the family of David through his mother Mary. 4. Even tradition speaks in general of the descent of Mary from David. Strauss himself confesses this (vol. i., p. 162) the theory of the Davidic descent of Mary soon (!) became common.' He then quotes from the apocryphal writings, Protevangelion of James, c. i. and x., and the Gospel of the Nativity of Mary, according to which those persons designated as the parents of Mary, Joachim and Anna, belonged to the family of David; he next quotes Justin Martyr, according to whom the Virgin descended from the family of David, Jacob, Isaac, and Abraham. More particularly, however, for the purpose of supporting a certain misunderstood theological view, for the purpose of finding in the descent of Jesus his kingly and priestly dignity, the idea was formed that Jesus belonged to a mixed family of the seed of Judah and Levi (Testament of Simeon c. 71, and above); and in later times, in consequence of an interpretation of Luke i. 36, which cannot be proved to be correct, the opinion became current that Mary was a relative (ovyyevns) of Elizabeth, who was a daughter of Aaron's. On the contrary, even Jewish tradition asserts that the Heli mentioned by Luke was the father of Mary. -We hope that we have proved satisfactorily enough that Luke gives not the family-tree of Joseph, but that of Mary, who how

a This connection had already been indicated by the philologist Lachmann, by the punctuation which he adopted: πρὸς παρθένον ἐμνηστευμένην ἀνδρί, ᾧ ὄνομα Ἰωσήφ, ἐξ οἴκου Δαυΐδ, καὶ τὸ ὄνομα τῆς παρθένου Μαριάμ: to a virgin espoused to a man, whose name was Joseph, of the house of David, and the name of the virgin was Mary.

b Compare Lightfoot on Luke iii. 23.

ever also descended from the family of David; and in this case it is altogether in order that the family-trees in Matthew and in Luke should on the one hand not be identical, and on the other should run together previous to David.

It makes a little difference if, as has been maintained, the Salathiel and the Zorobabel in Matthew and Luke are the same persons. In this case it would still be necessary to explain how the two family-trees could separate after these names to unite again in David. In favour of their identity it may be urged that the Salathiel of Luke happens to be removed from David by just about as many members as the Salathiel of Matthew; for the former reckoning from David, is the twenty-first member, and the latter the fifteenth; and therefore (if we reckon the four names which were designedly omitted) the nineteenth. The problem to be solved therefore is this: in two different family-trees, somewhere about the same time, the time of the captivity, there are two persons called Salathiel, each of which has à son called Zorobabel. At the same time, if we hold them to be identical, we must renew the hypothesis of the marriage of a brother-in-law or that of adoption, with all its inconveniences. These inconveniences, however, are much better and more tolerable than is the assertion of modern critics as to the want of credibility of the family-trees on account of this inconceivable identity. But this supposed identity never can be established. What is there remarkable in the circumstances that two persons of the same name should follow each other in two different though allied lines somewhere about the same time? There is nothing very remarkable in the names, and there is still less in the analysis of these names. There were, we must say, accidentally about the same time two Salathiels. Let us, instead of this, write down one of our own common names, two Theodores or two Gotthilfs; this is quite a common thing. Each of these men had a son who bore the surname Zorobabelthat is, born in Babylony. Even this surname is very natural, inasmuch as they were really born, as we know, during the Babylonish captivity. The pair of Salathiels and Zorobabels might indeed be identical as regards their name. Matthew, however, and Luke at the same time, give their ancestors and their posterity; these each time have altogether different names ; according to Matthew, they belong to the family of Solomon; according to Luke, to that of Nathan: consequently they cannot possibly be identical. Such a transposition as modern criticism imagines can only be maintained if, on the one hand, we are already satisfied that the genealogies before us are throughout unworthy of credit,

с

Compare Paulus, Exeget. text book, 1 Part, p. 282 ss.

of

of the contrary of which we have seen there is satisfactory evidence; and if, on the other hand, we give Luke the credit of being possessed of so little knowledge of the Old Testament that he could incorporate his Salathiel and Zorobabel with the house of Nathan, although in reality, as any one acquainted with Old Testament history would have told him, they belonged to that branch of the family of David which descended from Solomon. The older critics, such as Julius Africanus and others, hence universally maintained that the two names in question were those of different individuals. Strauss is of the contrary opinion (vol. i., p. 164): When we consider the fame of Zerubbabel, the son of Shealtiel, at the time of the captivity, it is scarcely credible that Luke by the expression could refer to any other person than to him.' Yes, Luke! who himself, as we have seen, says exactly the opposite. A truly strange consequence of this canon of fame it is, when Bruno Bauer identifies the four names which follow each other, Levi, Simeon, Judah, and Joseph (Luke iii. 29, 30) with the well-known sons of Jacob; and Amos and Nahum (ver. 25) with the well known prophets; and from this very apparent combination, forms his conclusion as to the credibility of our familytree. This is what is called historical criticism.

We now draw the result of our investigation. Both familytrees, the one in Matthew as far as Zerubbabel, and the one in Luke as far as Nathan, show an intimate knowledge and a careful use of Old Testament narratives. We are at present altogether destitute of any independent authority by which to examine the names which occur after these; but their entire difference from each other is explained by the supposition which is confirmed by the text itself, and by the connection of the corresponding evangelists, that Matthew gives the family-tree of Joseph, the legal father of Jesus, and Luke that of Mary his mother. There is hence not only no contradiction between their mutual testimony, but they bear even in particular points manifold traces of authenticity. The general reasons to which we adverted in our introductory remarks become hence possessed of great power. These led us to expect a historically guaranteed view of the family-tree of Jesus, and certainly not such a one as was fabricated within the Christian Church, either intentionally or unintentionally, out of the fictions of tradition.

CALVIN AS A COMMENTATOR.

By the Rev. F. W. GOTCH, M.A., Trinity College, Dublin.

It has been, at least in some respects, a misfortune to the interests of biblical learning that the name of the great reformer of Geneva has been always associated with a certain system of doctrines, and with the adherents of that system. With the correctness or incorrectness of those doctrinal views, which even in the lifetime of Calvin acquired the name of Calvinism, we are not now concerned. The Journal of Sacred Literature is not, we conceive, a fit place for the discussion of such questions. But the writer of the Institutes certainly has other claims on the attention and gratitude of succeeding generations than those which arise from his researches into systematic theology; and these claims have been not unfrequently passed by or depreciated just in proportion as the others have been brought prominently into view. The world-wide fame of Calvin rests principally, almost exclusively, on the systematic form in which he arranged the doctrines of the Christian religion. How few comparatively amongst biblical students of the present day know anything of Calvin as a commentator, and how much smaller was even that small number fifteen or twenty years ago ? Indeed, until within that period, it was scarcely possible that it should be otherwise, at least in this country. The works of Calvin were rarely to be obtained except in a set of expensive folio volumes. The labours of an earlier generation in rendering the Commentaries of Calvin into English had lost their effect both on account of the scarcity of the translations themselves, and the obsoleteness of the style in which they were written. It is to the theologians of Germany that the honour is due of having called back the attention of the Christian world to the exegetical writings of the early reformers, and especially to those of Calvin. To Lücke,' says Professor Tholuck, belongs the honour of having first referred, in the department of exegesis, to Luther, Beza, Calvin, Camerarius, and many other excellent interpreters of the period of the Reformation. He was followed by the writer of these pages (Professor Tholuck) in his Commentary on the Epistle to the Romans. Pointed, as he was, on the one hand, by Neander to the ancient ecclesiastical fathers, and on the other by the newly awakened interest in the period of the Reformation to the fathers of the evangelical church, he supposed he could do nothing more useful for the exegesis of the New Testament, than to give an

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