As preached by Sister CeceliaDecember 22, 2019
Holy Wisdom Church
Luke’s
gospel takes the genealogy back to Adam and does not include any women.
Matthew’s gospel, which we have just heard, links Joseph’s line only as far
back as Abraham. His version includes 4 women and then jumps to Mary, spouse of
Joseph. What was Matthew trying to convey by including these women and only
going back to Abraham?
In some of
the Midrash I came across many stories about Abram that gave me an insight into
what Matthew might have been thinking. In one legend, Abram’s father, Terah,
was a believer in twelve gods and was also a store owner who made and sold
effigies of the many gods believed in by the peoples surrounding Abram’s tribe.
Abram had given much thought to the nature of the gods and come to the
conclusion that there is only one God, creator of all.
Abraham had
been left in charge of running the shop where the idols were sold. As the
people came in to buy the idols Abraham would ask how old they were and then
would remark how strange to worship something younger than they were themselves.
When an older woman brought in a dish of meat to be offered to her idol in the
store Abraham used a heavy club to break all the idols but one. He set the dish
of meat in front of it. When his father returned, he was aghast, but Abraham
told him that all the idols had wanted the meat and the strongest knocked off
the heads of all the others so it could have it all. His father remarked that
the idols were only wood and stone, so it could not be.
Abraham
remarked: “Listen to what you yourself say.”
Stories like
this give us a picture of Abraham searching after God and dissatisfied by the
idolatry of his people. So, when God’s call came to him, he was ready to go out
into the unknown. He had faith in the word of God to him. He trusted that God
was ultimately leading him and would fulfill God’s promises to him.
Mary, Jesus’
mother, is thought to be of David’s line, since she married Joseph. Linking
Jesus to David’s line emphasizes Jesus’ solidarity with all humanity, through
David’s connection with the father of faith, Abraham. It links the two
testaments, Old and New . Jesus refers to himself as the Son of Man rather than
the Son of David, making the associations less fixed and less narrowly
nationalistic. The women listed in the genealogy also bring to mind the more
universal nature of the message Jesus brought with his good news.
According to
Matthew’s version, the early ancestors were not all of the purely Hebrew line.
Judah had only three sons, whose mother was a Canaanite. The first son, Er,
married Tamar, another Canaanite, but he died before any children were
conceived. In order not to be a childless widow, since Judah would not send his
third son to marry Tamar, Tamar tricks Judah, pretending to be a harlot, and
becomes pregnant. When Judah goes to Tamar’s family to insist on justice—that
is, death for adultery—he is proven indeed to be the father. Unlike abusive
incest, this intentional act leads Tamar out of her father’s house to establish
not just a house of her own, but one of eternal significance in the future of
Israel. A stone that builders rejected became a cornerstone. Tamar—feared,
denied, and set aside—is the cornerstone upon whom the house of the Messiah is
built.
Rahab, the
mother of Boaz, was a prostitute in Jericho, a Canaanite town that Joshua was
directed to conquer for the Hebrew people to live in. It was with her help that
Joshua succeeded. Rahab instructs us in the way of grace. She intercedes for
her family as its self-appointed savior. Grace is not a private possession but
is contagious, moving from one person to another. Rahab perceives God’s might
and truth and trusts herself and all her family to God’s beneficence.
Ruth’s story
is better known than these other two. Like Abraham, she leaves everything she
has known, but without the comfort of divine call or promise, to follow Naomi.
In addition to introducing an alien ancestry to David’s and Jesus’ line, Ruth
asserts an element foreign to patriarchal culture: that of an initiating woman
who makes things happen. She exemplifies a mode of being, where to do for
another is to be for them, to be one with them.
Bathsheba is not mentioned in the list except
to identify her as the wife of Uriah the Hittite. She is yet another foreigner
in those of David’s line.
What was
Matthew trying to convey by including these women and only going back as far as
Abraham? He seems to be encouraging us to share in the faith and trust these
individuals had for God, the creator of all. As we use the gifts God has given
us, be open to all, to sinners, as well as those who are not of our race or
religious persuasion. Remember always that: God is with (among) us!
