Word Pictures in the New Testament - David Cox

Word Pictures in the NT [Luke: Chapter 3].
of age} (\•n h•sei et•n triakonta\). Tyndale has it right "Jesus
was about thirty yere of age when he beganne." Luke does not
commit himself definitely to precisely thirty years as the age of
Christ. The Levites entered upon full service at that age, but
that proves nothing about Jesus. God's prophets enter upon their
task when the word of God comes to them. Jesus may have been a
few months under or over thirty or a year or two less or more.
{Being Son (as was supposed) of Joseph, the son of Heli} (\•n
huios h•s enomizeto I•s•ph tou Helei\). For the discussion of the
genealogy of Jesus see on ¯Mt 1:1-17. The two genealogies differ
very widely and many theories have been proposed about them. At
once one notices that Luke begins with Jesus and goes back to
Adam, the Son of God, while Matthew begins with Abraham and comes
to "Joseph the husband of Mary of whom was born Jesus who is
called Christ" (Mt 1:16). Matthew employs the word "begot" each
time, while Luke has the article \tou\ repeating \huiou\ (Son)
except before Joseph. They agree in the mention of Joseph, but
Matthew says that "Jacob begat Joseph" while Luke calls "Joseph
the son of Heli." There are other differences, but this one makes
one pause. Joseph, of course, did not have two fathers. If we
understand Luke to be giving the real genealogy of Jesus through
Mary, the matter is simple enough. The two genealogies differ
from Joseph to David except in the cases of Zorobabel and
Salathiel. Luke evidently means to suggest something unusual in
his genealogy by the use of the phrase "as was supposed" (\h•s
enomizeto\). His own narrative in Lu 1:26-38 has shown that
Joseph was not the actual father of Jesus. Plummer objects that,
if Luke is giving the genealogy of Jesus through Mary, \huios\
must be used in two senses here (son as was supposed of Joseph,
and grandson through Mary of Heli). But that is not an unheard of
thing. In neither list does Matthew or Luke give a complete
genealogy. Just as Matthew uses "begat" for descent, so does Luke
employ "son" in the same way for descendant. It was natural for
Matthew, writing for Jews, to give the legal genealogy through
Joseph, though he took pains to show in Mt 1:16,18-25 that
Joseph was not the actual father of Jesus. It was equally natural
for Luke, a Greek himself and writing for the whole world, to
give the actual genealogy of Jesus through Mary. It is in harmony
with Pauline universality (Plummer) that Luke carries the
genealogy back to Adam and does not stop with Abraham. It is not
clear why Luke adds "the Son of God" after Adam (3:38).
Certainly he does not mean that Jesus is the Son of God only in
the sense that Adam is. Possibly he wishes to dispose of the
http://www.ccel.org/r/robertson_at/wordpictures/htm/LU3.RWP.html (8 of 9) [28/08/2004 09:04:59 a.m.]