Biblical genealogies are things most of us read, accept and move on in our reading.  But the genealogy Matthew gives for Jesus at the beginning of his Gospel has a particularly interesting aspect.  Matthew divides the “family tree” he constructs for the promised Messiah into three sections of fourteen generations each, saying: “Thus there were fourteen generations in all from Abraham to David, fourteen from David to the exile to Babylon, and fourteen from the exile to the Messiah” (Matthew 1:17).

But if we look back into the Old Testament lists of the ancient kings of Judah who were among the ancestors of Jesus, we find that Matthew actually omits  three individuals between the kings Jehoram and Uzziah (Matthew 1:8):  Ahaziah (2 Kings 8:25), Joash (2 Kings 12:1) and Amaziah (2 Kings 14:1).  In other words, there were actually seventeen known generations between David and the exile, rather than fourteen as Matthew states.

How can we reconcile this apparent contradiction in the Scriptures?  First, we must understand that Matthew follows a common ancient practice in structuring the genealogy he gives into clear units which were more easily remembered and taught.   That Matthew omits some individuals in order to accomplish this pattern is not surprising because if we look back to the very first verse of his Gospel, he does that to an even more striking degree in saying “This is the genealogy of Jesus the Messiah the son of David, the son of Abraham” – where the practice of “jumping generations” is clearly utilized to make his point: to stress that Jesus was the descendant of David (who is actually named first, before Abraham).

When we remember Matthew’s stress – both here and throughout his Gospel – on Jesus being the son of David, we can consider another fact.  The Jewish audience for whom Matthew primarily wrote had no numerals of the kind we use today. Instead, the Jews gave numerical values to certain letters of the Hebrew alphabet.  In this way, a given word could have a numerical value as well as a phonetic one.  “David” was written with the letters dalet (4), vav (6) and dalet (4), giving a total numerical value of 14. So fourteen was a number associated with the name of David, and it is certainly possible that Matthew structured his genealogy of Jesus in a pattern of fourteen generations in order to stress, in a literary or symbolic manner, the connection between David and Jesus, the “Son of David.”

We must remember that precisely because Mathew wrote to a Jewish audience, he knew that his readers were familiar with the king lists of the Hebrew Scriptures and that they would understand he was “jumping generations” in Matthew 1:8 in exactly the same way he did in Matthew 1:1.

We can see this fact in another way.  Ancient genealogies usually omitted women in their reckoning, but Matthew includes four women who were Gentiles or had Gentile connections (Matthew 1:3, 5-6), even though he did not include the four great matriarchs of the biblical tradition – Sarah, Rebekah, Leah and Rachel.  The reason is clearly because another theme of Matthew’s Gospel is the inclusion of the Gentiles in God’s plan for humanity. 

​Matthew adjusted the details of his genealogy of Jesus in order to make the points that were vital for his story.  So, rather than contradicting Old Testament accounts, Matthew’s genealogy of Jesus is carefully constructed to stress Jesus’ descent from David and from Gentile ancestors – which gave him the genealogy to be not only the King of the Jews, but also the King of all mankind.

The title of this post may appear strange. What else would “firstborn” mean other than being born first – the eldest of the children in a family?   In the Bible the designation of firstborn often does mean the literal “one born first” but just as often – if not more often – it has different connotations, and knowing those meanings  can help us to better understand a number of scriptures.

In ancient Israel, as in much of the ancient Near East, the firstborn son inherited his father’s responsibilities as head of the family (Genesis 27), so we read in the Old Testament that he normally received a special – double – inheritance (Deuteronomy 21:17).  We see this fact in the stories of the patriarchs, where we also see that being the “firstborn” was a privilege that could sometimes actually be bestowed on a younger son who was not the literal firstborn at all. When we read the stories of the patriarchs Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Joseph, we see that “firstborn” privilege was frequently not  based on literal birth order, but on selection.

But whether literally firstborn or chosen as such, the holder of the firstborn birthright  held a special place in biblical society.  After the Passover slaying of the Egyptian firstborn and the Exodus from Egypt, every firstborn Israelite male was dedicated to God’s service.  This obligation was later transferred to the Levites (Numbers 8:14-19), but the significance of the special relationship between God and the firstborn continued, as we see in the fact that the nation of Israel as a whole was called God's firstborn (Exodus 4:22-23, Jeremiah 31:9, etc.). This fact signified Israel’s special standing among the nations and also the priestly responsibility of Israel to be a “light” to the Gentile nations around them.

The term “firstborn” can be used metaphorically in the Bible as well as literally.  In the symbolic sense the term was often used in ancient Near Eastern cultures (as it still is today) to mean the superlative example of something – whether good or bad.  So in the Book of Job “firstborn” is even used of a terrible disease: “It consumes the parts of his skin; the firstborn of death consumes his limbs” (Job 18:13 ESV).  But  when speaking of people, firstborn may mean the least or the greatest.  So in Isaiah  we find “The firstborn of the poor will feed, and the needy will lie down in safety” (Isaiah 14:30 NKJV, ESV, etc.); and the Book of Psalms, speaking prophetically of the coming Messiah, states “… I will appoint him to be my firstborn, the most exalted of the kings of the earth” (Psalm 89:27).

Thus, Jesus Christ is called the “firstborn” in the New Testament, and we can see now how this can mean several things.  The term applies both to his literal position as firstborn of God:  “… when God brings his firstborn into the world, he says, “Let all God’s angels worship him” (Hebrews 1:6);  firstborn from the dead: “… the beginning and the firstborn from among the dead” (Colossians 1:18); and the One who is supreme: “The Son is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation” (Colossians 1:15).

We see, too, how these meanings flow over into the New Testament’s description of Christians as “firstborn.” Our relationship with Christ and our identification with him mean that we too have become firstborn, like the nation of physical Israel, but even more: “For those God foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brothers and sisters” (Romans 8:29).  That is why the Book of Hebrews refers to Christians as “the church of the firstborn” (Hebrews 12:23).
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So, the term “firstborn” in the Scriptures can mean much more than simply “the one born first.” It may mean that, but it may also mean the one to whom the birthright and responsibility was passed (which may apply in many situations, such as what Paul tells us about Christ being the “last” or “second” Adam in 1 Corinthians 15:44-46).  “Firstborn” may also mean the greatest or least of individuals or even things.  Above all, “firstborn” can refer to several aspects of the nature and role of Jesus Christ – and our identity with the One who is the ultimate firstborn.