MRS. A. S. LEWIS, ON THE GENEALOGIES OF OUR LORD. 27 



of David, and end with a discrepancy, which cannot be ascribed 

 to a copyist's error, in the name of Joseph's father. 



Further investigation shows that the two lines are distinct from 

 the time of Solomon to the captivity; after which they show 

 agreement for about five generations from Salathiel to Abiud. 

 A similar succession of names may be rather more dimly traced 

 in I Chron. iii, as far as Hodaiah, who is the last of David's line 

 who is named by the Chronicler. (See pp. 28 and 29.) 



From this point they are again distinct till we reach Matthan 

 or Matthat (if we may take these as variants of the same name), 

 the (apparent) grandfather of Joseph ; after which they again 

 apparently diverge; St. Matthew giving Jacob as the name of 

 J oseph's father, while St. Luke gives the name of Heli. It is scarcely 

 credible that this could be due to an error on the part of the 

 evangelists, for they were almost if not quite contemporaries of 

 Joseph and Mary. It must also be noticed that St. Luke qualifies 

 his statement of the parentage of Jesus by the words, " As was 

 supposed." 



The problems before us then are four — 



1. To account for the coalescence of the two lines in Salathiel, 



etc. 



2. To account for the similar coalescence in Matthan. 



3. To explain how it is that Joseph has apparently two 



fathers. 



4. To find what St. Luke means by his qualifying clause. 



1. This can be easily explained by assuming that St. Matthew 

 throughout traces the succession through the leading branch of the 

 family, which of course at first is the line of Solomon ; and that 

 this line died out in Jehoiachin, the curse of Jeremiah that he 

 should be childless being literally fulfilled. I do not see that the 

 following words in Jer. xxii, 10, prove that this supposition is 

 wrong, as Mrs. Lewis seems to think. If the royal line thus became 

 extinct, the next senior branch would take its place, and Salathiel, 

 son of Neri, would become the representative of the family. To 

 suppose that Salathiel was Jehoiachin's own son would leave 

 unexplained the remarkable coincidence which occurs at this period 

 between the genealogies of St. Matthew and St. Luke and greatly 

 discredit the latter. 



