To complete the comparison: we find the line from Abraham to David, that is, the whole first division of fourteen in our genealogy, in exact accordance with the names of men given in the Old Testament: leaving out however the names of some women, one of which makes a difficulty. It is said v. 5 that Rahab was the mother of Boaz. Not only is this without confirmation in the Old Testament, but even if she be made the great-grandmother of Jesse, the father of David, there are too few generations between her time and that of David (from about 1450 to 1050 B.C.), that is, counting either Rahab or David as one, four for 400 years. Yet this error falls back upon the Old Testament genealogy itself, in so far as Jesse’s great-grandfather Salmon, whom Matthew calls the husband of Rahab, is said Ruth iv. 20, as well as by Matthew, to be the son of Nahshon, who, according to Numbers i. 7, lived in the time of the march through the wilderness: [163] from which circumstance the idea was naturally suggested, to marry his son with that Rahab who saved the Israelitish spies, and thus to introduce a woman for whom the Israelites had an especial regard (compare James ii. 25, Heb. xi. 31) into the lineage of David and the Messiah. Many discrepancies are found in the second division from David to Zorobabel and his son, as well as in the beginning of the third. Firstly, it is said v. 8 Joram begat Ozias; whereas we know from 1 Chron. iii. 11, 12, that Uzziah was not the son, but the grandson of the son of Joram, and that three kings occur between them, namely, Ahaziah, Joash, and Amaziah, after whom comes Uzziah (2 Chron. xxvi. 1, or as he is called 1 Chron. iii. 12, and 2 Kings xiv. 21, Azariah). Secondly: our genealogy says v. 11, Josias begat Jechonias and his brethren. But we find from 1 Chron. iii. 16, that the son and successor of Josiah was called Jehoiakim, after whom came his son and successor Jechoniah or Jehoiachin. Moreover brethren are ascribed to Jechoniah, whereas the Old Testament mentions none. Jehoiakim, however, had brothers: so that the mention of the brethren of Jechonias in Matthew appears to have originated in an exchange of these two persons.—A third discrepancy relates to Zorobabel. He is here called, v. 12, a son of Salathiel; whilst in 1 Chron. iii. 19, he is descended from Jechoniah, not through Shealtiel, but through his brother Pedaiah. In Ezra v. 2, and Haggai i. 1, however, Zerubbabel is designated, as here, the son of Shealtiel.—In the last place, Abiud, who is here called the son of Zorobabel, is not to be found amongst the children of Zerubbabel mentioned 1 Chron. iii. 19 f.: perhaps because Abiud was only a surname derived from a son of one of those there mentioned. [164]