In fact, in their whole list of names, from David down to Joseph, they
only come together twice. Their names are all different but two, that of
Salathiel and Zorobabel, which names alone are found in both lists.
Matthew tells us that the son of David, through whom Joseph descended,
was Solomon, but Luke says it was Nathan. The next name in Matthew's
list is that of Roboam, but the corresponding name in Luke's list is
Mattatha. Matthew's next name is Abia, which Luke gives as Menan, while
Chronicles differs from both, and gives it as Abijah. Matthew says Joram
begat Ozias, but Chronicles virtually declares Joram had no such son,
although he had a great-great-grandson Uzziah. But Luke says, in effect,
there was no such person in the genealogical tree, or family line,
as either Joram, Ozias or Uzziah. Matthew says again, "Josias begat
Jechonias and his brethren, about the time they were carried away to
Babylon." (Matt. i. ii.)
But Chronicles declares that Jechonias was Jehoiakim's son, and not
Josiah's, and that Josiah had no such son. And, besides, we learn, from
2 Kings xiii., that Josiah was killed eleven years before the exile
to Babylon, and could not well beget a son after he had been defunct a
tenth of a century.
Matthew, after naming twenty-four generations as filling out the line,
and making it complete between David and Jacob, concludes by saying,
"and Jacob begat Joseph, the husband of Mary."
But Luke, antecedent to spinning out his list to fourteen generations
more than Matthew, i. e., making it fourteen generations longer,
declares that "Joseph was the son of Heli." So that Joseph either had
two fathers, Jacob and Heli; or Matthew or Luke, or both, were most
egregiously mistaken, with all their "inspiration."
Again, Luke says that Salathiel was the son of Neri; but Chronicles
says he was the son of Jechonias. And after Chronicles had registered
Zorobabel as the son of Penniah, Matthew and Luke, assuming to become
"wise above what was written," both declare that he was the son of
Salathiel. They agree here in contradicting Chronicles, which is
the only instance but one of their agreement in the whole list of
progenitors from David to Joseph.
With this exception they contradict each other all the way through, and
in many instances that of Chronicles, too.
This is a strange way, indeed, of proving Jesus Christ to have had two
fathers!--to be both the son of God and son of David! And it is still
stranger that they should trace his genealogy to Joseph, if they did
not consider him Joseph's son. Otherwise, the genealogy of "Sinbad the
Sailor," or "Harry Haulaway," would have been as apropos.
Such are the beautiful harmony and agreement in the words of "divine
inspiration" which Christians prate so much about.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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