Reflection on Jesus’ Ancestors

By Sister Rebecca

This coming Sunday, Matthew’s Gospel focuses on Jesus’ origins—his genealogy. It manifests a struggle within Matthew’s diaspora community in Syria some 10 years after the destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem in the year 70 CE. That community was a minority Jewish Christian community, which took Jesus as its leader and strove to establish a way of life rooted in obedience and love as Jesus lived and taught. But it was surrounded by some Jewish communities whose people did not accept Jesus as Messiah. There was a dire need for Matthew’s community to show Jesus’ person, not only as legitimately humanly rooted in Judaism but also as the Messiah long foretold by the Prophets inspired by the Spirit of God.

Matthew begins his Gospel with a list of names from Jesus’ ancestry. Many of the names are not only obscure to us but hardly pronounceable! For people living in medieval times, Jesus’ family tree—an abbreviated illustration of his lineage, called the Tree of Jesse—was a very popular subject in Christian art and very appealing to the imagination. Its name is derived from the messianic prophesy of Isaiah 11:1 and 10: “There shall come forth a shoot from the stump of Jesse, and a branch from his roots shall bear fruit. In that day the root of Jesse, who shall stand as a signal for peoples—of him shall the nations inquire and his resting place shall be glorious.” The Tree of Jesse is illustrated with this article.

When we begin to unpack the individual lives listed by Matthew, the message resounds loud and clear: Jesus fully entered our human condition with all its virtues and vices. The genealogy shows the continuity of Jesus in the history and tradition of Israel. His birth was a natural development of the long process of God’s steadfast relationship with his people and the long-awaited climax. It responds to the question: who is this Jesus? Matthew attempts to unveil who Jesus is for his community.

When we scratch below the surface of the persons in Jesus’ lineage, we cannot help but note that God writes straight in crooked lines. Matthew makes no effort to sanitize Jesus’ origins or even the members of his immediate family. Jesus was not born of all saintly ancestors. Rather, as the genealogy shows, his family tree contains as many sinners as saints. Among his ancestors were scoundrels, liars, adulterers, murderers, power-mongering men, some scheming women, mostly wicked and/or weak kings, corrupt religious authorities, and sinners of all sorts.

Both persons and the institutions that gave birth to Jesus were a mixture of grace and sin, holy wisdom and ignorance, yet, none the less, a mixture that mediated God’s favor. And from this mélange, Jesus was born. This can be scandalous for our sense of propriety and integrity, to our high ideals of how God “should” come to us—that not everything that gave birth to Christmas was immaculately conceived. The same holds true of what followed after Jesus’ birth. His earthly ministry was also partially shaped and furthered by the self-interest of religious and political authorities of his time and by the fear and infidelity of his own disciples. And this has continued throughout the 2000 years of history since. No, Jesus’ family tree up to our present day has a long list of both selfless holy women and men and sinners.

By contemplating the mystery of Jesus Christ in Kairos (eternal, Kingdom of God) time, with the inner lenses of the Spirit, we may perceive God’s Light, shining in the deep and scary darkness of our own present Chronos (our clock, calendar) time. This celebration of Christmas invites us to ponder and trust deeply that a loving and personal God guides each of us as well as in and through the present tragic events of the pandemic, not to mention some of the detours along the path of our own spiritual journeys.

It is an enormous challenge for us today is to trust that God is at work in our midst, in and through us, making crooked ways straight, and that God’s love does and will prevail. This trust is one of the authentic keystones of Christian spirituality. Matthew assures us that God does govern life and that nothing eludes God’s power, that there is a guiding Light beyond our comprehension, beyond our rational brains, which gives meaning to our lives. Like a hidden seed, as in Jesus’ parables of the Mustard Seed and the Yeast in the dough (Luke 13:18-21), God’s grace continues to work, revealing divinity through people in communities, in our churches, and in uncounted selfless individuals in the world at large, especially in those we witness through their untiring, selfless, faithful service to all, especially those health workers in the trenches during this worldwide pandemic.

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Stained Glass Window at Chartres, France (ca. 1140-1150)

The center part of the vertical glass illustrates the family tree of Jesus, which is flanked by 14 prophets and leaders who foretold the coming of the Messiah.

The Chartres window comprises eight square central panels, with seven rectangular ones on either side, separated. In the lowest central panel reclines the figure of Jesse, with the tree rising from his middle. In each of the seven sections the tree branches out into a regular pattern of scrolling branches, each bearing leaves in the form of the Fleur de Lys.

Central to each panel is a figure: Jesse, father of David, then King David, Solomon, followed by two generic abbreviated ancestral Kings of Israel, then the figures: Mary, mother of Jesus, and, at the summit, surrounded by doves symbolizing the seven gifts of the Spirit, a majestic figure of Christ, larger than the rest. In each of the narrower panels, edged by richly patterned borders, are the figures of fourteen prophets, and others who foretold the birth of the Messiah.