GENEALOGY je ne ŏl’ ə je (יַ֫חַשׂ, H3510; γενεαλογία, γένεσις, genealogy, to reckon by genealogy, generation). The ancestry or descent of individuals in the Biblical record.
1. Introduction. Genealogies are often given in the Bible and have various uses in the unfolding story of redemption. Inasmuch as history necessarily clusters around great men, the connected history of God’s dealing with men involves listing men in their connections with others of various ages. Genealogies and chronologies form the connecting link from early days to the end of the Biblical period. Usually other ancient histories are partial and piecemeal. By means of genealogical records, God has given a connected history from Adam to Christ.
Genealogies also have lesser uses in the sacred record. God’s blessings were often passed on in the family line and these genealogies express the covenant connections of ancient Israel. Military duty was by families. Certain offices such as the priesthood, the Levitical work, and the kingship, were hereditary, and genealogies trace the perpetuation of these offices. Also, land tenure in Israel was carried on chiefly through male descent. Genealogies therefore certified the title to ancestral holdings. Finally, in a tribal or semitribal community, a man’s genealogy was his identification and means of location. It is roughly equal to the addresses of modern houses. People are located by country, state, city, and street. In a similar way, Achan, for example, was identified as of the tribe of Judah, the family of Zerah, the household of Zabdi, the son of Carmi (Josh 7:17, 18). Such a brief genealogy gave only the first two or three and the last two or three links of the man’s ancestry.
2. Principal genealogies of Scripture. The ancient history of the race is compressed into the first chs. of Genesis. Except for a few incidents, this history consists of the listing of famous men and nations. There are two genealogies before the Flood (Gen 4; 5) and two after (Gen 10:11). These genealogies have been the subject of much study because of their importance and their position at the head of Bible history.
Genesis 5 and 11 are obviously similar, giving the line from Adam to Noah and from Noah to Abraham. Each ch. gives the age of a man at the birth of his son and the years that remained to him thereafter. Each genealogy consists of ten links (remembering that LXX and Luke record a son, Cainan, after Shem) followed by a family of three sons who were not triplets, though the record refers to them as born at the same time. It is natural to believe that these genealogies are schematic, naming only the chief men in easily memorizable form. That they are true genealogies, giving the descent of ancient men, there is no reason to doubt. It will be considered later whether or not they are complete. These genealogies are compared by some to the lists recorded on Sumer. tablets of the kings who reigned before and after the Flood. There is no similarity in names. The reigns of the Sumer. kings are extremely long; those after the Flood progressively shorter until the last few reigns are nearer the normal. The last links name a king or two who are historically known. Some have held that the Biblical lists derive from the Sumer. and thus are legendary. It seems just as possible to believe that both lists derive from the ancient tradition of the race and represent early tradition. The Biblical tradition is much more believable and by God’s providence and inspiration has preserved the true outlines of the past.
The genealogies in Genesis 4 and 10 are different from those in chs. 5 and 11. Genesis 10 is frequently called the “Table of Nations,” tracing the expanding migrations of the various sons of Noah and their successors. It can be shown that these successors are not given in straight genealogical lines. These are colonizations of peoples rather than merely lists of descendants. For instance the “sons” of Ham (Gen 10:6) include the Ethiopians, Egyptians, Libyans (prob.), and the Canaanites, a wide variety of peoples. The Canaanites themselves included Sidon, a city; Heth, progenitor of the Indo-European Hittites; the Amorites, a Semitic people; and others. That Canaan begot Sidon his first-born is not intended to be a reference to sonship, but an indication that the city Sidon was peopled early in the history of the land of Canaan. The chapter is aptly called “the earliest ethnological table in the literature of the ancient world” (New Scofield Reference Bible [1967], p. 15).
Actually this difference between chs. 10 and 11 of Genesis is borne out by the Heb. wording. In Genesis 10, the word “begot” represents a different form of this Heb. verb without the causative element. It usually refers to a mother bearing a child. It also refers to Moses as fig. begetting Israel (Num 11:12) or God bearing Israel (Deut 32:18), or God begetting the Messiah (Ps 2:7). The word when used of men apparently is used of general relationships, as expressed in Genesis 10, the Table of Nations and not literal fatherhood.
The same remarks apply to Genesis 4:17-22. The so-called genealogy of Cain includes doubtless some names of individuals who are progenitors of races and craftsmen, and who founded cities bearing their own names. The comparison with Genesis 10 and the fact that the same Heb. verb form is used in both cases makes it apparent that the list of names in Genesis 4 also includes peoples and movements.
In the rest of the Pentateuch there are many shorter genealogies. These genealogies usually first present a brief reference to the worldly descendants, followed by a more detailed history of the godly line.
Abraham’s family outside of Isaac is given very briefly in Genesis 25. This is followed by the family of Isaac (Gen 25:19). The chief men in the family of Esau are listed in ch. 36, followed by the family of Jacob in Genesis 46. Part of this genealogy of Jacob is repeated (Exod 6:14-25), but the family of Levi is expanded there to give the genealogy of Moses, the son of Amram, son of Kohath, son of Levi. It is clear that Kohath was actually one of Levi’s three sons and head of a clan. Amram was possibly Moses’ own father and head of a household. There were intervening links between Kohath and Amram because by Moses’ day the Levites numbered 22,000 males (Num 3:39). Many generations must have intervened. But the ancestry of Moses given in Exodus 6 places him within the tribe of Levi.
The history of the time of the judges is given in a chronological rather than genealogical format. The judgeship was not hereditary but charismatic, i.e., God individually called the judges to their tasks. The period of the judges is spanned by one brief genealogy—that at the end of the Book of Ruth. Actually Ruth is a book belonging in the time of the judges and in old Heb. listings was counted as a part of Judges. In Ruth 4:18-22, the line of Ruth’s husband, Boaz, is traced back to Perez, the son of Judah, and onward to David the great king. This genealogy, repeated in Chronicles and the NT, is our only record of the detailed ancestry of Israel’s chief monarch. This genealogy is incomplete, however. It speaks of Nahshon, the chief prince of Judah in Moses’ day (Num 2:3). His son, Boaz’ father, is given as Salmon, whereas Ruth 2:1 says Boaz was of the family of Elimelech. Clearly there were other intervening links between Nahshon and Boaz and prob. more than two links between Boaz and David.
For the history of the monarchy, the only genealogy of any extent is that of King David, whose line is traced in the books of Kings through eighteen generations to the captivity. The genealogy of the high priests is not given in the histories, though it was known and is given in the collected genealogies of Chronicles. The genealogies of the prophets are not given, for like that of the judges, their office was charismatic and not hereditary.
The remaining genealogies of any consequence in the OT are those of Ezra (Ezra 7:1-5), Joshua, the high priest (Neh 12:10, 11), and those remarkable lists of names in 1 Chronicles 1-9 where many previous genealogies are brought together and others are added.
1 Chronicles 1 comes straight out of Genesis, usually quoted directly from the early genealogies. Following this are genealogies of the twelve tribes as far as they are preserved, in this order: Judah, Simeon, Reuben, Gad, Levi, Issachar, Benjamin, Naphtali, Ephraim, Asher, and Benjamin. Dan and Zebulun, tribes of the extreme N, are missing, though some have surmised that the second mention of Benjamin is a copyist’s mistake for Zebulun; this is, however, questionable.
These tribal genealogies are, naturally enough, strong on the ancestries of famous people. David’s line is traced down to six or seven generations beyond the capitivity (1 Chron 3:9-24). Samuel’s line is given twice (6:22-30 and 6:33-38; cf. 1 Sam 1:1; 8:2). Aaron’s line is traced down through Eleazar to David’s time (1 Chron 6:50-53) and also to the captivity (6:3-15) whence it is taken on to Ezra in Ezra 7:1-5. The line of Saul is also given briefly (1 Chron 8:33-40). Curiously nothing is known about Moses’ descendants. His sons Gershom and Eliezer are mentioned only once (Exod 18:3, 4).
Many of the names and the incidental references to habitation and family events are found only in Chronicles. The author (now admitted by many critical scholars to have written c. 400 b.c.) obviously had access to ancient books of genealogies. Such books are referred to in Nehemiah 7:5, 64 and Ezra 2:62. It is quite possible that the author of Chronicles (Ezra or Nehemiah?) copied out of the book that Nehemiah had found. As is to be expected, some of the names are slightly different from those in the older lists. In some cases there may have been alternate names for a man. In other cases the names have suffered slightly in copying. This precise copying of names and numbers was notoriously difficult.
In American culture, genealogies are seldom kept, but in other cultures genealogies are more extensively preserved. The writer has had students from Korea and from India who possessed family records back forty generations and felt this to be not unusual. He has talked with an Arab in Jerusalem who named his child Edessa because his ancestors suffered in the persecutions of Edessa (3rd cent.). Such genealogies were kept even more in ancient times. A man living in China claims to be the seventy-seventh in direct descent from Confucius. In tribal cultures and in the settled life of ancient nations, such genealogies were apparently common.
The genealogies of Christ are recorded in Matthew 1 and Luke 3. Joseph and Mary were prob. well aware of their ancestry. The two lists differ after the mention of David, and some have found here a contradiction. Others have suggested that the genealogy in Matthew is that of Joseph; the one in Luke is of Mary (cf. the excellent treatment of Luke’s genealogy in John Lightfoot’s commentary, Hours with the Hebrew and Talmud, Horae Hebraicae et Talmudicae [1859], in loc.). It appears that Mary is enigmatically referred to as the daughter of Heli in the Talmud (quoted by Lightfoot also in H. L. Strack and P. Billerbeck, Kommentar zum Neuen Testament II [1929], p. 155). Joseph apparently was the son-in-law of Heli. But the genealogy of Joseph in Matthew loses its point, for Joseph was not the biological father of Jesus. Comparison with 1 Chronicles 3:19, however, will indicate that Matthew’s list is not a true genealogy. Matthew 1:12 says Salathiel begat Zerubbabel. 1 Chronicles 3:19 shows that Salathiel died without children and Zerubbabel was actually his nephew. This was uncommon in a usual genealogy, but it was frequent in lists including men who claimed the title to a throne. If the kingly line ran out, the nearest male relative assumed the title. Thus the “genealogy” in Matthew is a list of the heirs to the throne of Judah. Joseph had that title and passed that title on to his foster son, Jesus. It has further been pointed out that Joseph had the title to the throne of Judah, but being descended from Jehoiachin he could not reign, as he lay under Jeremiah’s curse (Jer 22:30). Jesus as the foster son received Joseph’s title to the crown, but being born of the virgin Mary He escaped Joseph’s curse. (For other views, cf. J. G. Machen, The Virgin Birth of Christ [1930], 204-209.)
3. Genealogies incomplete. As mentioned above, it is clear that many OT genealogies are incomplete. There are four links from Levi to Moses (Exod 6:16-20), but the descendants of Levi in Moses’ day were 22,000 males (Num 3:39). The genealogy from Ephraim, Levi’s nephew, to Joshua seems to show eighteen links (1 Chron 7:20-27). In the NT Matthew 1:1 names just three links from Christ to Abraham. The full genealogy, or list of kings (Matt 1:2-17), omits the names of Ahaziah, Joash and Amaziah and also Jehoiakim, in contrast to the lists of kings in the OT. The genealogy of Ezra (Ezra 7:1-5) has only five links from 456 b.c. back to Zadok, David’s high priest in about 960 b.c. Obviously, only the more famous men are mentioned.
These facts are necessary to know before examining the genealogies in Genesis 5 and 11. Attention already has been called to their schematic form. The assumption that the post diluvian genealogy is complete leads to some strange results. For example, the years given from the birth of a father to the birth of his son total 292 years from the Flood to the birth of Abraham, 467 years to his death. Shem lived 502 years after the Flood. Noah lived 350 years after the Flood, and he would have been a contemporary of Abraham. Arphaxad, Shem’s son, also lived until Abraham was 148 years old. Yet the record of Abraham says nothing about any contact with these ancient worthies. The record implies that Noah and his sons were long gone before Abraham was told to leave his kindred and start fresh in Canaan. Also the numerous peoples pictured as recolonizing the world (Gen 10) could hardly have repopulated and spread so widely in ten generations. It is far easier to realize that Genesis 11 is incomplete. It is also held that some of these names are actually family or clan names.
Furthermore, any view that holds the Flood to have destroyed all men all over the earth, must place the Flood earlier than 292 years before Abraham who lived about 2000 b.c. There is a record, practically continuous, of Egyp. dynasties going back to almost 3000 b.c.—1000 years before Abraham. The city of Jericho in the Jordan valley shows many layers of mud brick going back long before 3000 b.c., which any destructive flood would surely have washed away. The genealogy of Genesis 11 is clearly incomplete. The one found in Genesis 5 is likely incomplete also. The date of 4004 b.c. assigned to Creation by Ussher in the 17th cent. is wrong. He assumed these genealogies were complete.
Actually the genealogies in Genesis 5 and 11 may be considered as links in the ancient tradition of mankind. Some consider a generation about thirty years long. From another viewpoint a generation is the period from birth to death—nearer seventy years or longer (see Generation). From the latter viewpoint the time from Abraham back to the Flood would be at least the sum of the lives of these patriarchs, about 2,263 years. Probably the Flood was still earlier. There seems to have been an abrupt change of climate about 9000 b.c. which would fit the genealogies well enough if the Flood was connected with that event.
4. Other references. A word may be said about NT usages of the word genealogy. The foolish questions and genealogies mentioned in Titus 3:9 prob. refer to matters such as Paul referred to tracing his own ancestry from the tribe of Benjamin (Phil 3:5). Such trust in pedigree for merit before God was vain and far removed from the practical uses of genealogies in the OT.
Bibliography Commentaries in loc. (esp. ICC, Curtis and Madsen on Chronicles); W. H. Green, “Primeval Chronology,” BS (1890), 285-304 (quoted extensively in Buswell, see below); P. W. Crannel, ISBE II (1929), 1183-1196; J. G. Machen, The Virgin Birth of Christ (1930), 204-209; J. O. Buswell Jr., A Systematic Theology of the Christian Religion, I (1962), 325-343.