Read Part One here.
Read Part Two here.
The content of this final section will be published in installments as time permits.
Additions will be announced to the email list and on Facebook and X. Or just revisit this post from time to time over the next month.
The work is long enough to publish as a book, and that’s what I’ll do when it’s complete.
So if you contact me with any typos or suggested improvements/clarifications, you’ll get an acknowledgement.
6
The Seed and the Sword
The scandalous switch in the story
Jacob twice supplanted Esau using man’s desire for food. For Jesus to receive His birthright over the sons of men, He, too, would have to offer His ravenous rivals the very thing for which they hungered.
i.
That serpent of old
(Genesis – Sabbath)
From the beginning, the seed of the serpent shadowed the path of the Seed of the Woman. Sometimes it watched from a far horizon, and sometimes it hid in close quarters. Since it manifested in various guises, this shape-shifting adversary could turn up anywhere at any time, and it was tricky to pin down.
As a spiritual enemy, it exploited every opportunity to become “incarnate” in a willing host, whether an individual or an entire people. But as the proverbial “evil twin” its intention was always the same. It crouched at the door like a beast, lying in wait to shed innocent blood in the manner of Cain (Genesis 4:7).
The most intense animosity towards the promised Seed was embodied in the Amalekites. This vicious people from the bloodline of Esau functioned as the head of the snake. As distillations of the bitterness brewing behind the scenes of sacred history, Israel’s occasional stoushes with Amalek are fleeting glimpses into the mind of the devil.
As the paragon of serpent-kings, Amalek’s origin story is suitably cryptic. However, it is not difficult to decipher if we are wise and trace the plot back to Genesis 3. It alludes to the desire of the devil—an impotent palace eunuch—for his own dynasty. This could only be achieved by seizing the promises given to the Man and the Woman concerning the fruit of the land and the fruit of the womb.
Amalek’s root in the genealogy of Esau makes special mention of his mother, Timna. She was from a region that was also inhabited by clans of giants (Genesis 36:12, 22). By highlighting his pedigree as the product of an even deeper degree of intermarriage with pagans, this deliberately invokes the reason why mankind was condemned to utter destruction in the Great Flood. From the beginning, Amalek is to be understood as the Esau of Esaus—an anti-seed multiplied by an anti-Eve.
As mentioned, Amalek was described by the Prophet Balaam as “the first among the nations” (Numbers 24:20). Amalek was not an ancient people, so “first” was an ironic swipe at his pretensions. He wished to be the younger son who, like Jacob, inherited the blessing against the natural order. But his concentrated enmity for Israel garnered him only a greater curse.
The Lord God said to the serpent, “Because you have done this, cursed are you above all livestock and above all beasts of the field; on your belly you shall go, and dust you shall eat all the days of your life.” (Genesis 3:14)
Combined with “its end is utter destruction,” Balaam’s God-inspired curse upon Amalek was a shadow Alpha and Omega. By becoming Israel’s avowed foe and seeking the nation’s utter destruction, Amalek’s beginning secured his ultimate end. The punishment for his merciless rancor would be eye for eye and tooth for tooth.
The word for “first” in “the first among the nations” is translated “In the beginning…” in Genesis 1:1. When Israel was “born again” through the Red Sea, coming of age and rising from the waters as God’s chosen heir, Amalek was the first nation to attack. In order to prevent the sons of Abraham from inheriting the “dry land” of Canaan among the “wild sea” of the nations, this serpent crouched at the broken waters of the womb. Open-mouthed and ravenous as Esau, he waited to devour the “firstborn” people of God.
The Lord had promised to bless those who blessed Abraham and curse those who cursed him (Genesis 12:3; Numbers 24:9). So for this acute hatred of the sons of Jacob, God later “chose” Amalek as a kind of anti-firstborn.
Balak hired Balaam to defraud God’s firstborn of the Abrahamic promises. But instead of cursing Israel as Balak intended, Balaam’s first three oracles blessed Israel. Even worse, the prophet’s final oracle took a Noahic turn and encompassed the peoples of the wilderness. And like Noah who woke from his slumber to curse the seed of his youngest son, the Lord switched the curse to those who intended to steal the blessing. After heralding the Abrahamic star-son who would come from Israel, the Amalekites were singled out for special cursing in the list of desert nations.
This word “first” in Balaam’s prophecy is also the word for the “choice” firstfruits in Exodus 23:19—the best of the best. God’s condemnation of the Amalekites in Deuteronomy 25:17-19 is immediately followed by commands for offerings of firstfruits and tithes. Why? Because Amalek, the worst of the worst, would be denied a memorial by the people that remembered the Lord.
What made the Amalekites different was the character of the nation as a “sanctuary” enemy. Just as the serpent took advantage of the vulnerability of Eve in the world’s first holy of holies, Israel’s first battle against this serpentine seed was played out upon an Edenic stage. Although the Tabernacle of Moses was yet to be built, the new sanctuary is implicit in Exodus 17 in the same way that Balaam’s mountains replicated the four-horned Bronze Altar. The Lord’s presence upon Sinai is the Most Holy Place; Aaron, Moses, and Hur are the Table, Incense Altar, and Lampstand in the Holy Place; the waters from the rock are the Laver; and Joshua and Amalek wrestle for preeminence like Jacob and Esau in a bloody “firstfruits” battle upon the four-horned Altar-Land below. This was a familial dust-up in the Father’s house over who would inherit the earth.
Like the serpent, Amalek relied more upon stealth and surprise than brute force. Being nomadic raiders, the most likely meaning of “Amalek” is “the people who nip.” And the name “Agag” or “Gog”—the Amalekite equivalent of the royal title “Pharaoh”—means “fiery one.” These desert dwellers struck at the heel like fiery serpents, and only ventured into the Land under the protection of other nations with whom they were temporarily in league (Judges 3:13; 6:3).
While the Israelites’ disobedience doomed them to wander in the wilderness for one generation, Amalek the accursed inhabited it perpetually. Always on the move, the Amalekites were hard to locate and thus difficult to attack. Like a brood of snakes, they were vulnerable when exposed and mostly avoided open conflict. Instead, Amalek crept into the house like a thief to steal and kill and destroy (John 10:10). Ever the opportunist, he waited patiently until an unfair advantage presented itself—any breach, weakness, or misfortune that befell the chosen sons of Eve. Then he pounced.
Just as the Amalekites struck the stragglers of Israel after the exodus (most likely the women, the children, and the aged), so they also attacked the city of Ziklag in the south when the armies of Philistia and Israel left them unguarded. They burned the city and took the women and children captive.
The animosity of Edom for Israel was less serpentine and more draconian, but similarly opportunistic. Instead of “Garden” attacks upon actual women, their focus was the impregnable “bridal” city in the Land. They raided Jerusalem, but only after the Babylonians had razed its walls and left it defenseless. Like vultures tearing at a carcass left by a lion or a bear, they gloated over Jacob’s misery and plundered what remained.
Because of the violence done to your brother Jacob, shame shall cover you, and you shall be cut off forever. On the day that you stood aloof, on the day that strangers carried off his wealth and foreigners entered his gates and cast lots for Jerusalem, you were like one of them. (Obadiah 1:10-11)
The plot of Haman in the Book of Esther began in another impromptu sanctuary. As an Agagite, a descendant of Amalek, Haman’s strategy was cunning but cowardly—a serpentine strike in the royal court of Ahasuerus. And the glorious furnishings are described in vivid detail to remind us of the construction of the Tabernacle (Esther 1:5-7).
In characteristic Amalekite fashion, but at an unprecedented scale, this was an opportunistic raid (Garden) in league with other nations (Land) from India to Ethiopia (World).
Ezekiel predicted Haman’s strategy in his prophecy of these events. “Gog” (Agag) would attack the defenseless Israelites who lived in the unwalled towns (Esther 9:19).
“Thus says the Lord God: On that day, thoughts will come into your mind, and you will devise an evil scheme and say, ‘I will go up against the land of unwalled villages. I will fall upon the quiet people who dwell securely, all of them dwelling without walls, and having no bars or gates,’ to seize spoil and carry off plunder, to turn your hand against the waste places that are now inhabited, and the people who were gathered from the nations, who have acquired livestock and goods, who dwell at the center of the [Land].” (Ezekiel 38:10-12)
Although God is never once mentioned in the Book of Esther, the parries in each domain all bear His signature and follow His architectural blueprint. The deception was foiled by a wise woman (Garden); the “lawfare” that threatened the sons of Jacob was countered with a better decree (Land); and the incitement to violence intended to purge the empire of Jews ended with all nations bowing in fear before Mordecai (World).
The end of Haman—“exalted” on a pole like the bronze serpent—was as ironic as Balaam’s prophecy concerning Amalek. He desired to be like God’s chosen sons, Joseph and Daniel, the first among the king’s wise men. Instead, hanging from a tree, he became the man most cursed by God (Deuteronomy 21:23).
The execution of Haman’s entire “brood” was not only the end of Amalek, it was also the public vindication of God’s promises to Israel—the firstborn nation that miraculously rose from the dead.
As Isaiah had predicted using Edenic imagery, the seed of the Woman would be unharmed in the new order because the serpent’s nest would be empty (Isaiah 11:8). Amalek’s “In the beginning” claim ended with him being utterly “de-created.” Instead of being “formed and filled” anew with untold power, he was rendered formless (head) and void (body).
Despite continual failures within and attacks from without, the Messianic line endured, blossoming afresh from the stump of the old Davidic kingdom. Purified by the severe discipline of the exile, the revived spiritual fertility of the Jews would influence all of the surrounding nations.
Water shall flow from his buckets, and his seed shall be in many waters; his king shall be higher than Agag, and his kingdom shall be exalted. (Numbers 24:7)
They shall not hurt or destroy in all my holy mountain; for the [Land] shall be full of the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the sea. (Isaiah 11:9)
Those who lay in wait for God’s firstborn inevitably fell into their own traps. Whoever “saw red” like envious Esau only set an ambush for their own lives (Proverbs 1:18).
Importantly, the curse upon those who cursed Abraham even came upon members of his own household, such as the Israelite rulers who murdered the prophets God sent to warn them. Their wickedness led not only to the purging of idolatry from Israel, but also to Haman’s “jealous brother” plot that resulted in the voluntary exposure of God’s enemies across the known world. So every scheme of the wicked had ended up furthering the divine plan.
As predicted by Obadiah, the kingdom of Edom was also utterly destroyed. But as usual, the devil responded by becoming even more crafty. In the next manifestation of the seed of the serpent, the Edomite enemy would not be the one seeking the destruction of Jersualem and the Temple but the one building them—Herod the Great.
So, by the time of Christ, Esau and Jacob were living together in the tents of Isaac once again. The story of sibling rivalry would end as it began, but at a magnitude that would shake the world to its very foundations. God would alter the landscape to such a degree that even the narrow river of Israel’s progeny would overflow its banks.
ii.
Sinful beyond measure
(Exodus – Passover)
The virgin birth of the Messiah surpassed the marvel of its heralds—the long history of barren wombs made fertile. But it also kicked off the final family conflict. This time the feud would be a duel to the death, a contest so grueling and bloody that it would take forty years to identify the winner.
Herod was regarded with suspicion by many Jews, so the birth of the “chosen one” was an unwelcome spark amongst the kindling. His shocking reprise of Pharaoh’s slaughter of the Hebrew infants stamped out any hope before it could spread.
As in Exodus, the Seed of the Woman being the one under foot was contrary to the promise in Genesis 3:15. This diabolical switching of places invited the God of Moses to come and turn the tables once again. The Lord would shift the balance of power with another momentous deliverance, but this time it would not be a battle against flesh and blood. The target was no longer the devil’s willing tools but the deceiver himself.
The infant Jesus had been greeted by Jewish shepherds (priesthood), and then by Gentile wise men (kingdom). This was another instance of the core biblical principle: submission to heaven brings dominion on earth. Likewise, the Gospel would go to the Jews first because judgment begins at the House of God. The initial task of Jesus’ ministry was not to free Jerusalem from Roman rule: it was to free the Jews from the Jews. The chosen Son must first overcome the hirelings who ruled Jerusalem, the “big brothers” who had assumed His throne.
But the end of Israel can only be fully understood in the light of its origins. As is the case with all the works of God, the pattern planted in seed form at the beginning of the age dictated the shape of the end of the age. As He does with individuals, God withheld His judgment until the situation reached its adult form. Only by its mature fruit can a Jacob tree or an Esau tree be truly known.
The divine plan to end the old order was threefold, and each step was a shrewd act of provocation. The three stages of the strategy also reflect the offices and work of the Father, the Son, and the Spirit.
The Father is the one who gives life. In His birth, Jesus took hold of the footstool of the Herods as infant Jacob had grasped the heel of Esau. The king’s response—heartless infanticide—confirmed his true character, just as God intended.
The Son is the one who submits and inherits. In His death, Jesus offered His body as the proverbial bowl of red stew to the rulers of the Garden (the high priest), the Land (Herod Antipas), and the World (Pontius Pilate). Surrounding Him like wild beasts, they all “ate His flesh and drank His blood” in demonic fellowship. But in His resurrection, as the firstborn from the dead, Jesus took possession of the birthright of Adam. As the rightful heir of all three domains, He ascended to be enthroned in heaven as the true king of Israel.
The Spirit is the one who joins, multiplies, and gathers, so the final action in the legal proceedings—taking possession of the household—was “bridal” in nature. Instigated by Rebekah, the deception of blind Isaac was akin to the blindness of the first-century Jews (Romans 11:25). The Lord sent a delusion upon the rulers of Jerusalem so that they would believe a lie (2 Thessalonians 2:11). Charmed like Isaac by earthly might, they sided against God’s firstborn with the bloodthirsty hunters of men—Barabbas, Herod, and Caesar.
The food prepared by the Spirit was again that of Jesus’ own body. This time it was the flesh and blood of the Jewish martyrs—those who had vowed their allegiance to Christ with bread and wine in the fellowship of the Spirit. These faithful sons, in whose mouths no lie was found, were the “firstfruits to God and the Lamb” (Revelation 14:4-5). The Son of Man would harvest them from the Land as wheat for His silo and grapes for His winepress (Revelation 14:14-20). By this means, Jesus received the legacy of Abraham, a dynasty as numerous as the stars of the firmament above and the sand of the sea below.
In each of these three stages—birth, birthright, and blessing—the murderous brothers were drawn out into the open by a temptation they could not resist: a final victory over the Seed of the Woman. Although they developed a taste for blood, the escalation in violence was driven by more than bestial lust. There was a verbal ministry of provocation. It was the teachings of Jesus that incited the Jewish rulers, both church and state, to murder Him. And it was the testimony of Jesus in the mouth of the Apostolic Church that led to the bloody massacres of the saints by Jerusalem and Rome.
The Law of God had served as a similar provocation. Paul understood that although it was inherently good, its very goodness made it a magnet for evil.
For sin, seizing an opportunity through the commandment, deceived me and through it killed me. So the law is holy, and the commandment is holy and righteous and good. Did that which is good, then, bring death to me? By no means! It was sin, producing death in me through what is good, in order that sin might be shown to be sin, and through the commandment might become sinful beyond measure. (Romans 7:11-13)
The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. (1 Corinthians 15:56)
As in Eden, the giving of the Law called men to be teachers. But in making them more accountable it also made them more vulnerable to judgment (James 3:1). And as in Eden, this vulnerability was recognized by the serpent as an opportunity to attack. The devil even quoted Scripture in his attempts to corrupt Jesus. If he could succeed in doing so, the Father would be forced to disinherit Christ in the way He had disinherited Adam.
So although the Law was a lamp for the path of the righteous who would judge themselves and seek the mercy of God, it also made disobedience more attractive to idolaters. It incited them to “multiply” their sins, which eventually brought the serpents out into the open.
However, by the first century, the nationwide reverance for the Scriptures with which God blessed the Jews after the exile had ossified into legalism—the weaponization of the Law. The spring of life was now a whitewashed tomb. The Spirit of the Law had departed. The Law itself was now “possessed.”
The hypocrisy of the Pharisees was worse than the sins that had condemned the nation in centuries past—the “priestly” disobedience in the wilderness, and the “kingly” syncretism with pagan gods in the Promised Land. Their “prophetic” use of burdensome laws to trap, condemn, and destroy the people under the guise of holiness was a far more crafty corruption. And the subtlety of this “hack” was a clue to whose “seed” the elites of Jerusalem really were.
A new sort of provocation was required to expose them, a perfect (mature) love that matched their perfect hatred. The only worthy opponent to the Mosaic “body of death” was the Gospel of the resurrection.
This was not a wholesale shift from law to grace. Both had been present since the disobedience of Adam and the first sacrifice that atoned for his sin. Instead, it was a shift in emphasis—the same pattern but at the grandest scale. The point of history’s great chiasm had arrived.
Now that the promised salvation had come, the mercy offered to all nations would be the undoing of the thieves who had monopolized and corrupted the sanctuary. Their appropriation of the seat of Moses to evade his judgment had led them into a trap.
Like a fiery seraph, God’s Firstborn entered their Garden wielding the one law they were unable to possess.
“A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another.” (John 13:34)
Freed from their grasp, the perfect law of liberty now confronted them like Nathan the Prophet, revealing their sins to them in its divine mirror (James 1:22-25). It had the power to set them free like Moses; but like the Israelites who worshiped the golden calf after swearing to keep the Law of Moses, it also gave them the opportunity to become sinful beyond measure.
They chose to regard Jesus as their mortal enemy, a pretender who came with guile to steal their inheritance. They hung Him on a tree as a man to be cursed above all men, and broke every law in the book to put Him there.
But He went willingly, turning the tables against them by fulfilling this new law to a magnitude that shattered the ground and disqualified every ruler in every sphere.
And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in him may have eternal life. (John 3:14-15)
For one will scarcely die for a righteous person—though perhaps for a good person one would dare even to die— but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. (Romans 5:8)
Pentecost was Jesus’ second wind in His case against Jerusalem, and an integral part of this revived offense was the written Gospels, accounts inspired by the Spirit who had manifested as forked tongues of fire (Acts 2:3). These documents were more than declarations by the conquering king. Like the decree of Ahasuerus, they were designed by God to entice His hidden enemies into the light.
Imagine the reaction of a Herod or high priest upon hearing the Gospel of Matthew proclaimed in public! It would have been the same as Saul’s response when he heard of the anointing of David.
As the first-century equivalents of the writings of the ancient prophets, these publications were likewise intended to cause offense. The Lord preserved those earlier books for the edification of future generations, which is why Jesus and the apostles quoted them. If the Gospels are not read in the light of this same intention—provocation of the wicked along with the righteous—they are not being read in their comprehensive legal context, and thus cannot be fully understood.
Just as the key to the parable of the sheep and the goats is the Olivet Discourse, so the key to the Olivet Discourse is the entirety of Matthew’s Gospel. The book intentionally follows the legal pattern that governed all biblical covenants, a hierarchical sequence that was written implicitly into Genesis and established explicitly in Exodus. The pattern was also imitated by ancient kings in their legal treaties with nations whom they had conquered.
The Bible’s legal pattern has five steps, and they can be discerned in the basic themes of the Pentateuch:
- It identifies the conquering king as the supreme authority and source of well-being (Genesis);
- It then describes the relationship between the master and his new vassal (Exodus);
- It lists the obligations to be fulfilled by the vassal (including tribute) (Leviticus);
- and the consequences for obeying or disobeying these stipulations (blessings and curses) (Numbers);
- Finally, it records succession arrangements for the time when the current legal parties have passed (Deuteronomy).
Just as God set Israel apart to serve Him, so He also conscripted the Old Testament prophets as His legal representatives. As emissaries from the court of heaven, they came to bless and curse Israel and the nations.
This sequence was employed in various ways in the writings of those prophets to highlight their authority as judges of Israel. They were as empowered and endorsed by God as the judges in centuries past who were appointed to serve under Moses and in the Promised Land (Exodus 18:13-27; Deuteronomy 16:18-20).
It made sense that the works of these delegates followed the same formula as the covenant they were called to enforce. And the same goes for the apostles of Christ. Like the twelve wise arbiters named in the Book of Judges, they would sit upon twelve thrones and judge the tribes of Israel (Matthew 19:28). They would bring salvation to God’s people and restrain their oppressors. The irony, of course, was that this ministry began with their legal testimony against the tyrannical rulers of Jerusalem. This was the city where the Lord was crucified, and whose spiritual names were Sodom, Egypt, and Babylon (Revelation 11:8).
As mentioned, Matthew’s Gospel follows this legal pattern. It first establishes Jesus’ bona fides as the promised Son (Genesis). Then, after the Master calls His disciples, Jesus’ ministry begins to supersede that of the Temple (Exodus). The center of the book concerns matters of the Law and the Kingdom (Leviticus). Jesus then enters Jerusalem to bless and to curse (Numbers). Finally, He suffers, rises, and commissions His disciples as His successors on earth (Deuteronomy).
With this Mosaic template in mind, we can see that Matthew’s legal case against Jerusalem comes to a climax in the curses of chapter 23 and the judgments in 24-25. The location of the parable of the sheep and the goats at the end of the “blessings and curses” section sheds even more light upon its legal context. It describes the final word upon the Old Covenant “contest” between the firstborn of Man and the firstborn of God.
Although we can—and must—apply its lessons today (and that is why all Scripture was preserved for us), this legal context means there is no way that the parable can be interpreted as having any direct reference to events beyond the first century. To make such a claim is to demonstrate an ignorance of Jesus’ carefully-considered use of symbols and sequences from the Old Testament. All of the prophets used similar literary devices in order to verify their authority and share the weight of their burden.
Matthew’s hearers, who had been instructed in the Scriptures from childhood (2 Timothy 3:15), would not only have instantly recognized this Old Testament pattern, but also understood its legal implications. A new word from God meant that the old order was soon to pass away. As John the Baptist had warned, Israel was to be threshed by the Law and the Prophets one last time.
“His winnowing fork is in his hand, to clear his threshing floor and to gather the wheat into his barn, but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire.” (Luke 3:17)
So Matthew’s Gospel was not only a precious promise to the faithful; it was also a premeditated provocation of the wicked. And the apostle commenced his goading in the very first sentence of his evangel.
The legal testimony of this covenant document opens with the genealogy of Christ as the heir of Abraham and David. Matthew identifies Jesus not only as the chosen son of miraculous birth, but also as the beloved king who has come to conquer. The list of names was an authentic claim to the throne, so its publication and wide dissemination amongst the common people was a nightmare scenario for the Herods. The cat was not only out of the bag, it was also now irretrievably amongst the pigeons.
Moreover, Matthew deliberately structured the genealogy as a menstrual cycle in order to present Christ as the Seed of the Woman. He omitted some names (presumably those who were spiritually infertile) in order to achieve “fourteen days” from the physical infertility of Abraham to the spiritual fertility of David, another “fourteen days” from David to the barrenness (both physical and spiritual) of the exile in Babylon, and a final “fourteen days” from the deportation to the incarnation of Christ. Since the Woman’s cycle corresponds to the waxing and waning of the moon, David and Christ are the lights in the darkness of the lunar feasts of Moses.
In this way, even the shape of the genealogy was pregnant with meaning. It was a warning that the old world was passing away. The “evening” of the Old Covenant would soon vanish in the brightness of the “morning” of the new order (Hebrews 8:13).
Revelation picks up this theme by presenting Israel as the “woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet, and on her head a crown of twelve stars.” And her sworn enemy was the red dragon of the Herods who waited to devour her child (Revelation 12:1-3).
But notice that both the Woman and the dragon are signs in heaven. Both are comprised of Abrahamic “star-sons” (Genesis 15:3-6) but only one is the true Israel. Likewise, Matthew moves from the star-woman to the star-dragon in his record of the attempt by Herod the Great to wipe out the chosen son—the one whose birth was signified by an actual star.
Even more provocative was Matthew’s inclusion of women in the list of names; and not only women, but scandalous women—Rahab the Canaanite prostitute, Ruth the Moabitess, and “the wife of Uriah,” Bathsheba. These cryptic inclusions were the remedy for the mention of Timna, the mother of Amalek. The Man had come to rescue the Woman from the serpent and present His purified bride, chaste and spotless, at His wedding feast (Ephesians 5:24-27).
It is John who picks up this theme. Israel herself was the woman at the well who had had six “Adamic” husbands but was still waiting for Mr Right (John 4:17). She was also the bride for whom Jesus would transform six jars of water into the best of wines (John 2:1-11).
The question for “daughter Zion” was this: Would she be like Esther who was willing to risk all to rescue her people from Agag? Or would she be like Queen Vashti who disobeyed her husband’s request to present her beauty and character as the ideal for all women, and risked causing a rebellion in every noble household (Esther 1:18)? Women, too, can be trusting, beloved sheep or defiant, obstinate goats in their God-given stations. Every common husband is a nobleman as he pictures Christ, and every common wife is a noblewoman as she pictures His Church.
Matthew’s message in his genealogy—for both the men and the women—was that, by the work of Christ, pedigree and past were now not only secondary matters, but had been relegated by Christ to the dustbin of history. This was made explicit by Paul.
But now that faith has come, we are no longer under a guardian, for in Christ Jesus you are all sons of God, through faith. For as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is no male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. And if you are Christ’s, then you are Abraham’s offspring, heirs according to promise. (Galatians 3:28)
The message of this geneology, let alone the rest of Matthew’s Good News and its corroborating witnesses, was bad news for the status quo—for the murderous Jewish rulers who prided themselves on being sons of Abraham, and for the murderous Idumean (Edomite) rulers who had become Jews in order to salvage some sort of legacy.
But it gets even better, or worse, depending upon your perspective. As we read further, it becomes apparent that Matthew is also describing Jesus as God’s “firstborn son” by picturing Him as the true “Israel.” Taking a leaf from the literary manual of the Old Testament prophets, he does this by recapitulating the major themes of the Pentateuch in the first portion of his Gospel.
The device is a blunt instrument, and Matthew uses it to hammer home Jesus’ claim with the subtlety of Jael’s tent peg. But it is also a brilliant dramatic conceit because its forthright meaning would not be immediately apparent.
As the reader continued through the text, recognition of the five Books of Moses in its deep structure would suddenly dawn upon its Jewish hearers, resonating unforgettably in their hearts. This Jesus whom they had killed was He who had accompanied them from the beginning: Jesus was the better Adam, Moses, Aaron, and Israel, and He was about to lead them spiritually through a narrow pass into a broad land as the better Joshua.
So in Mathew 24-25, when Jesus employs the accoutrements of Solomon’s Temple (priesthood) and palace (kingdom) to portray His step-by-step enthronement, He is likewise using symbol and structure to make a claim—as the better son of David.
After judging Israel under the Law of Moses He would judge the nations as the one greater than Solomon. And with the mission of the Apostolic Church having been completed on earth, the final provocation would be in His own court, and from His own mouth.
