St Matthew 1: A son is born, but to whom?

Synopsis:

This starts with a genealogy from Abram to David and straight through to Jesus, who is called Christ.  There are apparently 14 generations from Abraham to David and another 28 to Jesus (14 before being carried away to Babylon and 14 after the Babylon incident). It turns out Jesus’ birth was “on the wise” because Mary got miraculously pregnant while she was espoused, but before she was married to Joseph. Because Joseph was a good man he didn’t want to make a public example of her, but he wasn’t sure if he should marry her either. An angel came to Joseph while he was considering whether to marry Mary or not and told him to marry Mary for the child she has if of the Holy Ghost and that you should name the child Jesus but he will also be known as Emmanuael and that he will save people from their sins. David woke up from his dream, got married to Mary and did not know her until her firstborn son Jesus was born.

In other words:

We are told of a man named Joseph who is a direct descendent of Abraham and David. He is supposed to get married but his bride to be gets pregnant. He is a good man and doesn’t want to turn her away or make a spectacle of her so he dreams that an angel tells him to marry her and that makes it all alright.

What I think really happened:

Either Mary had a guy on the side or she and Joseph did it before they got married. Either way she got knocked up and Joseph didn’t want to have her stoned or turned away, so he and Mary came up with a story that would allow the rest of the townsfolk to be ok with the fact she was pregnant before they got married.

Favorite bit:

St Matthew 1:19 – “Then Joseph her husband, being a just man, and not willing to make her a public example, was minded to put her away privily.” It speaks highly of Joseph that he was being so nice to her, especially since it probably wasn’t his kid.

What’s really funny!

We are clearly told the lineage to Joseph goes through Abraham and David for a reason. That reason is to convey royal lineage onto Jesus. The problem is that Jesus isn’t Joseph’s kid so the lineage doesn’t go through David or Abraham but, if this story is to be believed, straight from God. If the story isn’t to be believed, we have no idea who the father is, except that it probably isn’t Joseph, which means Jesus was basically adopted by Joseph, but is not a blood lineage to Abraham and David, so the lineage is irrelevant.

Moral Lesson Learned:

Family is who you say it is (St Matthew 1: 25)

Everyone has skeletons in their closet. Good people forgive people for past transgressions. (St Matthew 1: 19)