Posted on 12/19/2007 7:03:18 PM PST by Richard Poe
| by Richard Lawrence Poe Monday, December 17, 2007 |
Permanent Link Past Columns |
AT CHRISTMASTIME, Nativity scenes help bring the family of Jesus to life. However, they present only a small portion of his family. Scripture informs us that Jesus grew up in a large, sprawling clan, with many relatives. What became of that clan? Some branches may have survived. It is possible that some people living today might be related to Jesus.
Dan Brown’s blockbuster novel The Da Vinci Code contends that Jesus wed Mary Magdalene and fathered a royal dynasty of France. The book sparked interest in Jesus’ bloodline. Unfortunately, Brown's wild speculations and burning hostility toward the Church tainted the subject with an odor of crankery.
The fictional bloodline of Jesus ballyhooed in Brown’s novel should not be confused with Jesus' real bloodline.
Ancient writings make clear that Jesus hailed from an old and honored family. The first sixteen verses of the Gospel of Matthew set forth a genealogy depicting Joseph, the father of Jesus, as the twenty-fourth great grandson of King David.
Early Christians plainly viewed Jesus as an heir of David, a legitimate claimant to the throne of Israel.
Of course, they also viewed Jesus as the son of God, not of Joseph. This complicates the picture, but an adopted prince is a prince nonetheless.
Mary, the mother of Jesus, also came from a prominent family. Luke 1:5 tells us that Mary’s cousin Elizabeth was a Levite, descended from a long line of Israelite priests.
Mary's parents Joachim and Anna (or Hannah) were a wealthy and pious couple favored by God, according to the Gospel of James. Though never included in the Bible, the Gospel of James has received respectful study from generations of Christian scholars.
Despite his illustrious pedigree, Jesus worked as a humble carpenter. This should not surprise us. In his day, the sons of Herod ruled Judea, serving as puppets of Rome. The House of David was out of power, out of favor, and, in Jesus' case, out of pocket as well.
The New Testament names other relatives of Jesus. "Standing by the cross of Jesus were his mother, and his mother's sister, Mary, the wife of Cleophas...", states John 19:25.
It may seem odd that two sisters would share the same name, but these two Marys were probably cousins, not sisters.
Poor translation is to blame. The oldest known manuscripts of the New Testament are written in Greek. However, these Greek documents apparently drew on earlier sources composed in Aramaic, the language Jesus spoke.
Neither Aramaic nor Hebrew has any word for cousin. In these ancient tongues, the only precise way to identify a cousin was to use a clumsy formula such as "the son of my uncle". Consequently, Hebrew and Aramaic scribes often referred to cousins and other relatives as "brother" or "sister".
For example, in Genesis 29:15, Laban calls Jacob, his nephew, "brother". Genesis 14:12-14 refers to Lot as the "brother" of his uncle Abraham.
Four men are called "brothers of the Lord" in the Gospels; James, Simon, Jude and Joseph. Mark 6:3 also mentions “sisters” of Jesus. These "brothers" and "sisters" were most likely cousins of Jesus.
Two of them -- James and Joseph -- are probably the sons of "Mary, wife of Cleophas" whose names appear in Matthew 27:56. This same Mary also had a daughter named Salome, according to Mark 15:40.
At least a dozen blood relatives of Jesus can be identified by name. Could any of these have living descendants today?
Written records provide only fragmentary clues. Other research methods are available, however.
One such approach was featured on a March 27, 2006 episode of the History Channel's archaeology series Digging for the Truth.
Former host Josh Bernstein put the Da Vinci Code to the test by comparing DNA from the bones of a French Merovingian queen with DNA from a community claiming kinship with ancient Galileans. Not surprisingly, the samples showed no match. However, Bernstein made a more important discovery.
He found that members of Jerusalem’s Syriac Orthodox Church claim descent from the family of Jesus. This ancient community still speaks and worships in Aramaic. Its origins are obscure.
“These families can be traced all the way back to Jesus Christ?”, Bernstein asked the church's Archbishop Severios Malki Murad.
“Of course”, he replied. “We are from the same family”.
Such claims may or may not withstand scientific scrutiny. But they are worth exploring.
By comparing oral history, DNA and whatever scraps of written records survive, we may yet succeed in locating the nearest living relatives of Jesus.
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Richard Lawrence Poe is a contributing editor to Newsmax, an award-winning journalist and a New York Times bestselling author. His latest book is The Shadow Party: How George Soros, Hillary Clinton and Sixties Radicals Siezed Control of the Democratic Party, co-written with David Horowitz. |
Which I think Jesus vied for, but rather having died instead became the Messiah in the hearts of those who believed it.
And so Christ became the figure who liberated whole science form the dark ages, true reverence from today, and for which the New World could never have been known.
Jesus the Christ...The Living Son of G-d...
Does any more really matter?
Apparently not to you. But to those who seek the “historical” Jesus, it’s of great importance. I guess some people think there can be too much knowledge, huh?
The De Vinci Code is mostly bunk. But it happens that Jesus was married to Mary Magdalene. The proof is in the fact that he waited until she was alone and then he revealed himself to her alone, and he did this before seeing God. Only one person would be more significant to Jesus than his Father, and would be his wife.
Bump/ping for later read!
I hear that the family settled in and around the Alabama/Tennesee border...
I think they were mostly Thompsons.
What are you smoking? The “Roman Church”? What church exactly is that? After all during the 2nd and 3rd century there was no legal church in the Roman Empire, and much less one that could issue “edicts” calling for the murder of the “diaspora”, who would have enforced that, the Emperor Diocletion? What tripe.
He was born into it.
"but rather having died instead became the Messiah "
He claimed that while alive.
Last name? Who was Jesus’ father’s father...and so on.
You would be surprised how common it is today to find two sisters both named Mary that also have a brother named Jesus.
Interesting stuff. BUMP!
Mary and Joseph who? If someone were to send them a letter would it be addressed to just Mary and Joseph? Maybe they didn’t use last names in those days. But if that’s true then why was one Mary called Mary Magdalene?
I believe that the Jews of this period did not have family names, unlike the Romans and the Greeks. People had a personal name, and would be further identified by their relationships, e. g. son of, brother of, daughter of, etc. In the James ossuary hoax of a year or two ago, the vessel was inscribed as being that of 'James, son of Joseph, brother of Joshua (Jesus)'. The hoax was adding 'brother of Joshua' to the original inscription.
I don't see why, this is not some silliness about descendants of Jesus, but is a consideration of the likely existence of descendants of his cousins. Jesus is a human being with relatives whose descendants could still exist, as much as he is God.
Now I can see why the use of last names became more popular as the population grew. Margaret Mead said she had just about completed the genealogy for a given Pacific Island when she discovered somebody who had married someone from a neighboring island. Now she had to that genealogy too.
HOGWASH!
I’m wonde3ring why you left out Mary’s uncle, Joseph of Arimathea?... Good read, though.
You're getting into some pretty deep philosophical territory there. When you say Jesus was the son of God, does that mean that he had 23 of God's chromosomes? Does God have 23 human chromosome pairs? If not, and if He chose which genes to give to Mary's baby, who says He didn't choose Joseph's?
Under Jewish law at the time -- and for that matter, under common law up to today -- a child born within a marriage is presumed to be the child of both spouses, absent proof to the contrary. So legally, Jesus was the son of Joseph. Ethically and emotionally, Joseph loved and raised Jesus as his own. What I'm suggesting is that this might also have been true biologically.
They are given names. Magdalene was where she came from or resided, IIRC, Woman of Galilee.
I don’t know how they kept it all straight. Last names did make it more simple than calling everyone of their Father, town or profession!
And just why is it worth exploring?
Fascination with this kind of nonsense just takes our attention away from out true status in Christ.
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