January 18th, 2025

This Sunday’s title is somewhat easy to remember, “Second Sunday after the Epiphany.” And that method of titling will continue throughout this season, until we come to its final Sunday.

As the manifestation or revelation continues throughout the Epiphany season, that idea of revealing things about Jesus within the different Gospel accounts continues within these website writings as well. Currently we are looking at the Gospel according to Luke, a section at a time, in the way that the writer laid it out. And as last Sunday looked at the baptism of Jesus in the Gospel reading, last week’s blog also looked at that text, and this week we are looking at what comes after that text.

If you are reading thus far, and now it is revealed to you that the next section in this Gospel account is a genealogy, this writer would think that there would be a good chance that this is the extent of your interest with such a writing. You may very well give this a click and be done with it. How interesting could a genealogy be? How interesting would it be to know someone’s great-great-great-etc.-grandfather? That a genealogy already exists in the Gospel according to Matthew may be another reason to avoid continuing with this text.

A good next point for this writing may be the following: Since the writer of the Gospel according to Luke acknowledged other accounts in his introduction, a brief comparison to the genealogy that is within the Gospel according to Matthew may be helpful in pointing out its importance. You may wish to look at that genealogy in further detail at the beginning of that account, but a memorable point within that genealogy may be the importance of the number fourteen.

In the Gospel according to Matthew, the writer divides the genealogy into three “sets” of fourteen. (And you may wish to check his counting of the third section; you would think that a tax collector would know how to count!) The importance of the number fourteen does not only connect to the Hebrew name of David, but since the following sentence in that Gospel account has fourteen syllables, such a sentence lays out a way to see a structure to the text, especially since it originally did not have chapter and verse divisions like we have in all our texts today.

You may want to look at more detail in commentaries or in other translations of the text. But the following genealogy will be laid out in groups of seven. This is an important number, a number which, quite obviously for most people, is the sum of three and four. It is also half of fourteen. And perhaps you have already known the importance of seven from other parts of the scriptures, where the number three is connected to God in terms of the Trinity, and the number four is connected to the world, in terms of the four directions of the compass. God connects with this world in some not-so-obvious ways.

What follows is a very literal, word-for-word(s) translation of Luke 3:23-38 (if this is the first time reading such a text, it will be helpful to know that the hyphens connect the words in English which are the same word in the Greek, the language of the New Testament; and it also should be pointed out that the names in Greek may be slightly different from the way that they were learned and from the way that they were in the Old Testament; a common example of this is that the name Joshua in the Old Testament is the name Jesus in the New):

And  himself,  he-was  Jesus,  beginning  about  years,  thirty,  being  son,  as  it-was-supposed,  of-Joseph,  the-of  Eli,  the-of  Matthat,  the-of  Levi,  the-of  Melchi,  the-of  Jannai…

the-of  Joseph,  the-of  Mattathias,  the-of  Amos,  the-of  Naum,  the-of  Hesli,  the-of  Naggai,  the-of  Maath…

the-of  Mattathias,  the-of  Semein,  the-of  Josech,  the-of  Jodah,  the-of  Joanan,  the-of  Rhesa,  the-of  Zorobabel…

the-of  Salathiel,  the-of  Neri,  the-of  Melchi,  the-of  Addi,  the-of  Kosam,  the-of  Elmadam,  the-of  Er… 

the-of  Jesus,  the-of  Eliezer,  the-of  Jorim,  the-of  Matthat,  the-of  Levi,  the-of  Simeon,  the-of  Juda…

the-of  Joseph,  the-of  Jonam,  the-of  Eliakim,  the-of  Melea,  the-of  Menna,  the-of  Mattatha,  the-of  Natham…

the-of  David,  the-of  Jesse,  the-of  Jobed,  the-of  Boos,  the-of  Sala,  the-of  Naasson,  the-of  Aminadab…

the-of  Admin,  the-of  Arni,  the-of  Hesrom,  the-of  Phares,  the-of  Juda,  the-of  Jacob,  the-of  Isaac…

the-of  Abraham,  the-of  Thara,  the-of  Nachor,  the-of  Seruch,  the-of  Rhagau,  the-of  Phalek,  the-of  Eber…

the-of  Sala,  the-of  Cainam,  the-of  Arphaxad,  the-of  Sem,  the-of  Noe,  the-of  Lamech,  the-of  Mathusala…

the-of  Henoch,  the-of  Jaret,  the-of  Maleleel,  the-of  Cainam,  the-of  Enos,  the-of  Seth,  the-of  Adam…

the-of  God.
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You made it to the end! Good job.