Interrupting His-story – Day 8

1. This first book in the New Testament starts with “A record of the genealogy of Jesus Christ son of Abraham”. Genealogies are long lists of son-of-so-and-so or father-of-so- and-so, which we usually skip over and ignore. But, there is something different about this listing of Jesus’ ancestry.
(a) Read through the list of names in Matthew (1:1-16) and compare it to Luke’s genealogy of Jesus (Lk 3:23-38)
(b) How many women are there in Matthew’s account? (c) What do you know about each of them?

2. Besides the women sticking out like a sore thumb because it would not be usual to include the names of women in one’s ancestry – especially not that of Jesus who is called Christ – all these woman, had a ‘scandalous’ past. Even today, the older generation still judge a person’s character or standing based on the character or standing in the community of her/his mother or father.
(a) Do you know of any women in your circle whose past is not considered ‘honourable’ and whom you would be hesitant in admitting her being related to you?
(b) In the case of the women in Jesus’ ancestry, what was perceived as ‘scandal’ was due to perceptions and rules/ laws based on biases regarding their race, ethnicity, class, culture, religion and gender. Do you know of any woman in your context who is frowned upon or criticised because of circumstance of sacrifice?