Originally posted by The Galatian:
at least one of the geneologies cannot be true, as it represents itself.
They are both true. It is you who is having the problem.
They both represent that they are Joseph's geneologies.
No, they don't. Luke makes that pretty clear!
There is no "Catholic explanation".
Oh really? What about the Summa Theologica, a short form of which on this question can be found here:
http://www.newadvent.org/summa/403103.htm and which says the following (and a lot more!):
Various answers have been made by certain writers to this objection which was raised by Julian the Apostate; for some, as Gregory of Nazianzum, say that the people mentioned by the two evangelists are the same, but under different names, as though they each had two. But this will not stand: because Matthew mentions one of David's sons--namely, Solomon; whereas Luke mentions another--namely, Nathan, who according to the history of the kings (2 Kgs. 5:14) were clearly brothers.
Wherefore others said that Matthew gave the true genealogy of Christ: while Luke gave the supposititious genealogy; hence he began: "Being (as it was supposed) the son of Joseph." For among the Jews there were some who believed that, on account of the crimes of the kings of Juda, Christ would be born of the family of David, not through the kings, but through some other line of private individuals.
Others again have supposed that Matthew gave the forefathers according to the flesh: whereas Luke gave these according to the spirit, that is, righteous men, who are called (Christ's) forefathers by likeness of virtue.
But an answer is given in the Qq. Vet. et Nov. Test. [Part i, qu. lvi; part 2, qu. vi] to the effect that we are not to understand that Joseph is said by Luke to be the son of Heli: but that at the time of Christ, Heli and Joseph were differently descended from David. Hence Christ is said to have been supposed to be the son of Joseph, and also to have been the son of Heli as though (the Evangelist) were to say that Christ, from the fact that He was the son of Joseph, could be called the son of Heli and of all those who were descended from David; as the Apostle says (Rm. 9:5): "Of whom" (viz. the Jews) "is Christ according to the flesh."
Augustine again gives three solutions (De Qq. Evang. ii), saying: "There are three motives by one or other of which the evangelist was guided. For either one evangelist mentions Joseph's father of whom he was begotten; whilst the other gives either his maternal grandfather or some other of his later forefathers; or one was Joseph's natural father: the other is father by adoption. Or, according to the Jewish custom, one of those having died without children, a near relation of his married his wife, the son born of the latter union being reckoned as the son of the former": which is a kind of legal adoption, as Augustine himself says (De Consensu Evang. ii, Cf. Retract. ii).
This last motive is the truest: Jerome also gives it commenting on Mt. 1:16; and Eusebius of Caesarea in his Church history (I, vii), says that it is given by Africanus the historian. For these writers says that Mathan and Melchi, at different times, each begot a son of one and the same wife, named Estha. For Mathan, who traced his descent through Solomon, had married her first, and died, leaving one son, whose name was Jacob: and after his death, as the law did not forbid his widow to remarry, Melchi, who traced his descent through Mathan, being of the same tribe though not of the same family as Mathan, married his widow, who bore him a son, called Heli; so that Jacob and Heli were uterine brothers born to different fathers. Now one of these, Jacob, on his brother Heli dying without issue, married the latter's widow, according to the prescription of the law, of whom he had a son, Joseph, who by nature was his own son, but by law was accounted the son of Heli. Wherefore Matthew says "Jacob begot Joseph": whereas Luke, who was giving the legal genealogy, speaks of no one as begetting.
There are different opinions on what it means. The "it's really about Mary" story was apparently originated in the 15th century, by an admitted fraud and forger.
Document that, please. You are fond of flinging around statements like these with absolutely no documentation at all. Document that.
The Bible is not inerrant, unless rabbits chew cud. They don't, but the Bible says that they do.
You have been answered on this so many times I can't believe it, Galatian. On the CARM forum we went through this at least three times. Here is the short answer from my Word file for you:
Hares chew the cud (Lev. 11:6)
The clue here is in the meaning of 'cud.' Rabbits and hares pass two kinds of stools. One is feces. The other is a mucous-covered green pellet which the rabbit will re-ingest, licking it off its anus. These are generally passed in the early morning hours. If cud is defined as being only what a ruminant, or animal with a special stomach division which brings up food for chewing, can have, then rabbits and hares do not chew the cud. However if cud is defined as undigested matter which is re-ingested, then rabbits and hares certainly do chew the cud. Here again we have a grouping which includes a unique group with a general group, in much the same way bats were included with the birds. It makes perfectly good sense seen from their point of view.
"Their point of view" had been explained a few paragraphs earlier under the objection that bats had been grouped with birds in the Bible. Here is that paragraph:
the bat is a bird (Lev. 19:19, Deut. 14:11, 18)
We have an unfortunate tendency to see things through our own eyes and figure that those who don't see things the way we do are wrong. The Linnean taxonomic system, and our more extended one, were not only not known to the ancient Hebrews, such distinctions would have served them no purpose and thus would probably not have interested them. If one notices in the verses cited, as well as many other places in the Bible, the animals are classified by locomotion. Flying animals were classed with birds, including bats. Swimming animals were classified with fish, including whales and dolphins. The only problem with verses such as these is our own myopic ethnocentricity.
There are many things like that in the Bible, but it makes no difference to a Christian.
Galatian, if a Christian thought that God's Word needed man's ability to make sense of it rather than being the straightforward truth, then Christians would be trusting man more than God. This is not what a Christian knows or does. We KNOW God's Word means what it says and says what it means. The fact that you don't understand it and, in fact, refuse to understand it, says a whole lot more about your relationship with God than it does about the Bible.
The Bible takes its authority on tradition, and on the inspiration and scholarship of the people who compiled it. A canonical version of the Bible came very late in our history.
The nicest word I know for that statement is "horse plunky." The Bible takes its authority from God. It is a series of personal eyewitness narrations where it speaks of history -- including Genesis. The Roman Catholic church, which is what you are referring to, is basically a pagan religion using Christian terminology, the ancient statues of gods and goddesses renamed for saints, the practices of the ancient Babylonian apostacy in its rites, and dependance on man rather than God for salvation. It has done more to harm people through the ages, and in the name of Christ, than Hitler or Pol Pot or any of the rest of them ever dreamed of. You, sir, make me so angry with your repeated assertions of falsehoods even though you have been presented with the facts proving you wrong over and over again for at least five years now!
Open your eyes, Pat Parson, and quit spouting RC dogma as though it were the truth. It is not. The truth is available to you if you ever want it, straight from God's Word, straight from creation, straight from Jesus Christ. You don't need the Roman Catholic church for any of those.
For those who want a documented and referenced work tracing the origins of the heretical Roman Catholic church, I highly recommend Hislop's
Two Babylons now on the net here:
http://philologos.org/__eb-ttb/default.htm
