The "Generations" in Matt. 1 ...

amishrockstar · #1 (**permalink**) 09-25-2007, 01:02 PM

I was reading through Matthew 1 and stopped for a minute to think about vs. 17; I've heard how some Bible teachers believe that a 'generation' is 40 years, so I thought I'd break out the ol' calculator... from the Babylonian captivity to Christ there were 14 generations, so, 14x40=560, 560 BC is exactly were my Encyclopedia of Bible Facts places the 'Captivity' but after that the 40 year per generation hermeneutic breaks down (literally speaking) ... can someone give me a hand? Should I take the generations between the Captivity to Christ as a literal 40 years/generation but not for the period from Abraham to David and David to the Captivity?
THANKS,
Matthew

amishrockstar · #2 (**permalink**) 09-25-2007, 01:55 PM

I guess I got just a little beside myself when I calculated from the time of Christ to the captivity and it came out exactly to 560 years (when I looked up the Captivity in my book it placed it at that exact date)... I was thinking that the other periods should do the same thing. I've always taken the 'generations' to mean people and not necessarily 'time' periods --don't know what I was thinking.

bookslover · #3 (**permalink**) 09-25-2007, 09:56 PM

Well, if you carefully compare the list in Matthew with the lists in the Old Testament, you will find that the genealogies in Matthew are not complete. There are people missing. Matthew, for reasons which, as far as I know, have not yet been satisfactorily explained, crafted his genealogies to specifically get three lists of 14 generations.