PART II
Comparisons of Jewish and Early Christian Perspectives
CHAPTER 4
Shared Descent: Ancestry, Kinship, Marriage, and Family
Notions of shared descent and kinship are central to most attempts to define ethnic identities. For Max Weber, as we have already noted, it is âa belief in ⊠common originsâ that is at the heart of the constitution of an ethnic or racial group.1 Hence Jonathan Hall goes so farârather too farâas to claim that âfictive kinshipâ is âthe sine qua non for ethnic consciousness.â2 Yet no single factor should alone be seen as definitive or constitutive of ethnic or racial identities; various characteristics can acquire greater or lesser salience in different contexts and can be deployed for various rhetorical purposes. Nonetheless, appeals to shared ancestry and descentâand the sense of shared kinship that is built on such basesâare an obvious focus of attention for any study of ethnic identity-construction (and any study of the intersections between ethnic/racial and religious identities). Moreover, as both Weberâs and Hallâs comments indicate, the kinship bonds established through such appeals are essentially fictive, a matter of belief and perception more than objective lines of blood-connection, even if the latter is how the bonds are depicted and commonly understood. Indeed, ancestry is a particularly interesting locus for the interplay between fixity and fluidity to which Buell in particular has drawn attention,3 since it is, in one sense, something that is unalterableâone cannot (as children often bemoan) change oneâs biological parents, nor they theirs, and so onâbut in reality genealogies are constructed and presented in diverse ways for various purposes, as we shall see.4 In addition to the rhetorical uses of genealogy, ancestry, descent, and so on to construct notions of shared ethnic or racial identity, it is also important to consider the social norms and practices that reinforce and reproduce the sense of shared descent and kinship. Particularly important here are norms about marriage and the raising of children.
In this chapter, then, we shall examine how notions of shared ancestry and genealogies feature in both Jewish and early Christian texts and how a sense of shared kinship is deployed to express and develop group identity. We shall then turn to Jewish and Christian rules regarding marriage and assumptions regarding the identity of children.
4.1 Stories of Ancestors: Appeals to Genealogy and Descent
An interest in genealogiesârecording who begat whomâis prominently displayed in the Jewish scriptures. Right from the early chapters of Genesis there is a clear concern to record lines of descent: from Adam via Cain and then Seth, from Seth to Noah (see Gen 4:17â5:32), on through Noahâs three sons, Japheth, Shem, and Ham (Gen 10:1â32), then from Shem to Abram (Gen 11:10â29), and from Abram (now Abraham, see Gen 17:5) to Isaac and his two sons Esau and Jacob. Jacob later comes to be called Israel, father of the twelve sons from whom the twelve tribes take their names (see Gen 25:19â26; 32:28; 37:2â3; 49:1â28). The first eight chapters of 1 Chronicles consist of little else than versions of such genealogical records. Needless to say, such records do not exist merely for antiquarian interest but rather because they root the identity of the people for whom the text is intended in stories of their ancestors. Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob become the most prominent ancestors on whom the identity of the people of Israel is founded.5 Abraham in particular is appealed to as the progenitor of Israel, âthe rock from which [they] were cutâ (Isa 51:1â2).
Echoing the promise from Gen 17:5, Abraham is sometimes celebrated as a âfather of many nationsâ (e.g., Sir 44:19â21).6 Josephus draws genea logical connections between Abraham and various other peoples (e.g., A.J. 1.214, 221, 239, 241), and repeats the tradition that both Jews and Spartans are members of the ÎłÎÎœÎżÏ of Abraham (A.J. 12.225â27; see also 1 Macc 12:21: áŒÎș ÎłáœłÎœÎżÏ
Ï ÎÎČÏααΌ).7 This latter example in particular shows how such genealogical connectionsâeven when implausibleâcan be (strategically) invoked in order to forge alliances (1 Macc 12:1â7). But a more prominent kind of genealogical appeal is to Abraham as the originator of the Jewish ÎłÎÎœÎżÏ, which is specifically seen as the seed of Abraham (ÏÏáœłÏΌα ÎÎČÏααΌ, Isa 41:8; Pss. Sol. 9:9; 18:3).8 Josephus describes Abraham as âour fatherâ (ᜠÏαÏÎźÏ áŒĄÎŒáż¶Îœ) (A.J. 1.158). As Birgit van der Lans notes, appeals to the peopleâs Abrahamic descent are prominent in 4 Maccabees, which refers to them as âAbrahamâs childrenâ (ÎżáŒ± ÎÎČÏααΌ ÏαáżÎŽÎ”Ï) (6:17, 22; cf. 17:6) and, in a more developed formulation, as âIsraelite children, offspring of the seed of Abrahamâ (Ïáż¶Îœ ÎÎČÏαΌÎčαίÏÎœ ÏÏΔÏÎŒÎŹÏÏÎœ áŒÏÏÎłÎżÎœÎżÎč ÏαáżÎŽÎ”Ï ÎÏÏαηλáżÏαÎč) (18:1).9
One indication of the significance of such ancestral claims is found in cases where the conduct of the ancestors and their consequent rewards serves as a motivation for action deemed congruent with this inheritance (e.g., 1 Macc 2:51â61; 4 Macc 6:17â22; 14:20; 15:28; 18:1; this is a theme we shall examine in more depth in the following chapter). Ancestral traditions, and venerated burial places in particular, are also significant in territorial claims.10 Another indication of the significance of claims about ancestors is exemplified in Josephusâs Contra Apionem. The âextreme antiquityâ of the Jewish ÎłÎÎœÎżÏ (C. Ap. 1.1), which Josephus is concerned to establishâand which, he says, he has fully documented in the Antiquitiesâis, he argues, demonstrable due to the great care and accuracy with which the Jews keep their ancestral records and cherish their scriptures, compared with Greek and other historians (C. Ap. 1.1â46). Especially in the case of priests, strict regulations about whom a priest may marryâin order to keep the lineage âunmixed and pureâ (áŒÎŒÎčÎșÏÎżÎœ Îșα᜶ ÎșαΞαÏÏÎœ)âhave necessitated careful and accurate records, which cover âthe last two thousand yearsâ (C. Ap. 1.30â36). Here the Jewish claim to authentic and venerable peoplehood is made on the basis of claims about ancestral records, which purportedly demonstrate this identity as ÎłÎÎœÎżÏ.
Also significant are indications that ancestral identity can be changed or abandoned, for good or ill. Philo, with his focus on the importance of virtue, depicts ancestral identity as defined and, indeed, gained or lost through the practice of virtue. In De Virtutibus he remarks, on the one hand, on those among âthe founders of the [ Jewish] raceâ who did not profit from âthe virtues of their ancestorsâ (αጱ Ïáż¶Îœ ÏÏογÏÎœÏÎœ áŒÏΔÏαί) and, by failing to reproduce these virtues, were âdenied any part in the grandeur of their noble birth [ΔáœÎłÎ”ÎœÎ”ÎŻÎ±]â (Virt. 206â7). On the other hand, he depicts Abraham, the founder of the Jewish people, as leaving behind the vices of his ancestorsâindeed, leaving his race (ÎłÎ”ÎœÎ”ÎŹ) itselfâto attain true virtue (Virt. 211â216).11 Thus it seems that kinship and ancestry are definedâand changedâby conduct rather than blood (cf. Virt. 195; see further in ch. 5).
The New Testament, of course, begins in its canonical form with its own âbook of Genesisâ (ÎÎŻÎČÎ»ÎżÏ ÎłÎ”ÎœÎÏΔÏÏ) (Matt 1:1), which itself opens precisely with a lengthy genealogy (Matt 1:1â16) intended to recount the lineage of Jesus the Messiah, identified initially, and fundamentally, as both son of Abraham and son of David (Matt 1:1). Matthewâs genealogy is clearly stylized, with its three blocks of fourteen generations (Matt 1:17). It contains certain striking features: the tracing of Jesusâs lineage through Joseph, not Mary, despite the account of miraculous conception that follows (Matt 1:18â25); and the inclusion of four womenâTamar, Rahab, Ruth, and âthe wife of Uriahââwho fit somewhat uneasily into such a deliberately constructed Israelite lineage.12
Lukeâs genealogy of Jesus is significantly different, naming different lines of paternity, which are traced backward through time rather than forward, ending up with Adam, rather than Abraham, born âof Godâ (Luke 3:23â38). Again, the line is traced through Joseph, even though Luke signals that this was only what people âsupposedâ was Jesusâs paternal lineage (áœĄÏ áŒÎœÎżÎŒÎŻÎ¶Î”ÏÎż, Luke 3:23). This is significant insofar as it indicates that the setting out of Jesusâs ancestral lineage is deemed valuable, even if it does notâeven for the writerâpretend to convey his actual âblood-line.â Such a genealogy can, as it were, valuably insert him into a line of ancestors, giving him the identity of son of David, Jacob, Isaac, Abraham, Adam (among others), and ultimately God. Indeed, just as Jewish writers can connect Jewish ancestral claims to other peoples for strategic purposes, as we noted above, so a comparable (universalizing) move is made in Acts 17:28â29, which stresses the idea that all humanity is âGodâs offspringâ (ÎłÎÎœÎżÏ) as the basis of an appeal to accept the Christian message.
In polemical contexts, New Testament authors can also seek to undermine Jewish ancestral claims: John the Baptist is recorded as challenging his hearers not to rely on their status as Abrahamâs descendants since âGod is able from these stones to raise up children for Abrahamâ (Matt 3:9//Luke 3:8). The image of stones as descendants is an interesting one to which we shall return. In the notoriously polemical John 8, Jesus goes much further, denying the claims of the Ioudaioi to have Abraham, and indeed God, as their âfatherâ and insisting instead that their opposition to him reveals them to be children of the âdevilâ (ᜠΎÎčÎŹÎČολοÏ) (John 8:39â44). In turn, the Ioudaioi dispute Jesusâs identity as Ioudaios: âYou are a Samaritan and have a demonâ (John 8:48). From both sides, at least as presented in this dialogue, there is an attempt to deny and discredit the ancestry of the other.
In John, the identity of those who believe in Jesus is defined not in terms of being, or becoming, Abrahamâs descendants (cf. John 8:37) but rather in terms of being children of God. This is explicitly described as having come about by Godâs fatherly âsiringâ or begetting of these children (John 1:12â13, áŒÎș ΞΔοῊ áŒÎłÎ”ÎœÎœÎźÎžÎ·ÏαΜ). Indeed, referring to God as âthe Fatherâ (with Jesus as âthe Sonâ) is especially frequent in John, and the motif of new birth and of being born of God is a prominent Johannine theme (John 3:3â8; 1 John 2:29; 3:9; 4:7; 5:4, 18).13 Claiming Godâs paternity as a basis for the peopleâs identity is not often found in Hebrew Bible and Second Temple Jewish texts, as Katherine Girsch (now Katherine Marcar) has shown, though it is occasionally evident (e.g., Deut 32:18; less directly, Num 11:12; Isa 66:7â9) and seems to become somewhat more prominent in Jewish thought by the first century CE.14 Elsewhere in the New Testament, there is a brief allusion to the specific idea of rebirth, or regeneration, in Titus 3:5 (ÏαλÎčÎłÎłÎ”ÎœÎ”Ïία) and more prominently in 1 Peter, to which we shall shortly return.
Two particular motifs of ancestral descent thus seem especially significant in terms of the construction of early Christian identity in the New Testament: being Abrahamâs descendants and being Godâs offspring. In both cases, the language of âseedâ (ÏÏÎÏΌα) is usedâa point of interest to which we shall return. The former motif is prominent in Paulâs letters, while the second appears in 1 Peter. We shall consider each in turn, focusing on the particular examples of Gal 3 and 1 Pet 1â2.
In Gal 3, seeking to convince his recalcitrant Galatian gentile converts that membership of the righteous, Spirit-filled people comes not by works ...