2. ' A/3gaa/A, Abraham} St Matthew, in enumerating our Lord's ancestors, adopts the order of descent (though he employs that of ascent in ver. 1), and begins also from Abraham, instead of Adam, not however to the exclusion of the Gentiles (cf. xxviii. 19), since in Abraham all nations are made blessed. — »&} rovg adsXpou; aurou, and his brethren) These words are not added in the case of Abraham, Isaac, or Jacob, though they also had brethren, but only in that of Judah : for the promises were restricted to the family of Israel.
3. nai TOV Zap&, and Zara) the twin-brother of Pharez. — IK rqs Qa.fj.ap, of Thamar) St Matthew, in the course of his genea logy, makes mention of women who were joined to the race of Abraham by any peculiar circumstance. Thamar ought to have become the wife of Shelah (see Gen. xxxviii. 11, 26), and Judah became by her the father of Pharez and Zara : Rahab, though a Canaanitess, became the wife of Salmon : Ruth was a Moabitess, yet Boaz married her. The wife of Uriah became the wife of David.
4. Naatftfwi/, Naasson) Contemporary with Moses. The silence regarding Moses preserved throughout this pedigree is re markable.
5. TOV Boo£ ex. r%g 'Pa^djS, Boaz of Rahab} Some think that the immediate ancestors of Boaz have been passed over ; but it stands thus also in Ruth iv. 21 : nor can the first Fourteen, the standard of the two others, admit of an hiatus. More correct is their opinion, who maintain that, in such a length of time, some of the ancestors mentioned lived to a great age. The definite article, r?j£, placed before the proper name 'Pa^a/3, shows that Rahab of Jericho is here meant ; nor does the orthography of the word 'Pa^a/3 interfere with this hypothesis : for both *Paa/3 (Raab or Rahab) and 'Pa^djS (Rachab) are written for 2m. See Hiller's1 Onomasticon Sacrum, p. 695. The Rahab of Jericho was very young when she hid the spies (Josh. vi. 23) : she outlived, however, Joshua and the elders (Ibid. xxiv. 29, 30) ; and her marriage with Salmon must have taken place still later, as it is not mentioned in that book, though
1 Matthew Hiller, a Lutheran divine and learned Orientalist, born at Stuttgard, 1646. Successively Professor at various universities with great reputation. Died 1725.— (I. B.)