Seder 104: Numbers 3:1---The Twelfth "Toledot Verse"

 Numbers 3 begins, "These are the generations of Aaron and Moses at the time that the LORD spoke with Moses on Mount Sinai."  

Numbers 3:1 has the same form as eleven verses in the book of Genesis that begin, "These are the generations of...;" or, in the case of Genesis 5:1, "This is the book of the generations of..."  All of these verses feature the Hebrew word toledot ("generations").  They focus the narrative on particular families.  Commentator Michael Morales observes, "By use of the toledot formula the Pentateuch's narrative builds a highway from Adam (as archetypal priest) to Aaron the high priest (as cultic Adam)..."

There is a thirteenth toledot verse in Ruth 4:18:  "Now these are the generations of Perez..."  The final paragraph of the book of Ruth traces the line of Judah (and of the Messiah) from Perez to David.  

In the Christian Bible there is a fourteenth toledot verse in Matthew 1:1, which has wording that echoes Genesis 5:1 in the LXX:  "The book of the genealogy of Jesus Christ..."  It's wonderful that this turns out to be the fourteenth one, given the importance of the number 14 in the genealogy of Matthew 1.  Rob Wilson of Church of the Messiah has often pointed out the significance of Matthew 1:1 as a toledot verse.

Seder 4 Sermon: Generations

Genesis 5 begins, "This is the book of the generations of Adam."  The book of Genesis is punctuated by a number of statements of this form.  (The next one appears in Gen 6:9.)  According to one theory, much of the book of Genesis may have originally consisted of a series of clay tablets, with these statements appearing as either the headers or footers for the tablets.  Sometimes these statements seem to be summarizing what has just been said; sometimes they seem to summarize what comes next; and sometimes both. 

In his sermon on Seder 4, Rob Wilson makes the important observation that the New Testament begins with a statement of the same form:  "The book of the genealogy of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham" (Matt 1:1).  In fact, the Greek words for "the book of the genealogy", biblos geneseos, are the same words used in the Septuagint translation of "book of the generations" in Gen 5:1.

As with the statements in the book of Genesis, we might view Matt 1:1 as both a summary of what has come before (the entirety of the Hebrew Scriptures) and a summary of the New Testament.  Both are, fundamentally, the story of Jesus the Messiah.

Rob also emphasizes that we are all part of this story (see Ps 139:16).

Matthew 1 gives one of two genealogies of Jesus recorded in the New Testament.  The other appears in Luke 3.  The two genealogies lead to Jesus' legal father Joseph by two different routes, and there are multiple ideas about how to explain the differences between them.

Rob pointed out that the two genealogies send two different messages.  The Matthew 1 genealogy focuses on Jesus as the Jewish Messiah, while the Luke 3 genealogy emphasizes Jesus as son of God and savior of all mankind.    Both are important messages.