And after the carrying away of Babylon, Jechonias begat Salathiel, and Salathiel begat Zorobabel,
One short verse carries David's royal line across the exile in Babylon. It runs that line straight through Jeconiah, a king God had cursed.
The first name in this verse belongs to a king the Old Testament calls by several other names.
He was the son and successor of Jehoiakim king of Judah… Jehoiachin went to Babylon as a captive and stayed in prison for thirty-six years. When Evil-merodach came to the throne, he freed him and raised him above the other captive kings. Jehoiachin ate at the king's table for the rest of his life. Scripture calls him JECONIAH in 1 Chronicles 3:16-17 and Esther 2:6… It also calls him CONIAH in Jeremiah 22:24, 28, and JECHONIAS in Matthew 1:11-12.
Commentators differ over exactly how verses 11 and 12 handle Jehoiakim: some read Jehoiakim as omitted from verse 11, while Gaebelein argues that "Jehoiakim is often called by the name of his son Jechoniah," so that "in the twelfth verse we have Jechoniah, the son of Jehoiakim."
Jeremiah had called this same king childless. This verse shows what that word did and did not mean.
"Childless" here does not mean he had no descendants. The prophecy itself mentions his offspring. It means he had "no direct lineal heir to the throne" (Fausset). Matthew 1:12 proves he had descendants ("Jechoniah was the father of Shealtiel"), and so does 1 Chronicles 3:17… Anyway, God made no mistake. He speaks, and it is done; He commands, and it stands fast. "And the word of our God will stand forever."
If none of Jeconiah's descendants could reign, naming him here looks like the end of the promise. One writer shows how the cursed line could still pass on a right it could not use.
The genealogy shows a ruin that is hopeless apart from God. It shows Joseph, the last of the line here before Christ, to be Jeconiah's son. And prophecy had spoken against Jeconiah (Jeremiah 22:30): as to the throne he would be "childless… for none of his offspring shall succeed in sitting on the throne of David." …so a curse strikes the direct line of descent, yet the line still keeps the legal title. It could therefore hand on to another what was of no use to itself. The marriage of Joseph and Mary was, in the wisdom of God, the means of accomplishing this. The Lord's birth from Mary made Him the real Son of David, while the marriage of His mother made Him David's legal heir.
That is also why "was the father of" in this verse does not always mean birth.
So Jechoniah was not the actual father of Salathiel. Matthew gives the succession, not the strict birth line. We must now look for the heir to David's throne in the line of another of David's sons. Luke 3:27 shows this: Salathiel's real father was Neri, a descendant of Nathan, son of David.
In Babylon the captives were losing even their Hebrew names.
As a matter of policy, the king of Babylon might change their Hebrew names to Babylonian ones. He did this with Daniel and his three friends. It would be natural for him to erase from their minds all memory of what they were, and all thought of their country and of God's temple. If so, Satan was just as much trying to drown God's line of kings in the common mass of Gentile names… Yet in that confusion, as they went to Babylon as captives, the Spirit of God connects the last real king of Judah — Josiah — with his descendant born in Babylon… In Matthew the promised Seed appears, the last of the line. He will have no successor, for He lives for ever.
The last name in this verse appears again in Haggai. There God takes up the same picture of a ring that He had used against Jeconiah.
Haggai 2:20-23 is another message from God. It looks again to the future, when all nations will be shaken. Then God will take the true seed of David and make Him like a signet ring. Haggai still calls this seed "Zerubbabel my servant," a picture of Christ as the prince of the house of David. Coniah, or Jeconiah, king of Judah, was faithless, and God pulled him off like a signet ring from His right hand (compare Jeremiah 22:24). Christ is the opposite: He is the signet on God's right hand, to seal all His purposes concerning the nations and His chosen people Israel.
- Curse. Jeremiah did not say Jeconiah would have no children. He said none of his offspring would ever sit on David's throne.
- Title. The cursed line kept the legal right it could never use, and so was able to hand it to another.
- Marriage. Joseph's marriage to Mary joined the two lines. Birth from Mary made Christ the real Son of David. The marriage made Him the legal heir.
- Preservation. Babylon could change names and carry off a nation, yet God kept the link from Josiah to a descendant born there.
- Signet. God tore the ring from His hand in Jeconiah. He puts it back on in Zerubbabel's greater Son, who seals God's purposes and will have no successor.
and Zorobabel begat Abiud, and Abiud begat Eliakim, and Eliakim begat Azor,
Matthew 1:13 belongs to the last stretch of the family list, the generations after Israel's exile in Babylon. Zerubbabel is the last great name in it, and the men after him — Abiud, Eliakim, Azor — are strangers to the Old Testament.
The list runs in three blocks of fourteen names, and this verse belongs to the last one. That structure is deliberate, and it explains why some links are missing.
In each of the three divisions of the Messiah's genealogy, the Spirit of God was pleased to give fourteen generations. They run from Abraham down to David, from David to the captivity, and from the captivity to Christ. So if a chain of generations in fact held more links than these fourteen, everything above that number had to drop out. Then, as we have just seen, the omission is not random, but made with special moral force.
Once the verse moves past Zerubbabel, the record goes quiet — and that silence is part of the point.
The third part has only one significant name in it, that of Zerubbabel. After him the line lapses into complete obscurity. All is ruined and hopeless, except for God. Then all at once, by a clear divine intervention, Jesus is born — a true resurrection.
Zerubbabel was more than a survivor of the exile. A prophecy ends with a promise made straight to him, and one writer sees that promise reaching past the man himself.
The prophecy concludes with a special promise to Zerubbabel, the royal prince of David's line. No doubt he is here a figure of Christ. The promise made to him will be fulfilled in the person of his greater Son, for "Zerubbabel was the father of … Joseph the husband of Mary, of whom Jesus was born, who is called Christ" (Matt. 1:13, 16).
Abiud, Eliakim and Azor have no story outside this list. Even the names in this stretch speak of exile and decay.
In the last fourteen generations, beginning with Zerubbabel, we find no more prominent names. The Old Testament records only two of them. Zerubbabel means "born in Babel," and his son Abiud means "perishing."
A reference work can say only where Abiud stands:
Son of Zerubbabel, in the genealogy of the Lord Jesus, Matt. 1:13: not mentioned in the Old Testament.
Readers who compare this verse with Luke's list find that the names do not match.
Both lists are the same from Abraham to David. Then they differ until they reach Shealtiel and Zerubbabel, whose names stand in both. After that they differ again. Luke's list is much fuller: it has forty-one names from David to Joseph, where Matthew has only twenty-six. Matthew leaves names out, and this fits the whole into the three divisions of "fourteen generations."
These verses trace a family losing everything visible.
A time comes when the ruin appears beyond repair, when in the struggle Satan's triumph seems certain. The kingdom sinks under waves of judgment. Yet, as we have seen in the genealogies, weak representatives of the royal line still live on — without titles, without privileges, without authority and without a kingdom. After them the line grows ever more obscure and low. It carries on in silence until we reach a poor carpenter who becomes the reputed father of the "woman's Seed." Christ is born!
Yet obscurity is not the same as worthlessness. One writer reads these unknown men as people who kept faith when there was nothing left to show for it.
Apart from Zerubbabel, the third fourteen appear to have been what we now call "nobodies" in the nation. Joseph, the husband of Mary, was, as we all know, a working carpenter. They had no reputation in the nation. Yet we are persuaded that Malachi 3:16-17 is a true description of these people: they lived in a day of small things and still did not throw away their confidence in the Lord God of Israel.
- Placed — The verse sits in the third block of fourteen generations, from the exile to Christ. The structure is deliberate, and so are the missing names.
- Emptied — After Zerubbabel the royal family holds no throne, no title and no kingdom. The line runs on in silence down to a village carpenter.
- Unknown — Abiud, Eliakim and Azor appear nowhere in the Old Testament. Almost none of this final group left a record.
- Kept — Obscurity did not mean God had let go: the promise made to Zerubbabel reached its fulfilment in his greater Son.
- Born — Apart from God the line looks ruined and hopeless. Then God steps in: Jesus is born, and the fallen line rises in Him.