What race was Jesus?
Ordinary people asked about Jesus' background from the start, and Scripture answers with names, a tribe, and a family tree rather than with a modern category. The Bible gives Him a definite human descent — Jewish, of Judah, of David — while also tracing Him back to the first man, which raises the question of how one nation and the whole human family both belong to His story.
Born a Jew, of Israel
The New Testament states plainly which people He came from. Writing about Israel's privileges, Paul crowns the list with the descent of Christ, and one commentator sets the two key texts side by side:
Michael HardtChrist was — as He Himself said — the salvation "from the Jews" (John 4:22). He was the Son of David, the Son of Abraham (Matt. 1:1). As far as His natural descent through Mary is concerned, He had come out of Israel (Rom. 9:5).
When the woman at the well raised the rival claims of Samaria and Jerusalem, Jesus did not treat the two as equal:
William KellyIn verse 22 the Lord makes it impossible for the Samaritan to conclude that, if Christian worship was about to be the only worship acceptable to God, independent of place or race, then Samaritan worship had been just as good as Jewish. Not so. The Samaritans worshipped what they did not know; the Jews knew what they worshipped, "for salvation," as He added, "is from the Jews."
The tribe of Judah and the line of David
Within Israel His descent is narrower still. Jacob's blessing on his sons pointed to one family:
Morrish Bible DictionaryWhen Jacob blessed his sons, the predictions show that the royal line was centred in Judah. The sceptre should not depart from Judah, nor a lawgiver from between his feet, until Shiloh came. From Judah sprang David and a long line of kings. Christ, as born of the tribe of Judah, is called "the Lion of the tribe of Judah" (Rev. 5:5).
That tribe carried a practical limit. Israel's priests came from Levi, not Judah, so His earthly life could not be a priestly one:
Morrish Bible DictionaryThe Lord was not, and could not be, a priest on earth, for He was not of the order of Aaron (Heb. 7:14; Heb. 8:4); but on the cross He offered Himself to God.
Outsiders inside the family tree
Matthew's list of ancestors is not racially tidy. Only four women appear in it, and commentators note who they were:
J. A. TrenchThere are four women, and only four, mentioned as ancestors of the Son of David according to the flesh. None of these names could be placed there on any principle except grace: Tamar, Rahab, Ruth the Moabitess, and "the wife of Uriah." What a sign that Emmanuel could not limit the outgoings of His heart to the respectable in Israel, or even to those who belonged to Israel!
Ruth's case shows how such a person entered the line at all:
J. G. BellettThough she was the daughter of an unclean and rejected people, she is given a place equal to the greatest mothers in Israel. Like Rahab before her, the Hope of the nation comes through her, according to the flesh (Matt. 1:5). She had no natural kinship with Israel; but through grace she is grafted into Israel.
Traced back to Adam
Matthew runs the line downward from Abraham and David; Luke runs it the other way and does not stop at Israel:
William KellyLuke was writing to Gentiles, who could not be expected to be equally interested in His messianic relations. But once they had learned something of who Jesus was, it would be very interesting to see what His lineage as man was, and to trace Him up to Adam, the father of the whole human family. What could be more fitting than to link Him with the head of the race, if the object was to show the grace that would go out to all mankind?
The same one-family thought is stated directly when Paul preaches to Greeks: God "made of one blood all nations of men" (Acts 17:26) — a text one writer applies to the unity of mankind that human wickedness cannot undo.
A J PollockAnd even in spite of nationalities today, the oneness of mankind as seen in creation, which man's wickedness cannot destroy, is declared in Scripture.
What it means for those who believe
His Jewish descent does not create a racial hierarchy among Christians. Commenting on Colossians 3:11, one writer draws out how far the levelling goes:
Norman AndersonIn the new man there are no racial distinctions at all (Greek or Jew), no religious distinctions (circumcised or uncircumcised), no social distinctions (barbarian or Scythian) and no secular distinctions (slave or free). What stands out about the new man is his blessed character, and the blessed fact that to the new man Christ is the entire absorbing object — Christ is everything and in all.
Summary
- Jewish. By birth He belonged to Israel: Son of David, Son of Abraham, and He Himself said salvation is from the Jews.
- Judah. Within Israel He came of the royal tribe, which is why Scripture calls Him the Lion of the tribe of Judah — and why He was no priest on earth.
- Grace. His recorded ancestry already reached past Israel: Rahab and Ruth were outsiders brought in, so no one can claim the line on merit or blood.
- Adam. Luke traces Him up to the first man, linking Him with the whole human family, not one nation only.
- Christ. For those who believe, race, religion, and rank no longer mark them out; Christ is all, and in all.