If Jesus was the son of God then for Jesus to have a grandfather, wouldn't God need to have a Father?

Not just in the NIV, but in all translations of the Bible, and in the original Greek manuscripts, from which all translations are taken! As a genealogist, this does not cause a problem. Firstly, there is the possibility that some generations have been "telescoped" that is, minor characters skipped over, leaving "begat" to mean "became the ancestor of". Secondly, if you consider that I am descended from Charlemagne over 30 different ways (I gave up counting), then you can appreciate that if I draw up my family tree back to Charlemagne, I can go many different ways, some of which will overlap with others for several generations, and then diverge again, to converge closer to the 800 AD's. It is the same with the genealogy of Jesus. It is possible that both Mary and Joseph were descended from King David. It is definite that they were both descended from Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Because of the command to not marry outside of the Jewish faith, the nation of Israel was quite "inbred". Thus, you can follow many a line of Joseph's, but you know you are going to end up at Abraham eventually. Does that make sense? Thirdly, names were not as fixed as they are now. If you look at the Old and New Testaments, you will see that most people changed names or had alternate names by which they were known. Abraham was originally Abram, Benjamin was named Ben-Oni by his mother as he died. Jacob became Israel. Thus Heli and Jacob may be the same person. Fourthly, it is possible that the genealogy in Luke may be that of Mary. The Jews believed, and still do, that it is a wise man who knows his own father, and mothers' genealogies were often seen as more reliable than fathers'. It is important for us to realise that both these books were circulating in communities which knew Joseph and Mary, and there was never a problem with having two genealogies listed. They were obviously quite logical to the listeners of the time. So, does God have a dad? No. God is eternal and always existed. There was no one before Him. He is the beginning and the end. Does Jesus have a paternal grandfather? In human genealogical terms, yes. Despite the fact that we know he was not Joseph's biological son (and Luke acknowledges this by saying in Ch 3 v 23 "He was the son, so it was thought, of Joseph,". but God had to put His son into a human family, for Jesus to be the promised Saviour. His plan from the beginning was to create a nation, a lineage and ultimately a family for the Saviour. The nation was Israel, the lineage was that of David, the family that of Joseph. So, officially, the paternal grandfather of Jesus was Joseph's father, even though we know that Joseph was not Jesus' real father.

It's because Luke and Matthew made up the genealogies out of old legend and hearsay. After all the dozens of invasions and deportations, the records were not complete; if they had any records left at all.

This is simpler to explain than it's being made to seem. One is the geneology from Marys side and the other is from Josephs side.

Matther 1:6-16 and Luke 3:23-31 each gives the ancestors of Joseph the husband of Mary and Step father of Jesus. The first one starts from Abraham (verse 2) all the way down to Jesus. The second one from Jesus all the way back to Adam. The only common name to these two lists between David and Jesus is JOSEPH, Some wonder how this could be true. At least two authorities give as the preferable solution of this explanation... that Luke traces the natural linage of Jesus through his fleshly mother Mary and her ancestors, whild Matthew gives Jesus' legal linage, through Joseph and his ancestors. Starting with the oldest entry in each of the Genealogical accounts... the understanding above helps us to see why they part company after David. Matthew's account going through the line of David's son Solomon, while Luke's traces instead through David's son Nathan, and why, though they meet again briefly at Shealtiel and Zerubbable, they then branch off once more and pursue different lines. Matthew ends with Jacob as the father of Joseph and, according to this understanding, Luke ends with Heli, who was actually the father of Jesus' fleshly mother, Mary.---The Westminister Dictionary of the Bible (Revised Edition of 1944, page 198, column 1); McClintock and Strong's CyclopFdia (1882, Volume 111, page 773, column 2) Why, then, does Luke omit Mary and list Joseph as "the son of Heli" Says the Cyclopfdia above, page 773, column 2: "In constructing their genealogical tables, it is well known that the Jews reckoned wholly by males, rejecting where the blood of the grandfather passed to the grandson through a daughter, the name of the daughter herself, and counting that dauhter's husband for the son of the maternal grandfather even tho the geneology there was traced through Mary's linage. The Cyclopaedia sees in the very wording of Luke's account a conformation of this thought saying;, page 74, column1; "The evangecal Luke has critically distinguished the real from the legal geneology by a parenthetical remark: "Jesus being (as was reputed) the son of Joseph (but in reality) the son of Heli, or his grandson by his mothers side. Luke 3:23

No one knows. It is all speculation. Indeed, we can't even establish that Jesus literally existed. Even if we do assume His existence, the accounts contradict. It's left up to the best argument you can make.

Jesus paternal grandfather was Jacob. These two accounts purposely differ on lines of descent from David down to Jesus. - Matthew traces Christ's descent, on the side of his 'step-father' Joseph. This line of descent includes Solomon, through which the LEGAL right to the "throne of David" ran. - Luke traces the genealogy of Jesus from Heli, the father of Mary, the wife of Joseph. This line of descent establishes Jesus' NATURAL right to the Messiahship as a son of David. Hope this was helpful.

Different genealogies are given because Luke and Matthew made them up. No one knows who Jesus' paternal grandfather was because no one knows who his father was. I don't want to sound irreverent. I believe in God, and I read and love the Bible. I just believe the Bible is a human work. Some basic relevant points I was taught in university: - Luke and Matthew are signifiers for the authors of their respective gospels: meaning, they aren't the true authors, of whom we know pretty much nothing about - Luke and Matthew both wrote their gospels using Mark (and perhaps other texts) as source material, but they wrote them independently of each other - Luke and Matthew both had an agenda in writing their gospels, i.e. they wanted to present Jesus as they believed him to be, so they gave him the kind of life and characteristics that would do just that - their purpose in creating genealogies was to ground Jesus in the Jewish religious tradition and to assuage rumours of his illegitimate parentage ("You say he had no father? Of course he did, he's the messiah, so he must have a father because, as we all know, no messiah would be born a bastard! Anyway, his father is God! But on top of that, his father is Joseph ... a descendant of Abraham, the father of the Jews!")

You've received some very good and accurate answers to this question...I'm glad to see this because this is one of the so called "contradictions"contained in the Bible...It only seems like a contradiction to those who are not familiar with the whole story.

the DIRECT line was through Mary's family...She was the descendant of King David. However, in the Jewish system, Males took the lead in family matters, and a family was always identified by the male members of that family...Jacob and Heli were the two fathers of Joseph and Mary...They are regarded as equal.

Heli was the father of Mary. If Heli had no sons then when Mary married Joseph, Heli would "adopt" Joseph and the family line could continue. Thus Heli could be considered the father of Joseph in a legally binding but not necessarily physically accurate descriptive way.

8-18-2017 WHY FOUR GOSPELS? It concerns the Hebrew word 'tsemach', also spelled zemach, which means branch. The study is too long to post here, so it starts in the middle: Isaiah 4:2: "In that day shall the branch [tsemach] of the Lord be beautiful and glorious, and the fruit of the earth shall be excellent and comely for them that are escaped of Israel." Jeremiah 23:5: "Behold, the days come, saith the Lord, that I will raise unto David a righteous Branch [tsemach], and a king shall reign and prosper, and shall execute judgment and justice in the earth." Jeremiah 33:15: "In those days, and at that time, will I cause the Branch [tsemach] of righteousness to grow up unto David; and he shall execute judgment and righteousness in the land." Zechariah 3:8: "Hear now, O Joshua the high priest, thou, and thy fellows that sit before thee: for they are men wondered at: for behold, I will bring forth my servant the Branch [tsemach]." Zechariah 6:12: "And speak unto him, saying, Thus speaketh the Lord of hosts, saying, Behold the man whose name is The Branch [tsemach]; and he shall grow up out of his place, and he shall build the temple of the Lord:" Relax now, that is the last of the verses. Now we can put it all together. Now we can see the reason for four gospels: the savior was prophesied as a servant, a king, a man, and the son of God. There are five prophecies, but the reference to a king is repeated in Jeremiah, so there are four different aspects of his life to be documented. Each gospel treats one of these four aspects. Matthew is the story of a king. The genealogy in Matthew is the royal line, in ascending order because a king traces his ascent to the throne. It is in Matthew that we are told of wise men bringing gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh: the traditional gifts to a king. It is in Matthew that another king tries to murder the infant Jesus to protect his own status. It is in Matthew that Jesus declares most of the new, stricter interpretations of the law of Moses, acting on his kingly authority. In Matthew we see the pageantry of an angel rolling the stone away from the tomb and sitting upon it. The other gospels just say the tomb was open. Mark is the story of a servant. It begins, with only a slight preamble, where Jesus's ministry begins. Very little of what Jesus said is recorded, since a servant's opinions and pronouncements are important only insofar as they come from his master. His last words are not recorded, he just "cried with a loud voice." Mark is a short, terse record of where Jesus went and what he did. There is no genealogy because a servant has none. Luke is the story of a man. As such it has a man's genealogy, recorded in descending order because a man traces his descent from an ancestor. The genealogy in Luke is the legal line, beginning with "as was supposed", which is a legal term meaning "determined by law". The genealogy in Matthew is the kingly line, recorded in ascending order because a king traces his ascent to the throne. The genealogy in Luke says so-and-so "son of" so-and-so, and some of the names were in fact adopted sons. But in Matthew it says so-and-so "begat" so-and-so, a purely human genealogy. Mark has no genealogy because a servant has none. John has a very short genealogy: he is the son of God. His last words on the cross, "It is finished", recall his first recorded words, "Wist ye not that I must be about my father's business?"