The Importance of a Father's Name

What's the big deal about a name? Should that detail be important to me?

Some details escape me. For some reason I decide a detail isn't important when in actuality it holds a key to understanding something more. I have always had a hard time reading through the list of names given in the old and new testaments. But over time I have come to realize they are there for a reason.

Have you ever read the family trees quoted in Matthew 1 and Luke 3? Did you ever notice one is different from the other?

One is the tree for Mary and the other is for Joseph.

I always wondered why it was important for the writers to have those in the gospels. According to In The Footsteps of Jesus, by W.E. Pax, it was the father's lineage not the mother's that determined a child's lineage. In fact, even if there wasn't a biological link, the legal father gave the child his ancestry, his name, his legacy.

Lineage and ancestors were a key part of life in those days. Those names were not picked out of a hat. They were important. Those names established the right for Jesus to claim to be the Root of David, the Son of David, the Son of Man, the Lion of Judah. The list goes on.

It was for the skeptics of the day that the names were listed. Similar, you could say, to the credentials listed after someone's name, or a bio given before a speaker takes the platform.

So, is that detail important? I say yes. It confirms the fulfillment of multiple prophecies regarding the Messiah.