Fathers in the Bible: Some failings

There are a lot of fathers mentioned in the Bible. About all we know about a lot of them is, in the words of the King James Version, that "so and so begat such and such." Which means, of course, that so and so was a sperm contributor. The Bible doesn't usually tell us much else about how good, or how bad, such fathers were.

We know more about some fathers, and their failings. Here's a quick list.

Isaac and Jacob both had favorite sons. This, of course, is not a way to make the non-favored offspring happy. The result was a split family, in each case.

Eli, Samuel, and David didn't discipline their children very well. There were bad consequences, in each case, including some deaths in at the case of Eli's and David's families, and maybe Samuel's.

Omri was a bad man who set a bad example. Two of his children, Athaliah and Ahab, followed him. Athaliah ordered her own grandchildren killed, so that she could be ruler. Ahab let his wife, Jezebel, lead him around, and did, or allowed her to do, some very wicked things. The whole family worshiped abominable idols, although Ahab at least acknowledged God.

Zachariah doubted that God would use his son, John the Baptist, as God told him that he would.

*   *   *   *   *

On the other hand, perhaps the Bible is like today's local TV news. Good things are seldom reported! We are not told much about Joshua's father, Nun, David's father, Jesse, or Samuel's father, Elkanah, Moses's father, Amram, or Zebedee, the father of James and John. There's nothing, or next to nothing, about the fathers of Deborah, Job, Jeremiah, Daniel, Ezekiel, Martha, Mary and Lazarus, Dorcas, Ruth or Rahab. We are told little about Joseph, the stepfather of Jesus. But it's a good guess that at least some of these men did a good job, judging by their offspring. But I'm not sure that is true. Children can be better (or worse) than their parents. The only father I can think of, where there is some description of the good example they set, is Mordecai, Esther's stepfather, or adoptive father.

If fatherhood has ever been easy -- which is very doubtful -- it isn't easy  now. God, help the fathers of today to avoid the flaws of the fathers discussed in the first part of this post, and to emulate good fathers, like Mordecai, and, probably, Jesse, Amram, Zebedee and millions of other unsung fathers, in the Bible and later, who have never run for office, been CEO of a big company, or written a book, but whose legacy is good children.

Thanks for reading. I'm thankful for a good father. I'm thankful for children who have made me look good.

Foster fatherhood -- and stepfatherhood

I don't believe that I had a foster father or a stepfather, although there is, I suppose, such a possibility. I share some characteristics with my father, and I never heard anything to suggest that he wasn't my "real," (meaning biological) father.

The Free Dictionary has this for its first entry for "father:"
1. A man who begets or raises or nurtures a child.

So, to the dictionary, a father is not only a biological father, but, possibly, a stepfather or foster father who has helped to raise or nurture a child, or, perhaps, even done it himself, with little or no help.

As far as I am aware, there is only one example of foster father- or stepfatherhood in the Bible, but it is a very important one, namely Joseph, Mary's husband, and the earthly father of Jesus.

Joseph did a remarkable thing. He married Mary, even though he knew she was pregnant, and he also knew that he wasn't the biological father of the baby she would bear. (See Matthew 1, which describes the manner in which Joseph discovered this fact.) As the Wikipedia puts it, Joseph is not mentioned much in the gospels, "in which he never speaks." Mary speaks, Jesus speaks to his parents, Joseph is given visions, but the Wikipedia is correct -- he never speaks. We have to infer his reaction.

God entrusted Joseph with important aspects of the care of His own Son. Matthew 2 tells us that it was Joseph, not Mary, who was divinely warned to flee to Egypt, and was told to return from Egypt.

Joseph is a great example of an apparently humble man, who did what he needed to do for his foster son, even, apparently, not telling others that Jesus wasn't his son. (Luke 3:23)

In this day and time, a lot of stepfathers, and foster fathers, have stepped up, as it were. They are doing a good, humble, patient job of raising and nurturing daughters and sons that aren't their biological offspring. God bless them, and help them.

Sunspots: A Google search for the words wicked stepmother returns about 169,000 web pages. A similar search for the words wicked stepfather returns less than 92,000. I can't think of a single fairy tale that has a wicked stepfather as a character, but there are several with wicked stepmothers. Why? I don't really know.

I work a little with elementary school children. I ran into a case in which a boy, about 10 years of age, was downright obsessive about his biological father. He told me that his stepfather was a good father, good to him. From what I could gather, his biological father was not -- he had not contacted the boy for months, including at Christmas and his birthday. Yet he was somehow longing for his "real" father, almost all the time. God help him, and others like him, and help fathers (and mothers) to be better at carrying out their responsibilities.

The Wikipedia article on Joseph says that the word τεκτων (Anglicized as tekton, which is probably related to the modern technician.) is used to describe his occupation. (Matthew 13:55). This word, it says, "cannot be translated narrowly; it evokes an artisan with wood in general, or an artisan in iron or stone." That same word is used to describe Jesus, Himself, in Mark 6:3.

Thanks for reading. If any fathers read this, be a good father, God helping you (and me). If any children of stepfathers or foster fathers read this, be sure to let them know how much you appreciate them.

2 comments:

Keetha Broyles said...

Greg was the inventor of our improvised grill and he said to tell you it was amazing - - - we were just sitting around and that grill evolved all by itself!!!

;-)

June 15, 2009

Martin LaBar said...

No intelligent design?

Note: This post got published, by mistake, on June 15th. I deleted it, and re-published, including a comment, and my response, this time, I hope, on the 21st, Father's Day.