Peresh

The Greek repeats the verb ἐγέννησεν ("begot, fathered") in every clause; for oral reading the English carries it forward from the previous verse and states it only once per generation, giving the list a steady, chantable rhythm. "Was the father of" renders a verb that in this genealogy simply marks descent, not necessarily immediate paternity. The names appear here in their familiar Hebrew Scripture forms (Perez, Zerah, Hezron, Ram) rather than transliterations of Matthew's Greek spellings (Phares, Zara, Esrom, Aram), so that the hearer recognizes the figures from earlier narratives. The phrase ἐκ τῆς Θαμάρ is rendered "by Tamar"; alternatives are "whose mother was Tamar" or "from Tamar."

The Greek preposition ἐκ with the genitive ("out of, from") is the standard way of naming the mother in a birth notice, so ἐκ τῆς Θαμάρ marks maternal origin. The definite article before her name is normal Greek usage with proper names and carries no special emphasis in English. The Hebrew names behind the Greek forms carry meanings tied to the birth story: Perez suggests "a breaking out, a breach," and Zerah is linked to "brightness" or "scarlet dawn" — echoing the scarlet thread tied to the hand that emerged first.

Tamar was the daughter-in-law of Judah; when denied her right to a levirate marriage after being widowed, she disguised herself and secured offspring from Judah himself, and Judah declared her more in the right than he was. Perez and Zerah were the twins born from that encounter. Genealogies of this era normally listed fathers only, so the naming of a mother is deliberate. The line through Perez became the leading clan of Judah, and the intervening generations to Hezron and Ram are compressed from tribal records.

Tamar is the first of four women named in this genealogy, all of them associated with irregular or outsider circumstances. Their presence signals from the outset that the lineage of the Messiah runs through human failure, scandal, and unexpected grace rather than through unblemished pedigree — a theme this Gospel develops in its portrayal of whom God welcomes. Naming the non-elect twin Zerah alongside Perez also preserves the memory that God's choice within a family is his own to make.

The manuscript tradition is stable here, with only minor spelling variation in the transliterated names (for example Ζάρα/Ζάρε, Ἐσρώμ/Ἑσρώμ). At the name Ram, the parallel genealogy in another Gospel shows a more complicated tradition, where some witnesses insert additional names between Hezron and Amminadab; Matthew's shorter form follows the list preserved in the Hebrew Scriptures.