Anf-02 ii.iii.vi Pg 3.1
Npnf-201 iii.vi.vii Pg 57
The law to which Eusebius refers is recorded in Num. xxxvi. 6, 7. But the prohibition given there was not an absolute and universal one, but a prohibition which concerned only heiresses, who were not to marry out of their own tribe upon penalty of forfeiting their inheritance (cf. Josephus, Ant. IV. 7. 5). It is an instance of the limited nature of the law that Mary and Elizabeth were relatives, although Joseph and Mary belonged to the tribe of Judah, and Zacharias, at least, was a Levite. This example lay so near at hand that Eusebius should not have overlooked it in making his assertion. His argument, therefore in proof of the fact that Mary belonged to the tribe of Judah has no force, but the fact itself is abundantly established both by the unanimous tradition of antiquity (independent of Luke’s genealogy, which was universally supposed to be that of Joseph), and by such passages as Ps. cxxxii. 11, Acts ii. 30, xiii. 23, Rom. i. 3.
For the command is to marry one of the same family142 142 δήμου.
and lineage,143 143 πατριᾶς
so that the inheritance may not pass from tribe to tribe. This may suffice here.
