But the Rahab who
Matthew famously mentions in the genealogy of
Jesus, as the mother of
Boaz of
Bethlehem(
MATTHEW 1:5) is spelled Ραχαβ: Rachab. Most commentators will report that the Rahab in
Christ's family line is the converted Rahab the prostitute of Jericho, but that is by no means certain because Matthew uses the other version of the name Rahab (what we call Rahab II: רהב). In English these names sound the same but in Hebrew and Greek they're as different as Johnny and Ronnie.
And if Rahab of Jericho had married someone important, such as
Salmon, the great-grandfather of king
David(Ruth 4:20), we would have surely heard about it at some point in the fifteen hundred years or so between Rahab of Jericho and Matthew. In
HEBREWS 11:31 Paul says that Rahab's
faith kept her from perishing along with the rest of the disobedient townsfolk. If her survival would have given her the opportunity to become the ancestor of Jesus Christ, Paul would have likely made a note of that too. It seems that Matthew isn't talking about Rahab of Jericho but of an other, to us unknown Rahab..."