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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.comKeil and Delitzsch Commentary - 1 Chronicles 2:9 - 2:9
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This Chapter Verse Commentaries:
The only name given here as that of a descendant of Ethan is Azariah, of whom nothing further is known, while the name recurs frequently. Nothing more is said of the remaining sons of Zerah; they are merely set down as famous men of antiquity (Berth.). There follows in
1 Chronicles 2:9-41
The family of Hezron, the first-born son of Pharez, which branches off in three lines, originating with his three sons respectively. The three sons of Hezron are Jerahmeel, and Ram, and Chelubai; but the families springing from them are enumerated in a different order. First (1Ch 2:10-17) we have the family of Ram, because King David is descended from him; then (1Ch 2:18-24) the family of Chelubai or Caleb, from whose lineage came the illustrious Bezaleel; and finally (vv. 25-41), the posterity of the first-born, Jerahmeel.
1Ch 2:9
לֹו נֹולַד אֲשֶׁר, what was born to him. The passive stands impersonally instead of the more definite active, “to whom one bore,” so that the following names are subordinated to it with אֵת. The third person singular Niph. occurs thus also in 1Ch 3:4 and 1Ch 26:6; the construction of Niph. with אֵת frequently (Gen 4:18; Gen 21:5, and elsewhere). Ram is called, in the genealogy in Mat 1:3-4, Aram; comp. רָם, Job 32:2, with אֲרָם, Gen 22:21. כְּלוּבַי is called afterwards כָּלֵב; cf. on 1Ch 2:18.
1Ch 2:10-15
The family of Ram (1Ch 2:10-12), traced down through six members of Jesse. - This genealogy is also to be found in Ruth. 1Ch 4:19-21; but only here is Nahshon made more prominent than the others, by the addition, “prince of the sons of Judah.” Nahshon was a prince of Judah at the exodus of the Israelites from Egypt (Num 1:7; Num 2:3; Num 7:12). Now between him, a contemporary of Moses, and Pharez, who at the immigration of Jacob into Egypt was about fifteen years old, lies a period of 430 years, during which the Israelites remained in Egypt. For that time only three names - Hezron, Ram, and Amminidab - are mentioned, from which it is clear that several links must have been passed over. So also, from Nahshon to David, for a period of over 400 years, four generations - Salma, Boaz, Obed, and Jesse - are too few; and consequently here also the less famous ancestors of David are omitted. שַׂלְמָא is called in Rth 4:20-21, שַׁלְמָה and שַׂלְמֹון. In 1Ch 2:13-15, seven sons and two daughters of Jesse, with those of their sons who became famous (1Ch 2:16, 1Ch 2:17), are enumerated. According to 1Sa 17:12, Jesse had eight sons. This account, which agrees with that in 1Sa 16:8-12, may be reconciled with the enumeration in our verse, on the supposition that one of the sons died without posterity. In 1Sa 16:6. and 1Ch 17:13, the names of the eldest three - Eliab, Abinadab, and Shammah - occur. Besides יִשַׁי, we meet with the form אִשַׁי (1Ch 2:13); and the name שַׁמָּה is only another form of שִׁמְעָה, which is found in 2Sa 13:3 and in 1Ch 20:7, and is repeated in 2Sa 13:32 and 2Sa 21:21 in the Kethibh (שׁמעי). The names of the other three sons here mentioned (1Ch 2:14 and 1Ch 2:15) are met with nowhere else.
1Ch 2:16-17
The sisters of David have become known through their heroic sons. Zeruiah is the mother of the heroes of the Davidic history, Abishai, Joab, and Asahel (cf. 1Sa 26:6; 2Sa 2:18; 2Sa 3:39; 2Sa 8:16, and elsewhere). Their father is nowhere mentioned, “because their more famous mother challenged the greater attention” (Berth.). Abigail was, according to 2Sa 17:25, the daughter of Nahash, a sister of Zeruiah, and so was only a half-sister of David, and was the mother of Amasa the captain of the host, so well known on account of his share in the conspiracy of Absalom; cf. 2Sa 17:25; 2Sa 19:14, and 2Sa 20:10. His father was Jether, or Jithra, the Ishmaelite, who in the Masoretic text of 2Sa 17:25 is called, through a copyist's, error, הַיִּשְׂרְאֵלִי instead of הַיִּשְׁמְעֵאלִי; see comm. on passage.
1Ch 2:18-24
The family of Caleb. - That כָּלֵב is merely a shortened form of כְּלוּבַי, or a form of that word resulting from the friction of constant use, is so clear from the context, that all exegetes recognise it. We have first (1Ch 2:18-20) a list of the descendants of Caleb by two wives, then descendants which the daughter of the Gileadite Machir bore to his father Hezron (1Ch 2:21-23), and finally the sons whom Hezron's wife bore him after his death (1Ch 2:24). The grouping of these descendants of Hezron with the family of Caleb can only be accounted for by supposing that they had, through circumstances unknown to us, come into a more intimate connection with the family of Caleb than with the families of his brothers Ram and Jerahmeel. In 1Ch 2:42-55 follow some other lists of descendants of Caleb, which will be more fully considered when we come to these verses. The first half of the 18th verse is obscure, and the text is probably corrupt. As the words stand at present, we must translate, “Caleb the son of Hezron begat with Azubah, a woman, and with Jerioth, and these are her (the one wife's) sons, Jesher,” etc. בָּנֶיהָ, filii ejus, suggests that only one wife of Caleb had been before mentioned; and, as appears from the “and Azubah died” of 1Ch 2:19, Azubah is certainly meant. The construction אֵת הֹולִיד, “he begat with,” is, it is true, unusual, but is analogous to חוֹלִיד מִן, 1Ch 8:9, and is explained by the fact that הֹולִיד may mean to cause to bear, to bring to bearing; cf. Isa 66:9 : therefore properly it is, “he brought Azubah to bearing.” The difficulty of the verse lies in the וְאֶת־יְרִיעֹות אִשָּׁה, for, according to the usual phraseology, we would have expected אִשְׁתֹּו instead of אִשָּׁה. But אִשָּׁה may be, under the circumstances, to some extent justified by the supposition that Azubah is called indefinitely “woman,” because Caleb had several wives. וְאֶת־וְרִיעֹות gives no suitable meaning. The explanation of Kimchi, “with Azubah a woman, and with Jerioth,” cannot be accepted, for only the sons of Azubah are hereafter mentioned; and the idea that the children of the other wives are not enumerated here because the list used by the chronicler was defective, is untenable: for after two wives had been named in the enumeration of the children of one of them, the mother must necessarily have been mentioned; and so, instead of בָּנֶיהָ, we should have had עֲזוּבָה בְּנֵי. Hiller and J. H. Michaelis take וְאֶת as explicative, “with Azubah a woman, viz., with Jerioth;” but this is manifestly only the product of exegetical embarrassment. The text is plainly at fault, and the easiest conjecture is to read, with the Peschito and the Vulgate, אֶת אִשְׁתֹּו instead of וְאֶת אִשָּׁה, “he begat with Azubah his wife, Jerioth (a daughter); and these are her sons.” In that case אִשָּׁה would be added to עֲזוּבָה, to guard against עֲזוּבָה being taken for acc. obj. The names of the sons of Azubah, or of her daughter Jerioth, do not occur elsewhere.
1Ch 2:19-20
When Azubah died, Caleb took Ephrath to wife, who bore him Hur. For אֶפְרָת we find in 1Ch 2:50 the lengthened feminine form אֶפְרָתָה; cf. also 1Ch 4:4. From Hur descended, by Uri, the famous Bezaleel, the skilful architect of the tabernacle (Exo 31:2; Exo 35:30).
1Ch 2:21-24
The descendants of Hezron numbered with the stock of Caleb: (a) those begotten by Hezron with the daughter of Machir, 1Ch 2:21-23; (b) those born to Hezron after his death, 1Ch 2:24.
1Ch 2:21-22
Afterwards (אַחַר), i.e., after the birth of the sons mentioned in 1Ch 2:9, whose mother is not mentioned, when he was sixty years old, Hezron took to wife the daughter of Machir the father of Gilead, who bore him Segub. Machir was the first-born of Manasseh (Gen 50:23; Num 26:29). But Machir is not called in 1Ch 2:21 and 1Ch 2:23 the father of Gilead because he was the originator of the Israelite population of Gilead, but אָב has here its proper signification. Machir begot a son of the name of Gilead (Num 26:29); and it is clear from the genealogy of the daughters of Zelophehad, communicated in Num 27:1, that this expression is to be understood in its literal sense. Machir is distinguished from other men of the same name (cf. 2Sa 9:4; 2Sa 17:27) by the addition, father of Gilead. Segub the son of Hezron and the daughter of Machir begat Jair. This Jair, belonging on his mother's side to the tribe of Manasseh, is set down in Num 32:40., Deu 3:14, as a descendant of Manasseh. After Moses' victory over Og king of Bashan, Jair's family conquered the district of Argob in Bashan, i.e., in the plain of Jaulan and Hauran; and to the conquered cities, when they were bestowed upon him for a possession by Moses, the name Havvoth-jair, i.e., Jair's-life, was given. Cf. Num 32:41 and Deu 3:14, where this name is explained. These are the twenty-three cities in the land of Gilead, i.e., Peräa.
1Ch 2:23
These cities named Jair's-life were taken away from the Jairites by Geshur and Aram, i.e., by the Arameans of Geshur and of other places. Geshur denotes the inhabitants of a district of Aram, or Syria, on the north-western frontier of Bashan, in the neighbourhood of Hermon, on the east side of the upper Jordan, which had still its own kings in the time of David (2Sa 3:3; 2Sa 13:37; 2Sa 14:23; 2Sa 15:8), but which had been assigned to the Manassites by Moses; cf. Jos 13:13. The following וגו אֶת־קְנָת must not be taken as an explanatory apposition to יָאִיר אֶת־חַוֹּת: “Jair's-life, Kenath and her daughters, sixty cities” (Berth.). For since מֵאִתָּם refers to the collective name Jair, Geshur and Aram could not take away from Jair sixty cities, for Jair only possessed twenty-three cities. But besides this, according to Num 32:42, Kenath with her daughters had been conquered by Nobah, who gave his own name to the conquered cities; and according to Deu 3:4, the kingdom of Og in Bashan had sixty fenced cities. But this kingdom was, according to Num 32:41, and Num 32:42, conquered by two families of Manasseh, by Jair and Nobah, and was divided between them; and as appears from our passage, twenty-three cities were bestowed upon Jair, and all the rest of the land, viz., Kenath with her daughters, fell to Nobah. These two domains together included sixty fenced cities, which in Deu 3:14 are called Jair's-life; while here, in our verse, only twenty-three cities are so called, and the remaining thirty-seven are comprehended under the name of Kenath had her daughters. WE must therefore either supply a w copul. before אֶת־קְנָת, or we must take אֶת־ק in the signification “with Kenath,” and refer עִיר שִׁשִּׁים to both Jair's-life and Kenath. Cf. herewith the discussion on Deu 3:12-14; and for Kenath, the ruins of which still exist under the name Kanuat on the western slope of the Jebel Hauran, see the remarks on Num 32:42. The time when these cities were taken away by the Arameans is not known. From Jdg 10:4 we only learn that the Jair who was judge at a later time again had possession of thirty of these cities, and renewed the name Jair's-life. כָּל־אֵלֶּה is not all these sixty cities, but the before-mentioned descendants of Hezron, who are called sons, that is offspring, of Machir, because they were begotten with the daughter of Machir. Only two names, it is true, Segub and Jair, are enumerated; but from these two issue the numerous families which took Jair's-life. To these, therefore, must we refer the כָּל־אֵלֶּה.
1Ch 2:24
After the death of Hezron there was born to him by his wife Abiah (the third wife, cf. 1Ch 2:9 and 1Ch 2:21) another son, Ashur, the father of Tekoa, whose descendants are enumerated in 1Ch 4:5-7. Hezron's death took place אֶפְרָתָה בְּכָלֵב, “in Caleb Ephrathah.” This expression is obscure. According to 1Sa 30:14, a part of the Negeb (south country) of Judah was called Negeb Caleb, as it belonged to the family of Caleb. According to this analogy, the town or village in which Caleb dwelt with his wife Ephrath may have been called Caleb of Ephrathah, if Ephrath had brought this place as a dower to Caleb, as in the case mentioned in Jos 15:18. Ephrathah, or Ephrath, was the ancient name of Bethlehem (Gen 33:19; Gen 48:1), and with it the name of Caleb's wife Ephrath (1Ch 2:19) is unquestionably connected; probably she was so called after her birthplace. If this supposition be well founded, then Caleb of Ephrathah would be the little town of Bethlehem. Ashur is called father (אֲבִי) of Tekoa, i.e., lord and prince, as the chief of the inhabitants of Tekoa, now Tekua, two hours south of Bethlehem (vide on Jos 15:59).
1 Chronicles 2:25-41
The family of Jerahmeel, the first-born of Hezron, which inhabited a part of the Negeb of Judah called after him the south of the Jerahmeelites (1Sa 27:10; 1Sa 30:29).
1Ch 2:25
Four sons were born to Jerahmeel by his first wife. Five names indeed follow; but as the last, אֲחיָּה, although met with elsewhere as a man's name, is not ranged with the others by ו copul., as those that precede are with each other, it appears to be the name of a woman, and probably a מ has fallen out after the immediately preceding ם. So Cler., J. H. Mich., Berth. This conjecture gains in probability from the mention in 1Ch 2:26 of another wife, whence we might expect that in 1Ch 2:25 the first wife would be named.
1Ch 2:26-27
Only one son of the second wife is given, Onam, whose posterity follows in 1Ch 2:28-33; for in 1Ch 2:27 the three sons of Ram, the first-born of Jerahmeel, are enumerated.
1Ch 2:28
Onam had two sons, Shammai and Jada; the second of these, again, two sons, Nadab and Abishur.
1Ch 2:29-31
To Abishur his wife Abihail bore likewise two sons, with whom his race terminates. - In 1Ch 2:30, 1Ch 2:31, Nadab's posterity follow, in four members, ending with Ahlai, in the fourth generation. But Ahlai cannot well have been a son, but must have been a daughter, the heiress of Sheshan; for, according to 1Ch 2:34, Sheshen had no sons, but only daughters, and gave his daughter to an Egyptian slave whom he possessed, to wife, by whom she became the mother of a numerous posterity. The שֵׁשָׁן בְּנֵי is not irreconcilable with this, for בְּנֵי denotes in genealogies only descendants in general, and has been here correctly so explained by Hiller in Onomast. p. 736: quicquid habuit liberorum, sive nepotum, sustulit ex unica filia Achlai.
1Ch 2:32-41
The descendants of Jada, the brother of Shammai, in two generations, after which this genealogy closes with the subscription, “these were the sons of Jerahmeel.”
(Note: Bertheau reckons up to “the concluding subscription in 1Ch 2:33” the following descendants of Judah: “Judah's sons = 5; Hezron and Hamul = 2; Zerah's sons = 5; Karmi, Akar, and Azariah = 3; Ram and his descendants (including the two daughters of Jesse, and Jeter the father of Amasa) = 21; Kaleb and his descendants = 10; Jerahmeel and his descendants = 24: together = 70.” But this number also is obtained only by taking into account the father and mother of Amasa as two persons, contrary to the rule according to which only the father, without the mother, is to be counted, or, in case the mother be more famous than the father, or be an heiress, only the mother.)
- In 1Ch 2:34-41 there follows the family of Sheshan, which was originated by the marriage of his daughter with his Egyptian slave, and which is continued through thirteen generations. The name of this daughter is in 1Ch 2:25. not mentioned, but she is without doubt the Ahlai mentioned in 1Ch 2:31. But since this Ahlai is the tenth in descent from Judah through Pharez, she was probably born in Egypt; and the Egyptian slave Jarha was most likely a slave whom Sheshan had in Egypt, and whom he adopted as his son for the propagation of his race, by giving him his daughter and heir to wife. If this be the case, the race begotten by Jarha with the daughter of Sheshan is traced down till towards the end of the period of the judges. The Egyptian slave Jarha is not elsewhere met with; and though the names which his posterity bore are found again in various parts of the Old Testament, of none of them can it be proved that they belonged to men of this family, so as to show that one of these person shad become famous in history.