1 Chronicles 2:42

Now the sons of Caleb the brother of Jerahmeel were, Mesha his firstborn, which was the father of Ziph; and the sons of Mareshah the father of Hebron.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(42-55) These verses revert to the Calebite stocks. Interpreted as merely bearing upon the extraction of individuals about whom, for the most part, nothing whatever is known beyond what these brief notices reveal, the section presents great difficulties. The key to it appears to be the assumption that it is an ancient record of the relations between certain great branches of the tribe of Judah, and their various settlements; in other words, these lists are tribal and topographical, rather than genealogical.

I.—1Chronicles 2:42-45 : Caleb brother of Jerahmeel = Caleb son of Hezron (1Chronicles 2:18) = Chelubai (1Chronicles 2:9).

(42) Mesha.—The name of a king of Moab (2Kings 3:4), whose monument of victory, the famous Moabite stone, was found in 1868 at Dibou. Here the name is probably that of a principal Calebite clan, settled at Ziph, near Hebron (Joshua 15:54-55; 1Samuel 23:14).

Father of Ziph.—Comp. 1Chronicles 2:21, “father of Gilead,” and 24.

And the sons of Mareshah the father of Hebron.—The statement of the verse is, “the sons of Mareshah were sons of Caleb,” that is, the Mareshathites, or people of Mareshah (Joshua 15:44), a town in the Shephelah, were a Calebite clan. This branch of Caleb is called “father of Hebron,” because it had the chief part in colonising that old Canaanite city.

(43) Korah.—Elsewhere the name of a subdivision of the Kohathite Levites; in 1Chronicles 1:35 it was a tribe of Edomites. In this place, therefore, it may be a clan of Hebronites.

Tappuah.—A town in the Shephelah (Joshua 15:34; Joshua 16:8).

Rekem.—A Benjamite city (Joshua 18:27); in 1Chronicles 7:16, a Machirite chieftain or clan.

Shema.—Occurs several times in the chronicle. In 1Chronicles 5:8; 1Chronicles 8:13 it appears to be the name of a clan; in 1Chronicles 11:44 and Nehemiah 8:4 a person is meant.

(44) Jorkoam.—Occurs nowhere else in the Old Testament. The LXX. (Alex.) has Ἰεκλάν, Jeklan. Probably, therefore, the correct reading is Jokdeam. (For the change of Hebrew d to Greek l see 1Kings 5:11, where Hebrew Darda is represented by Δαραλά.) Jokdeam was a town in the hill-country of Judah (Joshua 15:56). The chief or clan Raham is here called its father or founder.

Rekem.—The LXX. (Alex.) again has Jeklan (Jokdeam), which is as likely to be right as Rekem.

Shammai.—See 1Chronicles 2:28.

(45) Maon . . . Beth-zur.—Towns in the hill-country of Judah (Joshua 15:55; Joshua 15:58). Maon, now Main, south of Hebron. Beth-zur (2Chronicles 11:7), now Beit-sûr. In Judges 10:12 Midianites, not Maonites, is the better reading.

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

2:1-55 Genealogies. - We are now come to the register of the children of Israel, that distinguished people, who were to dwell alone, and not be reckoned among the nations. But now, in Christ, all are welcome to his salvation who come to him; all have equal privileges according to their faith in him, their love and devotedness to him. All that is truly valuable consists in the favour, peace, and image of God, and a life spent to his glory, in promoting the welfare of our fellow-creatures.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

A third line of descent from Caleb, the son of Hezron, the issue probably of a different mother, perhaps Jerioth 1 Chronicles 2:18. The supposed omissions in this verse have been supplied as follows:

(1) "Mesha, the father of Ziph; and the sons of Ziph, Mareshah, the father of Hebron;" or

(2) "Mareshah, the father of Ziph; and the sons of Mareshah, the father of Ziph, Hebron."

Ziph, like Jorkoam 1 Chronicles 2:44 and Beth-zur 1 Chronicles 2:45, is the name of a place where the respective chiefs ("fathers") settled. Similarly Madmannah, Machbenah, and Gibea 1 Chronicles 2:49, Kirjath-jearim (Joshua 9:17 note), Bethlehem and Beth-gader (Jedur, 1 Chronicles 2:51) are unmistakeable names of places in the list, names which it is not probable were ever borne by persons.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

42. the sons of Caleb—(compare 1Ch 2:18, 25). The sons here noticed were the fruit of his union with a third wife.

Matthew Poole's Commentary

The sons of Caleb, to wit, of that Caleb mentioned 1 Chronicles 2:18, as appears by comparing that verse with 1 Chronicles 2:21. And these are his sons by another and his third wife. See Poole "1 Chronicles 2:18".

Ziph; the name either of a man, or of a place, of which see Joshua 15:24,55; and then father is to be understood here, as 1 Chronicles 2:23,24.

The father of Hebron; not the place so called, but a man, as is evident, because his sons here follow.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

Now the sons of Caleb the brother of Jerahmeel,.... Called Chelubai, 1 Chronicles 2:9 and is the same Caleb spoken of in 1 Chronicles 2:18 and his sons next reckoned were by a third wife, Azubah, Ephrath being dead, 1 Chronicles 2:19 and these sons were

Mesha his firstborn, which was the father of Ziph; who gave name to the city of Ziph; there were two of this name in the tribe of Judah, Joshua 15:24 or this is the title of Mesha, governor of the city of Ziph; so the Targum calls him, prince of the Ziphites:

and the sons of Mareshah the father of Hebron; according to Kimchi and Ben Melech, the words are to be supplied thus, "and the sons of Ziph were Mareshah the father of Hebron"; which, though sometimes the name of a city in the tribe of Judah, is here the name of a man, from whom, perhaps, the city had its name, since Hebron is said to have sons in the next verse; Jarchi makes Mesha to be the prince of Ziph, and prince of the children of Mareshah, and prince of Hebron.

Geneva Study Bible

Now the sons of Caleb the brother of Jerahmeel were, Mesha his firstborn, which was the {l} father of Ziph; and the sons of Mareshah the father of Hebron.

(l) That is, the chief governor or prince of the Ziphims, because the prince should have a fatherly care and affection for his people.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

42–49. The Descendants of Caleb

42. Caleb the brother of Jerahmeel] Called Chelubai (1 Chronicles 2:9) and Caleb the son of Hezron (1 Chronicles 2:18). There is nothing to shew what relationship existed between this Caleb and Caleb son of Jephunneh (1 Chronicles 4:15 and Numbers 13:6). Perhaps they are to be identified; cp. 1 Chronicles 2:49, note. Both are assigned to the tribe of Judah.

Several of the names, viz. Ziph (Joshua 15:24 or 55), Mareshah (2 Chronicles 11:8), Hebron, Tappuah (Joshua 15:34), Maon (Joshua 15:55), and Beth-zur (Joshua 15:58) are names of towns in the S. or S.W. of Judah, and consequently may represent here the respective populations of those towns, and not individual descendants of Caleb.

Mesha] The Moabite king whose deeds are recorded on the Moabite stone bore this name. It means Victory, enlargement. LXX. reads Mareshah (Μαρεισά) as in the latter part of the verse.

Pulpit Commentary

Verses 42-49. - These verses are occupied with the resumption of descendants of Caleb - the Caleb apparently of vers. 9 and 18, though, this being so, the last clause in ver. 49, the daughter of Caleb, Achsa, will require accounting for. This statement would lead us to suppose that we were assuredly reading of Caleb the son of Jephunneh; but it cannot be so. The name of Caleb, with the questions gathering round it, will be best considered here. Of the nine times in which it occurs in this chapter, the mere duplicates (of vers. 20, 46, 48) may be at once counted off. The compound "Caleb-ephratah" of ver. 24 has been already dealt with. Nor need we for the present suppose ver. 50 to have any real meaning inconsistent with its apparent meaning, viz. that Caleb is the name of a grandson (son of Hut) as well as of the grandfather. There remain the occasions of the occurring of the word in vers. 9, 18, 42, 49.

1. The first appearance, then, of the name in this chapter (ver. 9) exhibits it in a form different from that in which it appears the other times in this chapter or elsewhere, viz. as כְלוּבַי, instead of כָלֵב (or once as a patronymic, 1 Samuel 25:3, כּלִֹבִּי). The Vulgate follows the Hebrew, but the Septuagint has at once substituted Caleb. The Syriac Version has Salchi, and the Arabic Sachli, both of them, no doubt, mere transcribers' errors through the mistake of a letter. This form "Chelubai" is, then, an ἅπαξ λεγόμενον, and no different account has yet been given of the name appearing thus on this one occasion. It may be described, with Lange ('Comm. Old Testament,' in loc.), as "adjectivus gentilis" to כְלוּב, which word, however, occur where it will, is never treated as a synonym with Caleb except by the Septuagint, and then but once (1 Chronicles 4:11), making Lange's further claim of three forms for the name of Caleb wrong. The name might be translated the "Cheluban" or "Chelubite."

2. The Caleb called here first "Chelubai," again" Caleb the son of Hezron," and now "Caleb the brother of Jerahmeel," some, and Keil among them, have endeavoured to identify with Caleb the son of Jephunneh. This latter is a well-known figure in history. He, together with Joshua, was among those who, departing from Egypt, were pursued of Pharaoh, and of all the host these two alone lived to enter into the promised land. This is enough to give him distinction and a prominent place before the eye. To this Caleb unmistakable reference is made in twenty-eight passages, in sixteen of which he is called "son of Jephunneh," and in three of those sixteen "son of Jephunneh the Kenazite." Now, he tells us himself (Joshua 14:7) that he was forty years old in the seceded year after the Exodus. But it seems (Genesis 46:12, 26) that Hezron, grandson of Judah, and the father of the Caleb of this chapter, was, however young, one of those who went down into Egypt with Jacob, at a date, according to any chronology, which must render it impossible for any son of his to have been alive and only forty years of age at the time of the Exodus. This being so, either the statement already referred to, found at the close of ver. 49, that "the daughter of Caleb was Achsa," must be an interpolation from some ignorant transcriber's marginal annotation, or, unlikely as it is, Caleb the son of Hezron and Caleb the son of Jephunneh both named a daughter Achsa. It is, moreover, likely enough that the frequent describing of Caleb the son of Jephuuneli in this style was occasioned by the desire to distinguish him from some other Caleb, not a contemporary, indeed, but already well known m a generation preceding but not too remote. Other considerations decidedly concur with this view: e.g. Ram is brother of Caleb the son of Hezron; he has a grandson, Nahshon, of great distinction," a prince of the children of Judah," whose sister Aaron married; he was the elect of the Judah tribe to assist Moses and Aaron in the first numbering of the people (Numbers 1:7). Great prominence is given to him (Numbers 7:12; Numbers 10:14). He was clearly (Matthew 1:4; Luke 3:32) fifth in descent from Judah, in perfect agreement with the table of this chapter. Now, it was this grandson of the elder brother of Caleb who was contemporary with Caleb the son of Jephunneh. Similarly, the Bezaleel of this chapter (ver. 20), a great-grandson of Caleb the Hezronite, is spoken of (Exodus 31:1; Exodus 35:30) at the same date exactly at which Caleb the son of Jephunneh says he was still but forty years of age l

3. The identity of the Caleb of ver. 50, son of Hut, with Caleb the son of Jephuuneh is supposed by some, but is not clear. It appears to be asserted, without explanation, in the arts. "Caleb" and "Ephrath," signed A. C. H., Smith's 'Bible Dictionary,' though in the second part of the latter article it is alluded to as only possible. On the other hand, it may rather be that Caleb the son of Jephunneh, instead of being identical with this Caleb the son of Hur, is so called in order to distinguish him from this latter as a contemporary. Again, it has been happily conjectured ('Speaker's Commentary,' in loc.) that just as ver. 33 closes the table of Jerahmeel with "These were the sons of Jerahmeel," so ver. 49 should close the table of Caleb (ver. 42) with the words, These were the Boris of Caleb. With a slight alteration, ver. 50 would then begin The sons of Hur, etc. This is, however, only conjecture. Ver. 42, then, must be considered to give us another family of Caleb, i.e. a family by another wife, of name not given, just possibly the Jerioth unaccounted for in ver. 18. The first statement lauds us in perplexity. Mesha (מֵישַׁע) is the firstborn (i.e. by the wife or woman in question), and the founder of Ziph. And amid some omission or corruption of text, we are then confronted with the words, and the sons of Marsehah (מָרֵישָׁה) the father (or again, perhaps founder) of Hebron. The reading of the Septuagint gives Mareshah in both of these passages, and may come from a Hebrew text that we have not. The substitution could, however, scarcely be accounted for as a mere clerical error, considering both the omission of a resh and the replacing of an he with an ayin. The sentence refuses at present any treatment except the unsatisfactory one of pure conjecture. But employing this, it may be noted that the omitting of the words, "the sons of," before Mareshah would most help to clear the verse of confusion. In this and following verses, Ziph, Hebron, Tappuah, Jorkoam, and Beth-zur, are all names of places certainly, whether or not they are all of persons. 1 Chronicles 2:42

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

Other renowned descendants of Caleb. - First of all there are enumerated, in 1 Chronicles 2:42-49, three lines of descendants of Caleb, of which the two latter, 1 Chronicles 2:46-49, are the issue of concubines. - The first series, 1 Chronicles 2:42-45, contains some things which are very obscure. In 1 Chronicles 2:42 there are menitioned, as sons of Caleb the brother of Jerahmeel, Mesha his first-born, with the addition, "this is the father of Ziph; and the sons of Mareshah, the father of Hebron," as it reads according to the traditional Masoretic text. Now it is here not only very surprising that the sons of Mareshah stand parallel with Mesha, but it is still more strange to find such a collocation as "sons of Mareshah the father of Hebron." The last-mentioned difficulty would certainly be greatly lessened if we might take Hebron to be the city of that name, and translate the phrase "father of Hebron," lord of the city of Hebron, according to the analogy of "father of Ziph," "father of Tekoa" (1 Chronicles 2:24), and other names of that sort. But the continuation of the genealogy, "and the sons of Hebron were Korah, and Tappuah, Rekem, and Shema" (1 Chronicles 2:43), is irreconcilable with such an interpretation. For of these names, Tappuah, i.e., apple, is indeed met with several times as the name of a city (Joshua 12:17; Joshua 15:34; Joshua 16:8); and Rekem is the name of a city of Benjamin (Joshua 18:27), but occurs also twice as the name of a person - once of a Midianite prince (Numbers 31:8), and once of a Manassite (1 Chronicles 7:16); but the other two, Korah and Shema, only occur as the names of persons. In 1 Chronicles 2:44., moreover, the descendants of Shema and Rekem are spoken of, and that, too, in connection with the word הוליד, "he begat," which demonstrably can only denote the propagation of a race. We must therefore take Hebron as the name of a person, as in 1 Chronicles 6:2 and Exodus 6:18. But if Hebron be the name of a man, then Mareshah also must be interpreted in the same manner. This is also required by the mention of the sons of Mareshah parallel with Mesha the first-born; but still more so by the circumstance that the interpretation of Mareshah and Hebron, as names of cities, is irreconcilable with the position of these two cities, and with their historical relations. Bertheau, indeed, imagines that as Mareshah is called the father of Hebron, the famous capital of the tribe of Judah, we must therefore make the attempt, however inadmissible it may seem at first sight, to take Mareshah, in the connection of our verse, as the name of a city, which appears as father of Hebron, and that we must also conclude that the ancient city Hebron (Numbers 13:23) stood in some sort of dependent relationship to Mareshah, perhaps only in later time, although we cannot at all determine to what time the representation of our verse applies. But at the foundation of this argument there lies an error as to the position of the city Mareshah. Mareshah lay in the Shephelah (Joshua 15:44), and exists at present as the ruin Marasch, twenty-four minutes south of Beit-Jibrin: vide on Joshua 15:44; and Tobler, Dritte Wanderung, 129 and 142f. Ziph, therefore, which is mentioned in 2 Chronicles 11:8 along with Mareshah, and which is consequently the Ziph mentioned in our verse, cannot be, as Bertheau believes, the Ziph situated in the hill country of Judah, in the wilderness of that name, whose ruins are still to be seen on the hill Zif, about four miles south-east from Hebron (Joshua 15:55). It can only be the Ziph in the Shephelah (Joshua 15:24), the position of which has not indeed been discovered, but which is to be sought in the Shephelah at no great distance from Marasch, and thus far distant from Hebron. Since, then, Mareshah and Ziph were in the Shephelah, no relation of dependence between the capital, Hebron, situated in the mountains of Judah, and Mareshah can be thought of, neither in more ancient nor in later time. The supposition of such a dependence is not made probable by the remark that we cannot determine to what time the representation of our verse applies; it only serves to cover the difficulty which renders it impossible. That the verse does not treat of post-exilic times is clear, although even after the exile, and in the time of the Maccabees and the Romans, Hebron was not in a position of dependence on Marissa. Bertheau himself holds Caleb, of whose son our verses treat, for a contemporary of Moses and Joshua, because in 1 Chronicles 2:49 Achsa is mentioned as daughter of Caleb (Joshua 15:16; Judges 1:12). The contents of our verse would therefore have reference to the first part of the period of the judges. But since Hebron was never dependent on Mareshah in the manner supposed, the attempt, which even at first sight appeared so inadmissible, to interpret Mareshah as the name of a city, loses all its support. For this reason, therefore, the city of Hebron, and the other cities named in 1 Chronicles 2:43., which perhaps belonged to the district of Mareshah, cannot be the sons of Mareshah here spoken of; and the fact that, of the names mentioned in 1 Chronicles 2:43 and 1 Chronicles 2:44, at most two may denote cities, while the others are undoubtedly the names of persons, points still more clearly to the same conclusion. We must, then, hold Hebron and Mareshah also to be the names of persons.

Now, if the Masoretic text be correct, the use of the phrase, "and the sons of Mareshah the father of Hebron," instead of "and Mareshah, the sons of the father of Hebron," can only have arisen from a desire to point out, that besides Hebron there were also other sons of Mareshah who were of Caleb's lineage. But the mention of the sons of Mareshah, instead of Mareshah, and the calling him the father of Hebron in this connection, make the correctness of the traditional text very questionable. Kimchi has, on account of the harshness of placing the sons of Mareshah on a parallel with Mesha the first-born of Caleb, supposed an ellipse in the expression, and construes מר ובני, et ex filiis Ziphi Mareshah. But this addition cannot be justified. If we may venture a conjecture in so obscure a matter, it would more readily suggest itself that מרשׁה is an error for מישׁע, and that חברון אבי is to be taken as a nomen compos., when the meaning would be, "and the sons of Mesha were Abi-Hebron." The probability of the existence of such a name as Abihebron along with the simple Hebron has many analogies in its favour: cf. Dan and Abidan, Numbers 1:11; Ezer, 1 Chronicles 12:9, Nehemiah 3:19, with Abi-ezer; Nadab, Exodus 6:23, and Abinadab. In the same family even we have Abiner, or Abner, the son of Ner (1 Samuel 14:50.; 2 Samuel 2:8; cf. Ew. 273, S. 666, 7th edition). Abihebron would then be repeated in 1 Chronicles 2:43, in the shortened form Hebron, just as we have in Joshua 16:8 Tappuah, instead of En-tappuah, Joshua 17:7. The four names introduced as sons of Hebron denote persons, not localities: cf. for Korah, 1 Chronicles 1:35, and concerning Tappuah and Rekem the above remark. In 1 Chronicles 2:44 are mentioned the sons of Rekem and of Shema, the latter a frequently recurring man's name (cf. 1 Chronicles 5:8; 1 Chronicles 8:13; 1 Chronicles 11:44; Nehemiah 8:4). Shema begat Raham, the father of Jorkam. The name יקעם is quite unknown elsewhere. The lxx have rendered it Ἰεκλὰν, and Bertheau therefore holds Jorkam to be the name of a place, and conjectures that originally יקדעם (Joshua 15:56) stood here also. But the lxx give also Ἰεκλὰν for the following name רקם, from which it is clear that we cannot rely much on their authority. The lxx have overlooked the fact that רקם, 1 Chronicles 2:44, is the son of the Hebron mentioned in 1 Chronicles 2:43, whose descendants are further enumerated. Shammai occurs as a man's name also in 1 Chronicles 2:28, and is again met with in 1 Chronicles 4:17. His son is called in 1 Chronicles 2:45 Maon, and Maon is the father of Bethzur. בּית־צוּר is certainly the city in the mountains of Judah which Rehoboam fortified (2 Chronicles 11:7), and which still exists in the ruin Bet-sur, lying south of Jerusalem in the direction of Hebron. Maon also was a city in the mountains of Judah, now Main (Joshua 15:55); but we cannot allow that this city is meant by the name מעון, because Maon is called on the one hand the son of Shammai, and on the other is father of Bethzur, and there are no well-ascertained examples of a city being represented as son (בּן) of a man, its founder or lord, nor of one city being called the father of another. Dependent cities and villages are called daughters (not sons) of the mother city. The word מעון, "dwelling," does not per se point to a village or town, and in Judges 10:12 denotes a tribe of non-Israelites.