Attributed commentary excerpt
Keil & Delitzsch on 1 Chronicles 6:1
A historical reference excerpt for this verse. Read it alongside the biblical text and other available sources.
Commentary on the Old Testament
C. F. Keil & F. Delitzsch · 19th-century historical commentary
Source: BibleWord.ai's local reference edition of this named work.
(5:27-41). The family of Aaron, or the high-priestly line of Aaron, to the time of the Babylonian exile. - Ch1 6:1-3. In order to exhibit the connection of Aharon (or Aaron) with the patriarch Levi, the enumeration begins with the three sons of Levi, who are given in Ch1 6:1 as in Gen 46:11; Exo 6:16, and in other passages. Of Levi's grandchildren, only the four sons of Kohath ( Ch1 6:2) are noticed; and of these, again, Amram is the only one whose descendants - Aaron, Moses, and Miriam - are named ( Ch1 6:3); and thereafter only Aaron's sons are introduced, in order that the enumeration of his family in the high-priestly line of Eleazar might follow. With Ch1 6:2 cf. Exo 1:18, and on Ch1 6:34 see the commentary on Exo 6:20. With the sons of Aaron ( Ch1 6:44) compare besides Exo 6:23, also Num 3:2-4, and Ch1 24:1-2. As Nadab and Abihu were slain when they offered strange fire before Jahve ( Lev 10:1.), Aaron's race was continued only by his sons Eleazar and Ithamar. After Aaron's death, his eldest son Eleazar was chosen by God to be his successor in the high priest's office, and thus the line of Eleazar came into possession of the high-priestly dignity. Ch1 6:4-15 (5:30-41). In Ch1 6:4-15 the descendants of Eleazar are enumerated in twenty-two generations; the word הוליד, "he begat," being repeated with every name. The son so begotten was, when he lived after his father, the heir of the high-priestly dignity. Thus Phinehas the son of Eleazar ( Exo 6:25) is found in possession of it in Jdg 20:28. From this the older commentators have rightly drawn the inference that the purpose of the enumeration in Ch1 6:4-15 was to communicate the succession of high priests from Eleazar, who died shortly after Joshua ( Jos 24:33), to Jehozadak, whom Nebuchadnezzar caused to be carried away into Babylon. From the death of Aaron in the fortieth year after Israel came forth from Egypt, till the building of the temple in the fourth year of the reign of Solomon, 400 years elapsed (480 - \_40 = 440, Kg1 6:1). From the building of the temple to the destruction of Jerusalem and of the temple by the Chaldaeans there was an interval of 423 years (36 years under Solomon, and 387 years during which the kingdom of Judah existed; see the chronological table to 1 Kings 12). Between the death of Aaron, therefore, and the time when Jehozadak was led away into captivity, supposing that that event occurred only under Zedekiah, lay a period of 440 + 423 = 863 years. For this period twenty-two generations appear too few, for then the average duration of each life would be 39 1/4 years. Such an estimate would certainly appear a very high one, but it does not pass the bounds of possibility, as cases may have occurred in which the son died before the father, when consequently the grandson would succeed the grandfather in the office of high priest, and the son would be omitted in our register. The ever-recurring הוליד cannot be brought forward in opposition to this supposition, because הוליד esuace in the genealogical lists may express mediate procreation, and the grandson may be introduced as begotten by the grandfather. On the supposition of the existence of such cases, we should have to regard the average above mentioned as the average time during which each of the high priests held the office. But against such an interpretation of this list of the posterity of Eleazar two somewhat serious difficulties are raised. The less serious of these consists in this, that in the v…
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