And the sons of Ephraim ,.... A son of Joseph, and father of a tribe of this name, whose genealogy through five generations follows: Shuthelah, Bered, Tahath, Eladah, Tahath; the second. read more
And Zabad his son ,.... Not the son of Tahath the second last mentioned, but the son of Ephraim, a second son of his: and Shuthelah ; his son, the son of Zabad, called after his uncle's name, 1 Chronicles 7:20 . and Ezer, and Elead ; two other sons of Zabad: whom the men of Gath that were born in that land slew : that is, Zabad and his three sons; these the men of Gath slew, who were Philistines that dwelt there, and were originally of Egypt, and were born in that land, but had... read more
And Ephraim their father mourned many days ,.... For the loss of his son and grandchildren for the above fact was done while the Israelites were in Egypt, and Ephraim the patriarch yet alive; nor is there any need to suppose another Ephraim, different from him: and his brethren came to comfort him ; some of the heads of the other tribes of Israel, particularly Manasseh, with some of his family. read more
And when he went in to his wife ,.... After his grief and sorrow in part at least had subsided: she conceived and bare a son ; which in some measure made up for the loss he had sustained: and he called his name Beriah ; which signifies being "in evil" or calamity, he being born in an evil time: because it went evil with his house ; or evil was in his house, as Noldius F13 Ebr. Concord. Part. No. 750. p. 165. , in his family; a great calamity had befallen it. read more
And his daughter was Sherah ,.... That is, the daughter of Beriah; not an immediate daughter, but a descendant of his, otherwise she could not have reached the times of Joshua, as she did by what follows: who built Bethhoron the nether, and the upper ; which were cities on the border of the tribe of Ephraim; which the Israelites having taken from the Canaanites, and destroyed, she rebuilt, see Joshua 16:3 . and Uzzensherah ; which was called after her own name, and to distinguish... read more
And Rephah was his son ,.... The son of Beriah, whose genealogy from him is traced down to Joshua in this and the two following verses, and stands thus: after Rephah, Resheph, Telah, Tahan, Laadan, Ammihud, Elishama, who was prince of the tribe of Ephraim in the wilderness, Numbers 1:10 , then Non or Nun, whose son was Jehoshua or Joshua. read more
Whom the men of Gath - slew - We know nothing of this circumstance but what is related here. The Targum paraphrases the whole thus: "These were the leaders of the house of Ephraim; and they computed their period [or boundary, כיצא kitsa ] from the time in which the Word of the Lord of the universe spake with Abraham between the divisions, [i.e., the separated parts of the covenant sacrifice; see Genesis 15:9-21 ;], but they erred, for they should have counted from the time in... read more
His daughter was Sherah - That is, remnant; "called so," says the Targum, "because she was the remnant that escaped from the slaughter mentioned above." read more
The chief difficulty of this passage lies in reconciling the points of chronology which it forces to the surface. 1 Chronicles 7:20 , 1 Chronicles 7:21 , purport to contain the line of descent from Ephraim through his son Shu-thelah to the seventh generation, viz. to another Shuthelah. The remaining two names, Ezer and Elead, may perhaps be two brothers of the first Shuthelah, i.e. own sons of Ephraim. If it be so, these two must not be supposed to correspond with Becher and Tahan,... read more
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Matthew Henry's Complete Commentary - 1 Chronicles 7:20-40
We have here an account, I. Of the tribe of Ephraim. Great things we read of that tribe when it came to maturity. Here we have an account of the disasters of its infancy, while it was in Egypt as it should seem; for Ephraim himself was alive when those things were done, which yet is hard to imagine if it were, as is here computed, seven generations off. Therefore I am apt to think that either it was another Ephraim or that those who were slain were the immediate sons of that Ephraim that was... read more