1 Chronicles 1:51

Hadad died also. And the dukes of Edom were; duke Timnah, duke Aliah, duke Jetheth,

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(51) Hadad died also.—Rather, And Hadad died, and there were (or arose) chiliarchs of Edom, the chiliarch of Timnah, the chiliarch of Aliah, &c. This appears to state that Hadad was the last king of Edom, and that after his death the country was governed by the heads of the various clans or tribes, without any central authority. In Genesis 36:40, the sentence, “And Hadad died,” is wanting, and the transition from the kings to the chiliarchs is thus effected: “And these are the names of the chiliarchs of Esau, after their clans, after their places, by their names: the chiliarch of Timnah,” &c. The chiliarchs (‘allûphîm, from ‘eleph, a thousand) were the heads of the thousands or clans (mishpehôth) of Edom (Genesis 36:40). (See Note on 1Chronicles 14:1.) The names in these verses are not personal, but tribal and local, as the conclusion of the account in Genesis 36:43 indicates: “These are the chiliarchs of Edom, after their seats, in the land of their domain.” Comp. the names of the sons of Esau and Seir (1Chronicles 1:35-42). This makes it clear that Timnah and Aholibamah were towns. The king of Edom is often mentioned elsewhere in the Old Testament. (See Numbers 20:14; Amos 2:1-8 th cent. B.C. ; 2Kings 3:9 - 9th cent.) According to Ewald (Hist. p. 46), the chieftains of Edom follow the list of kings, “as if David had already vanquished the last king of Edom, and put it under” merely tribal government, in subordination to himself. “The Hadad who fled very young to Egypt at David’s conquest (1Kings 11:14-22) may have been grandson of Hadad, the last king.”

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

28-54 The genealogy is from hence confined to the posterity of Abraham. Let us take occasion from reading these lists of names, to think of the multitudes that have gone through this world, have done their parts in it, and then quitted it. As one generation, even of sinful men, passes away, another comes. Ec 1:4; Nu 32:14, and will do so while the earth remains. Short is our passage through time into eternity. May we be distinguished as the Lord's people.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

The slight differences favor the view, that the writer of Chronicles has here, as elsewhere, abridged from Genesis (see the marginal references).

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

37. Reuel—a powerful branch of the great Aeneze tribe, the Rowalla Arabs.

Shammah—the great tribe Beni Shammar. In the same way, the names of the other kings and dukes are traced in the modern tribes of Arabia. But it is unnecessary to mention any more of these obscure nomads, except to notice that Jobab (1Ch 1:44), one of the kings of Edom, is considered to be Job, and that his seat was in the royal city of Dinahab (Ge 36:32; 1Ch 1:43), identified with O'Daeb, a well-known town in the center of Al Dahna, a great northern desert in the direction of Chaldea and the Euphrates [Forster].

Matthew Poole's Commentary

No text from Poole on this verse.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

Now these are the kings that reigned in the land of Edom,.... Which had its name from Esau, who was so called, Genesis 25:30. From hence, to the end of the chapter, an account is given of the kings and dukes of Edom, in the same order as in Genesis 30:31.

Geneva Study Bible

Hadad died also. And the dukes of Edom were; duke Timnah, duke Aliah, duke Jetheth,

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

51b–54. The “Dukes” of Edom (Cp. Genesis 36:40-43)

51. dukes] The word means “leader of a thousand.” The list which follows is probably topographical, not chronological. It seems to give the names of the “dukedoms” into which Edom was divided at the time when the list was drawn up.

duke Timnah, etc.] Render, the duke of Timnah, etc.

Aliah] In Genesis 36:40, “Alvah.”

Pulpit Commentary

Verses 51-54. - H. LIST OF ELEVEN DUKES OF EDOM. These, the remaining verses of ch. 1, appear to give a list of eleven dukes of Edom, emphasized apparently as "the dukes of Edom," as though there were none before or after them. But see Genesis 36:15, 41, 43, the study of which can scarcely leave a doubt on the mind that this list is not one of persons but of places; e.g. "the duke" of the city, or region of "Timnah," and so on. The places were dukedoms. The names of these verses, in both Authorized Version and Hebrew text, are an exact counterpart of those found in Genesis 36:40-43, except that Aliah here (so Allan, ver. 40) stands for Alvah in Genesis. In the Septuagint we have Golada, Elibamas, and Babsar here, for Gola, Olibemas, and Mazar there. Thus this first chapter contains those genealogical tables which concern the patriarchs from Adam up to Israel, spanning a stretch of some two thousand three hundred years, and embracing also tables of Edom and certain of the descendants of Edom up to the period of kings. The chapter contains not a single instance of a remark that could be described as of a moral, religious, or didactic kind. Yet not a little is to be learnt sometimes, not a little suggested, from omission and solemn silence as well as from speech; no more notable instance of which could perhaps be given, when we take into account time, place, and circumstances, than that already alluded to in the omissions involved in the following of the name of Seth upon that of Adam. The genealogies of this chapter, with their parallels in Genesis, are notable also for standing unique in all the world's writing, and far over all the world's mythology, for retracing the pedigree of the wide family of men, and especially of the now scattered family of the Jew, to its original. From the time of the close of our Chronicle genealogies, supplemented by the earliest of the New Testament, no similarly comprehensive but useful, ambitious but deliberately designed and successfully executed enterprise has been attempted. And as Matthew Henry has well said, since Christ came, the Jews have lost all their genealogies, even the most sacred of them, "the building is reared, the scaffold is removed; the Seed is come, the line that led to him is broken off."



1 Chronicles 1:51

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

The princes of Edom. - The names correspond to those in Genesis 36:40-43, but the heading and the subscription in Genesis are quite different from those in the Chronicle. Here the heading is, "and the Allufim of Edom were," and the subscription, "these are the Allufim of Edom," from which it would be the natural conclusion that the eleven names given are proper names of the phylarchs. But the occurrence of two female names, Timna and Aholibamah, as also of names which are unquestionably those of races, e.g., Aliah, Pinon, Teman, and Mibzar, is irreconcilable with this interpretation. If we compare the heading and subscription of the register in Genesis, we find that the former speaks of the names "of the Allufim of Edom according to their habitations,

(Note: So it is given by the author, "nach ihren Wohnsitzen;" but this must be a mistake, for the word is משׁפּחותם equals their families, not משׁבתם, as it is in the subscription. - Tr.)

according to their places in their names," and the latter of "the Allufim of Edom according to their habitations in the land of their possession." It is there unambiguously declared that the names enumerated are not the names of persons, but the names of the dwelling-places of the Allufim, after whom they were wont to be named. We must therefore translate, "the Alluf of Timna, the Alluf of Aliah," etc., when of course the female names need not cause any surprise, as places can just as well receive their names from women as their possessors as from men. Nor is there any greater difficulty in this, that only eleven dwelling-places are mentioned, while, on the contrary, the thirteen sons and grandsons of Esau are called Allufim. For in the course of time the number of phylarchs might have decreased, or in the larger districts two phylarchs may have dwelt together. Since the author of the Chronicle has taken this register also from Genesis, as the identity of the names clearly shows he did, he might safely assume that the matter was already known from that book, and so might allow himself to abridge the heading without fearing any misunderstanding; seeing, too, that he does not enumerate אלּוּפי of Esau, but אדום אלּוּפי, and Edom had become the name of a country and a people.