1 Chronicles 7:15

And Machir took to wife the sister of Huppim and Shuppim, whose sister's name was Maachah;) and the name of the second was Zelophehad: and Zelophehad had daughters.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(15) And Machir took to wife.—The Hebrew cannot mean this. Translate, now Machir took a wife of Huppim and of Shuppim (the two Benjamite clans of 1Chronicles 7:12); and the name of the first (read ‘ahath) was Maachah, and the name of the second (read shēnîth) was. . . .” (the name is omitted). It is tempting to make Zeiophehad the other wife, who had only daughters, whereas Maachah bore a son (1Chronicles 7:16); but Numbers, l.c., and Josh., l.c., make Zelophehad a man. We must, therefore, suppose a lacuna of some few words, which gave the name of Machir’s second wife, and the descent of Zelophehad from her. The expression “of Huppim and of Shuppim” is literally “to Huppim and to Shuppim,” that is, belonging to. So “of Tola,” (1Chronicles 7:2).

We have no means of further elucidating the import of this curious tribal record. That it relates to West Manasseh is inferred from its position here, as well from the fact that 1Chronicles 5:23-24 treated of East Manasseh. (See also Joshua 17:1-5.) The name of Gilead, however, points to the transjordanic half of the tribe. The whole passage seems to assert an Aramean and a Benjamite element in the population of Western Manasseh.

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

7:1-40 Genealogies. - Here is no account either of Zebulun or Dan. We can assign no reason why they only should be omitted; but it is the disgrace of the tribe of Dan, that idolatry began in that colony which fixed in Laish, and called it Dan, Jud 18 and there one of the golden calves was set up by Jeroboam. Dan is omitted, Re 7. Men become abominable when they forsake the worship of the true God, for any creature object.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

The lists here are remarkably different from those in marginal references Probably the persons here mentioned were not literally "sons," but were among the later descendants of the founders, being the chief men of the family at the time of David's census.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

1Ch 7:14-40. Of Manasseh.

14, 15. The sons of Manasseh—or descendants; for Ashriel was a grandson, and Zelophehad was a generation farther removed in descent (Nu 26:33). The text, as it stands, is so confused and complicated that it is exceedingly difficult to trace the genealogical thread, and a great variety of conjectures have been made with a view to clear away the obscurity. The passage [1Ch 7:14, 15] should probably be rendered thus: "The sons of Manasseh were Ashriel, whom his Syrian concubine bare to him, and Machir, the father of Gilead (whom his wife bare to him). Machir took for a wife Maachah, sister to Huppim and Shuppim."

Matthew Poole's Commentary

The sister; which word is here fitly understood out of the following clause, where it is expressed, and she is called Maachah, who also is called the wife of Machir, 1 Chronicles 7:16. The name of the second; of the second son or grandson of Machir; for so Zelophehad was, Numbers 26:29, &c. Or Zelophehad is here called the second, because he was the younger brother of Ashriel, who was the eldest son of Hepher, the son of Gilead, the son of Machir.

Had daughters, i.e. only daughters, and no sons.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

And Machir took to wife the sister of Huppim and Shuppim, whose sister's name was Maachah,.... He married into the tribe of Benjamin, a sister of the persons mentioned, 1 Chronicles 7:12 whose name was Maachah:

and the name of the second was Zelophehad; the second son of Manasseh, or of his posterity mentioned; for he was not his immediate son; for he was the son of Hepher, the son of Gilead, the son of Machir, the son of Manasseh, Numbers 27:1.

and Zelophehad had daughters; but no sons, the names of his daughters are given, Numbers 26:33.

Geneva Study Bible

And Machir took to wife the sister of Huppim and Shuppim, whose sister's name was Maachah;) and the name of the second was Zelophehad: and Zelophehad had daughters.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

15. took to wife the sister of Huppim and Shuppim] R.V. took a wife of H. and Sh., i.e. allied himself by marriage to these two families.

whose sister’s name] Render, and his (Machir’s) sister’s name. The statement regarding Maachah is ethnographical, and means that the people of Maachah (a district at the foot of Hermon) were related by blood to Machir (the Eastern Manassites).

Zelophehad had daughters] Numbers 27:1-11.

Pulpit Commentary

Verse 15. - Maachah. Of this Maachah, one among tea of the same name, nothing else is known. The Peshito Syriac makes her the mother instead of wife of Machir. The distinct mention of the marriage of a Manassite to a Benjamite woman is to be noticed. Zelophehad. The meaning of the preceding words, and the name of the second, is unintelligible. Zelophehad was son of Hephen, who was (through Gilead and Maehir) great-grandson of Manasseh (Joshua 17:3). The number and names and wise appeal and success of the daughters here spoken of, are given in Joshua 17:3-6; Numbers 26:33; Numbers 27:1-11; Numbers 36:5-12. 1 Chronicles 7:15

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

1 Chronicles 7:15 is literally, "And Machir took a wife to Huppim and Shuppim, and the name of his sister was Maachah, and the name of the second Zelophehad." According to 1 Chronicles 7:16, on the contrary, Maachah is the wife of Machir, and we should consequently expect to find in 1 Chronicles 7:15 only the simple statement, "And Machir took a wife whose name was Maachah." From the words מעכה אחתו מעכה sdrow eh ולשׁפים לחפים no meaning which harmonizes with the context can be obtained. Since ל אשּׁה לקח signifies "to take a wife for one" (cf. Judges 14:2), we can only suppose that by the names Huppim and Shuppim Machir's sons are meant, to whom he, as their father, gave wives. But we cannot suppose that the sons of Machir are referred to, for the birth of the sons is first mentioned in 1 Chronicles 7:16. But we have found the names חפם and שׁפם spoken of as descendants of Benjamin; and Bertheau consequently conjectures that these names have been brought thence into our verse by some gloss, and that the beginning of our verse originally stood thus: המלכת אחתו ושׁם מעכם ושׁמה אשׁה לקח ומכיר לקח אשׁה ושׁם, "And Machir took a wife whose name is Maachah, and the name of his sister if Hammoleketh" (the last according to 1 Chronicles 7:18). By this means we certainly bring some meaning into the words; but we cannot venture to maintain that this conjecture corresponds to the original text, but rather incline to doubt it. For, in the first place, the following words, "And the name of the second (is) Zelophehad," do not suit the proposed reading. Berth. must here alter השּׁני into אהיו (the name of his brother). But even after this alteration, the mention of the brother of Machir is not suitable to the context; and moreover Zelophehad was not a true brother, but only a nephew of Machir, the son of his brother Hepher; cf. Numbers 26:33; Numbers 27:1. And besides this, according to the concluding formula, "These are the sons of Gilead, the son of Machir, the son of Manasseh" (1 Chronicles 7:17), we should expect to find in 1 Chronicles 7:15, 1 Chronicles 7:16, not merely sons or descendants of Machir, but rather descendants of Gilead. We therefore hold the statement of 1 Chronicles 7:15, "And the name of the second if Zelophehad, and Zelophehad had (only) daughters," to be correct and beyond criticism, and the first part of 1 Chronicles 7:15 to be corrupt and defective; and conjecture that a son of Gilead's was mentioned in it, to whose name the words, "And the name of the second," etc., belonged. This son who was mentioned in the text, which has been handed down to us only in a defective state, was probably the Ashriel mentioned in 1 Chronicles 7:14, a son of Gilead, whose descent from Machir was given more in detail in the corrupt and consequently meaningless first half of 1 Chronicles 7:15. In 1 Chronicles 7:15, 1 Chronicles 7:17, other descendants of Machir by his wife Maachah are enumerated, which favours the probable conjecture that the wife whom Machir took, according to 1 Chronicles 7:15, was different from Maachah, that Machir had two wives, and that in 1 Chronicles 7:15 originally the sons of the first were enumerated, and in 1 Chronicles 7:16, 1 Chronicles 7:17, the sons of the second. Peresh and Shelesh are mentioned only here. בּנין, "his sons" (that is, the sons of the last-named, Shelesh), were Ulam and Rakem, names which are also met with only here. The name בּדן is found in our Masoretic text, 1 Samuel 12:11, as the name of a judge, but probably בּרק should be read instead.