1 Chronicles 8:12

The sons of Elpaal; Eber, and Misham, and Shamed, who built Ono, and Lod, with the towns thereof:

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(12) Shamer, or Shemer, occurred in 1Chronicles 7:34 as a clan of Asher.

Who built.Ono and Lod. . . .—Literally, he built Ono and Lod and her daughters. The clause is a parenthesis referring to Shemer.

Ono, now Kefr Auna, recurs in Ezra 2:33, Nehemiah 7:37; Nehemiah 11:35, but is not found elsewhere in the Old Testament. It is always coupled with Lod, and must have been near it.

Lod, the Lydda of Acts 9:32, is now the village of Ludd, north of Ramleh, between Jaffa and Jerusalem.

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

8:1-40 Genealogies. - Here is a larger list of Benjamin's tribe. We may suppose that many things in these genealogies, which to us seem difficult, abrupt, and perplexed, were plain and easy at that time, and fully answered the intention for which they were published. Many great and mighty nations then were in being upon earth, and many illustrious men, whose names are now wholly forgotten; while the names of multitudes of the Israel of God are here kept in everlasting remembrance. The memory of the just is blessed.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

After he had sent them away - Translate it: "after he had divorced his wives, Hushim and Baara."

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

8. Shaharaim begat children in the country of Moab—He had probably been driven to take refuge in that foreign land on the same calamitous occasion that forced Elimelech to emigrate thither (Ru 1:1). But, destitute of natural affection, he forsook or divorced his two wives, and in the land of his sojourn married a third, by whom he had several sons. But there is another explanation given of the conduct of this Benjamite polygamist. His children by Hushim are mentioned (1Ch 8:11), while his other wife is unnoticed. Hence it has been thought probable that it is Baara who is mentioned under the name of Hodesh, so called because her husband, after long desertion, returned and cohabited with her as before.

Matthew Poole's Commentary

Of which see Ezra 2:33 Nehemiah 7:37 11:35.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

The sons of Elpaal; Eber, and Misham, and Shamed,.... Besides those in 1 Chronicles 8:14.

who built Ono, and Lod, with the towns thereof; not Shamed, but Elpaal his father, so the Targum; and the Talmudists say (o), these were walled cities from the days of Joshua the son of Nun, and were destroyed in the days of the concubine in Gibea, and Elpaal came and rebuilt them; they were inhabited by the Benjaminites, upon their return from the Babylonish captivity, Nehemiah 11:35 they were near to each other; according to a Jewish chronologer (p), it was three miles from the one to the other; Lod is the same with Lydda, in Acts 9:32.

(o) T. Hieros. Megillah, fol. 70. 1. & T. Bab Megillah, fol. 4. 1. So the Targum. (p) Juchasin, fol. 39. 2.

Geneva Study Bible

The sons of Elpaal; Eber, and Misham, and Shamed, who built Ono, and Lod, with the towns thereof:

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

12. Ono, and Lod] Ezra 2:33; Nehemiah 7:37; Nehemiah 11:35. The two places were evidently well-known in post-exilic times, and were doubtless near together. Lod is the Lydda of the N.T. (Acts 9:32). Targ. adds, which the sons of Israel laid waste and burnt with fire, when they made war in Gibeah with the tribe of Benjamin.

Pulpit Commentary

Verses 12-28. - One of the sons of this last-named wife, Hushim, was named Elpaal. From ver. 12 to ver. 28 we have a numerous list of his descendants, evidently in different degrees of relationship, but with the thread picked up apparently several times, in the persons of the first-mentioned "sons," viz. the five, Eber, Misham, Shamed, Beriah, Shema (see vers. 16, 18, 21, 25, 27). Verse 12. - Ono and Lod. These places are not mentioned in Joshua as originally assigned to Benjamin. They were obtained or "built" afterwards. They are first mentioned in this passage, afterwards in Ezra 2:33; Nehemiah 6:2; Nehemiah 7:37; Nehemiah 11:36. Led is, with little doubt, the Lydda of Acts 9:32. 1 Chronicles 8:12

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

The descendants of Shaharaim. - The descent of Shaharaim from the sons and grandsons named in 1 Chronicles 8:1-3 is obscure, and the conjecture which connects him with Ahishahar of 1 Chronicles 7:10 is unsupported. He was the father of a considerable number of heads of fathers'-houses, whom his two or three wives bore to him. According to 1 Chronicles 8:8, he begat "in the country of Moab after he had sent them, Hushim and Baara his wives, away; (1 Chronicles 8:9) there begat he with Hodesh his wife, Jobab," etc. When and how Shaharaim, a Benjamite, came into the country of Moab, is not known; all that can be gathered from our verse is that he must have lived there for a considerable time. שׁלחו is infin. Pi., the "i" being retained, and the Daghesh forte omitted with Sheva (cf. as to this formation, Ew. 238, d.). אתם, accus. of the pronoun, which, as it precedes its noun, is in gen. masc., although the names of women follow (cf. for this use of the pronoun, Ew. 309, c.). חוּשׁים and בּערה are women, as we learn from the following נשׁיו. By this parenthesis, the beginning of the main sentence has been lost sight of, and the הוליד is taken up again in ויּולד. As to הוליד with מן, cf. the remark on 1 Chronicles 2:8. חדשׁ is the third wife, which he took instead of those he had sent away. The seven names in 1 Chronicles 8:9, 1 Chronicles 8:10 are grouped together as sons or descendants of the last-named wife, by the concluding remark, "These his sons are heads of fathers'-houses." Then, further, in 1 Chronicles 8:11, 1 Chronicles 8:12, the sons and grandsons of the first (divorced) wives, one of whom built the cities Ono and Lydda, are enumerated; but we have no means of determining whether the בּנה הוּא refers to Shemer, the last mentioned, or to Elpaal the father of the three sons, Eber, and Misham, and Shemer. It would, however, naturally suggest itself, that the words referred to the first. לד (Lod) is without doubt the city Lydda, where Peter healed the paralytic (Acts 9:32.). It belonged in the Syrian age to Samaria, but it was added to Judea by the King Demetrius Soter, and given to Jonathan for a possession (1 Macc. 11:34, cf. with 10:30, 38). In the Jewish was it was destroyed by the Roman general Cestius (Joseph. de Bell. Jud. ii. 19. 1), but was rebuilt at a later time, and became the site of a toparchy of Judea. In still later times it was called Diospolis, but is now a considerable Mohammedan village, lying between Jafa and Jerusalem to the north of Ramleh, which bears the old name Ludd, by the Arabs pronounced also Lidd. See v. Raumer, Pal. S. 10; Robins. Pal. sub voce; and Tobler, Dritte Wanderung, S. 69f. Ono is mentioned elsewhere only in Ezra 2:33; Nehemiah 7:37 and Nehemiah 11:35, along with Lod, and must have been a place in the neighbourhood of Lydda.