Nehemiah 12:19

And of Joiarib, Mattenai; of Jedaiah, Uzzi;

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

12:1-26 It is a debt we owe to faithful ministers, to remember our guides, who have spoken to us the word of God. It is good to know what our godly predecessors were, that we may learn what we should be.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

The six generations of high priests covered a little more than two centuries (538-333 B.C.), or a little under thirty-five years to a generation. Jaddua was the high priest who (according to Josephus) had an interview with Alexander shortly after the battle of Issus.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

12. in the days of Joiakim were priests, the chief of the fathers—As there had been priests in the days of Jeshua, so in the time of Joiakim, the son and successor of Jeshua, the sons of those persons filled the priestly office in the place of their fathers, some of whom were still alive, though many were dead.

Matthew Poole's Commentary

No text from Poole on this verse.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

And in the days of Joiakim were priests, the chief of the fathers,.... This was the son and successor of Jeshua, or Joshua, the first high priest of the second temple; the principal men of the priesthood in his time were as follow, and who were the sons, or however the descendants of the priests in the time of his father before mentioned: these were Meraiah, Hananiah, Meshullam, Jehohanan, Jonathan, Joseph, Adna, Helkai, Zechariah, (the prophet of that name,) Meshullam, Zichri, Piltai, Shammua, Jehonathan, Mattenai, Uzzi, Kallai, Eber, Hashabiah, Nethaneel; in all twenty, whereas there are twenty two named, as in his father's days, there being no sons or descendants from two of them, namely, Hattush and Miamin.

Geneva Study Bible

And of Joiarib, Mattenai; of Jedaiah, Uzzi;

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Pulpit Commentary

Verse 19. - And of Joiarib. The conjunction "and' occurring here, exactly as it does in ver. 6, once only in the whole list, and before the same name, shows that the two documents (Nehemiah 12:1-7, 12-21) are from the same hand. That the hand is that of Nehemiah, or a contemporary, seems to follow from the fact that no reason can be assigned for the division, or for the low place in the lists of the names Joiarib and Jedaiah, except the failure of these families to set their seals to the covenant (see the comment on ver. 6). PARENTHETIC STATEMENT OF THE TIME DOWN TO WHICH EXACT LISTS OF THE LEADING PRIESTS AND LEVITES WERE KEPT (Nehemiah 12:22, 23). These verses appear to constitute a late insertion. They interrupt the list of high church officers in the time of Joiakim, which is commenced in ver. 12 and not concluded till ver. 26. By their mention of Jaddua as high priest, and of "Darius the Persian" as contemporary king, they betray a writer who lived at least as late as B.C. 336, or nearly a century after the time of Nehemiah's religious reforms. The facts put on record by this writer are not of very much importance. They seem to be simply these: -

1. That the practice of accurately recording the heads of the priestly and Levitical courses, which Nehemiah has noted as belonging to the days of Joiakim, was continued under his successors, Eliashib, Joiada, Johanan, and Jaddua, down (at any rate) to the accession of Darius Codomannus; and,

2. That in the case of the Levites the lists were inserted into the book of the chronicles - not our "Book," but that larger one, of which ours is in the main an abbreviation - down to the time of Johanan, the son (or, rather, grandson) of Eliashib. It has been supposed that the writer originally accompanied these statements with lists that have been lost, but this does not appear to be probable. Nehemiah 12:19

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

Nehemiah 12:12-21 contains the list of the priestly houses and their heads, which has been already explained in conjunction with that in Nehemiah 12:1-7. Nehemiah 12:22-26. The list of the heads of the Levites, Nehemiah 12:22 and Nehemiah 12:24, is, according to Nehemiah 12:26, that of the days of Joiakim, and of the days of Nehemiah and Ezra. Whence it follows, that it does not apply only to the time of Joiakim; for though Ezra might indeed have come to Jerusalem in the latter days of Joiakim's high-priesthood, yet Nehemiah's arrival found his successor Eliashib already in office, and the statements of Nehemiah 12:22 and Nehemiah 12:23 must be understood accordingly.