Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of 1 Chronicles 7:21
And Zabad his son, and Shuthelah his son, and Ezer, and Elead, whom the men of Gath [that were] born in [that] land slew, because they came down to take away their cattle.
21. they came down ] This phrase suits a descent from the hills of Ephraim, but not an invasion from Goshen. It therefore occurred probably after Israel was settled in Canaan, i.e. long after Ephraim was dead, and the conduct ascribed to Ephraim in 1Ch 7:22-23 must be understood of the tribe personified in its ancestor. The clan Beriah became prominent after disaster had befallen the clans Ezer and Elead.
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
1Ch 7:21-22
Whom the men of Gath that wore born in that land slew.
The massacre of Ephraims children
In the mines of Peru, there are veins of peculiar richness; but the very rubbish is valuable. In the Bible there are passages of peculiar importance, but there is nothing trifling, nothing useless. To be able to extract from the more barren portions of Scripture the instructions they were intended to communicate is a talent which every Christian should cultivate. This passage teaches us–
I. That there is no individual or society secure from sudden and severe misfortune. Oh! it is natural for us, when we are happy, to cherish the thought that we shall continue to be happy. And we may be placed in circumstances in which such an anticipation seems not only natural but reasonable. Our worldly substance may be abundant; our bodily constitution may be sound and strong, promising us a long and healthy life; our children may be growing up around us, with every appearance of being the support and comfort of our declining years. We may enjoy the affection of our friends. Very few persons have ever been so prosperous, or had equal ground to presume on the permanence of their prosperity as Ephraim. We have reason to hope that Ephraim was a good man. He was certainly the son of a very good man. We cannot doubt that his father Joseph gave him a religious education. We know that Ephraim was a wealthy man. It was, indeed, his great wealth that excited the cupidity of these Philistine robbers. It is obvious that he had reached a good old age, and he had gathered around him children and childrens children, and the children of childrens children. You can easily suppose the good old man retiring to rest happy in his possessions, and happier still in his anticipations, for he had reason to anticipate coming prosperity. God had spoken good of all the descendants of Israel, but of none had He spoken so much good as of Ephraim. In his numerous descendants he probably pleased himself with the thought, that he saw the begun accomplishment of the promise that his seed should become a multitude of nations. But what a fearful and sudden reverse was he destined to experience! This affecting incident reads a lesson to us all. It tells those who are afflicted, in patience to possess their souls; and it bids those who are happy, join trembling with their mirth. It tells those who are in affliction to give God thanks that they have not been afflicted as Ephraim was. We may have been bereaved of much, it may be, but where is any of us that can for a moment compare his bereavements with those of Ephraim?
II. That the dispensations of Divine providence are often apparently in direct opposition to the declarations of the Divine promise. It is difficult to conceive a more striking illustration of this general principle than that furnished by the remarkable incident recorded in the passage before us. Ephraim, as a descendant of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, had an interest in all the promises made to his illustrious ancestors. I will make thy seed as the dust of the earth, said Jehovah to Abraham; as the number of the stars, so shall thy seed be. Ephraim was one of the sons of Joseph, and of course Ephraim had his share in the remarkable blessing that was pronounced on his father. Joseph is a fruitful bough, even a fruitful bough by a well, whose branches run over the wall. Nor was this all; Ephraim had a share in that blessing which Jacob pronounced on himself, and on his brother Manasseh. When Joseph heard that his father was sick, apparently to death, he went to visit him, and he took along with him his two sons, Manasseh and Ephraim. Jacob having been told that his son Joseph was coming to see him, strengthened himself, and sat upon his bed. And Jacob said unto Joseph, God Almighty appeared unto me at Luz, in the land of Canaan, and blessed me, and said unto me, Behold I will make thee fruitful, and multiply thee, and I will make of thee a multitude of people, etc. There was more even than this. There was a great peculiarity in the manner in which Jacob pronounced this blessing. He crossed his hands, and laid his right hand on Ephraim, the youngest, and his left hand on Manasseh, the eldest; and when Joseph attempted to alter the position of the old mans hands, he replied, I know it, my son, I know it, etc. Such was the promise; and in the narrative before us, you see the providence. Can two things be more apparently in direct opposition? Here is a promise that Ephraim shall be more prosperous than all his brethren; and here is a providence that deprives Ephraim at once of all his property, and, as it would seem, of all his children also. Nor is this at all an unparalleled or even an uncommon case, so far as apparent contrariety between the providence and promise of God is concerned. Was it like a fulfilment of a promise made to Israel that Jehovah would give them a good and large land, flowing with milk and honey, to lead them directly into the depths of the Arabian wilderness and keep them wandering there for forty years? Was it like a fulfilment of the promise which God had made to David, that he would make him the ruler of his people, when he drove him from the court of Saul, and exposed him to imminent hazard of his life on the mountains of Israel from the persecutions of his infuriated enemy? I can appeal to the experience of every Christian. Is it not distinctly stated in Gods Word that no evil shall happen to the righteous? Is it not distinctly said, what is good God will give His people? Now, I put it to every Christian, if he has not in the course of his life met with much which at the time he could not help thinking evil for him? The reason of this apparent inconsistency of the providence with the promises of God, is by no means that there is a real opposition between them. It is the same God who speaks in His Word that works in His providence–and He is the same yesterday, to-day, and for ever. His Word and His work are really perfectly harmonious; and in many eases those dispensations, which are apparently frustrating the promise are, in reality, fulfilling it. The reason why the promise and the providence of God often seem to us to be at variance, is our ignorance of the extent and of the particular design of the Divine dispensations. If we could see the commencement, and progress, and issue of all Gods dispensations, we would gladly say, He is doing all things well, as we shall by and by be constrained to say, He has done all things well. But in the present state this must be a matter of faith, not of sense. It is the Divine appointment, that here we must walk by faith.
III. That the dissolution of those connections that bind us together in a variety of relations in human life, occasions to all rightly constituted minds severe suffering and permanent sorrow. It would be a miserable world–at least I am sure it would not be a happy one–if there were no husbands and wives, parents and children, and brothers and sisters, relative and friends. That man must be deplorably selfish, who, on reflecting on the various sources of his happiness, does not find social relation and affection one of the most copious. In proportion to the happiness springing from these relations, is the pain that is occasioned when they are dissolved, especially when they are unexpectedly and violently dissolved. Not merely are our friends the proper objects of a much stronger kind of affection than any other species of property; but their loss is of all other earthly losses the most irreparable. Our property, our reputation, our health, may be lost and regained. But a friend whom we have lost by death, we never can bring back again from the grove. (J. Brown, D. D.)
Family sorrow
I. The Cause Of Sorrow.
II. The Sympathy In The Sorrow.
III. The Remembrance Of The Sorrow.
1. Perpetuated in joy.
2. Perpetuated in sorrow. (J. Wolfendale.)
Fuente: Biblical Illustrator Edited by Joseph S. Exell
Verse 21. 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, 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 Ge 15:9-21,] but they erred, for they should have counted from the time in which Isaac was born; they went out of Egypt therefore thirty years before the period: for, thirty years before the birth of Isaac the Word of the Lord of the universe spake with Abraham between the divisions. And when they went out of Egypt, there were with them two hundred thousand warriors of the tribe of Ephraim, whom the men of Gath, the natives of the land of the Philistines, slew, because they came down that they might carry away their cattle. 22. – And Ephraim their father mourned for them many days, and all his brethren came to comfort him. 23. – And he went in to his wife, and she conceived and bare a son, and called his name Beriah, ( in evil,) because he was born in the time in which this evil happened to his house.”
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
This history is not recorded elsewhere in Scripture, but it is in the ancient Hebrew writers, though mixed with many fables. The Philistines (one of whose cities this Gath was) and the Egyptians were next neighbours; and in those ancient times it was usual for such to make inroads one into anothers country, and to carry thence what prey they could take, as we find both in Scripture and in profane writers. And as the Philistines had probably made such inroads formerly into Egypt, and particularly into the land of Goshen, which was the utmost part of Egypt bordering upon the Philistines land; so the Israelites might requite them in the like kind: and particularly the children of Ephraim, either presuming upon their numbers and strength, or having possibly received the greatest injury from the Philistines in their last invasion, might make an attempt upon the Philistines to their own great loss, as is here related. And this seems to have happened a little before the Egyptian persecution, and before the reign of that new king mentioned Exo 1:8. The Philistines are here called
the men of Gath, either because they were subject to the king of Gath, as afterwards that people were, or because they lived about Gath. And this clause,
that were born in that land, may be added emphatically, as the motive which made them more resolute and furious in their fight with the Ephraimites, because they fought in and for their own land, wherein all their wealth and concerns lay, and against those that unjustly endeavoured to turn them out of their native country.
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole
21. whom the men of Gath . . . slew,c.This interesting little episode gives us a glimpse of the stateof Hebrew society in Egypt for the occurrence narrated seems to havetaken place before the Israelites left that country. The patriarchEphraim was then alive, though he must have arrived at a veryadvanced age; and the Hebrew people, at all events those of them whowere his descendants, still retained their pastoral character. It wasin perfect consistency with the ideas and habits of Orientalshepherds that they should have made a raid on the neighboring tribeof the Philistines for the purpose of plundering their flocks. Fornothing is more common among them than hostile incursions on theinhabitants of towns, or on other nomad tribes with whom they have noleague of amity. But a different view of the incident is brought out,if, instead of “because,” we render the Hebrew particle”when” they came down to take their cattle, for the tenorof the context leads rather to the conclusion that “the men ofGath” were the aggressors, who, making a sudden foray on theEphraimite flocks, killed the shepherds including several of the sonsof Ephraim. The calamity spread a deep gloom around the tent of theiraged father, and was the occasion of his receiving visits ofcondolence from his distant relatives, according to the custom of theEast, which is remarkably exemplified in the history of Job (Job2:11; compare Joh 11:19).
Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
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, 1Ch 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 removed into Palestine, which had its name from them, of which Gath was one of its cities; and this bordering upon the land of Goshen, or being near it, where the Israelites dwelt, they made inroads upon them, and plundered them:
because they came down to take away their cattle; and the sons, the grandsons of Ephraim, resisted them, and so were slain: and that the aggressors were not the Ephraimites, who went out of Egypt before their time, and fell upon the men of Gath, born in the land of the Philistines, in order to dispossess them of their land and substance, and were slain by them, which is the sense of the Targum and other writers, both Jewish and Christian; but the men of Gath, as is clear from this circumstance, that they
came down, as men did when they went from Palestine to Egypt, not when they went from Egypt to Palestine, then they “went up”; which would have been the phrase used, if this had been an expedition of the Ephraimites into Palestine; besides, it is not reasonable to think, that the Ephraimites, addicted to husbandry and cattle, and not used to war, should engage in such an enterprise; but rather the men of Gath, or the Philistines, who were a warlike people, and given to spoil and plunder; this, according to a learned chronologer l, was seventy four years after Jacob went down to Egypt, and one hundred and forty years before the children of Israel came from thence.
l Nic. Abrami Pharus, l. 9. c. 21. p. 242.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
THE TRIBE OF EPHRAIM (1Ch. 7:20-29).
Shuthelah (Numbers 26, 35) was head of the first of the four Ephraimitic clans (mishpehth). The names of six successive chieftains of his line appear to be given in 1Ch. 7:20-21, ending with his namesake Shuthelah. It is likely, however, that these names really represent clans, as in other similar cases. (Comp. Num. 26:29-33.) Bered (Gen. 16:14) is a local name, a place in the desert of Shr. But Bered may be a mistake for Becher. So Tahath (Num. 33:26) was a desert station of Israel. But Tahath may well be a corruption of Tahan, son of Ephraim (1Ch. 7:25, and Num. 26:35).
(21) Ezer and Elead.Apparently these names are coordinated with the Shuthelah of 1Ch. 7:20, as sons of Ephraim. Elead is a masculine form of Eleadah.
Whom the men of Gath. . . .Literally, and the men of Gath who were born in the land slew them; for they had come down to take their cattle.
Born in the landThat is, aborigines of Canaan as contrasted with the Ephraimites, who were foreign invaders. Others think the real aborigines of Philistia, the Avim of Deu. 2:23, are meant. In 1Ch. 7:21-22 we have a brief memorial of an ancient raid of two Ephraimite clans upon the territory of Gath, for the purpose of lifting cattle, much as the Highland freebooters used to drive off the herds of their Lowland neighbours.
They came down.The reference of the pronoun is not quite clear. Conceivably the Gittites were the aggressors. The expression carne down is often used of going from Canaan to Egypt, but not vice versa. It can hardly, therefore, apply to an invasion of Gath by Ephraimites from Egypt. And the phrase born in the land excludes an expedition of Gittites to Goshen. It seems, then, that the descent was made upon Philistia from the hill country of Ephraim, in the early days of the settlement of the tribe in Canaan.
Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)
1Ch 7:21 And Zabad his son, and Shuthelah his son, and Ezer, and Elead, whom the men of Gath [that were] born in [that] land slew, because they came down to take away their cattle.
Ver. 21. Whom the men of Gath slew.] And no marvel; because, belike, being weary of the Egyptian servitude, and remembering that Palestina was promised to their forefathers for an inheritance, they would needs take possession thereof before the time, which rash adventure of these sons of Ephraim cost them their lives, and perhaps occasioned that cruel decree of Pharaoh, king of Egypt, against the Israelites. Exo 1:9-11 See to this purpose, Psa 78:9 . This happened about the birth of Aaron. It is not safe to break God’s prison.
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
they: i.e. the sons of Ephraim. A pre-Exodus raid, presuming perhaps on their descent from Joseph (Gen 46:20), the governor of Egypt.
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
because they came: Or rather, “when [Strong’s H3588], (kee) they came down to take away their cattle;” for it does not appear that the sons of Ephraim were the aggressors, but the men of Gath, who appear to have been born in Egypt. This is the only place in the Sacred Writings where this piece of history is mentioned, and the transaction seems to have happened before the Israelites came out of Egypt; for it appears from the following verse, that Ephraim was alive when these children of his were slain.
Reciprocal: Num 26:35 – Becher Eze 25:15 – to destroy Joh 11:19 – to comfort
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
1Ch 7:21. Whom the men of Gath slew This history is not recorded elsewhere in Scripture, but it is in the ancient Hebrew writers. The Philistines (one of whose cities Gath was) and the Egyptians were next neighbours; and in those ancient times it was usual for such to make inroads one into anothers country, and to carry thence what prey they could take. And as the Philistines had probably made such inroads formerly into Egypt, and particularly into the land of Goshen, which was the utmost part of Egypt bordering upon the Philistines land; so the Israelites might requite them in the like kind: and particularly the children of Ephraim, to their own loss. And this seems to have happened a little before the Egyptian persecution, and before the reign of that new king mentioned Exo 1:8. And this clause, that were born in the land, may be added emphatically, as the motive which made them more resolute in their fight with the Ephraimites, because they fought in and for their own land, wherein all their wealth and concerns lay.
Fuente: Joseph Bensons Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
7:21 And Zabad his son, and Shuthelah his son, and Ezer, and Elead, whom the men of {i} Gath [that were] born in [that] land slew, because they came down to take away their cattle.
(i) Which was one of the five principal cities of the Philistines and who slew the Ephraimites.