1 Chronicles 1:20

[See comments on 1 Chronicles 1:5].

And Joktan begat Almodad, and Sheleph, and Hazarmaveth, and Jerah, No JFB commentary on these verses.

1 Chronicles 1:20 And Joktan begat Almodad, and Sheleph, and Hazarmaveth, and Jerah,Ver. 20. And Joktan begat Almodad and Sheleph, &c.] These thirteen sons of Joktan were captains of those colonies that went out of the land of Shinar, upon the dispersion of the nations into various parts of the world, according to their different languages. Whether they fell from the true religion professed by their grandfather Heber is uncertain; but from them is supposed to descend the people of East India, and of America also.

THE SONS OF SHEM, OR THE SEMITES (1 Chronicles 1:17-23). (17) Blam.—The Elamtum of the Assyrian inscription, the classic Susiana, a mountainous land eastward of Babylonia, to which it was subject in the days of Abraham (Genesis 14). The names Assurϋ, Elamϋ, Kassϋ, and Accadϋ occur together in an old Assyrian list of nations. Κlama, from which the Assyrian and Hebrew names are derived, is Accadian. The native designation was Ansan. The Sargonide kings of Assyria had frequent wars with Elam. Asshur.—Assyria proper, i.e., a district on the Tigris, about twenty-five miles long, between the thirty-sixth and thirty-seventh parallels of latitude. Asshur was the name of its older capital and tutelar god. The Semitic Assyrians appear to have been settled at Asshur as early as the nineteenth century B.C. They were emigrants from Babylonia (Genesis 10:11). The original name was A-usar, “water-meadow.” Arphaxad apparently means Babylonia, or, at least, includes it. Babylonian monarchs styled themselves “King of the Four Quarters” (of heaven); and Arphaxaa may perhaps mean land of the four quarters or sides, and be derived from the Assyrian arba-kisβdi “four sides” (Friedrich Delitzsch). More probably it is Arph-chesed, “boundary of Chaldea.” Lud, usually identified with the Lydians (Assyrian Luddi), perhaps their original home in Armenia. The name has also been compared with Rutennu, the Egyptian name of the Syrians (I and r being confused in Egyptian). But comp. Ezekiel 27:10; Ezekiel 30:5. Aram.—The high land—that is, eastern and western Syria, extending from the Tigris to the Great Sea. The name is constantly used for the Arameans, or Syrians. Uz.—An Arab tribe, called Hβsu by Esarhaddon, who reduced them. Perhaps, however, Uz (Heb., Ϋη), is the Assyrian Uηηa, a district on the Orontes, mentioned by Shalmaneser II. (B.C. 860-825). Job lived in the “land of Uz.” The remaining names appear to be also those of Arab tribes, who must have lived northward in the direction of Aram; these are called sons of Aram in Genesis 10 Hul is the Assyrian Hϋlξ’a, which formed a part of the mountain land of Kasiar or Mash (Inscription of Assurnβηirpal, B.C. 885-860). For Meshech Genesis 10 has Mash, which is compared with Mount Masius, near Nisibin. (So the Syriac and some Heb. MSS.) (18) Eber.—The land on the other side (Gr., ἡπέραν) Perζa. Here the land beyond the Euphrates is meant, from which “Abraham, the Hebrew” (i.e., Eberite), migrated. (19) Two sons.—This indicates the ancient consciousness that the Hebrew and Arabian peoples were akin. The earth was divided.—Or, divided itself. (Comp. Deuteronomy 32:7-9.) The words probably refer to a split in the population of Mesopotamia. (20) Joktan begat Almodad.—The Joktanite tribes lived along the coast of Hadhramaut (Hazarmaveth) and Yemen, in southern Arabia. The tribes of Yemen call their ancestor Qahtβn (= Joktan). The names in 1 Chronicles 1:20-21, are all explicable from Arabic sources. (22) Ebal.—Genesis 10:28. Obal, where, however, the LXX. read Εὐάλ (Ebal). The different spelling is due to the common confusion in MSS. of the Hebrew letters w and y. Both Ebal and Abimael are unknown.

Verse 20. Joktan begat Almodad] "He divided and measured the earth by lines. Sheleph; he assigned rivers to be boundaries. Hazarmaveth; he prepared a place of snares to kill by the highways. Jerah; he built inns, and when any person came to eat and drink, he gave him deadly poison, and so took his property." - T. According to these traditions, the two first were geographers; the third, a public robber; and the fourth, an unprincipled innkeeper, who gave poison to his rich guests, that he might get their property. Such things have been done even in modern times.

20. Joktan begat Almodad] All the names of the sons of Joktan here given, so far as they have been identified, represent peoples situated in S. Arabia or on the W. coast of the Red Sea lying over against S. Arabia.