1 Kings 4:7
Verse
Context
Solomon’s Twelve Officers
6Ahishar was in charge of the palace; and Adoniram son of Abda was in charge of the forced labor.7Solomon had twelve governors over all Israel to provide food for the king and his household. Each one would arrange provisions for one month of the year, 8and these were their names: Ben-hur in the hill country of Ephraim;
Summary
Commentary
- Adam Clarke
- Keil-Delitzsch
- Jamieson-Fausset-Brown
- John Gill
- Tyndale
Adam Clarke Bible Commentary
Twelve officers - The business of these twelve officers was to provide daily, each for a month, those provisions which were consumed in the king's household; see Kg1 4:22, Kg1 4:23. And the task for such a daily provision was not an easy one.
Carl Friedrich Keil and Franz Delitzsch Old Testament Commentary
Solomon's Official Persons and Their Districts. - Kg1 4:7. Solomon had (appointed) twelve נצּבים over all Israel, who provided (כּלכּלוּ) for the king and his house, i.e., supplied provisions for the necessities of the court. These prefects are not to be regarded as "chamberlains," or administrators of the royal domains (Michaelis and Ewald), for these are mentioned in Ch1 27:25. under a different title. They are "general receivers of taxes," or "chief tax-collectors," as Rosenmller expresses it, who levied the king's duties or taxes, which consisted in the East, as they still do to the present time, for the most part of natural productions, or the produce of the land, and not of money payments as in the West, and delivered them at the royal kitchen (Rosenmller, A. und N. Morgenland, iii. p. 166). It cannot be inferred from the explanation given by Josephus, ἡγεμόνες καὶ στρατηγοί, that they exercised a kind of government, as Thenius supposes, since this explanation is nothing but a subjective conjecture. "One month in the year was it every one's duty (אחד על יהיה) to provide." The districts assigned to the twelve prefects coincide only partially with the territories of the tribes, because the land was probably divided among them according to its greater or smaller productiveness. Moreover, the order in which the districts are enumerated is not a geographical one, but probably follows the order in which the different prefects had to send the natural productions month by month for the maintenance of the king's court. The description begins with Ephraim in Ch1 27:8, then passes over in Ch1 27:9 to the territory of Dan to the west of it, in Ch1 27:10 to the territory of Judah and Simeon on the south, in Ch1 27:11 and Ch1 27:12 to the territory of Manasseh on this side from the Mediterranean to the Jordan, then in vv. 13 and 14 to the territory of Manasseh on the other side of the Jordan, thence back again in vv. 15 and 16 to the northern parts of the land on this side, viz., the territories of Naphtali and Asher, and thence farther south to Issachar in v. 17, and Benjamin in v. 18, closing at last in v. 19 with Gilead. Kg1 4:8 In the names of the prefects we are struck with the fact, that in the case of five of them the names given are not their own but their fathers' names. It is very improbable that the proper names should have dropped out five times (as Clericus, Michaelis, and others suppose); and consequently there is simply the assumption left, that the persons in question bore their fathers' names with Ben prefixed as their own proper names: Benhur, Bendeker, etc., after the analogy of Benchanan in Ch1 4:20 and others, although such a proper name as Ben-Abinadab (Ch1 4:11) appears very strange. Benhur was stationed on the mountains of Ephraim. These mountains, here only the mountainous district of the tribe of Ephraim, were among the most fruitful portions of Palestine (see at Jos 17:14-15). Kg1 4:9 Bendeker was in Makaz, a city only mentioned here, the situation of which is unknown, but which is at any rate to be sought for in the tribe of Dan, to which the other cities of this district belong. Shaalbim has probably been preserved in the present Selbit, to the north-west of Ylo (see at Jos 19:42). Bethshemesh, the present Ain-Shems (see at Jos 15:10). Elon (אילון), which is distinguished from Ajalon (Jos 19:42 and Jos 19:43) by the epithet Bethchanan, and belonged to the tribe of Dan, has not yet been discovered (see at Jos 19:43). The lxx have arbitrarily interpolated ἕως before Bethchanan, and Thenius naturally takes this under his protection, and consequently traces Bethchanan in the village of Beit Hunn (Rob. Pal. ii. p. 371), but without considering that ἕως yields no reasonable sense unless preceded by מן, ἐκ (from; cf. Kg1 4:12). Kg1 4:10 Benhesed was in Arubboth, which does not occur again, so that its situation, even if it should be identical with Arab in Jos 15:52, as Bttcher conjectures, can only be approximatively inferred from the localities which follow. To him (לו), i.e., to his district, belonged Sochoh and all the land of Hepher. From Sochoh we may see that Benhesed's district was in the tribe of Judah. Of the two Sochohs in Judah, that still exist under the name of Shuweikeh, it is impossible to determine with certainty which is intended here, whether the one upon the mountains (Jos 15:48) or the one in the plain (Jos 15:35). The fact that it is associated with the land of Hepher rather favours the latter. The land of Hepher, which must not be confounded with the city of Gath-hepher in the tribe of Zebulun (Jos 19:13; Kg2 14:25), but was the territory of one of the Canaanitish kings who were defeated by Joshua, was probably situated in the plain (see at Jos 12:17). Kg1 4:11 Ben-Abinadab had the whole of the high range of Dor (דּאר נפת, Jos 12:23), i.e., the strip of coast on the Mediterranean Sea below the promontory of Carmel, where the city of Dor, which has been preserved in the village of Tantura or Tortura, nine miles to the north of Caesarea, was situated (see at Jos 11:2). Whether this district embraced the fruitful plain of Sharon is not so clearly made out as Thenius supposes. בּן־אבינדב stands at the head absolutely, without any grammatical connection with כּל־נפת: "Abinadab: the whole of the high range of Dor," etc. The person named was probably a son of David's eldest brother but one (Sa1 16:8; Sa1 17:13), and therefore Solomon's cousin; and he had married Solomon's daughter. Kg1 4:12 Baana the son of Ahilud was most likely a brother of Jehoshaphat the chancellor (Kg1 4:3). This district embraced the cities on the southern edge of the plain of Jezreel, and extended to the Jordan. Taanach and Megiddo, which have been preserved in the villages of Taanuk and Lejun, were situated on the south-western border of this plain, and belonged to the Manassites (see at Jos 12:21; Jos 17:11). "And all Bethshean," in other words, the whole of the district of Bethshean, i.e., Beisan, at the eastern end of the valley of Jezreel, where it opens into the Jordan valley (Rob. Pal. ii. p. 740ff.), "which (district was situated) by the side of Zarthan below Jezreel, from (the town of) Bethshean (see at Jos 17:11) to Abel-Mecholah, on the other side of Jokmeam." Zarthan, also called Zereda (compare Kg1 7:46 with Ch2 4:17), has probably been preserved, so far as the name is concerned, in Kurn Sartabeh, in the neighbourhood of which the old city probably stood, about five miles to the south of Beisan, at a point where the Jordan valley contracts (see at Jos 3:16). The expression "below Jezreel" refers to "all Bethshean," and may be explained from the elevated situation of Jezreel, the present Zern (see at Jos 19:18). According to Rob. iii. p. 163, this is "comparatively high, and commands a wide and noble view, extending down the broad low valley on the east of Beisan and to the mountains of Ajlun beyond the Jordan." The following words, "from Bethshean to Abel-Mecholah," give a more precise definition of the boundary. The lxx have erroneously inserted καὶ before מבּית־שׁאן, and Thenius and Bttcher defend it on the strength of their erroneous interpretations of the preceding statements. Abel-Mecholah was in the Jordan valley, according to the Onomast., ten Roman miles to the south of Beisan (see at Jdg 7:22). The last clause is not quite intelligible to us, as the situation of the Levitical city Jokmeam (Ch1 6:53, or Kibzaim, a different place from the Jokneam on Carmel, Jos 12:22; Jos 21:34) has not yet been discovered (see at Jos 21:22). According to this, Baanah's district in the Jordan valley did not extend so far as Kurn Sartabeh, but simply to the neighbourhood of Zarthan, and embraced the whole of the tribe-territory of Manasseh on this side of the Jordan. Kg1 4:13 Bengeber was in Ramoth of Gilead in the tribe of Gad (Jos 20:8), probably on the site of the modern Szalt (see at Deu 4:43). "To him belonged the Havvoth Jair (Jair's-lives) in Gilead, to him the region of Argob in Bashan, sixty great cities with walls and brazen bolts." If we look at this passage alone, the region of Argob in Bashan appears to be distinct from the Havvoth Jair in Gilead. But if we compare it with Num 32:40-41; Deu 3:4-5, and Deu 3:13, Deu 3:14, and Jos 13:30, it is evident from these passages that the Jair's-lives are identical with the sixty large and fortified cities of the region of Argob. For, according to Deu 3:4, these sixty fortified cities, with high walls, gates, and bars, were all fortified cities of the kingdom of Og of Bashan, which the Israelites conquered under Moses, and to which, according to Num 32:41, Jair the Manassite, who had conquered them, gave the name of Havvoth Jair. Hence it is stated in Jos 13:30, that the sixty Jair-towns were situated in Bashan. Consequently the אר חבל לו in our verse is to be taken as a more precise definition of וגו יאיר חוּת לו, or a clearer description of the district superintended by Bengeber, so that Gilead is used, as is frequently the case, in the broader sense of Peraea. Compare with this the Commentary on Deu 3:4, Deu 3:13, Deu 3:14, where the names ארגּב and חוּת are explained, and the imaginary discrepancy between the sixty Jair's-towns in the passages cited, and the twenty-three and thirty cities of Jair in Ch1 2:22 and Jdg 10:4, is discussed and solved. And when Thenius objects to this explanation on the ground that the villages of Jair cannot be identical with the sixty fortified cities, because villages of nomads and strongly fortified cities could not be one and the same, this objection falls to the ground with the untenable interpretation of חוּת as applying to nomad villages. Kg1 4:14 Ahinadab the son of Iddo received as his district Mahanaim, a fortified and probably also a very important city to the north of the Jabbok, on the border of the tribe of Gad, which may perhaps have been preserved in the ruin of Mahneh (see at Jos 13:26 and Gen 32:3). מחנימה, to Mahanaim (cf. Ewald, 216, a., note), with ה local, probably referring to the fact that Ahinadab was sent away to Mahanaim. Kg1 4:15 Ahimaaz, possibly Zadok's son (Sa2 15:27; Sa2 17:17.), in Naphtali. This does not denote generally "the most northern portion of the land, say from the northern end of the lake of Gennesaret into Coele-Syria," as Thenius supposes; for the tribe-territory of Asher, which had a prefect of its own, was not situated to the south-west of Naphtali, but ran along the west of Naphtali to the northern boundary of Canaan (see at Jos 19:24-31). He also (like Ben-Abinadab, Kg1 4:11) had a daughter of Solomon, Basmath, as his wife. Kg1 4:16 Baanah the son of Hushai, probably the faithful friend and wise counsellor of David (Sa2 15:32., Kg1 17:5.), was in Asher and בּעלות, a name quite unknown. If בּ forms part of the word (Baaloth, according to the lxx, Vulg., Syr., and Arab.), we must take it as a district, since the preposition בּ would necessarily have been repeated if a district (Asher) had been connected with a town (Baaloth). In any case, it is not the city of Baaloth in the Negeb of Judah (Jos 15:24) that is intended. Kg1 4:17 Jehoshaphat the son of Paruach, in Issachar; i.e., over the whole of the territory of that tribe in the plain of Jezreel, with the exception of the cities of Taanach, Megiddo, and Bethshean, which were in the southern portion of it, and were allotted to the Manassites, and, according to Kg1 4:12, were put under the care of Baanah; and not merely in the northern part of Issachar, "with the exception of the plain of Jezreel," as Thenius erroneously maintains. Zebulun may possibly have also formed part of his district, if not entirely, yet in its southern portion, provided that the northern portion was assigned to Ahimaaz in Naphtali, since Zebulun had no prefect of its own. Kg1 4:18 Shimei the son of Elah, possibly the one mentioned in Kg1 1:8, in Benjamin. Kg1 4:19 Geber the son of Uri, in the land of Gilead, i.e., as the apposition "the land of Sihon ... and of Og..." clearly shows, the whole of the Israelitish land on the east of the Jordan, as in Deu 34:1; Jdg 20:1, etc., with the simple exception of the districts placed under Bengeber and Ahinadab (Kg1 4:13 and Kg1 4:14). אחד נציב, "one president was it who (was) in the land (of Gilead)." נציב cannot signify a military post or a garrison here, as in Sa1 10:5; Sa1 13:3, etc., but is equivalent to נצּב, the president (Kg1 4:7). The meaning is, that notwithstanding the great extent of this district, it had only one prefect.
Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary
HIS TWELVE OFFICERS. (Kg1 4:7-21) Solomon had twelve officers over all Israel--The royal revenues were raised according to the ancient, and still, in many parts, existing usage of the East, not in money payments, but in the produce of the soil. There would be always a considerable difficulty in the collection and transmission of these tithes (Sa1 8:15). Therefore, to facilitate the work, Solomon appointed twelve officers, who had each the charge of a tribe or particular district of country, from which, in monthly rotation, the supplies for the maintenance of the king's household were drawn, having first been deposited in "the store cities" which were erected for their reception (Kg1 9:19; Ch2 8:4, Ch2 8:6).
John Gill Bible Commentary
And these are their names,.... Or rather the names of their fathers; for of many of them not their own names but their fathers' names are given, as being well known: the son of Hur, in Mount Ephraim; a fruitful country in the tribe of Ephraim, from whence this officer was to furnish the king with provisions for one month in the year.
Tyndale Open Study Notes
4:7-19 The twelve district governors probably handled lesser administrative duties, such as securing revenue and providing food for the king’s household. Solomon’s twelve districts did not exactly coincide with the old tribal allotments.
1 Kings 4:7
Solomon’s Twelve Officers
6Ahishar was in charge of the palace; and Adoniram son of Abda was in charge of the forced labor.7Solomon had twelve governors over all Israel to provide food for the king and his household. Each one would arrange provisions for one month of the year, 8and these were their names: Ben-hur in the hill country of Ephraim;
- Scripture
- Sermons
- Commentary
- Adam Clarke
- Keil-Delitzsch
- Jamieson-Fausset-Brown
- John Gill
- Tyndale
Adam Clarke Bible Commentary
Twelve officers - The business of these twelve officers was to provide daily, each for a month, those provisions which were consumed in the king's household; see Kg1 4:22, Kg1 4:23. And the task for such a daily provision was not an easy one.
Carl Friedrich Keil and Franz Delitzsch Old Testament Commentary
Solomon's Official Persons and Their Districts. - Kg1 4:7. Solomon had (appointed) twelve נצּבים over all Israel, who provided (כּלכּלוּ) for the king and his house, i.e., supplied provisions for the necessities of the court. These prefects are not to be regarded as "chamberlains," or administrators of the royal domains (Michaelis and Ewald), for these are mentioned in Ch1 27:25. under a different title. They are "general receivers of taxes," or "chief tax-collectors," as Rosenmller expresses it, who levied the king's duties or taxes, which consisted in the East, as they still do to the present time, for the most part of natural productions, or the produce of the land, and not of money payments as in the West, and delivered them at the royal kitchen (Rosenmller, A. und N. Morgenland, iii. p. 166). It cannot be inferred from the explanation given by Josephus, ἡγεμόνες καὶ στρατηγοί, that they exercised a kind of government, as Thenius supposes, since this explanation is nothing but a subjective conjecture. "One month in the year was it every one's duty (אחד על יהיה) to provide." The districts assigned to the twelve prefects coincide only partially with the territories of the tribes, because the land was probably divided among them according to its greater or smaller productiveness. Moreover, the order in which the districts are enumerated is not a geographical one, but probably follows the order in which the different prefects had to send the natural productions month by month for the maintenance of the king's court. The description begins with Ephraim in Ch1 27:8, then passes over in Ch1 27:9 to the territory of Dan to the west of it, in Ch1 27:10 to the territory of Judah and Simeon on the south, in Ch1 27:11 and Ch1 27:12 to the territory of Manasseh on this side from the Mediterranean to the Jordan, then in vv. 13 and 14 to the territory of Manasseh on the other side of the Jordan, thence back again in vv. 15 and 16 to the northern parts of the land on this side, viz., the territories of Naphtali and Asher, and thence farther south to Issachar in v. 17, and Benjamin in v. 18, closing at last in v. 19 with Gilead. Kg1 4:8 In the names of the prefects we are struck with the fact, that in the case of five of them the names given are not their own but their fathers' names. It is very improbable that the proper names should have dropped out five times (as Clericus, Michaelis, and others suppose); and consequently there is simply the assumption left, that the persons in question bore their fathers' names with Ben prefixed as their own proper names: Benhur, Bendeker, etc., after the analogy of Benchanan in Ch1 4:20 and others, although such a proper name as Ben-Abinadab (Ch1 4:11) appears very strange. Benhur was stationed on the mountains of Ephraim. These mountains, here only the mountainous district of the tribe of Ephraim, were among the most fruitful portions of Palestine (see at Jos 17:14-15). Kg1 4:9 Bendeker was in Makaz, a city only mentioned here, the situation of which is unknown, but which is at any rate to be sought for in the tribe of Dan, to which the other cities of this district belong. Shaalbim has probably been preserved in the present Selbit, to the north-west of Ylo (see at Jos 19:42). Bethshemesh, the present Ain-Shems (see at Jos 15:10). Elon (אילון), which is distinguished from Ajalon (Jos 19:42 and Jos 19:43) by the epithet Bethchanan, and belonged to the tribe of Dan, has not yet been discovered (see at Jos 19:43). The lxx have arbitrarily interpolated ἕως before Bethchanan, and Thenius naturally takes this under his protection, and consequently traces Bethchanan in the village of Beit Hunn (Rob. Pal. ii. p. 371), but without considering that ἕως yields no reasonable sense unless preceded by מן, ἐκ (from; cf. Kg1 4:12). Kg1 4:10 Benhesed was in Arubboth, which does not occur again, so that its situation, even if it should be identical with Arab in Jos 15:52, as Bttcher conjectures, can only be approximatively inferred from the localities which follow. To him (לו), i.e., to his district, belonged Sochoh and all the land of Hepher. From Sochoh we may see that Benhesed's district was in the tribe of Judah. Of the two Sochohs in Judah, that still exist under the name of Shuweikeh, it is impossible to determine with certainty which is intended here, whether the one upon the mountains (Jos 15:48) or the one in the plain (Jos 15:35). The fact that it is associated with the land of Hepher rather favours the latter. The land of Hepher, which must not be confounded with the city of Gath-hepher in the tribe of Zebulun (Jos 19:13; Kg2 14:25), but was the territory of one of the Canaanitish kings who were defeated by Joshua, was probably situated in the plain (see at Jos 12:17). Kg1 4:11 Ben-Abinadab had the whole of the high range of Dor (דּאר נפת, Jos 12:23), i.e., the strip of coast on the Mediterranean Sea below the promontory of Carmel, where the city of Dor, which has been preserved in the village of Tantura or Tortura, nine miles to the north of Caesarea, was situated (see at Jos 11:2). Whether this district embraced the fruitful plain of Sharon is not so clearly made out as Thenius supposes. בּן־אבינדב stands at the head absolutely, without any grammatical connection with כּל־נפת: "Abinadab: the whole of the high range of Dor," etc. The person named was probably a son of David's eldest brother but one (Sa1 16:8; Sa1 17:13), and therefore Solomon's cousin; and he had married Solomon's daughter. Kg1 4:12 Baana the son of Ahilud was most likely a brother of Jehoshaphat the chancellor (Kg1 4:3). This district embraced the cities on the southern edge of the plain of Jezreel, and extended to the Jordan. Taanach and Megiddo, which have been preserved in the villages of Taanuk and Lejun, were situated on the south-western border of this plain, and belonged to the Manassites (see at Jos 12:21; Jos 17:11). "And all Bethshean," in other words, the whole of the district of Bethshean, i.e., Beisan, at the eastern end of the valley of Jezreel, where it opens into the Jordan valley (Rob. Pal. ii. p. 740ff.), "which (district was situated) by the side of Zarthan below Jezreel, from (the town of) Bethshean (see at Jos 17:11) to Abel-Mecholah, on the other side of Jokmeam." Zarthan, also called Zereda (compare Kg1 7:46 with Ch2 4:17), has probably been preserved, so far as the name is concerned, in Kurn Sartabeh, in the neighbourhood of which the old city probably stood, about five miles to the south of Beisan, at a point where the Jordan valley contracts (see at Jos 3:16). The expression "below Jezreel" refers to "all Bethshean," and may be explained from the elevated situation of Jezreel, the present Zern (see at Jos 19:18). According to Rob. iii. p. 163, this is "comparatively high, and commands a wide and noble view, extending down the broad low valley on the east of Beisan and to the mountains of Ajlun beyond the Jordan." The following words, "from Bethshean to Abel-Mecholah," give a more precise definition of the boundary. The lxx have erroneously inserted καὶ before מבּית־שׁאן, and Thenius and Bttcher defend it on the strength of their erroneous interpretations of the preceding statements. Abel-Mecholah was in the Jordan valley, according to the Onomast., ten Roman miles to the south of Beisan (see at Jdg 7:22). The last clause is not quite intelligible to us, as the situation of the Levitical city Jokmeam (Ch1 6:53, or Kibzaim, a different place from the Jokneam on Carmel, Jos 12:22; Jos 21:34) has not yet been discovered (see at Jos 21:22). According to this, Baanah's district in the Jordan valley did not extend so far as Kurn Sartabeh, but simply to the neighbourhood of Zarthan, and embraced the whole of the tribe-territory of Manasseh on this side of the Jordan. Kg1 4:13 Bengeber was in Ramoth of Gilead in the tribe of Gad (Jos 20:8), probably on the site of the modern Szalt (see at Deu 4:43). "To him belonged the Havvoth Jair (Jair's-lives) in Gilead, to him the region of Argob in Bashan, sixty great cities with walls and brazen bolts." If we look at this passage alone, the region of Argob in Bashan appears to be distinct from the Havvoth Jair in Gilead. But if we compare it with Num 32:40-41; Deu 3:4-5, and Deu 3:13, Deu 3:14, and Jos 13:30, it is evident from these passages that the Jair's-lives are identical with the sixty large and fortified cities of the region of Argob. For, according to Deu 3:4, these sixty fortified cities, with high walls, gates, and bars, were all fortified cities of the kingdom of Og of Bashan, which the Israelites conquered under Moses, and to which, according to Num 32:41, Jair the Manassite, who had conquered them, gave the name of Havvoth Jair. Hence it is stated in Jos 13:30, that the sixty Jair-towns were situated in Bashan. Consequently the אר חבל לו in our verse is to be taken as a more precise definition of וגו יאיר חוּת לו, or a clearer description of the district superintended by Bengeber, so that Gilead is used, as is frequently the case, in the broader sense of Peraea. Compare with this the Commentary on Deu 3:4, Deu 3:13, Deu 3:14, where the names ארגּב and חוּת are explained, and the imaginary discrepancy between the sixty Jair's-towns in the passages cited, and the twenty-three and thirty cities of Jair in Ch1 2:22 and Jdg 10:4, is discussed and solved. And when Thenius objects to this explanation on the ground that the villages of Jair cannot be identical with the sixty fortified cities, because villages of nomads and strongly fortified cities could not be one and the same, this objection falls to the ground with the untenable interpretation of חוּת as applying to nomad villages. Kg1 4:14 Ahinadab the son of Iddo received as his district Mahanaim, a fortified and probably also a very important city to the north of the Jabbok, on the border of the tribe of Gad, which may perhaps have been preserved in the ruin of Mahneh (see at Jos 13:26 and Gen 32:3). מחנימה, to Mahanaim (cf. Ewald, 216, a., note), with ה local, probably referring to the fact that Ahinadab was sent away to Mahanaim. Kg1 4:15 Ahimaaz, possibly Zadok's son (Sa2 15:27; Sa2 17:17.), in Naphtali. This does not denote generally "the most northern portion of the land, say from the northern end of the lake of Gennesaret into Coele-Syria," as Thenius supposes; for the tribe-territory of Asher, which had a prefect of its own, was not situated to the south-west of Naphtali, but ran along the west of Naphtali to the northern boundary of Canaan (see at Jos 19:24-31). He also (like Ben-Abinadab, Kg1 4:11) had a daughter of Solomon, Basmath, as his wife. Kg1 4:16 Baanah the son of Hushai, probably the faithful friend and wise counsellor of David (Sa2 15:32., Kg1 17:5.), was in Asher and בּעלות, a name quite unknown. If בּ forms part of the word (Baaloth, according to the lxx, Vulg., Syr., and Arab.), we must take it as a district, since the preposition בּ would necessarily have been repeated if a district (Asher) had been connected with a town (Baaloth). In any case, it is not the city of Baaloth in the Negeb of Judah (Jos 15:24) that is intended. Kg1 4:17 Jehoshaphat the son of Paruach, in Issachar; i.e., over the whole of the territory of that tribe in the plain of Jezreel, with the exception of the cities of Taanach, Megiddo, and Bethshean, which were in the southern portion of it, and were allotted to the Manassites, and, according to Kg1 4:12, were put under the care of Baanah; and not merely in the northern part of Issachar, "with the exception of the plain of Jezreel," as Thenius erroneously maintains. Zebulun may possibly have also formed part of his district, if not entirely, yet in its southern portion, provided that the northern portion was assigned to Ahimaaz in Naphtali, since Zebulun had no prefect of its own. Kg1 4:18 Shimei the son of Elah, possibly the one mentioned in Kg1 1:8, in Benjamin. Kg1 4:19 Geber the son of Uri, in the land of Gilead, i.e., as the apposition "the land of Sihon ... and of Og..." clearly shows, the whole of the Israelitish land on the east of the Jordan, as in Deu 34:1; Jdg 20:1, etc., with the simple exception of the districts placed under Bengeber and Ahinadab (Kg1 4:13 and Kg1 4:14). אחד נציב, "one president was it who (was) in the land (of Gilead)." נציב cannot signify a military post or a garrison here, as in Sa1 10:5; Sa1 13:3, etc., but is equivalent to נצּב, the president (Kg1 4:7). The meaning is, that notwithstanding the great extent of this district, it had only one prefect.
Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary
HIS TWELVE OFFICERS. (Kg1 4:7-21) Solomon had twelve officers over all Israel--The royal revenues were raised according to the ancient, and still, in many parts, existing usage of the East, not in money payments, but in the produce of the soil. There would be always a considerable difficulty in the collection and transmission of these tithes (Sa1 8:15). Therefore, to facilitate the work, Solomon appointed twelve officers, who had each the charge of a tribe or particular district of country, from which, in monthly rotation, the supplies for the maintenance of the king's household were drawn, having first been deposited in "the store cities" which were erected for their reception (Kg1 9:19; Ch2 8:4, Ch2 8:6).
John Gill Bible Commentary
And these are their names,.... Or rather the names of their fathers; for of many of them not their own names but their fathers' names are given, as being well known: the son of Hur, in Mount Ephraim; a fruitful country in the tribe of Ephraim, from whence this officer was to furnish the king with provisions for one month in the year.
Tyndale Open Study Notes
4:7-19 The twelve district governors probably handled lesser administrative duties, such as securing revenue and providing food for the king’s household. Solomon’s twelve districts did not exactly coincide with the old tribal allotments.