Carl Friedrich Keil and Franz Delitzsch Old Testament Commentary

Among the priests there stand first, four names of sons and brethren of the high priest Jeshua, the son of Jozadak, who returned to Jerusalem with Zerubbabel. אחיו, his (Jeshua's) brethren. Judging by Ezr 2:36, these were among the descendants of Jedaiah, a section of the house of the high-priestly family (see rem. on Ezr 2:36), and were therefore distant cousins of the high priest. They gave their hands, i.e., bound themselves by shaking hands, to put away their wives, i.e., to dismiss them, and to sever them from the congregation of Israel, ואשׁמים, "and guilty a ram for their trespass," i.e., condemned to bring a ram as a trespass-offering. ואשׁמים is to be regarded as the continuation of the infinitive clause להוציא. As elsewhere, infinitive clauses are continued without anything further in the verb. finit. (comp. Ewald, 350); so here also does the adjective אשׁמים follow, requiring that להיות should be mentally supplied. איל־צאן, a ram of the flock, is, as an accusative of more exact definition, dependent on אשׁמים. This trespass-offering was imposed upon them according to the principle of the law, Lev 5:14, etc., because they had committed a מעל against the Lord, which needed expiation; see on Lev 5:14. - In what follows, only the names of the individuals, and a statement of the families they belonged to, are given, without repeating that the same obligations, namely, the dismissal of their strange wives, and the bringing of a trespass-offering, were imposed on them also, this being self-evident from the context. - Among the sons of Immer were three, among the sons of Harim five, among the sons of Pashur six offenders; in all, eighteen priests. By comparing Ezr 2:36-39, we perceive that not one of the orders of priests who returned with Zerubbabel was free from participation in this transgression. Some of the names given, Ezr 10:20-22, reappear in the lists in Neh 8:4 and Neh 10:2-9, and may belong to the same individuals.