14 And the Jebusite and the Amorite and the Girgashite,
And Israel sent men to Sihon, king of the Amorites, saying, Let me go through your land: we will not go into field or vine-garden, or take the water of the springs; we will go by the highway till we have gone past the limits of your land. And Sihon would not let Israel go through his land; but got all his people together and went out against Israel into the waste land, as far as Jahaz, to make war on Israel. But Israel overcame him, and took all his land from the Arnon to the Jabbok, as far as the country of the children of Ammon, for the country of the children of Ammon was strongly armed. And Israel took all their towns, living in Heshbon and all the towns and small places of the Amorites. For Heshbon was the town of Sihon, king of the Amorites, who had made war against an earlier king of Moab and taken from him all his land as far as the Arnon. So the makers of wise sayings say, Come to Heshbon, building up the town of Sihon and making it strong: For a fire has gone out of Heshbon, a flame from the town of Sihon: for the destruction of Ar in Moab, and the lords of the high places of the Arnon. Sorrow is yours, O Moab! Destruction is your fate, O people of Chemosh: his sons have gone in flight, and his daughters are prisoners, in the hands of Sihon, king of the Amorites. They are wounded with our arrows; destruction has come on Heshbon, even to Dibon; and we have made the land waste as far as Nophah, stretching out to Medeba. So Israel put up their tents in the land of the Amorites. And Moses sent men secretly to Jazer, and they took its towns, driving out the Amorites who were living there.
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Commentary on 1 Chronicles 1 Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
CHAPTER 1
1Ch 1:1-23. Adam's Line to Noah.
1. Adam, &c.—"Begat" must be understood. Only that one member of the family is mentioned, who came in the direct order of succession.
4-23. Noah, Shem, Ham, and Japheth—The three sons of this patriarch are enumerated, partly because they were the founders of the new world, and partly because the fulfilment of Noah's prophecy (Ge 9:25-27) could not otherwise appear to have been verified.
12. Casluhim (of whom came the Philistines), and Caphtorim—a better rendering is, "and Casluhim, of whom came the Philistim and Caphtorim." They were brethren, the sons of Casluhim, and at first dwelt together, whence their names are used interchangeably. The Caphtorim are described as inhabiting Azzah, or Gaza, the seat of the Philistines.
14-17. the Jebusite, &c.—At 1Ch 1:14-17 the names are not those of individuals, but of people who all sprang from Canaan; and as several of them became extinct or were amalgamated with their brethren, their national appellations are given instead of the personal names of their ancestors.
17. Uz, and Hul, and Gether, and Meshech—or, "Mash"; these were the children of Aram, and grandsons of Shem (Ge 10:23).
18. Arphaxad begat Shelah—Cainan, the father's name, is omitted here. (See Lu 3:36).
19. Peleg—(See on Ge 10:25).
22. Ebal—or, "Obal" (Ge 10:28).
1Ch 1:24-28. Shem's Line to Abraham.
24-27. Shem, &c.—This comprises a list of ten, inclusive of Abraham.
1Ch 1:29-31. Sons of Ishmael.
29. These are their generations—the heads of his twelve tribes. The great northern desert of Arabia, including the entire neck, was colonized by these tribes; and if we can recover, in the modern geography of this part of the country, Arab tribes bearing the names of those patriarchs, that is, names corresponding with those preserved in the original catalogue of Scripture, we obtain at once so many evidences, not of mere similarity, but of absolute identification [Forster].
Nebaioth—gave rise to the Nabathæans of the classic, and the Beni Nabat of Oriental writers.
Kedar—the Arab tribe, El Khedeyre, on the coast of Hedgar.
Abdeel—Abdilla, the name of a tribe in Yemen.
30. Dumah—Dumah and Tema, the great Arab tribes of Beni Teman. Thus this writer [Historical Geography of Arabia] traces the names of all the heads of the twelve tribes of Ishmael as perpetuated in the clans or tribes of the Arabs in the present day.
1Ch 1:32, 33. Sons of Keturah.
32. sons of Keturah—These became founders of nomadic tribes in the north of Arabia and Syria, as Midian of the Midianites (Ge 36:35; Jud 6:2).
and Shuah—from whom Bildad sprang (Job 2:11).
1Ch 1:34-42. Posterity of Abraham by Esau.
36. sons of Eliphaz—the tribe Adites, in the center country of the Saracens, so called from his mother, Adah (Ge 36:10).
Teman—gave rise to the land of Teman, near the head of the Red Sea.
Omar—the tribe Beni-Amma, settled at the northern point of Djebel Shera (Mount Seir).
Zephi—the tribe Dzaf.
Gatam—Katam, inhabited by the tribe Al Saruat, or "people of Sarah."
Kenaz—the tribe Aenezes, a tribe whose settlement lies in the neighborhood of Syria.
Amalek—the Beni Malak of Zohran, and the Beni Maledj of the Shat el Arab.
37. Reuel—a powerful branch of the great Aeneze tribe, the Rowalla Arabs.
Shammah—the great tribe Beni Shammar. In the same way, the names of the other kings and dukes are traced in the modern tribes of Arabia. But it is unnecessary to mention any more of these obscure nomads, except to notice that Jobab (1Ch 1:44), one of the kings of Edom, is considered to be Job, and that his seat was in the royal city of Dinahab (Ge 36:32; 1Ch 1:43), identified with O'Daeb, a well-known town in the center of Al Dahna, a great northern desert in the direction of Chaldea and the Euphrates [Forster].