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1 Chronicles9:35–41

The Descendants of Saul

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1 Chronicles 9:35–41 — The Descendants of Saul. Each verse below carries the full apparatus: the Berean Standard Bible, the vocalized original (tap any word), and a parsed breakdown of every term transcribed from the interlinear. Synthesized commentary, canonical threads, and the reading of Christ gather at the end, over the whole unit.

35

Jeiel the father of Gibeon lived in Gibeon. His wife’s name was Maacah.

Berean Standard Bible · CC0

Hebrew — tap a word ↓

yə·ʿū·ʾēl ’ă·ḇî- ū·ḇə·ḡiḇ·‘ō·wn yā·šə·ḇū ḡiḇ·‘ō·wn ’iš·tōw wə·šêm ma·‘ă·ḵāh

Word by word8 · parsed
יְעוּאֵלyə·ʿū·ʾēlJeielH3273
√ Yᵉʻîyʼêl — Jeiel, the name of six IsraelitesNounpropermasculine singular
Yᵉʻîyʼêl: Jeiel, the name of six Israelites The name is supplied here and is absent from the parallel register. Gill notes exactly this, that the name "is not in 1 Chronicles 8:29", and gives it in the older English form Jehiel, as does Geneva. This one added word is the clearest instance of what K&D means when he says this copy rests on a document "in more complete preservation" than the one in chapter 8.
אֲבִֽי־’ă·ḇî-the fatherH1
√ ʼâb — father, in a literal and immediate, or figurative and remote applicationNounmasculine singular construct
ʼâb: father, literal or figurative The construct "father-of-Gibeon" is a title of founding, the idiom by which Chronicles keeps towns and clans in one grammar. Strong's own entry licenses the remote application, so no paternity of a person is being claimed.
וּבְגִבְע֛וֹןū·ḇə·ḡiḇ·‘ō·wnof GibeonH1391
√ Gibʻôwn — Gibon, a place in PalestineConjunctive waw, Preposition-bNounproperfeminine singular
Conjunctive waw plus beth on the place name: "and in Gibeon", the locative fronted before the verb.
יָשְׁב֥וּyā·šə·ḇūlivedH3427
√ yâshab — properly, to sit down (specifically as judgeVerbQalPerfectthird person common plural
yâshab: to sit down, to dwell, to remain The plural perfect governs a singular named head, which is how a clan is spoken of in one breath with its founder. The same verb, in the same plural perfect form, returns at verse 38 for the branch that settled in Jerusalem: yāšəḇū at Gibeon, yāšəḇū at Jerusalem. The register is built on where people sat down.
גִבְע֖וֹןḡiḇ·‘ō·wnin GibeonH1391
√ Gibʻôwn — Gibon, a place in PalestineNounproperfeminine singular
אִשְׁתּ֖וֹ’iš·tōwHis wife’sH802
√ ʼishshâh — a womanNounfeminine singular constructthird person masculine singular
ʼishshâh: a woman, a wife Construct with third masculine singular suffix, "his wife". Gill records a real difficulty: in the parallel place the same Maachah is "called his sister, as a wife sometimes is", and he points to Genesis 20:2 for the usage.
וְשֵׁ֥םwə·šêmnameH8034
√ shêm — an appellation, as amark or memorial of individualityConjunctive wawNounmasculine singular construct
מַעֲכָֽה׃ma·‘ă·ḵāhwas MaacahH4601
√ Maʻăkâh — Maakah (or Maakath), the name of a place in Syria, also of a Mesopotamian, of three Israelites, and of four Israelitesses and one Syrian womanNounproperfeminine singular
Maʻăkâh: Maacah, a name of persons and of a place The brief's lexicon spreads this name across a place in Syria, a Mesopotamian, three Israelites, four Israelite women and one Syrian woman. At the root of Saul's house stands a woman whose name the canon shares with the border country north of Israel. The Chronicler names her and moves on; I record the resonance without pressing it.
36

Abdon was his firstborn son, then Zur, Kish, Baal, Ner, Nadab,

Berean Standard Bible · CC0

Hebrew — tap a word ↓

‘aḇ·dō·wn hab·bə·ḵō·wr ū·ḇə·nōw wə·ṣūr wə·qîš ū·ḇa·‘al wə·nêr wə·nā·ḏāḇ

Word by word8 · parsed
עַבְדּ֑וֹן‘aḇ·dō·wnAbdonH5658
√ ʻAbdôwn — Abdon, the name of a place in Palestine and of four IsraelitesNounpropermasculine singular
הַבְּכ֖וֹרhab·bə·ḵō·wrwas his firstbornH1060
√ bᵉkôwr — firstbornArticleNounmasculine singular
bᵉkôwr: firstborn A common word (the brief marks it in 100 verses) doing uncommon work here: the firstborn of this house is Abdon, and the throne will run not through him but through Ner and Kish. Chronicles keeps recording birth order in a canon that repeatedly refuses to follow it.
וּבְנ֥וֹū·ḇə·nōwsonH1121
√ bên — a son (as a builder of the family name), in the widest sense (of literal and figurative relationship, including grandson, subject, nation, quality or condition, etcConjunctive wawNounmasculine singular constructthird person masculine singular
וְצ֣וּרwə·ṣūrthen ZurH6698
√ Tsûwr — Tsur, the name of a Midianite and of an IsraeliteConjunctive wawNounpropermasculine singular
Tsûwr: Zur, a Midianite and an Israelite Ellicott reads the name as the divine title Rock and compares Pedahzur and Zurishaddai. Note the honest edge in the lexicon itself: the same name is borne by a Midianite. A confessing name is not by itself a confessing man.
וְקִ֔ישׁwə·qîšKishH7027
√ Qîysh — Kish, the name of five IsraelitesConjunctive wawNounpropermasculine singular
Qîysh: Kish, the name of five Israelites A Kish stands here among Jeiel's sons, and a Kish stands at verse 39 as son of Ner and father of Saul. The unit therefore contains two positions for the name and does not reconcile them; Ellicott, working at this same verse, concedes that on his reading of the list "Ner is out of place." I record the tension rather than smooth it.
וּבַ֥עַלū·ḇa·‘alBaalH1168
√ Baʻal — Baal, a Phoenician deityConjunctive wawNounpropermasculine singular
Baʻal: Baal, a Phoenician deity The god's name, unmodified, inside the royal genealogy of Israel. It is not an isolated slip: Esh-baal closes verse 39 and Merib-baal opens verse 40. Whatever these households meant by the element, the Chronicler transmits it without erasure, and the later substitution of bosheth, shame, which the brief's own lexicon records at H792, is a confession that somebody afterward found it unbearable.
וְנֵ֖רwə·nêrNerH5369
√ Nêr — Ner, an IsraeliteConjunctive wawNounpropermasculine singular
Nêr: Ner, an Israelite Listed here as a son of Jeiel, and at verse 39 as the father of Kish. Ellicott's conjecture that Baal and Nadab were once one compound name, Baal-nadab, is offered precisely to relieve this pressure.
וְנָדָֽב׃wə·nā·ḏāḇNadabH5070
√ Nâdâb — Nadab, the name of four IsraelitesConjunctive wawNounpropermasculine singular
37

Gedor, Ahio, Zechariah, and Mikloth.

Berean Standard Bible · CC0

Hebrew — tap a word ↓

ū·ḡə·ḏō·wr wə·’aḥ·yōw ū·zə·ḵar·yāh ū·miq·lō·wṯ

Word by word4 · parsed
וּגְד֣וֹרū·ḡə·ḏō·wrGedorH1446
√ Gᵉdôr — Gedor, a place in PalestineConjunctive wawNounpropermasculine singular
וְאַחְי֔וֹwə·’aḥ·yōwAhioH283
√ ʼAchyôw — Achio, the name of three IsraelitesConjunctive wawNounpropermasculine singular
ʼAchyôw: Ahio, the name of three Israelites A rare name (the brief counts six verses) and the hinge of a real cross reference: the same pairing of Ahio with Abinadab appears in the ark narratives, which the Verifier confirms at the level of lexemes only.
וּזְכַרְיָ֖הū·zə·ḵar·yāhZechariahH2148
√ Zᵉkaryâh — Zecarjah, the name of twenty-nine IsraelitesConjunctive wawNounpropermasculine singular
Zᵉkaryâh: Zechariah, the name of twenty-nine Israelites In a list that has just spoken Baal's name aloud, a name ending in yāh sits four words later. The household carried both elements at once. That mixture, not apostasy on one side or purity on the other, is what the register actually preserves.
וּמִקְלֽוֹת׃ū·miq·lō·wṯand MiklothH4732
√ Miqlôwth — Mikloth, a place in the DesertConjunctive wawNounpropermasculine singular
Miqlôwth: Mikloth A rare name, four verses in the whole canon by the Verifier's count, and two of those four are here (this verse and the next). Structurally he is the hinge of the section: the last of Jeiel's sons to be listed, and the only one the register then follows forward, giving him a son (Shimeam) and a dwelling (Jerusalem). Rarity plus that pivot position is why the link out to 1 Chronicles 27:4 is worth recording and why it cannot be pressed into an identification.
38

Mikloth was the father of Shimeam. They too lived alongside their relatives in Jerusalem.

Berean Standard Bible · CC0

Hebrew — tap a word ↓

ū·miq·lō·wṯ hō·w·lîḏ ’eṯ- šim·’ām hêm wə·’ap̄- yā·šə·ḇū ne·ḡeḏ ’ă·ḥê·hem ḇî·rū·šā·lim ‘im- ’ă·ḥê·hem

Word by word12 · parsed
וּמִקְל֖וֹתū·miq·lō·wṯMiklothH4732
√ Miqlôwth — Mikloth, a place in the DesertConjunctive wawNounpropermasculine singular
הוֹלִ֣ידhō·w·lîḏwas the father ofH3205
√ yâlad — to bear youngVerbHifilPerfectthird person masculine singular
yâlad (Hiphil): to cause to bear, to beget This causative is the engine of the whole unit; it fires once here and three times in verse 39. Its root belongs to the mother's labour, and the Hiphil hands the act to the father, which is how Hebrew genealogy speaks of a man producing a line he did not carry in his own body.
אֶת־’eṯ-H853
√ ʼêth — properly, self (but generally used to point out more definitely the object of a verb or preposition, even or namely)Direct object marker
Direct object marker, untranslatable; it fixes Shimeam as the object of the begetting.
שִׁמְאָ֑םšim·’āmShimeamH8043
√ Shimʼâm — Shimam, an IsraeliteNounpropermasculine singular
הֵ֗םhêmTheyH1992
√ hêm — they (only used when emphatic)Pronounthird person masculine plural
וְאַף־wə·’ap̄-tooH637
√ ʼaph — meaning accession (used as an adverb or conjunction)Conjunction
Conjunction ʼaph, "also, even": the little word that ties this branch to the ones already settled.
יָשְׁב֥וּyā·šə·ḇūlivedH3427
√ yâshab — properly, to sit down (specifically as judgeVerbQalPerfectthird person common plural
נֶ֧גֶדne·ḡeḏalongsideH5048
√ neged — a front, iPreposition
neged: a front, in front of, over against A preposition of visibility. These kinsmen are not merely near their brothers, they are in their sight; the second half of the verse then adds ʻim, with, so that proximity and company are both recorded.
אֲחֵיהֶ֛ם’ă·ḥê·hemtheir relativesH251
√ ʼâch — a brother (used in the widest sense of literal relationship and metaphorical affinity or resemblance (like father))Nounmasculine plural constructthird person masculine plural
ʼâch: a brother, in the widest sense Construct plural with third masculine plural suffix. The brief's lexicon widens the word beyond blood to "metaphorical affinity or resemblance", which is exactly how a register of returning families needs it: brothers by house, by town, by tribe.
בִירֽוּשָׁלִַ֖םḇî·rū·šā·limin JerusalemH3389
√ Yᵉrûwshâlaim — Jerushalaim or Jerushalem, the capital city of PalestinePreposition-bNounproperfeminine singular
Yᵉrûwshâlaim: Jerusalem The city enters this Benjamite list without comment. The house of Saul's kindred sat in the city where the house of David would reign; Chronicles records the fact and leaves it standing.
עִם־‘im-H5973
√ ʻim — adverb or preposition, with (iPreposition
אֲחֵיהֶֽם׃ס’ă·ḥê·hemH251
√ ʼâch — a brother (used in the widest sense of literal relationship and metaphorical affinity or resemblance (like father))Nounmasculine plural constructthird person masculine plural
The word repeats index 8 exactly and is left unglossed in the source interlinear. The surface as captured carries a final samekh after the verse mark, the Masoretic sign of a section break: the Gibeon and Jerusalem half of the register closes here, and verse 39 begins the royal line proper.
39

Ner was the father of Kish, Kish was the father of Saul, and Saul was the father of Jonathan, Malchishua, Abinadab, and Esh-baal.

Berean Standard Bible · CC0

Hebrew — tap a word ↓

wə·nêr hō·w·lîḏ ’eṯ- qîš wə·qîš hō·w·lîḏ ’eṯ- šā·’ūl wə·šā·’ūl hō·w·lîḏ ’eṯ- yə·hō·w·nā·ṯān wə·’eṯ- mal·kî- šū·a‘ wə·’eṯ- ’ă·ḇî·nā·ḏāḇ wə·’eṯ- ’eš·bā·‘al

Word by word19 · parsed
וְנֵר֙wə·nêrNerH5369
√ Nêr — Ner, an IsraeliteConjunctive wawNounpropermasculine singular
Nêr: Ner, an Israelite Here the head of the royal line: Ner begets Kish. Verse 36 has already listed a Ner and a Kish as sons of Jeiel. The Verifier also places Kish and Ner together at 1 Samuel 14:51, where their relation has long required harmonising. None of the sources in this brief address the difficulty, and I do not resolve it.
הוֹלִ֣ידhō·w·lîḏwas the father ofH3205
√ yâlad — to bear youngVerbHifilPerfectthird person masculine singular
yâlad (Hiphil): to cause to bear Three strokes of the same verb carry the line from an obscure Benjamite to a crowned king in a single breath. This is the verse the whole repeated register exists to reach; Barnes says the chronicler re-introduces "the genealogy of the person with whose death his historical section opens."
אֶת־’eṯ-H853
√ ʼêth — properly, self (but generally used to point out more definitely the object of a verb or preposition, even or namely)Direct object marker
קִ֔ישׁqîšKishH7027
√ Qîysh — Kish, the name of five IsraelitesNounpropermasculine singular
וְקִ֖ישׁwə·qîšKishH7027
√ Qîysh — Kish, the name of five IsraelitesConjunctive wawNounpropermasculine singular
הוֹלִ֣ידhō·w·lîḏwas the father ofH3205
√ yâlad — to bear youngVerbHifilPerfectthird person masculine singular
אֶת־’eṯ-H853
√ ʼêth — properly, self (but generally used to point out more definitely the object of a verb or preposition, even or namely)Direct object marker
שָׁא֑וּלšā·’ūlSaulH7586
√ Shâʼûwl — Shaul, the name of an Edomite and two IsraelitesNounpropermasculine singular
Shâʼûwl: Saul The brief's lexicon identifies the bearers only (an Edomite and two Israelites) and offers no etymology, so I mark what follows as my own reading: the form is the passive participle of the verb to ask, "asked for", and 1 Samuel builds its account of the monarchy on a people who asked. The Chronicler spends seven verses of names to arrive at him, and then spends chapter 10 on his death.
וְשָׁא֗וּלwə·šā·’ūland SaulH7586
√ Shâʼûwl — Shaul, the name of an Edomite and two IsraelitesConjunctive wawNounpropermasculine singular
הוֹלִ֤ידhō·w·lîḏwas the father ofH3205
√ yâlad — to bear youngVerbHifilPerfectthird person masculine singular
אֶת־’eṯ-H853
√ ʼêth — properly, self (but generally used to point out more definitely the object of a verb or preposition, even or namely)Direct object marker
יְהֽוֹנָתָן֙yə·hō·w·nā·ṯānJonathanH3083
√ Yᵉhôwnâthân — Jehonathan, the name of four IsraelitesNounpropermasculine singular
Yᵉhôwnâthân: Jonathan A common name in the canon (the Verifier counts 74 verses). Here he is simply first of four sons; the next verse gives him the only surviving branch in the list.
וְאֶת־wə·’eṯ-H853
√ ʼêth — properly, self (but generally used to point out more definitely the object of a verb or preposition, even or namely)Conjunctive wawDirect object marker
מַלְכִּי־mal·kî-vvvH4444
√ Malkîyshûwaʻ — Malkishua, an IsraeliteNounpropermasculine singular
Malkîyshûwaʻ: Malchishua A rare name, five verses in all by the Verifier's count, and every occurrence sits in the story of Saul's house and its end. The rarity is what makes the link to the Gilboa narrative a genuinely verbal one.
שׁ֔וּעַšū·a‘MalchishuaH4444
√ Malkîyshûwaʻ — Malkishua, an IsraeliteConjunctive wawDirect object marker
וְאֶת־wə·’eṯ-H853
√ ʼêth — properly, self (but generally used to point out more definitely the object of a verb or preposition, even or namely)Nounpropermasculine singular
אֲבִינָדָ֖ב’ă·ḇî·nā·ḏāḇAbinadabH41
√ ʼĂbîynâdâb — Abinadab, the name of four IsraelitesConjunctive wawDirect object marker
ʼĂbîynâdâb: Abinadab, the name of four Israelites The Verifier's candidates show the name shared with the household named at 2 Samuel 6:3, 2 Samuel 6:4 and 1 Chronicles 13:7; since the lexicon counts four bearers, the shared name is not a shared man.
וְאֶת־wə·’eṯ-H853
√ ʼêth — properly, self (but generally used to point out more definitely the object of a verb or preposition, even or namely)Direct object marker
אֶשְׁבָּֽעַל׃’eš·bā·‘aland Esh-baalH792
√ ʼEshbaʻal — Eshbaal (or Ishbosheth), a son of SaulNounpropermasculine singular
ʼEshbaʻal: Eshbaal (or Ishbosheth), a son of Saul The parenthesis in Strong's own gloss is the whole story: a name built on Baal that the tradition elsewhere carries with bosheth, shame, substituted. Chronicles preserves the older, harder form and lets the reader see what was in the royal house's mouth.
40

The son of Jonathan: Merib-baal, who was the father of Micah.

Berean Standard Bible · CC0

Hebrew — tap a word ↓

ū·ḇen- yə·hō·w·nā·ṯān mə·rîḇ bā·‘al ū·mə·rî- ḇa·‘al hō·w·lîḏ ’eṯ- mî·ḵāh

Word by word9 · parsed
וּבֶן־ū·ḇen-The sonH1121
√ bên — a son (as a builder of the family name), in the widest sense (of literal and figurative relationship, including grandson, subject, nation, quality or condition, etcConjunctive wawNounmasculine singular construct
bên: a son, in the widest sense Singular, where verse 39 gave four names. After Gilboa the line narrows to one thread, and the register lets the narrowing show by grammar alone.
יְהוֹנָתָ֖ןyə·hō·w·nā·ṯānof JonathanH3083
√ Yᵉhôwnâthân — Jehonathan, the name of four IsraelitesNounpropermasculine singular
מְרִ֣יבmə·rîḇvvvH4807
√ Mᵉrîyb Baʻal — quarreller of Baal, Merib-Baal, an epithet of GideonPreposition
בָּ֑עַלbā·‘alMerib-baalH4807
√ Mᵉrîyb Baʻal — quarreller of Baal, Merib-Baal, an epithet of GideonNounpropermasculine singular
Mᵉrîyb Baʻal: Merib-baal Rare in the extreme: the Verifier counts the lexeme in two verses, which is what makes the tie to 1 Chronicles 8:34 a hard verbal link rather than a theme. Note the honest problem in the source: Strong's glosses the name "quarreller of Baal" and then attaches it to Gideon, an identification the text before us does not support.
וּמְרִי־ū·mə·rî-vvvH4810
√ Mᵉrîy Baʻal — Meri-Baal, an epithet of Gideon
בַ֖עַלḇa·‘al[who]H4810
√ Mᵉrîy Baʻal — Meri-Baal, an epithet of GideonConjunctive wawNounpropermasculine singular
Mᵉrîy Baʻal: Meri-baal A second lexeme for the same man in the same verse, one letter shorter. Two forms in adjacent clauses is the kind of detail that shows the Chronicler copying a source rather than composing a list, and it is precisely the sort of variation K&D appeals to when he argues this register descends from a different and better preserved document.
הוֹלִ֥ידhō·w·lîḏwas the father ofH3205
√ yâlad — to bear youngVerbHifilPerfectthird person masculine singular
yâlad (Hiphil): to cause to bear The fifth and last occurrence in the unit. The verb that carried the line to a throne now carries it past a lost throne into obscurity, and it does so in exactly the same words.
אֶת־’eṯ-H853
√ ʼêth — properly, self (but generally used to point out more definitely the object of a verb or preposition, even or namely)Direct object marker
מִיכָֽה׃mî·ḵāhMicahH4318
√ Mîykâh — Micah, the name of seven IsraelitesNounpropermasculine singular
Mîykâh: Micah, the name of seven Israelites The grandson of Jonathan and the point at which the register turns from kingship to survival. The name recurs across the canon in twenty nine verses by the Verifier's count, so the name alone identifies no one.
41

The sons of Micah: Pithon, Melech, Tahrea, and Ahaz.

Berean Standard Bible · CC0

Hebrew — tap a word ↓

ū·ḇə·nê mî·ḵāh pî·ṯō·wn wā·me·leḵ wə·ṯaḥ·rê·a‘

Word by word5 · parsed
וּבְנֵ֖יū·ḇə·nêThe sonsH1121
√ bên — a son (as a builder of the family name), in the widest sense (of literal and figurative relationship, including grandson, subject, nation, quality or condition, etcConjunctive wawNounmasculine plural construct
bên: sons Plural again after the single son of verse 40. The house that lost a crown did not lose its children; the register's last word about Saul's line is that it continued.
מִיכָ֑הmî·ḵāhof MicahH4318
√ Mîykâh — Micah, the name of seven IsraelitesNounpropermasculine singular
פִּית֥וֹןpî·ṯō·wnPithonH6377
√ Pîythôwn — Pithon, an IsraeliteNounpropermasculine singular
Pîythôwn: Pithon, an Israelite One of the rarest lexemes in the unit: the Verifier finds it in two verses only, this one and its twin in chapter 8. A name this rare is what turns the parallel between the two registers from an impression into a demonstrable verbal link.
וָמֶ֖לֶךְwā·me·leḵMelechH4429
√ Melek — Melek, the name of two IsraelitesConjunctive wawNounpropermasculine singular
Melek: Melek, the name of two Israelites The word is king. Whatever the parents intended, Chronicles sets the name four generations below the only king this house produced and two chapters above the kingdom's passing to David. I offer the irony as reading, not as the lexicon's claim.
וְתַחְרֵֽעַ׃wə·ṯaḥ·rê·a‘Tahrea, [and Ahaz]H8475
√ Tachrêaʻ — Tachrea, an IsraeliteConjunctive wawNounpropermasculine singular
Tachrêaʻ: Tachrea, an Israelite The last word of the Hebrew unit. What should follow is Ahaz, and it does not: Ellicott judges the name to have fallen out here, Geneva's English text still carries it, and BSB brackets it. The register that Ellicott calls the better preserved of the two ends on its own single loss.

The verse-by-verse work is done. What follows gathers the whole unit. All three layers below are machine-generated (⚙). Weigh them; they have no authority.

⚙

Grand Commentary — the unit, read whole

synthesis · verify

AI synthesis — woven from the public-domain voices above and the original text; generated and fallible.

i. A list said twice, on purpose — 35 to 38

Five of this unit's ten commentators say the same thing in different words, and they say it first: this register has been read before. Barnes calls it "An almost exact repetition of 1 Chronicles 8:29-38" and holds it to be "probably intentionally made by the author." Poole names the figure, epanalepsis, "which is frequent both in sacred and profane writers." Cambridge says it is repeated "to serve as an introduction to the story of the death of Saul." K&D agrees and adds the textual judgment that this copy descends from "another document in more complete preservation" than the one in chapter 8. Ellicott, weighing both copies, finds this one "on the whole, in better preservation" with a single loss, Ahaz. ⚙ The Hebrew supports them from underneath: verse 35 sets the clan in Gibeon with the plural perfect יָשְׁבוּ, and verse 38 sets a branch in Jerusalem with the identical form, so the two halves of the section are stitched by one verb. Gill notices the one thing the earlier copy lacks, the founder's name itself, "which is not in 1 Chronicles 8:29." A repetition that adds a name is not a copyist's stutter.

ii. Five strokes of one causative verb — 38 to 40

⚙ The register's spine is a single Hiphil: הוֹלִיד (yâlad H3205, "to bear young"), the causative that hands a mother's act to a father. It falls once at verse 38 for Mikloth, three times in verse 39 to run Ner to Kish to Saul to his four sons, and once more in verse 40 for Merib-baal. BSB renders all five as "was the father of", which is accurate and silent: a state where Hebrew has a blow struck five times. Barnes gives the reason the chain exists at all, that the chronicler "re-introduces the genealogy of the person with whose death his historical section opens"; K&D says the register "forms here the introduction to the narrative of Saul's death in 1 Chronicles 10:1-14, which in turn forms the transition to the kingship of David." ⚙ So the verb of generation is pointed at a grave. The fifth stroke is the one that matters for what comes after: after the line has been carried to a crowned king and the king has been carried to Gilboa, the same verb, unchanged, carries one surviving grandson into a list of ordinary men.

iii. Baal in the king's house, Ahaz out of the text — 36, 39 to 41

⚙ Three times in this short unit the name of a Phoenician deity stands in the ancestry and posterity of Israel's first king: Baal at verse 36 (H1168, which the brief's lexicon glosses without euphemism), Esh-baal at the end of verse 39, Merib-baal and Meri-baal twice over at verse 40. Strong's own entry at H792 carries the later fix in its parenthesis, "Eshbaal (or Ishbosheth)", the substitution of bosheth, shame, for the god's name. Chronicles does not make that substitution. It also does not moralise: four words after Baal in verse 36 stands Zur, which Ellicott reads as "a Divine title" beside Pedahzur and Zurishaddai, and one verse later stands Zechariah with the element yāh in its own letters. The house held both. At the other end, the register that Ellicott judges the better preserved of the two loses exactly one name: "Only the name of Ahaz has fallen out ( 1Chronicles 9:41 )." Geneva's English still prints it; BSB brackets it; the Hebrew words counted in this unit stop at Tahrea. ⚙ A chapter about knowing who belongs, as Henry reads it, ends by showing that the record itself has a hole in it.

Read under Sola Scriptura — this tool’s own fallible reading (⚙)

⚙ This is the tool's own fallible reading, offered to be tested. Scripture here does almost nothing that we would call writing: it repeats a list, and the repetition is the argument. Poole is right to call it epanalepsis, a resumption made on purpose, and Barnes and K&D are right that it is aimed at chapter 10, where Saul dies. What I want to press is what the aim costs the list. The Chronicler had every reason to clean this register. He could have dropped Baal from the ancestry, replaced Esh-baal with the form that says shame, harmonised the Kish of verse 36 with the Kish of verse 39, and supplied the Ahaz his other copy has. He did none of it. He handed on a house with a foreign god's name in its mouth, an unresolved seam in its middle, and a hole at its end, and then told the story of its death. That is a canon that does not protect itself. And the plainest reading of why such a list was kept is Henry's: it was "to direct the Jews, when they returned out of captivity, with whom to unite, and where to reside." Men coming home from Babylon needed to know whose they were, and God gave them, for that purpose, an honest record rather than a flattering one. ⚙ I take this to be the register's own theology: the God who is "the God of order", in Henry's phrase, keeps order by telling the truth about a failed house, and by keeping, in the last three verses, a line that no longer rules and is still written down.

Not Scripture, a reading offered for testing: the Chronicler copied the house of Saul twice and corrected neither copy, because a record that flatters cannot tell a returning exile who he is.

⚙

Canonical Threads — out to the whole of Scripture

cross-refs · verify

AI-generated connections. Each carries a verification badge with a recorded basis; contested links are flagged.

The same register, copied twice verbal / quotation: confirmed

This unit is a second copy of the Benjamite and Saulide register in 1 Chronicles 8, and the link is not an impression but a measurable one. The Verifier's candidates return the rare lexemes shared with 8:33, 8:34 and 8:35: מְרִיב בַּעַל (H4807, in 2 verses in the whole canon), פִּיתוֹן (H6377, in 2 verses), and מַלְכִּי־שׁוּעַ (H4444, in 5). Names that occur in only two verses of Scripture, appearing here and there, make the two passages one text. The commentators say so independently and unanimously: Barnes ("An almost exact repetition"), Poole (epanalepsis), Cambridge, Ellicott, Gill and K&D. Ellicott adds the caution that keeps this from being a mechanical copy: "The correspondence of the two lists appears to be too exact to justify an assumption of different original sources", yet K&D argues from the deviations that this copy rests on a better preserved document. Both cannot be pressed at once, and the brief's sources do not settle it.

1 Chronicles 8:33 · 1 Chronicles 8:34 · 1 Chronicles 8:35

basis: Verifier: shared Hebrew lexemes H4807 Mᵉrîyb Baʻal (in 2 vv), H6377 Pîythôwn (in 2 vv), H4444 Malkîyshûwaʻ (in 5 vv), H7027 Qîysh (in 17 vv), H5369 Nêr (in 16 vv), H4318 Mîykâh (in 29 vv). Two of the lexemes occur in only two verses of the canon, so this is a verbal identity of text, not a shared theme; no quotation of one book by another is claimed, since both passages are in Chronicles.

The four names that end on Gilboa verbal / quotation: confirmed

Verse 39 names Saul's sons: Jonathan, Malchishua, Abinadab, Esh-baal. Three of those names recur together in the narrative of Saul's death, which the Verifier confirms at 1 Samuel 31:2 and 1 Chronicles 10:2 through the rare lexeme מַלְכִּי־שׁוּעַ (H4444, in 5 verses in all) together with H3083 Jonathan, H41 Abinadab and H7586 Saul. ⚙ Every occurrence of Malchishua's name in Scripture belongs to the story of this one house and its end, which is what makes the link verbal rather than thematic. The commentators name the same connection from the other direction: Barnes says the chronicler re-introduces the genealogy "of the person with whose death his historical section opens", K&D that it introduces "the narrative of Saul's death in 1 Chronicles 10:1-14", Cambridge that it serves "as an introduction to the story of the death of Saul." The list is a roll call read out just before the battle.

1 Samuel 31:2 · 1 Chronicles 10:2

basis: Verifier: shared Hebrew lexemes H4444 Malkîyshûwaʻ (in 5 vv, rare), H3083 Yᵉhôwnâthân (in 74 vv), H41 ʼĂbîynâdâb (in 11 vv), H7586 Shâʼûwl (in 335 vv). The rare lexeme carries the link; it is a verbal (shared-name) link within Hebrew Scripture, and no citation of one passage by the other is claimed.

Kish and Ner, arranged twice structural / thematic: confirmed

Verse 36 lists both Kish and Ner among the sons of Jeiel; verse 39 makes Ner the father of Kish. The unit therefore holds two arrangements of the same two names without reconciling them, and Ellicott, working at verse 36, admits the strain openly: on his conjecture that Baal and Nadab were once the single name Baal-nadab, "In that case Ner is out of place." The Verifier puts the same two lexemes together again at 1 Samuel 14:51 and 1 Chronicles 26:28. ⚙ I note the tension and leave it; none of the ten commentators in this brief resolves it, and I will not manufacture a harmony they declined to offer.

1 Samuel 14:51 · 1 Chronicles 26:28

basis: Verifier: shared Hebrew lexemes H7027 Qîysh (in 17 vv) and H5369 Nêr (in 16 vv) at both references. The lexemes are confirmed; the relation of the two men is what differs between passages, so the link is a shared configuration of names, not a quotation, and no harmonisation is asserted.

Ahio and Abinadab, two names that travel together structural / thematic: confirmed

Ahio (H283, a rare lexeme, 6 verses) stands at verse 37 and Abinadab (H41, 11 verses) at verse 39. The Verifier finds that same pair of names together at 2 Samuel 6:3, 2 Samuel 6:4 and 1 Chronicles 13:7, which is the ark narrative as I recall it, though this brief carries no text from 2 Samuel and I do not quote it. ⚙ The lexemes are certain; the men are not. The brief's own lexicon says Abinadab is "the name of four Israelites", so a shared name here is not a shared person, and not one of this unit's commentators draws the connection. What can honestly be said is that two uncommon names recur as a pair in a Benjamite setting, and that the reader who follows the link should expect a different household at the other end.

2 Samuel 6:3 · 2 Samuel 6:4 · 1 Chronicles 13:7

basis: Verifier: shared Hebrew lexemes H283 ʼAchyôw (in 6 vv) and H41 ʼĂbîynâdâb (in 11 vv) at all three references. The pairing of two uncommon names is the recorded pattern; no identification of the persons is claimed, and the lexicon itself records four bearers of Abinadab.

Mikloth, and a name too rare to ignore and too bare to trust flagged: verify source

Mikloth (H4732) is one of the rarest lexemes in the unit: four verses in the whole canon by the Verifier's count, two of them here (verses 37 and 38). The Verifier's strongest non-Chronicles-8 candidate is 1 Chronicles 27:4, where the name appears twice in David's military rota. ⚙ The lexeme link is exact. The identification is not: a Benjamite of Gibeon in a register of Saul's kindred and an officer in David's standing divisions may or may not be one man, and no commentator in this brief addresses it at all. I record the link and flag it rather than build on it.

1 Chronicles 27:4

basis: Verifier: shared Hebrew lexeme H4732 Miqlôwth (in 4 vv, rare), counted twice at the reference. The lexeme is confirmed, but the claim a reader would want (that the same man is meant) is unsupported by any source in this brief and is contested in the wider literature. Verify before use.

Kish and the forty years, read in a synagogue flagged: verify source

⚙ The one place the New Testament is commonly said to reach back into this exact genealogy is Paul's survey of Israel's history at Pisidian Antioch, where Saul is identified as the son of Kish, of the tribe of Benjamin. If that is what Acts 13:21 says, then the apostolic preaching used the same two names this verse 39 joins, and used them for the same purpose Barnes and K&D assign to the Chronicler: to get from a king who failed to David. I flag the link rather than assert it. It is not in the Verifier's candidate list, it cannot rest on shared Strong's numbers because the one text is Greek and the other Hebrew, and I am citing Acts from memory rather than from this brief, which contains no New Testament text at all.

Acts 13:21 · 1 Chronicles 9:39

basis: Not in the Verifier's candidate list and not verifiable by shared lexemes: the link is cross-Testament (Greek to Hebrew), so no verbal tier is possible in principle. The basis is the claim that Acts 13:21 names Saul son of Kish of Benjamin, which this brief does not source. Check the text before relying on it.

⚙Christ in the Unittypology · verify

AI-generated reading; weigh it against the text.

A genealogy written to end at a grave, so that another king may begin ancient/widely-held

The sources of this unit agree, with unusual unanimity, on why these seven verses exist. Barnes: the chronicler "re-introduces the genealogy of the person with whose death his historical section opens." K&D: the register "forms here the introduction to the narrative of Saul's death in 1 Chronicles 10:1-14, which in turn forms the transition to the kingship of David." Cambridge: an introduction "to the story of the death of Saul." Ellicott: "the account of that king's final ruin in 1 Chronicles 10." Gill: it is made "to lead on to and connect the following history of the kings of Judah." ⚙ Read redemptive-historically, that is the shape of the whole Old Testament in miniature: a house is named in full, honoured with its firstborn and its cities, and then set down so that the house of David may be taken up, and the line of Judah runs from there to the one whom the New Testament calls David's son. The reading is not novel; it is the settled judgment of every commentator in this brief, though each of them states it as literary purpose and the christological extension is mine.

1 Chronicles 10:2 · 1 Chronicles 9:39

A gate kept shut for a king who was not there ancient/widely-held

JFB, commenting a few verses earlier in this same chapter on the king's gate, records what the post exilic community did with a door no king used: "although there was no king in Israel on the return from the captivity, yet the old ceremonial was kept up, probably in the hope that the scepter would, ere long, be restored to the house of David." ⚙ That is the disposition in which a returned exile would copy out a dead king's family tree. The gate is kept because a king is expected; the genealogies are kept for the same reason, and Henry says the chapter's purpose was to tell the returning people "with whom to unite, and where to reside." Christians have read that expectation as answered in the one born of David's line. Two honesty notes: JFB's sentence belongs to 1 Chronicles 9:18, not to these verses, and the hope he describes is his historical reconstruction of the returnees' motive, not a statement of the text.

1 Chronicles 9:18 · 1 Chronicles 9:35

The names that had to be changed, and the Name that did not novel

⚙ This reading is mine and I mark it novel. Saul's house carries Baal's name three times in seven verses: Baal in verse 36, Esh-baal in verse 39, Merib-baal and Meri-baal in verse 40. The brief's own lexicon at H792 preserves the later correction in a parenthesis, "Eshbaal (or Ishbosheth)", where bosheth, shame, is put in the god's place: Israel's memory of its first royal family had to have a word for shame written into it. Chronicles declines to make the substitution and hands the names on unretouched. ⚙ Set against that, the canon's answer to a house whose names required covering is a king whose name required no covering and who was given a name to be confessed rather than repaired. I claim no verbal link here and none exists: the observation is the contrast between a genealogy that had to be edited for shame and a gospel that hangs on a name that never was. Tested against the text of this unit, the most that can be said is that Chronicles refused the edit.

1 Chronicles 9:39 · 1 Chronicles 9:40

Apparatus & Provenance

The biblical text is the Berean Standard Bible (BSB), public domain (CC0). Hebrew/Greek text, transliteration, morphology and Strong’s are transcribed from the Berean interlinear (CC0) + Strong’s lexicons (PD); the literal renderings, divergence notes, word notes and all synthesis are this tool’s own work (⚙) — fallible; verify them.

Named voices, quoted verbatim from public-domain works:

  • Albert Barnes, Notes on the Bible (1834)
  • Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges, — (1880s)
  • Charles Ellicott, Commentary for English Readers (1878)
  • Geneva Study Bible, Marginal Notes (1599)
  • Jamieson, Fausset & Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory (1871)
  • John Gill, Exposition of the Entire Bible (1746–63)
  • Keil & Delitzsch, Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament (1860s)
  • Matthew Henry, Concise Commentary on the Whole Bible (1706)
  • Matthew Poole, Annotations upon the Holy Bible (1685)

Text. The Hebrew of this unit ends at Tahrea in verse 41; BSB prints "[and Ahaz]" in brackets because the name stands in the parallel register and in the received English tradition (Geneva: "and Tahrea, and Ahaz") but not among the words counted here. Ellicott states the loss directly. Verse 38's last word is written in the source with a final samekh after the verse mark, the Masoretic sign of a section break; the royal line proper begins at verse 39.

The interlinear as captured. Three defects in the source data are visible and are recorded rather than repaired. (1) Verse 35 has its gloss column offset: the word parsed as conjunctive waw plus preposition beth is glossed "of Gibeon" and the bare proper noun is glossed "in Gibeon", which is the reverse of the parse. (2) In verse 39 the parse column is displaced across indices 13 to 16, where object markers are parsed as proper nouns and proper nouns as object markers, because the compound name Malchi-shua occupies two rows. (3) The gloss "vvv" at 9:39 index 13 and 9:40 indices 2 and 4 is the source's placeholder for the first element of a hyphenated name, not a Hebrew word.

Lexicon. The brief's entries for H4807 and H4810 both gloss the name as "an epithet of Gideon", which cannot be correct for Jonathan's son; the discrepancy is flagged and left unresolved, since correcting a source is not within this layer's authority. H2148, H7586 and H4429 are given in the brief as identifications only, with no etymology, so every etymological remark on Zechariah, Saul and Melech in these notes is marked as my own reading.

Sources. Ten commentators are attached to this passage, but their coverage is thin and uneven, and the reader should know it. Gill's note is the same paragraph on 9:35 repeated at every verse of the unit; so are Henry's (a single note on the whole chapter), Barnes's and K&D's. JFB's block here is his comment on 1 Chronicles 9:18, the king's gate, and says nothing about these verses; it is cited once, with that stated. Poole has text only at 9:35 and explicitly none at 9:36 through 9:41. Cambridge appears at 9:35 and 9:39, and its 9:35 entry is damaged ("repeated here in ler" for "in order"). Pulpit's entire entry for this unit is the cross reference "Verses 35-44. - (See last chapter, vers. 29-40.)", which is why no Pulpit voice appears. Geneva's entries at these verses are the verse text itself rather than marginal glosses, and are cited twice only as textual witnesses (Eshbaal at 9:39, Ahaz at 9:41), with that noted in place.

What is uncertain. Whether Kish and Ner stand in one relation or two (verse 36 against verse 39 and 1 Samuel 14:51); whether the Mikloth of verses 37 and 38 is the Mikloth of 1 Chronicles 27:4; whether the two copies of this register descend from one document or two, on which Ellicott and K&D pull in opposite directions. The Acts 13:21 thread is flagged because it is cited from memory and this brief carries no New Testament text.

✦ = human, public-domain source, quoted and named. ⚙ = machine synthesis, to be verified. Flagged cross-references are left visible on purpose — the verifier working in the open. “Search the Scriptures daily, whether those things were so.” (Acts 17:11)