Numbers 36:17

[Reformed Biblical] nvolve your land and people in guilt, and will certainly bring down God’s vengeance upon yourselves and them. Numbers 35:34 Be not cruel to your own land by making it a den of mu rderers. ## Numbers 36:1 NUMBERS CHAPTER 36 The inconvenience of daughters inheriting is remedied by a general command that all such marry in the tribe of their fathers, to which of them they shall think best, Num_36:1-9. They obey, Num_36:10-12. These commands God gave by Moses to Israel in the plains of Moab, Num_36:13. ## The chief fathers of the families, who had the care and management of the public affairs of that tribe committed to them. Numbers 36:2 ## Our brother, i.e. our kinsman, one of our tribe, Jos_17:2 ,3 . Numbers 36 :3 For their inheritance will pass to their children, who will be of another tribe by their father’s side, which alone is considered in this pl ace. Numbers 3 6:4 Which God appointed principally for this end, to preserve the inheritance in the hands of the tribes and families to which they were first given. Numbers 36:5 ## Their plea is just and reasonable. God did not take particular care about every occurrence that happened, or might happen, but left divers things to be found out by h

[Reformed Biblical] named or called , to wit, by Moses and by God’s appointment, to manage this affair, and others as there was occasion. Compare Num_16:2 26:9 . ## Heads of thousands. See Exo_18:21 Num_10:4. Numbers 1:17 Numbers 1:18 Numbers 1:19 Numbers 1:20 ## By their generations, Heb. to wit, their generations , i.e. the persons begotten of Reuben’s immediate children, who are here subdivided into families, and they into houses, and they into particular persons. Numbers 1:21 Numbers 1:22 Numbers 1:23 Numbers 1:24 Numbers 1:25 Numbers 1:26 Numbers 1:27 ## Far more than any other tribe, in accomplishing of Jacob’s prophecy, Ge 49 . Numbers 1:28 Numbers 1:29 Numbers 1:30 Numbers 1:31 Numbers 1:32 Numbers 1:33 ## Above eight thousand more than Manasseh, towards the accomplishment of that promise, Gen_48:20, which the devil in vain attempted to defeat by stirring up the men of Gath against them, 1Ch_7:21 ,22 Numbers 1:34 Numbers 1:35 Numbers 1:36 Numbers 1:37 The smallest number, except one, though Benjamin had more immediate children than any of his brethren, Gen_46:21; whereas Dan had but one immediate son, Gen_46:23, yet now his number is the biggest but one of all the tribes, and is almost double to that of Benjamin. Such great and strange changes God easily can, and frequently doth, make in families, 1Sa_2:5. And therefore let none boast or please themselves too much in their numerous offspring.

Verse 15. - Maachah . Of this Maachah, one among tea of the same name, nothing else is known. The Peshito Syriac makes her the mother instead of wife of Machir. The distinct mention of the marriage of a Manassite to a Benjamite woman is to be noticed. Zelophehad . The meaning of the preceding words, and the name of the second , is unintelligible. Zelophehad was son of Hephen, who was (through Gilead and Maehir) great-grandson of Manasseh ( Joshua 17:3 ). The number and names and wise appeal and success of the daughters here spoken of, are given in Joshua 17:3-6 ; Numbers 26:33 ; Numbers 27:1-11 ; Numbers 36:5-12 . 1 Chronicles 7:15

The Midianites, who were descended from Abraham through Keturah (Genesis 25:2, Genesis 25:4), had their principal settlements on the eastern side of the Elanitic Gulf, from which they spread northwards into the fields of Moab (Genesis 36:35; Numbers 22:4, Numbers 22:7; Numbers 25:6, Numbers 25:17; Numbers 31:1.; Judges 6:1.), and carried on a caravan trade through Canaan to Egypt (Genesis 37:28, Genesis 37:36; Isaiah 60:6). On the eastern side of the Elanitic Gulf, and five days' journey from Aela, there stood the town of Madian, the ruins of which are mentioned by Edrisi and Abulfeda, who also speak of a well there, from which Moses watered the flocks of his father-in-law Shoeib (i.e., Jethro). But we are precluded from fixing upon this as the home of Jethro by Exodus 3:1, where Moses is said to have come to Horeb, when he drove Jethro's sheep behind the desert. The Midianites on the eastern side of the Elanitic Gulf could not possibly have led their flocks as far as Horeb for pasturage. We must assume, therefore, that one branch of the Midianites, to whom Jethro was priest, had crossed the Elanitic Gulf, and settled in the southern half of the peninsula of Sinai (cf. Exodus 3:1). There is nothing improbable in such a supposition.