Joel the chief - "Joel, prince of the Sanhedrin; and Shapham, master of the college; and Jaanai and Shaphat, judges in Mathnan." - T.

Joel the chief,.... In this and the following verse are reckoned up the principal men in the tribe of Gad, and the chief of all was Joel, another from him in the tribe of Reuben, 1 Chronicles 5:4.

and Shapham the next; the second chief man, from whom, Reland (x) conjectures, Shophan, a city in the tribe of Gad, had its name, Numbers 32:35.

and Jaanai; from whom Danjaan might be called, as Michaelis intimates, 2 Samuel 24:6.

and Shaphat in Bashan; not Shaphat the father of Elisha, according to a tradition of the Jews, mentioned by Kimchi; which is not at all probable.

(x) Palestin. Illustrat. par. 2. p. 602.

The sons of Gad (Genesis 46:16) are not named here, because the enumeration of the families of Gad had been already introduced by 1 Chronicles 5:11, and the genealogical connection of the families enumerated in 1 Chronicles 5:12., with the sons of the tribal ancestor, had not been handed down. In 1 Chronicles 5:12 four names are mentioned, which are clearly those of heads of families or fathers'-houses, with the addition "in Bashan," i.e., dwelling, for ישׁבוּ is to be repeated or supplied from the preceding verse. - In 1 Chronicles 5:13 seven other names occur, the bearers of which are introduced as brothers of those mentioned (1 Chronicles 5:12), according to their fathers'-houses. They are therefore heads of fathers'-houses, but the district in which they dwelt is not given; whence Bertheau concludes, but wrongly, that the place where they dwelt is not given in the text. The statement which is here omitted follows in 1 Chronicles 5:16 at a fitting place; for in 1 Chronicles 5:14 and 1 Chronicles 5:15 their genealogy, which rightly goes before the mention of their dwelling-place, is given. אלּה, 1 Chronicles 5:14, is not to be referred, as Bertheau thinks, to the four Gadites mentioned in 1 Chronicles 5:12 and 1 Chronicles 5:13, but only to those mentioned in 1 Chronicles 5:13. Nothing more was known of those four (1 Chronicles 5:12) but that they dwelt in Bashan, while the genealogy of the seven is traced up through eight generations to a certain Buz, of whom nothing further is known, as the name בּוּז occurs nowhere else, except in Genesis 22:21 as that of a son of Nahor. The names of his ancestors also are not found elsewhere among the Gadites.

Joel the chief, and Shapham the next, and Jaanai, and Shaphat in Bashan.

5:1-26 Genealogies. - This chapter gives some account of the two tribes and a half seated on the east side of Jordan. They were made captives by the king of Assyria, because they had forsaken the Lord. Only two things are here recorded concerning these tribes. 1. They all shared in a victory. Happy is that people who live in harmony together, who assist each other against the common enemies of their souls, trusting in the Lord, and calling upon him. 2. They shared in captivity. They would have the best land, not considering that it lay most exposed. The desire of earthly objects draws to a distance from God's ordinances, and prepares men for destruction.