Ezra - 10:18



18 Among the sons of the priests there were found who had married foreign women: (namely), of the sons of Jeshua, the son of Jozadak, and his brothers, Maaseiah, and Eliezer, and Jarib, and Gedaliah.

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Explanation and meaning of Ezra 10:18.

Differing Translations

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And among the sons of the priests there were found that had taken strange wives: namely, of the sons of Jeshua the son of Jozadak, and his brethren; Maaseiah, and Eliezer, and Jarib, and Gedaliah.
And among the sons of the priests there were found that had married foreign women: namely , of the sons of Jeshua, the son of Jozadak, and his brethren, Maaseiah, and Eliezer, and Jarib, and Gedaliah.
And there were found among the sons of the priests that had taken strange wives: Of the sons of Josue the son of Josedec, and his brethren, Maasia, and Eliezer, and Jarib, and Godolia.
And among the sons of the priests there were found that had taken foreign wives, of the sons of Jeshua the son of Jozadak, and his brethren: Maaseiah, and Eliezer, and Jarib, and Gedaliah.
And among the sons of the priests there were found that had married strange women: namely, of the sons of Jeshua, the son of Jozadak, and his brethren, Maaseiah, and Eliezer, and Jarib, and Gedaliah.
And there are found of the sons of the priests that have settled strange women: of the sons of Jeshua son of Jozadak, and his brethren, Maaseiah, and Eliezer, and Jarib, and Gedaliah;
And among the sons of the priests who were married to strange women were these: of the sons of Jeshua, the son of Jozadak and his brothers, Maaseiah and Eliezer and Jarib and Gedaliah.
And there were found among the sons of the priests some who had taken foreign wives: From the sons of Jeshua, the son of Jozadak, and his brothers, Maaseiah, and Eliezer, and Jarib, and Gedaliah.

*Minor differences ignored. Grouped by changes, with first version listed as example.


Historical Commentaries

Scholarly Analysis and Interpretation.

Compare with the list in Ezra 2.

And among the sons of the priests there were found that had taken strange wives,.... So that it need not be wondered at that this evil should spread among the people, when those who understood the law, and should have instructed the people in it, set such an example: namely:
of the sons of Jeshua the son of Jozadak; who was the high priest; and perhaps for this fault of his, in not restraining his sons from such unlawful marriages, is he represented in filthy garments, Zac 3:3,
and his brethren, Maaseiah, and Eliezer, and Jarib, and Gedaliah; these were the brethren of Jeshua.

THOSE THAT HAD TAKEN STRANGE WIVES. (Ezra 10:18-44)
among the sons of the priests--From the names of so many men of rank appearing in the following list, some idea may be formed of the great and complicated difficulties attending the reformatory work.

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 Ezra 2:36, these were among the descendants of Jedaiah, a section of the house of the high-priestly family (see rem. on Ezra 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, Leviticus 5:14, etc., because they had committed a מעל against the Lord, which needed expiation; see on Leviticus 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 Ezra 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, Ezra 10:20-22, reappear in the lists in Nehemiah 8:4 and Nehemiah 10:2-9, and may belong to the same individuals.

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