Ezra10chapter 10

on the twentieth day of the ninth month: Albert Barnes sets the ninth month four months after Ezra's arrival at Jerusalem, dated at Ezra 7:9. Barnes reads the square as the temple's broad court. Bede takes the naming of Judah and Benjamin as a sign that the guilty belonged to the first migration.

Ezra 10:10-12

Ezra the priest stood up: Ezra's speech has three sentences. The people have been unfaithful, they must make confession to the LORD and do His will, and they must separate themselves from their foreign wives. The whole assembly answers in a loud voice, "Truly we must do as you say", before the details are settled.

Separate yourselves from the people of the land: Tertullian reads Paul's rule at 1 Corinthians 7:39, that a Christian marry only in the Lord, as a law of the Creator. In his reading the Creator forbids marrying foreign women everywhere.

Adam Clarke follows the assembly's answer through to verse 44, where some foreign wives had children. He calls it a great hardship on the women and children. By Jewish law such marriages were void, Clarke says, yet the foreign women had not known it, and he calls their case deplorable.

Ezra 10:13-15

it is the rainy season: The crowd's objection slows what the vow had promised. Their remedy becomes the method: leaders represent the assembly, and each case comes with its town's elders and judges. The Berean reads Jonathan and Jahzeiah as opponents, and some commentators take them as officers appointed to the work.

until the fierce anger of our God: Matthew Henry calls this plan a court of delegates, set up to receive complaints and to hear and determine each case. The people close on the fierce anger of God. Ezra had asked at 9:14 whether God would become so angry as to leave no remnant.

opposed this plan.): Albert Barnes notes that some render the clause as Jonathan and Jahzeiah opposed this, the reading the Berean follows. Four men are named against the plan. Barnes calls the opposition useless, and in verse 16 the exiles did as proposed.

Ezra 10:16-17

On the first day of the tenth month: The investigation runs three months, from the first day of the tenth month to the first day of the first month. Ezra selects family heads, each identified by name, to represent their families. This is the same ancestral method that shaped the registers of Ezra 2.

by the first day of the first month: John Gill counts three months for the investigation, from the tenth month to the first, and Albert Barnes a full two. Barnes lists the work. The family heads of verse 16 had to confirm that each wife was foreign and write each certificate of divorce.

Ezra 10:18-22

Among the descendants of the priests: The list opens among the priests with the descendants of the high priest Jeshua, so even the household nearest the altar is on it. Maaseiah, Eliezer, Jarib and Gedaliah pledge to send their wives away, and for their guilt they present a ram as a guilt offering.

They pledged to send their wives away: Albert Barnes counts these four as the high priest's family, and he reads the pledge as giving their hands, a solemn promise. Aben Ezra, as John Gill reports him, finds no rule that made a guilt offering the penalty for such marriages. He supposes the leaders advised it.

From the descendants of Immer: Immer is one of the four priestly houses John Gill finds in the first return, with 1,052 men at Ezra 2:37. The other three are Jedaiah, Pashhur and Harim. Immer's two names are the fewest of any priestly house here.

From the descendants of Harim: Harim is a priestly house of the first return, counted at 1,017 men in Ezra 2:39. Albert Barnes counts 13 priests in this list beyond the high priest's family. Harim gives five of them.

From the descendants of Pashhur: Pashhur was the largest of the four priestly houses of the first return, with 1,247 men at Ezra 2:38. Its six names are the most of any priestly house here. A Maaseiah stands in each priestly house of verses 19, 21 and 22.

Ezra 10:23-24

Among the Levites: The roll moves from priests to Levites, singers and porters. Only a handful of names appear in each order, six Levites, one singer, three porters, against the much longer priestly and lay lists. The proportion is itself a kind of witness: the failure ran widest among the laity.

From the gatekeepers: The first return had brought 128 singers of Asaph's line and 139 gatekeepers, by Ezra 2:41 and 42. Shallum's house leads the gatekeepers there. Albert Barnes counts ten Levites in the whole list, so he reckons this singer and these gatekeepers with the six Levites of verse 23.

Ezra 10:25-43

among the other Israelites: The heading "among the other Israelites" opens the longest stretch of the chapter, nineteen verses of names. Ten or more houses of ordinary Israelites are named, which shows how far the failure had spread. By verse 17 the cases were already dealt with, so the list records finished discipline.

From the descendants of Elam: A Jehiel stands among these men of Elam, and Shecaniah of verse 2 is a son of Jehiel, an Elamite. Elam had sent 1,254 men in the first return, by Ezra 2:7. Jeshaiah brought 70 more with Ezra at 8:7.

From the descendants of Zattu: Zattu had sent 945 men in the first return, by Ezra 2:8, and 300 more with Ezra at 8:5. The name Mattaniah occurs in four houses of this list, at verses 26, 27, 30 and 37. Jeremoth occurs in three.

From the descendants of Bebai: Bebai had sent 623 men in the first return, by Ezra 2:11, and 28 more with Ezra at 8:11. Its four names are the fewest of any lay house here.

From the descendants of Bani: Bani had sent 642 men in the first return, by Ezra 2:10, and 160 more with Ezra at 8:10. A Meshullam is named here. The name also stands at verse 15, among the men who stood against the plan.

From the descendants of Pahath-moab: Pahath-moab had sent 2,812 men in the first return, by Ezra 2:6, and 200 more with Ezra at 8:4. Binnui here is one man of that house. A house of the same name follows at verse 38.

From the descendants of Harim: This is the lay house of Harim, counted at 320 in the first return by Ezra 2:32. The priests of Harim in verse 21 belong to a second house of that name. Its eight names follow in verse 32.

Eliezer, Isshijah, Malchijah, Shemaiah: These eight belong to the lay house of Harim headed in verse 31. A Shemaiah stands in both houses of Harim, the priests of verse 21 and the laymen here. Malchijah and Malluch also recur, at verses 25 and 29.

From the descendants of Hashum: Hashum had sent 223 men in the first return, by Ezra 2:19. Ezra's roll in chapter 8 leaves it out. Six lay houses of this list, Parosh, Elam, Zattu, Bebai, Bani and Pahath-moab, do appear in that roll.

From the descendants of Bani: The descendants of Bani head a second group here. The other Israelites of verses 25 to 43 come under eleven headings, and Bani has two of them. Albert Barnes counts at least ten distinct families.

Maadai, Amram, Uel, Benaiah: These six names open the second group of Bani, headed at verse 34. Benaiah stands in four lay houses of this list, at verses 25, 30, 35 and 43. Only Mattaniah occurs as often.

Vaniah, Meremoth, Eliashib: The name Eliashib occurs four times in this chapter, at verses 6, 24, 27 and 36. Here it names a layman of Bani. Meremoth also shares his name with the priest who received the treasure at 8:33.

Mattaniah, Mattenai, and Jaasu: Bani's second group closes here at twelve names. Only Binnui's group, of thirteen, runs longer in the lay list. Mattaniah and Mattenai stand side by side, and a Mattenai also stands first in the house of Hashum at verse 33.

From the descendants of Binnui: Binnui heads the largest group in the whole list, thirteen names in verses 39 to 42. At 8:33 a Noadiah son of Binnui stands among the Levites who received the treasure. This Binnui is a lay house.

Shimei, Shelemiah, Nathan, Adaiah: Shimei, first in Binnui's group, is also the name of a Levite at verse 23 and of a man of Hashum at verse 33. Adaiah recurs from the house of Bani at verse 29.

Machnadebai, Shashai, Sharai: The two registers may join the houses of Binnui and Bani. Ezra 2:10 lists the descendants of Bani with 642, and Nehemiah 7:15 gives the descendants of Binnui with 648 in the same place. Machnadebai, Shashai and Sharai occur in no other verse of Ezra.

Azarel, Shelemiah, Shemariah: Shelemiah is named here a second time, after verse 39. Parosh shows the same at verse 25, where Malchijah is named twice. Shemariah also stands in the lay house of Harim at verse 32.

Shallum, Amariah, and Joseph: A Shallum also stands among the gatekeepers at verse 24. Shallum and Amariah are both names in Ezra's own line of descent, at Ezra 7:2 and 3. Binnui's thirteen names end with this verse.

And from the descendants of Nebo: The descendants of Nebo numbered 52 in Ezra 2:29. Albert Barnes and John Gill both count about 113 men who had married foreign women, and the names in this list come to 111. Matthew Henry notes that the same unfaithfulness returns in Nehemiah 13.

some of them had children by these wives: The book ends without a scene, on a sentence about consequence: all these men had married foreign women, and some of them had children. The narrative breaks off in the middle of the register. The ending matches the book's opening, which had picked up mid-sentence from the close of Chronicles.