Important features of the fortunes of the Caleb clan can be discerned from the lists in this chapter, verses 18–24, 42–50. It appears that at first their seats were in the southern parts of Judah—witness verses 42–49, in which several of the names, viz. Ziph (Joshua xv. 24 or 25), Mareshah (2 Chronicles xi. 8), Hebron, Tappuah (Joshua xv. 34), Maon (Joshua xv. 55), and Beth-zur (Joshua xv. 58) are names of towns in the south or south-west of Judah. From these, their pre-exilic homes, they were driven northwards, and during the exilic period and afterwards they occupied many of the townships not far from Jerusalem, e.g. Bethlehem (see verses 50–55). Apart from the names in verses 50–55, we have a testimony to this northward movement in verse 24 (where see note), and probably also in verse 18, where the names Jerioth (tents) and Azubah (forsaken) hint at the abandonment first of nomadic life and then of the south Judean settlements. This movement was largely no doubt compulsory, under pressure from the Edomites to the south (compare above i. 43, note) who in their turn were being forced north by a strong and fairly constant encroachment of Arab tribes (see Wellhausen, De Gentibus, and more recently Hölscher, Palästina, pp. 22, 30, on the importance of such evidence as this notice in Chronicles for determining the composition and conditions of Palestine in the post-exilic period).
Mesha] The Moabite king whose deeds are recorded on the Moabite Stone bore this name. LXX. reads Mareshah (Μαρεισά) as in the latter part of the verse.
⁴⁵And the son of Shammai was Maon; and Maon was the father of Beth-zur. ⁴⁶And Ephah, Caleb’s concubine, bare Haran, and Moza, and Gazez: and Haran begat Gazez. ⁴⁷And the sons of Jahdai; Regem, and Jotham, and Geshan, and Pelet, and Ephah, and Shaaph. ⁴⁸Maacah, Caleb’s concubine, bare Sheber and Tirhanah.
45. Maon] Nabal who was a Calebite lived at the town of Maon (1 Samuel xxv. 2, 3). It is improbable that Maon was ever used as the name of a person; compare Buchanan Gray, Hebrew Proper Names, pp. 127 f. See note on verse 42.
⁴⁹She bare also Shaaph the father of Madmannah, Sheva the father of Machbena, and the father of Gibea; and the daughter of Caleb was Achsah.
49. the daughter of Caleb was Achsah] Compare Judges i. 12.
50–55. These verses give the post-exilic settlements of the Calebites in the townships of northern Judea, not far from Jerusalem: see verse 42, note.
⁵⁰These were the sons of Caleb; the son[¹] of Hur, the firstborn of Ephrathah, Shobal the father of Kiriath-jearim; ⁵¹Salma the father of Beth-lehem, Hareph the father of Beth-gader.
[¹] The Septuagint has, sons.
50. the son of Hur] Read with the LXX., the sons of Hur. Hur was the son of Caleb (verse 19).