Numbers 36

The amendment contained provisions for preventing any portion of the inheritance of one tribe passing to another through the marriage of an heiress. The necessity for regulating this arose out of the ordinance which permitted the daughters of an Israelite dying without male issue to inherit their father’s property. And as it was on the suit of the daughters of

Zelophehad that that ordinance had been promulgated, so now it was on the suit of the chiefs of the Machirites, of whom Zelophehad had been one, that a supplemental enactment is made, directing that heiresses should marry within their own tribe. The Machirites doubtless foresaw the loss which, but for the provisions of the text, would be likely to fall on their tribal inheritance. Espin.

By the previous law it would happen that the inheritance of the daughters of Zelophehad, who belonged to the tribe of Manasseh, if they married into another tribe, would be transferred from their own to their husband’s tribe. This, should it ever occur, Manasseh thought would be a hardship and a wrong. That tribe did not attempt to nullify the laws of the land, but brought the case before the national legislature, and sought relief through its action. The petition was respectfully considered, and a law was enacted in accordance with its prayer. By this law, heiresses were required to marry in their own tribes, that no part of the ancient inheritance might be alienated from the original family. It is plain that, if the decree of the nation had been different from what it was, Manasseh’s duty would have been submission. E. C. W.

It was a great point with the people of Israel that their possession should always appear as one lent to them by God. But the division of the tribes was essentially connected with this view. This division would be done away with if the inheritance was allowed to pass into other tribes by marriage; and this so much the more as the small states which formed the tribes rested altogether on the family constitution. The geographical boundaries, therefore, could not be regulated otherwise than by the possessions of the families constituting the tribe. Gerl.

The original division of land was to the several tribes according to their families, so that each tribe was settled in the same country, and each family in the same barony or hundred. Nor was the estate of any family in one tribe permitted to pass into another, even by the marriage of an heiress. So that, not only was the original balance of property preserved, but the closest and dearest connections of affinity attached to each other the inhabitants of every vicinage. Thus domestic virtue and affection had a more extensive sphere of action; the happiness of rural life was increased, and a general attention to virtue and decorum was promoted, from that natural emulation, which each family would feel to preserve unsullied the reputation of their neighborhood; and the poor might everywhere expect more ready assistance, since they implored it from men whose sympathy in their sufferings would be quickened by hereditary friendship, and hereditary connection. Graves.

This law was amended because of a direct appeal to the Lawgiver in view of certain difficulties expected to arise under it if it were left as first drafted. It is quite probable that the legislation in Deuteronomy was the result of a similar, though unrecorded, emergency. Such instances, in fact, serve to account, in some measure, for the journal-like character of a large portion of the laws of the Pentateuch. So-called discrepancies are often nothing more or less than amendments called forth by altered circumstances, or revision suggested by further thought. In the case before us there is certainly no just occasion for predicating a later date for the law in its Levitical form. We see, indeed, the very circumstance of the history that called it forth passing before our eyes E. C. B.

ANNOUNCEMENT OF MOSES’S DEATH. HIS TOUCHING PRAYER. ORDINATION OF JOSHUA AS HIS SUCCESSOR.