The writer's next concern was to trace the line of people to whom and through whom God promised to bring blessing and salvation. That nation was Israel, the descendants of Jacob. The writer viewed Israel as consisting of 12 tribes, not just the tribes represented by the returnees from Babylonian exile. The nation as a whole would have a future.
Jacob prophesied that his third son, Judah, would become the leader of the Israelites. Through him God would provide the promised blessing to come (Gen. 49:8-12). The Davidic dynasty was one branch of Jacob's descendants, so the writer had special interest in Judah.
"Many unrelated fragments have been brought together here in the interests of completeness."25
Jabez's prayer (v. 10) shows that prayer and a prayer-answering God can overcome the threat of evil.26This writer believe in the efficacy of prayer, and he emphasized prayer much in his narrative.
"As a Judahite and ancestor of David, it seems quite likely that Jabez was a type of David and that his fervent appeal was made in anticipation of God's selection and blessing of the yet unborn house of David."27
The writer may have listed Simeon's descendants next because the Simeonites shared the tribal territory God gave to Judah. The Judahites absorbed many of them through intermarriage shortly after settlement in the land.
Reuben, Gad, and half the tribe of Manasseh settled east of the Jordan River. Reuben would have normally been the son through whom the greatest blessing would come since he was the first-born. However because of his sin (v. 1) God passed him over. God's blessing of Joseph with the double portion of the birthright and His blessing of Judah with leadership over the Israelites was contrary to natural order. It was pure grace for those tribes.
God was not only faithful to bless as He had promised, but He also judged sin as He had said He would (vv. 25-26). This is the reason the transjordanian tribes went into captivity.
This list clearly defines the priests and Levites' line of descent. Only the descendants of Aaron, the priests, could serve in the temple by offering sacrifices on the incense altar (v. 49; cf. Num. 3:5-38). Nehemiah correctly barred priests who could not demonstrate that they were descendants of Aaron from serving in the rebuilt (second) temple (Neh. 7:63-65).
The priests could only function when Israel dwelt in the Promised Land and as long as the tabernacle or temple God had blessed with His presence stood. With the return from exile the ritual of covenant worship was again possible. Consequently the priesthood was very important to the restoration community.
God had given the special privilege of being priests to Aaron and his sons as a gracious blessing. Normally the first-born son acted as priest of the family in the ancient Near East. This was one of the privileges of the birthright. Reuben had forfeited this, too, by his sin.
Verses 1-15 trace Aaron's descendants, the high priests, to the Babylonian exile.
"Some writers have wanted to portray the high priest in postexilic times in an exalted position. But it is striking how little attention the Chronicler gives to the role of high priest. . . .
". . . in a number of passages he put considerable emphasis on faith in God as the way to blessing but rarely on ritual perfection."28
Verses 16-53 give a more general list of the descendants of Levi whom God allowed to assist the priests in certain aspects of Israel's worship. They received this privilege as a result of God's grace as well (Num. 3:12-13, 45; 8:14). God's physical provision for the Levites concludes the chapter (vv. 54-81).
The writer placed Levi's genealogy at the heart of a chiastic structure. In this way he drew attention to Levi's central importance in Israel.29
AThe lineage of David (chs. 1-3)
BJudah and Simeon in the South (4:1-43)
CThe transjordanian tribes to the north (ch. 5)
DLevi (ch. 6)
C'The other northern tribes (ch. 7)
B'Benjamin in the South (ch. 8)
A'The lineage of Saul (ch. 9)
"The emphasis on Judah and Levi in the genealogies marks the center of the Chronicler's hope and faith. Two things marked the true Israel: the king and the priest."30
As we compare parallel genealogies in various parts of Scripture we observe that some lists contain omissions and additions. This shows that genealogical lists are not always complete.
The tribes the writer listed were Issachar, Benjamin, Naphtali, Manasseh, Ephraim, and Asher. Why did he omit Dan and Zebulun? The inclusion of these tribes would have resulted in a total of 14 tribes since he had counted Levi and had dealt with both halves of Manasseh separately. Evidently to keep the whole number of tribes at 12 he omitted these.31Another possibility is that perhaps the tribes of Dan and Zebulun had little influence or relevance among the Jews who made up the returned exiles.32That there were 12 tribes seems to have been more important to the writer than how he reckoned them as 12. The writers of both the Old and New Testaments used many different combinations each totalling 12 in the many lists of the 12 tribes that appear in Scripture. By listing 12 tribes the Chronicler emphasized that the whole nation was intact. The term "all Israel"occurs over 40 times in Chronicles, and there are also many occurrences of the phrases "all the house of Israel"and "all the tribes of Israel."
In these chapters (4-7) the writer stressed the following central features of God's covenant relationship with Israel. The leadership of Judah that even swallowed up another tribe came to a head in David and his descendants. The transjordanian tribes experienced the results of unfaithfulness to God. The tribe of Levi enjoyed the privilege of priesthood in Israel. The writer also drew attention to the 12-tribe structure of the one Israelite nation.
