Chapter 1

1 Chronicles 1

(1:1-4) It’s interesting that this book does not begin with an introduction. It just jumps into the genealogies for nine chapters (!). He starts with Adam which could “point to the unity of the race” and the “universality of God’s redemptive program within history.”

The chronicler omits Cain and Abel from his list—likely because they didn’t have descendants. Another possibility is that the chronicler favors genealogies that point toward a certain direction or line. At minimum, we know that these genealogies are not exhaustive lists. He also doesn’t tell us that “Shem, Ham, and Japheth” are all Noah’s sons, rather than son, grandson, and great-grandson. It’s assumed that all three are Noah’s sons.

Table of nations

(1:5-23) This comes from the so-called “table of nations” (Gen. 10:2-29). This section shows where the various nations came from.

Verse 8 is where the Klu Klux Klan (KKK) got the hair brained idea that the African nations were under the curse of Ham (Gen. 9:24ff), and therefore, they should be enslaved.

(1:24-27) This recounts and abbreviates the table given in Genesis 11:10-26. This takes us from God favoring the Semitic people in general (Gen. 9:26 “the God of Shem”) to the Israelite people in particular (Gen. 12, Abram).

(1:28-34) This recounts Genesis 25:1-4, 9, 13-16.

(1:35-41) This summarizes the table of Esau’s descendants (Gen. 36).

(1:42) Uz was the name of Job’s home (Job 1:1; cf. Lam. 4:21).

(1:51) Moses doesn’t mention the death of King Hadad. This could be because Hadad outlived Moses. But the chronicler is writing 1,000 years after Moses.