Esau, Edom and a Neighboring People

Edom means red, and Genesis has given the name twice already: Esau was born red (25:25) and asked for “that same red pottage” (25:30). This is the ninth of the book’s “generations” headings, and the second given to a son who is not the heir, after Ishmael’s in 25:12.

In 26:34 Esau’s Hittite wives were Judith the daughter of Beeri and Bashemath the daughter of Elon. Here Elon’s daughter is Adah. Aholibamah is called the daughter of “Anah the daughter of Zibeon”, but the Samaritan and Greek texts read “son of Zibeon”, which is how verse 24 lists Anah.

In 28:9 Esau’s Ishmaelite wife is Mahalath, “the sister of Nebajoth”; the same phrase identifies this Bashemath. Nebajoth was Ishmael’s firstborn (25:13). Esau married into Ishmael’s house after he saw that the daughters of Canaan pleased not Isaac his father (28:8).

Eliphaz reappears as the name of the first of Job’s three friends, “Eliphaz the Temanite” (Job 2:11), and Teman is Eliphaz’s son in verse 11. Reuel, “friend of God”, is also a name of Moses’ father-in-law in Exodus 2:18.

“Born unto him in the land of Canaan” is the mirror of 35:26, where Jacob’s sons were “born to him in Padan-aram”. The brother who stayed had his sons in the land of promise; the heir had his abroad. Korah is a name that turns up again in Levi’s line (Numbers 16:1), with no relation to this one.

“From the face of his brother” turns round the phrase God used in 35:1, “when thou fleddest from the face of Esau thy brother”. The Hebrew says only that he went “to a land”; the KJV supplies “the country”. Esau was already found in Seir in 32:3, so this may gather up a move made in stages.

The wording follows 13:6 almost exactly, where Abram and Lot parted: “the land was not able to bear them, that they might dwell together: for their substance was great.” “Wherein they were strangers” is literally “the land of their sojournings”, the phrase God used in giving the land to Abraham (17:8).

Seir means hairy, and Esau was born “like an hairy garment” (25:25); the hairy man settles in the hairy, wooded mountain. Mount Seir is the high country east of the Arabah, south of the Dead Sea. “Esau is Edom” is said for the second time in eight verses.

A second “generations” heading follows the first. The first traced Esau’s family while it lived in Canaan; this one begins again from the same two sons and follows them in Seir. The Hebrew calls him “the father of Edom”, making the man the ancestor of a nation.

Only two sons are named here, the sons of Adah and Bashemath, because only their lines are carried to the next generation. Aholibamah’s three sons are held back and given their own entry in verse 14, with their mother’s whole pedigree.

Teman became a district of Edom famous for wisdom: “Is wisdom no more in Teman?” (Jeremiah 49:7). Kenaz gives his name to the Kenezites, and Caleb is “the son of Jephunneh the Kenezite” (Numbers 32:12), so a strand of Esau’s line was later counted within Judah.

Timna was the sister of the Horite chief Lotan (verse 22), so Esau’s line married into Seir’s ruling families. 1 Chronicles 1:36 lists Timna and Amalek among the sons of Eliphaz. The Talmud (Sanhedrin 99b) tells that Timna sought to join Abraham’s family, was refused, and became a concubine instead.

Zerah is also the name of Tamar’s second twin in 38:30, and a Jobab “the son of Zerah of Bozrah” becomes king in verse 33, perhaps from this line. Reuel’s four sons appear with no mother’s name of their own; they are counted through their grandmother Bashemath.

Aholibamah means something like “tent of the high place”. Her father and grandmother, as the KJV reads it, are named again in full, as in verse 2. Her sons are counted as Esau’s own sons, not grandsons, and their entry is set apart from the other two wives’ lines.

“Duke” is the Latin dux, a leader. The KJV uses the word in this chapter, its copy in 1 Chronicles 1, and once more in the Song of Moses: “Then the dukes of Edom shall be amazed” (Exodus 15:15). The Hebrew alluf may be linked to elef, a thousand or a clan.

Korah appears among Eliphaz’s chiefs, though he was Aholibamah’s son in verses 5 and 14 and is listed again under her in verse 18. The Samaritan text leaves him out here. Amalek is counted among “the sons of Adah” although Timna bore him; a concubine’s son belongs to the principal wife’s line.

Every one of Reuel’s four sons in verse 13 becomes a chief, with no name dropped or added. “In the land of Edom” gives the country a name taken from Esau’s nickname, before the chapter has told how he came to hold it.

Aholibamah’s sons are chiefs in their own right, a generation earlier than the other lines, where the chiefs are grandsons. Their mother is named as “the daughter of Anah” for the third time, which keeps her Horite descent in view just before the Horites themselves are listed.

A one-line colophon closes Esau’s part of the chapter, and it repeats “who is Edom” for the third time (verses 1 and 8). Fourteen chiefs have been named from three wives, counting Korah twice.

Here Seir is a man, the ancestor after whom the mountain is named. Deuteronomy 2:12 remembers that “the Horims also dwelt in Seir beforetime; but the children of Esau succeeded them”. Zibeon was called a Hivite in verse 2; in Hebrew, Hivite and Horite differ by a single letter.

Dishon and Dishan are brothers whose names differ by one vowel. Dishon is an animal name: the KJV renders it “pygarg”, a kind of antelope, in the list of clean animals (Deuteronomy 14:5). Seir’s seven sons make a round number of chiefs.

Timna, Lotan’s sister, is the concubine of verse 12, and the list takes the trouble to name her. Lotan’s son Hori bears the clan name itself. Hemam is spelled Homam in 1 Chronicles 1:39.

1 Chronicles 1:40 spells two of these names differently, Alian for Alvan and Shephi for Shepho, the sort of drift that small letters invite in copying. Ebal happens to share its name with the mountain of cursing by Shechem (Deuteronomy 11:29), with no link between them.

Anah was named as Seir’s son in verse 20 and is Zibeon’s son here. Two men of one name in consecutive generations, uncle and nephew, would explain why the verse stops to say “this was that Anah”. Ajah is a name that returns in 2 Samuel 3:7 as the father of Saul’s concubine Rizpah.

The Horite list loops back to Esau’s marriages: this Aholibamah is Esau’s wife of verse 2. A daughter named in a list of sons is rare, and she is named because the Edomite chiefs of verse 18 descend from her. Her brother Dishon shares his name with his great-uncle.

1 Chronicles 1:41 has Hamran, spelled “Amram” in the KJV, where Genesis has Hemdan; in Hebrew the two differ by d and r, letters easily confused in the old script. Ithran is also a name in Asher’s line (1 Chronicles 7:37).

Akan appears in 1 Chronicles 1:42 as Jakan, and the wells of “the children of Jaakan” were a camping place on Israel’s road through the wilderness (Deuteronomy 10:6; Numbers 33:31). A Horite family name was still attached to wells in Moses’ day.

Uz is the name of Job’s country (Job 1:1), and Lamentations 4:21 addresses “O daughter of Edom, that dwellest in the land of Uz”. The name is also given to a grandson of Shem (10:23) and a son of Nahor (22:21), so it was widely used.

The sons of Seir are now called by the same title as Esau’s descendants, alluf. The Book of Genesis sets two ruling houses in one land, each with its chiefs, before the Horites give way to Edom.

Verse 21 said “in the land of Edom”; this verse says “in the land of Seir”. The list uses both names for one country. The Horite chiefs are listed twice with the same seven names, once as sons and once as rulers.

When Moses reaches Kadesh he sends messengers to “the king of Edom” (Numbers 20:14), so Edom’s monarchy was old by then. Ibn Ezra reports an earlier Jewish scholar who dated this list to the reign of Jehoshaphat, and rejected the idea sharply.

Bela’s father Beor has the same name as the father of Balaam (Numbers 22:5), and the Targum identified Bela with Balaam. The two may share only a common name. Dinhabah, the city, is not known outside this list and its copy in Chronicles.

Bozrah became Edom’s chief city, the one Isaiah names: “Who is this that cometh from Edom, with dyed garments from Bozrah?” (Isaiah 63:1). The appendix to Job in the Greek Bible identifies Job with this Jobab, a late tradition.

Husham is given no father, only a homeland: Temani, the country of the Temanites, named after Eliphaz’s son Teman in verse 11. The kings come from different parts of Edom, and none of them is said to be the son of the one before.

Hadad is the name of the Syrian storm god and of later rulers, among them an Edomite prince who fled to Egypt from David and returned to trouble Solomon (1 Kings 11:14–22). Midian and Moab are allies against Israel in Numbers 22:4, so a battle between them recalls a different age.

Samlah means garment. Masrekah appears to be built on sorek, a choice vine, the word used in Jacob’s blessing of Judah: “his ass’s colt unto the choice vine” (49:11). A place of vineyards, then, if the name tells anything; the site is unknown.

A king of Edom called Saul, Shaul in Hebrew, the same name as Israel’s first king. Rehoboth means broad places, like Isaac’s well in 26:22. “The river” usually means the Euphrates, which is far from Edom, so many take it here as a local stream.

Baal-hanan means “Baal is gracious”, the Canaanite god’s name set inside a royal name, the counterpart of Hebrew names like Hananiah. Achbor, his father, means mouse; the same name is borne by an official of King Josiah (2 Kings 22:12).

Hadar is the only king whose death is not recorded. 1 Chronicles 1:50–51 calls him Hadad and then adds “Hadad died also”, which suggests the Genesis list was closed while he still reigned. Mezahab means “waters of gold”, perhaps a place, perhaps a family name.

“After their places” marks a change: these are chiefdoms named by districts, not a line of sons. Timnah is the concubine’s name of verse 12 and Alvah is near Alvan of verse 23, turned into the names of territories.

Aholibamah, Esau’s wife, has become the name of a district. Pinon is probably Punon, a camp of Israel in the wilderness (Numbers 33:42), the copper-mining valley of Feinan in modern Jordan. Elah may be Elath, the port on the Red Sea.

Kenaz and Teman were grandsons of Esau in verse 11 and are districts here. Mibzar means fortress, from the same root as Bozrah, and may name the region around that city; the link is a guess from the letters.

“The land of their possession” is achuzzah, the word for the burial field Abraham bought (23:20). Edom already holds a possession, while the next verse says that Jacob “dwelt in the land wherein his father was a stranger” (37:1).