(4-19) The heads in Jerusalem: as compared with 1 Chronicles 9, by no means complete. Judah and Benjamin are represented, with priests and Levites and porters.

(4) Perez.--In 1 Chronicles 9 the descendants of Perez (or Phares) are not given; but the descendants of Zerah, present there, are absent here. This may be a question of the right reading of the text.

Verse 4. - At Jerusalem dwelt certain of the children of Judah, and of the children of Benjamin. It is not meant that all the dwellers in Jerusalem were of these two tribes, since among them were certainly Levites (vers. 10-19), Ephraimites, and Mansesites (1 Chronicles 1. s. c.), together with Nethinims (ver. 21) who were of no tribe, and probably some representatives of all or most of the other tribes (see the comment on Ezra 2:70). But the present purpose of Nehemiah is to mention especially the Jewish and Benjamite chiefs. Athaiah, or Uthai, as the name is given in 1 Chronicles 9:4. The son of Uzziah. The ancestors assigned to Athaiah here and in 1 Chronicles 9. are wholly different, with the single exception of Pharez or Perez, the son of Judah. Both lists are of course abbreviations of a far longer one, and it has happened that the two writers have in no ease selected for mention the same name.

11:1-36 The distribution of the people. - In all ages, men have preferred their own ease and advantage to the public good. Even the professors of religion too commonly seek their own, and not the things of Christ. Few have had such attachment to holy things and holy places, as to renounce pleasure for their sake. Yet surely, our souls should delight to dwell where holy persons and opportunities of spiritual improvement most abound. If we have not this love to the city of our God, and to every thing that assists our communion with the Saviour, how shall we be willing to depart hence; to be absent from the body, that we may be present with the Lord? To the carnal-minded, the perfect holiness of the New Jerusalem would be still harder to bear than the holiness of God's church on earth. Let us seek first the favour of God, and his glory; let us study to be patient, contented, and useful in our several stations, and wait, with cheerful hope, for admission into the holy city of God.And at Jerusalem dwelt certain of the children of Judah, and of the children of Benjamin,.... It belonging partly to one tribe and partly to the other, and so inhabited by both, as it originally was, Joshua 15:63

of the children of Judah; Athaiah; called Uthai, 1 Chronicles 9:4 whose lineage is traced through Uzziah, Zechariah, Amariah, Shephatiah, Mahalaleel:

of the children of Perez; a son of Judah, see 1 Chronicles 9:4.