Shelah (son of Judah)

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For other uses, see Shelah (disambiguation).

According to the Bible, Shelah/Shela (Hebrew: שֵׁלָה, Modern: Shela, Tiberian: Šēlā, meaning "petition"[1]) was the youngest son of Judah, and was born at Chezib,[2] which can be identified with an unknown town in the vicinity of Mareshah. [3]

Biblical narrative

In the text[

Book of Chronicles
, Shelah is identified as the name of a clan, containing a subclan named Er.

According 1 Chronicles 4:21–23, the sons of Shelah were:

  1. Er, the father of Lecah
  2. Laadah, the father of Mareshah.
  3. The families of the house of the linen workers of the house of Ashbea
  4. Jokim, the men of Chozeba
  5. Joash
  6. Saraph
  7. Jashubi-Lehem

The descendants of the last 4 sons were potters who dwelt at Netaim and Gederah and worked for the king.

According to some

aetiological myth concerning fluctuations in the constituency of the tribe of Judah, with Shelah representing the newest clan to become part of the tribe.[9][10] The Book of Chronicles' description of Er as a descendant of Shelah, suggests that Er was in reality the name of a clan that was originally equal in status to the Shelah clan, but was later subsumed by it.[9][11]

Professor Aaron Demsky argues that the genealogy of Shelah is an allegory of the history of Shelanite clans in

Moabites. The last Shelanite clans to emerge consisted of the residents of Lahem or Lahmas. The last four clans worked for the king, who was most likely Hezekiah.[3]

In 701 BC, Sennacherib destroyed important Shelanite cities. Survivors fled to Jerusalem and assimilated with the local populace after the return of Babylonian exiles[3] in c.a. 538 BC. [12][13] According to Demsky, the author of the Book of Chronicles considered the Shelanite clans to be inferior to other Judahite clans, based on their positioning in the biblical text. [3]

Scholars have argued that the Tamar and Shelah narrative has a secondary role in either promoting the institution of

classical rabbinical writers argued that this narrative concerns the origin of levirate marriage.[14]

Family Tree

Shelah
(descendant)
Er		(descendant)
Joash
(descendant)
Saraph

Notes and citations

  1. ^ Matthew George Easton (1894). Illustrated Bible Dictionary, and Treasury of Biblical History, Biography, Geography, Doctrine, and Literature. T. Nelson. p. 621.
  2. ^ Genesis 38:5
  3. ^ a b c d Demsky, Aaron (December 26, 2016). "Who Was "Shelah Son of Judah" and What Happened to Him?". TheTorah.com. Archived from the original on February 8, 2024.
  4. ^ Genesis 38:7–10
  5. ^ Genesis 38:7–10
  6. ^ Genesis 38:11
  7. ^ Genesis 38:11
  8. ^ Genesis 38:14
  9. ^ a b c d J. A. Emerton, Judah And Tamar
  10. Encyclopedia Biblica
  11. Encyclopedia Biblica
  12. ^ Ezra 2:64–65
  13. ^ http://hirr.hartsem.edu/ency/jews.htm Archived 2018-06-24 at the Wayback Machine , the "population" section of this article estimates a pre-exilic population of 1.8 million in Israel and Judah combined. referenced on 6/26/2018.
  14. ^ Genesis Rabbah 85:6
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