Numbers Chapter 34 verse 18 Holy Bible
And ye shall take one prince of every tribe, to divide the land for inheritance.
read chapter 34 in ASV
And you are to take one chief from every tribe to make the distribution of the land.
read chapter 34 in BBE
And ye shall take one prince of every tribe, to divide the land.
read chapter 34 in DARBY
And ye shall take one prince of every tribe, to divide the land by inheritance.
read chapter 34 in KJV
And ye shall take one prince of every tribe, to divide the land by inheritance.
read chapter 34 in WBT
You shall take one prince of every tribe, to divide the land for inheritance.
read chapter 34 in WEB
and one prince -- one prince -- for a tribe ye do take to give the land by inheritance.
read chapter 34 in YLT
Pulpit Commentary
Pulpit CommentaryVerse 18. - One prince of every tribe. This was arranged no doubt in order to insure fairness in fixing the boundaries between the tribes, which had to be done after the situation of the tribe was determined by lot; the further subdivision of the tribal territory was probably left to be managed by the chiefs of the tribe itself. Of these tribe princes (see on Numbers 13:1; Joshua 14:1), Caleb is the only one whose name is known to us, and he had acted in a somewhat similar capacity forty years before. This may of itself account for the tribe of Judah being named first in the list, especially as Reuben was not represented; but the order in which the other names follow is certainly remarkable. Taken in pairs (Judah and Simeon, Manasseh and Ephraim, etc.), they advance regularly from south to north, according to their subsequent position on the map. Differing as this arrangement does so markedly from any previously adopted, it is impossible to suppose that it is accidental. We must conclude either that a coincidence so apparently trivial was Divinely prearranged, or that the arrangement of the names is due to a later hand than that of Moses.
Ellicott's Commentary
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers(18) And ye shall take one prince of every tribe . . . --In addition to Eleazar the high priest, and Joshua the commander of the army, one chief man, or prince, was to be selected out of each of the ten tribes which were interested in the division, as at the first census one out of each tribe was associated with Moses and Aaron (Numbers 1:4), and as was probably the case at the second census under Moses and Eleazar. (Comp. Numbers 27:2.) Security was thus afforded for the equity and impartiality of the allotment; the position of the territory only, and not its dimensions, being determined by lot. With the exception of Caleb, the names of the princes selected for this purpose are not mentioned elsewhere.
