jehoiarib Summary and Overview

Jehovah defends, a priest at Jerusalem, head of one of the sacerdotal courses (1 Chr. 9:10; 24:7). His "course" went up from Babylon after the Exile (Ezra 2:36-39; Neh. 7:39-42).

JEHOI'ARIB (whom Jehovah defends), the head of the first course of priests. 1 Chr 24:7.

="Jehovah will defend." 1 Chronicles 9:10; 24:7. A descendant of his is mentioned in Nehemiah 11:10, also descendant representatives of nearly all the old courses (1 Chronicles 12:6,19). But the Talmud makes these professed representatives of the old 24 courses to have been not really descendants from the original heads, except from four of them, Jedaiah, Immer, Pashur, and Harim, for which the Babylonian Talmud has Joiarib (as implied in Ezra 2:36-39; Nehemiah 7:39-42); and that these four were subdivided into six each to make the 24; and that the 24 took the old names (Luke 1:5). The Asmonaean family and Josephus belonged to the course of Jehoiarib. The Talmud view is not favored by Nehemiah 10:2-8, which enumerates21 courses, of Nehemiah's time: Nehemiah 12:1-7,19, also enumerates 22 courses of Zerubbabel's time, among them Jehoiarib, of whose course Mattenai was chief in Jehoiakim's days. Jehoiarib is added in 12:6, not appearing in 10:2-8; from which Lord A. C. Hervey infers that Jehoiarib did return from Babylon, but later than Zerubbabel's time, and that his name was added to the list subsequently.