What is the significance of Hezron in the Bible?

Son of Pharez, and grandson of Judah. Gen. 46:12; Num. 26:21; Ruth 4:18-19; 1 Chr. 2:5-25; 1 Chr. 4:1.

From Judah to David there is only a succession of names without any distinguishing mark with the exception of three, and two of these are prominent through their sin. Er, whom the Lord slew, Achar, the troubler of Israel, and Nahshon, the prince of the children of Judah. Having brought the line down to David, the Holy Spirit, as it were, pauses and notes the sons of Hezron (Esrom, Matt. 1) other than Ram (Aram, Matt. 1), i.e. to Jerahmeel, and to Chelubai, the same is called Caleb (see vers. 9 and 18). The honoured line passed through Ram, but his natural connections have a place in the archives of Judah. Doubtless every one named was prominent for some quality or excellence, or for some special blessing conferred which would confer still greater eminence. Hur is the son of Caleb. This is the Hur that with Aaron held up the hands of Moses when Israel fought and overcame Amalek, and was associated with Aaron in the care of the people when Moses went up the mount (Ex. 17:12). Bezaleel, grandson of Hur, was named of God and endowed with wisdom for a very special purpose, taught to make all the furniture for the tabernacle (Ex. 31). This gave greater eminence than all the riches of Jain, who had twenty-three cities, and took sixty more. But even Segub is named, though only half-brother to Ram. Is it not because of his connection with the ancestry of David, with that line which was always so choice with God that even the least affinity with it entitles to a place in these genealogies? Were not these named ones counted among God's elect ones? Would they be mentioned at all if among those who fell in the wilderness through unbelief? Unless such as Achar, whose sin brought such momentous consequences upon Israel, all whose names appear here, are among the worthies of that people. This special mention of Hezron's family and descendants is not a mere genealogical list from Judah to David where the evil take their place in successional order with the good; but these are men of renown, and while the book of God is read, their names will stand forth as of those whom God would honour.

1 Chronicles 2. — Esau with his kings and dukes are outside the chosen line. God's people are now in view. Not all Abraham's sons, not all Isaac's sons, but of Israel's, not one excepted. The offshoots of the elect stem Abraham, Isaac, Israel are lost in the common herd of Gentiles. Nay, even the people themselves are scarcely noticed till the KING is seen: hence the rapid run from Judah the son of Israel to David (verses 3-15). The king is presented with just enough of his line of descent to show that he is of the tribe of Judah, and he is presented in the person of David, who was chosen of God to be a type of the kingly power of Jesus the Messiah, hence for this reason, called a man after God's own heart (1 Sam. 13:14, Acts 13:22). The ancestry of David, is the human ancestry of our Lord Jesus. Of the twelve sons of Israel, Judah takes the first place, not now to tell us of Judah, but of Him who sprang from Judah, the KING first, afterwards the children of the Kingdom. The Holy Spirit hastens to present Him Who is and was ever the Object before God.

Only a list of names from Judah to David! But can we find in the whole book of God a similar space as brief as this which contains so much of grace and of God's unchangeableness in purpose on the one side, and of the vileness of man's nature on the other? For the names here given are inseparably connected with both. The crucifixion of the Lord goes infinitely beyond all in declaring the grace of God and the wickedness of man; but what do we find in this list? Names renowned in the world and honoured among men? nay, but associated with the worst corruption and with disobedience to God and dishonour to His name. Like Judah himself married to a Canaanitess, take Er, Tamar, Pharez, what vileness and shame! There is a Hezron and a Boaz, and with them greatness and piety, but there is also an Achar [Achan] who is prominently marked as "the troubler of Israel, who transgressed in the thing accursed."

This table enumerates 32 of Leah, 16 of Zilpah, 11 of Rachel, 7 of Bilhah=66. But the head also goes with his house; and so with the larger list of Leah's children we see Jacob counted (verse 8), which is confirmed by the fact of 33 attributed to Leah, whereas no more than 32 literally are named, reckoning Dinah, and excluding Er and Onan who died in Canaan as we are expressly told. Objectors have failed to take into account the peculiarity in the mention of Hezron and Hamul in verse 12. It is merely said (and said only in their case) that the sons of Pharez "were" Hezron and Hamul, not that they were born in Canaan, where those had died for whom they were substitutes; next, that the Hebrew of verse 26 does not go so far as to say with the Authorised Version, "came with Jacob into Egypt," but of, i.e. belonging to, Jacob. It should be borne in mind that there is no reason, but rather the contrary from scriptural usage for construing <span style="font-family: 'H ebraica'">awhih' teB'</span> "at that time," of an isolated point of time, but rather of a general period, consisting as here of a number of events, the last and not the first of which might synchronize with the event recorded just before. It seems clear that Stephen ([Acts 7:14) cites the LXX. where 76 are given, as the Greek version (Gen. 46:20) adds five sons and grandsons of Manasseh and Ephraim. Is it not monstrous for a man professing Christianity and ostensibly in the position of bishop, to neglect elements so necessary to a judgment of the question, and to pronounce the Biblical account "certainly incredible," mainly on the assumption that Pharez's sons were born in Canaan, which is nowhere said but rather room left for the inference that it was not so in the exceptional form of Gen. 46:12? Yet after citing this verse we are told, "It appears to me certain (!) that the writer here means to say that Hezron and Hamul were born in the land of Canaan." Is scepticism only certain that its own dreams are true, and that scripture is false? There was a natural and weighty motive for selecting two grandsons of Judah, though no other of Jacob's great-grandsons are mentioned in the list. For they only were substitutional, as the very verse in which they occur implies. And it was of the deeper interest too, as one of them (Hezron) stands in the direct line of the Messiah, which was, as it appears to me, one chief reason for introducing the details of Judah's history and its shame in Gen 38. It is vain to quote Num. 3:17 to set aside the peculiar force of the allusion to the sons of Pharez in Gen. 46:12, with which there is no real analogy.

The first objection is that in Genesis 46. Hezron and Hamul are stated to have gone down to Egypt, and consequently to have been born in Canaan; but that this is impossible if the ages of Judah and Joseph be considered. It is contended that Judah was forty-two when Jacob went down into Egypt, inasmuch as Joseph was thirty-nine. Genesis 30:24-26; ch. 31:41, are cited to prove that Joseph was born in the seventh, Judah in the fourth, year "of Jacob's double marriage." The impossibility of Hezron and Hamul's going down to Egypt arises from this, that Judah was twenty when Joseph went down into Egypt, and that Hezron and Hamul, who rank in point of time with Judah's great-grandchildren, though his own grandchildren by Tamar, could not have been born when he was forty-two, that is, twenty-two years afterwards. On the other hand, it is insisted that the narrative of Jacob's going down makes sixty-six souls go with him, and there are not sixty-six without Hezron and Hamul.

90 There is no ground for the objection at all. I do not insist on the uncertainty of the exact difference between the ages of Judah and Joseph, as what might be added, even if just, would hardly clear up the point; though, bringing it perhaps within the limits of possibility, it is sufficient to throw doubt on Dr. C.'s assertions. But Genesis 46 is simply to record the immediate descendants of Jacob who were associated with himself in Egypt to give his family. Thus Er and Onan are noticed; only, it is added, they died in Canaan. It is then added, "and the sons of Pharez were Hezron and Hamul." This twelfth verse is distinctly genealogy, not that all went down into Egypt who are named in it; for Er and Onan are named because they are sons, while it is expressly stated they did not go down at all.*

In verse 12 the introduction of "were" is emphatic, and the phrase, I apprehend, clearly intended to be supplementary. It is not "Er, and Onan, and Shelah, and Pharez, and Zarah, and the sons of Pharez, Hezron and Hamul," which would clearly have been the case if they had been goers down into Egypt. But the historian stops at Zarah, and adds supplementary information: Er and Onan were on the list of sons, but they did not go down — they died before — and Pharez's sons were Hezron and Hamul. They are looked at as filling up the breach, but the latter half of the verse is (in contrast with going down) an explanation of the history of that family. As if he had said, These were Judah's sons, but I must add this explanation to the statement: Er and Onan never got down, for they died, and Pharez had two sons, who are counted in to supply their place. For though the leading thought be the going down of the family into Egypt, yet in order to this he gives the whole family; and that this is so is evident, for he introduces Joseph's sons, adding, that they were born in Egypt. Indeed I think it very questionable whether all Benjamin's sons were born when he came into Egypt.

Son of Esrom, and father of Aminadab. Matt. 1:3-4; Luke 3:33: called RAM, Ruth 4:19; 1 Chr. 2:9-10.

Son of Hezron and father of Amminadab. Ruth 4:19; 1 Chr. 2:9-10. Called ARAM in Matt. 1:3-4; Luke 3:33.

There is no proof that Caleb was the son of Hezron, son of Pharez; if it was the same Caleb as in Numbers, he was the son of Jephunneh. One thing is certain, the Hezron in question died in Canaan in Caleb Ephratah, and it was after this that Abiah bore a son. Hence we see there were no early names in Chronicles with "jah"; Abijah was the grandson of one who died in Canaan. In general the names are after the Exodus. Carmi and Hur are given as sons of Judah because they were directly descended from him, for they were clearly not his sons, nor was Shobal; verse 50 shows that Shobal was at least great-grandson of Judah's grandson, and Reaiah was his son, i.e., there were at least six generations.

Of the family of Jerahmeel there is little but the names. The Ram here (1 Chron. 2:25) is nephew to the Ram, son of Hezron, and brother to Jerahmeel (1 Chron. 2:9). But there is in this branch of Hezron's descendants one man most prominent on account of what he was and what he became through the favour of God, and in so sovereign a manner that, while Israel is under law, a Gentile is honoured and prominent in Israel. Sheshan had no sons but daughters. Would not his name and family soon be lost among the thousands of Judah? Nay; for his daughter, though given to his Egyptian servant, stands at the head of thirteen generations (1 Chron. 2:35-41).

Son of Caleb, son of Hezron. 1 Chr. 2:18.