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1 Chronicles 27 · a question people ask

Wasn't Asahel already dead?

In the text

The chapter says, "The fourth captain for the fourth month was Asahel the brother of Joab, and Zebadiah his son after him. In his division were twenty-four thousand" (27:7). 2 Samuel tells how Abner struck Asahel, and "he fell down there and died in the same place" (2 Samuel 2:23). 1 Chronicles doesn't say when Asahel led the fourth month's division, or when Zebadiah followed him, and these notes don't either. The two verses are set side by side as the WEB has them: the book's introduction says that where the books differ, the chapters quote both and don't try to reconcile them beyond what the text says.

The verses

“The fourth captain for the fourth month was Asahel the brother of Joab, and Zebadiah his son after him. In his division were twenty-four thousand.”
1 Chronicles 27:7 · World English Bible
“However, he refused to turn away. Therefore Abner with the back end of the spear struck him in the body, so that the spear came out behind him; and he fell down there and died in the same place. As many as came to the place where Asahel fell down and died stood still.”
2 Samuel 2:23 · World English Bible

From Favor's study of 1 Chronicles 27

1 Chronicles 27: Like the stars of the sky

David didn't number those twenty years old and under "because the LORD had said he would increase Israel like the stars of the sky" (27:23): in Hebrew, the same verb and the same words for the stars of the sky as the LORD's promise to Abraham and to Isaac (Genesis 22:17, 26:4). And the count Joab began, he "didn’t finish" (27:24).

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Scripture quotations are from the World English Bible, which is in the public domain. Every answer cites the verses it rests on. What we believe · All Bible questions