Bible Commentaries
Numbers 36

Verses 1-13

Numbers 36:1-13 . Heiresses Required to Marry within their own Tribe.— This law supplements the enactment in Numbers 27:1-11, which allowed daughters to inherit their father’ s property, but still left open the possibility of the property, on their marriage, passing with them to another tribe. In practice, the transfer of lands from one tribe to another seems to have been not infrequent, for the same cities are sometimes represented as belonging to different tribes (presumably at different periods). Thus Dibon is Gadite in Numbers 32:34, but Reubenite in Joshua 13:17; Heshbon is Reubenite in Numbers 32:37, but Gadite in Joshua 21:39; Hormah belongs to Judah in Joshua 15:30, but to Simeon in Joshua 19:4.

Numbers 36:1 . Before Moses: the LXX adds, “ and before Eleazar the priest” ; cf. Numbers 27:2.