Living In “Negative World”

“There were some that could not prove themselves Israelites (v. 59, 60), a considerable number, who presumed they were of the seed of Jacob, but could not produce their pedigrees... There were others that could not prove themselves priests, and yet were supposed to be of the seed of Aaron... Now we are here told how they lost their evidence. One of their ancestors married a daughter of Barzillai, that great man whom we read of in David's time; he gloried in an alliance to that honourable family, and, preferring that before the dignity of his priesthood, would have his children called after Barzillai's family, and their pedigree preserved in the registers of that house, not of the house of Aaron, and so they lost it. In Babylon there was nothing to be got by the priesthood, and therefore they cared not for being akin to it... Now that the priests had recovered their rights, and had the altar to live upon again, they would gladly be looked upon as priests. But they had sold their birthright for the honour of being gentlemen, and therefore were justly degraded, and forbidden to eat of the most holy things. Note, Christ will be ashamed of those that are ashamed of him and his service.” -Matthew Henry