Good evening, and welcome to EBible Fellowship’s Bible study in the book of Genesis.  Tonight is study #16 in Genesis 36, and we will read Genesis 36:20-30:

These are the sons of Seir the Horite, who inhabited the land; Lotan, and Shobal, and Zibeon, and Anah, And Dishon, and Ezer, and Dishan: these are the dukes of the Horites, the children of Seir in the land of Edom. And the children of Lotan were Hori and Hemam; and Lotan's sister was Timna. And the children of Shobal were these; Alvan, and Manahath, and Ebal, Shepho, and Onam. And these are the children of Zibeon; both Ajah, and Anah: this was that Anah that found the mules in the wilderness, as he fed the asses of Zibeon his father. And the children of Anah were these; Dishon, and Aholibamah the daughter of Anah. And these are the children of Dishon; Hemdan, and Eshban, and Ithran, and Cheran. The children of Ezer are these; Bilhan, and Zaavan, and Akan. The children of Dishan are these; Uz, and Aran. These are the dukes that came of the Horites; duke Lotan, duke Shobal, duke Zibeon, duke Anah, Duke Dishon, duke Ezer, duke Dishan: these are the dukes that came of Hori, among their dukes in the land of Seir.

I will stop reading there.  We have seen some of these names before, but let us start with Seir.  And we know that mount Seir is the place Esau went to, and it became part of Edom.  But Seir is also a person, and we are told that he had sons, in Genesis 36:20:

These are the sons of Seir the Horite, who inhabited the land…

The word “inhabited” means that he dwelt there.  More than likely, he was the original inhabitant, or at least he was the one whereby this land got its name of “mount Seir.”  It appears it was named after this man named Seir.  And as we check the Bible, and we have gone to some of these verses before, and if we go to Deuteronomy 2, we will see that God gave Esau the land of Seir.  It says in Deuteronomy 2:1-5:

Then we turned, and took our journey into the wilderness by the way of the Red sea, as JEHOVAH spake unto me: and we compassed mount Seir many days. And JEHOVAH spake unto me, saying, Ye have compassed this mountain long enough: turn you northward. And command thou the people, saying, Ye are to pass through the coast of your brethren the children of Esau, which dwell in Seir; and they shall be afraid of you: take ye good heed unto yourselves therefore: Meddle not with them; for I will not give you of their land, no, not so much as a foot breadth; because I have given mount Seir unto Esau for a possession.

If you recall when we have looked at mount Seir in the past, we have seen how it identifies with the Law of God.  Turn over to Deuteronomy 33:2:

And he said, JEHOVAH came from Sinai, and rose up from Seir unto them…

The Lord joins Sinai (where the Law was given) with Seir, so the inhabitants of Seir would identify with those who are in relationship with the Law, as all unsaved people are in a relationship with the Law of God.  As a matter of fact, according to Romans 7, the unsaved individual is married to the Law, and only through the death of Christ could he become “dead to the Law,” in order to marry another, Jesus Himself.  And that is only true of God’s elect, and that leaves the rest of mankind in a marriage relationship to the Law.  That is typified here by those who inhabit mount Seir. 

It also says in Deuteronomy 2:5 that they were not to meddle with the Edomites because He had given mount Seir unto Esau for a possession.  We also see this stated in Joshua 24:4:

And I gave unto Isaac Jacob and Esau: and I gave unto Esau mount Seir, to possess it; but Jacob and his children went down into Egypt.

So at the time God arranged for Jacob and the children of Israel to leave Canaan and go to Egypt, God was continuing to increase the Edomites in mount Seir, and that particular land would remain their land.

Further on in Deuteronomy 2, we read in Deuteronomy 2:10-12:

The Emims dwelt therein in times past, a people great, and many, and tall, as the Anakims; Which also were accounted giants, as the Anakims; but the Moabites call them Emims. The Horims also dwelt in Seir beforetime; but the children of Esau succeeded them, when they had destroyed them from before them, and dwelt in their stead; as Israel did unto the land of his possession, which JEHOVAH gave unto them.

Here, the Lord is speaking of a great and tall people, the Anakims.  These were one of the people that when the Israelites spied out the land and saw them, they said, “And we were in our own sight as grasshoppers, and so we were in their sight.”  They must have been very tall, and they were accounted as “giants,” as we read in verse 11.  In that context, the Lord refers to the Horims who also dwelt in Seir beforetime (in times past), and it would seem to imply that the Horims were on the level of the giants, and they were also a great and tall people.  I mention that because it says in our verse in Genesis 36:20:

These are the sons of Seir the Horite…

The word “Horite” is Strong’s #2752, as is the word “Horims” in Deuteronomy 2:12 where it says, “The Horims also dwelt in Seir beforetime.”  It is the same Hebrew word, so that would indicate that Seir was one of these Horims.  That is why he is said to be Seir the Horite, or Horim.  Was he great and tall?  Perhaps.  Again, there is some indication of that due to the context in Deuteronomy 2.

The only other time we read of a “Horite” is in Genesis 14, the chapter that gives the account of Lot (and others) being taken captive, and then Abram and his trained servants delivered him.  But we read in Genesis 14:5:

And in the fourteenth year came Chedorlaomer, and the kings that were with him, and smote the Rephaims in Ashteroth Karnaim, and the Zuzims in Ham, and the Emims in Shaveh Kiriathaim,

Again, there is the Emims.  Let us go back to Deuteronomy 2:10-11:

The Emims dwelt therein in times past, a people great, and many, and tall, as the Anakims; Which also were accounted giants…

So the Emims were accounted “giants,” and Chedorlaomer smote them.  Then it adds in Genesis 14:6:

And the Horites in their mount Seir, unto Elparan, which is by the wilderness.

So they were Horites, or Horims.  And, again, this would fit in because we see the Emims mentioned first just as in Deuteronomy 2, and then the Horites, or Horims, so they could identify with “giants.”  But we do not read the word “giant” in Genesis 36.  As a matter of fact, what happens when we continue to read is that Seir the Horite had sons, and listed among his sons are Zibeon and Anah, as it says in Genesis 36:24-25:

And these are the children of Zibeon; both Ajah, and Anah: this was that Anah that found the mules in the wilderness, as he fed the asses of Zibeon his father. And the children of Anah were these; Dishon, and Aholibamah the daughter of Anah.

We have heard that before, have we not?  Earlier in this same chapter, we saw in Genesis 36:2:

Esau took his wives of the daughters of Canaan; Adah the daughter of Elon the Hittite, and Aholibamah the daughter of Anah the daughter of Zibeon the Hivite;

Again, Aholibamah is the daughter of Anah, and that is in agreement, and Anah is the son of Zibeon.  Remember when we saw that language, we realized that when it said, “the daughter of Anah,the daughter of Zibeon,” it is another way of saying that Anah is her father, and Anah is the son of Zibeon, so Zibeon was her grandfather.  It would just be like saying, “the son of Anah the son of Zibeon.”  We find fairly often in the Bible that someone can be a later descendant, and yet be called a son, and that is a similar thing here, as it can apply to a daughter as well. 

So it would appear that since Esau married Aholibamah the daughter of Anah, and Anah was the son of Zibeon, and Zibeon was the son of Seir, that this is just a few generations from Seir the Horite (or Horim).  This man that was possibly “as a giant” had a son named Zibeon; and Zibeon had a son named Anah, and Anah had a daughter.  So it would be a fourth generation from Seir the Horite, and Esau married her (Aholibamah). 

Perhaps it was a sort of political marriage, as we saw with Solomon and various kings of Israel and Judah that entered into political marriages with people of other lands.  And Esau could have entered into the “community” of mount Seir, or the land of Seir, through marriage, but it would appear that he later took the land by force, if we go by what we read in Deuteronomy 2:12:

The Horims also dwelt in Seir beforetime; but the children of Esau succeeded them, when they had destroyed them from before them, and dwelt in their stead; as Israel did unto the land of his possession, which JEHOVAH gave unto them.

Remember that Esau had four hundred men when he came to meet his brother Jacob as Jacob came out of Haran.  Esau had an army, just like Abram had an army, in Genesis 14, of over three hundred men.  Esau had even more men, and he married into the Horites, and into Seir’s family, but at some point there was a battle, and the Edomites succeeded the Horims.   God was with the Edomites.  You know, when God says He gave someone the land, that does not mean they just “walked in.”  He gave the land of Canaan to Israel, and yet Joshua and the nation of Israel had to do battle, after battle, after battle, against the inhabitants of the land, and the same was apparently true for the Edomites.

So let us just read this curious verse in Genesis 36:24, and we will just consider this for a couple minutes, and in our next Bible study we will try to get into it a little more.  It says in Genesis 36:24:

And these are the children of Zibeon; both Ajah, and Anah: this was that Anah that found the mules in the wilderness, as he fed the asses of Zibeon his father.

This really stands out because we are getting some additional commentary and detail.  For many verses now, we have pretty much been reading names and titles and things regarding genealogy.  But now there is this sort of “break,” and it is refreshing in some ways because we are told something curious concerning Anah: “this was that Anah that found the mules in the wilderness, as he fed the asses of Zibeon his father. “  We wonder why God is telling us about this.  What does this have to do with the spiritual things of the Gospel? 

What are these mules?  That is the first thing, if you would like to start looking at this.  It is not the typical word for “mules.”  The Hebrew word translated as “mules” here is only translated this way in this verse, and it is the only time this particular word is used.  But it is related to other words such as the word “sea.”  But it is a plural word in our verse.  The two related words have identical consonants, so they are the same word, and they are both translated as “sea” or “seas.”  So we could read this as, “… this was that Anah that found the seas in the wilderness, as he fed the asses of Zibeon his father.” 

By the way, Jay Green translated this word as “hot springs,” if you look in the interlinear Bible.  So it was Anah that found the hot springs in the wilderness.  And “springs” would identify with water, so I guess that would be the similarity to the word “sea.”  But why hot springs?  It is because Strong’s says that this word comes from the Hebrew word “yôm,” and with the vowel pointing the Hebrew word translated as “mules” is the Hebrew word “yêm.”  And the related words “sea” or “seas” is “yâm,” (with an “a” vowel sound).  The word for “mules” has an ”e” vowel sound, and the word it comes from is “yôm,” and that is the word translated as “day,” as in “the day breaketh,” and that word is used practically every time you see the word “day” in the Old Testament.

But that makes no sense if we say that Anah found the “days” in the wilderness.  So what I think what Jay Green did was in thinking that in the day the sunlight gives off heat, so he put that together with the idea of water, and came up with “hot spring.”  So this is a very interesting word, and when we get together in our next Bible study, we will look more at this word, especially the spiritual level.