Asher, Son of Israel and Zilpah

A son named, an era given

Asher (Hebrew אָשֵׁר) is a son of Israel, born to Zilpah (Genesis 35:26), and so one of the twelve from whom the tribes come. The dossier places him in the era of the patriarchs, around 1996 BC to 1635 BC, a span taken from an era placed on Ussher's chronology (1650). His name is first written at Genesis 30:13 and reaches as far as Revelation. That long reach needs a caution at the outset: the name Asher belongs to a man, to a tribe, to a people and to a stretch of land, and most of the forty-six verses that carry it are not about the man at all. They concern his descendants and their territory. If we want the person, we have very little. If we want his name in the life of Israel, we have a great deal.

What Scripture records of the man

The record of Asher himself is short. He is named at his birth in Genesis 30:13. He is listed among the sons of Zilpah in Genesis 35:26, named again in the list at Genesis 46:17, and in the roll of names at Exodus 1:4. His sons are given as Imnah, Ishvah, Ishvi and Beriah, with a daughter (Genesis 46:17), and that daughter is named again in the wilderness census, where the text pauses over her: "The name of the daughter of Asher was Serah" (Numbers 26:46). He is named at Genesis 49:20, and in the list of 1 Chronicles 2:2, which simply sets him last in a line of brothers: "Dan, Joseph, Benjamin, Naphtali, Gad, and Asher."

That is the whole of it. No speech of his is preserved. No act of his is narrated. He is a name in family lists, a father of named children, and nothing more that Scripture chose to tell.

Counted, named, settled

From the wilderness onward the name belongs to the tribe. At the first census the tally is precise: "Of the children of Asher, their generations, by their families, by their fathers' houses, according to the number of the names, from twenty years old and upward, all who were able to go out to war: those who were counted of them, of the tribe of Asher, were forty-one thousand five hundred" (Numbers 1:40-41). A generation later the number has grown: "These are the families of the sons of Asher according to those who were counted of them, fifty-three thousand and four hundred" (Numbers 26:47). The name also stands in Numbers 1:13, 2:27, 7:72, 10:26, 13:13, 26:44 and 34:27, and in Deuteronomy 27:13 and 33:24.

The land comes in Joshua. Asher is a neighbour on the northern frontier: "Southward it was Ephraim's, and northward it was Manasseh's, and the sea was his border. They reached to Asher on the north, and to Issachar on the east. Manasseh had three heights in Issachar, in Asher Beth Shean and its towns, and Ibleam and its towns, and the inhabitants of Dor and its towns, and the inhabitants of Endor and its towns, and the inhabitants of Taanach and its towns, and the inhabitants of Megiddo and its towns" (Joshua 17:10-11). The allotment, its borders and its cities are recorded in Joshua 17:7, 19:24, 19:31, 19:34, 21:6 and 21:30, and cities within Asher are noted again in 1 Chronicles 6:62 and 6:74.

The failure Scripture names

Then Judges tells the truth about the tribe. "Asher didn't drive out the inhabitants of Acco, nor the inhabitants of Sidon, nor of Ahlab, nor of Achzib, nor of Helbah, nor of Aphik, nor of Rehob; but the Asherites lived among the Canaanites, the inhabitants of the land, for they didn't drive them out" (Judges 1:31-32). Seven towns listed, and the same verdict twice in two verses: they didn't drive them out. The land was given; the land was not taken. Asher is named again in Judges 5:17, and among those gathered in Judges 6:35 and 7:23.

After that the name surfaces in the life of the kingdom at 2 Samuel 2:9, 1 Kings 4:16, 1 Chronicles 7:30, 7:40 and 12:36, and 2 Chronicles 30:11; in Ezekiel 27:6; and in Ezekiel's portions of the land, where the tribe is given place between two brothers: "By the border of Dan, from the east side to the west side, Asher, one portion. By the border of Asher, from the east side even to the west side, Naphtali, one portion" (Ezekiel 48:2-3). The name stands again among the gates at Ezekiel 48:34.

What we do not know

We do not know when Asher died, or where, or how. We have no words from his mouth, no journey, no quarrel, no obedience, no sin set down as his own. The failure the Bible records under his name belongs to his descendants in Judges 1:31-32, not to a scene from his own life. Scripture does not say why so little was kept of him.

The line into the New Testament

Two New Testament verses carry the name: Luke 2:36 and Revelation 7:6. Neither text is quoted in this study, so nothing may be built around them here. What they do show is plain enough. The name first spoken at Genesis 30:13, a name attached to a man of whom no deed at all is recorded, is still in use in the pages that tell of Christ and in the book that closes the canon. He was named at his birth, named in the censuses, named in the land, and named there. That is not nothing. It is the mark of a God who keeps names He has once given, even when the story behind them is silent.