Bible Synapse
Was Achan the son of Carmi or of Zerah?
Hard question · Genealogies · raised by 1 of the lists sceptics circulate
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“Achan, the son of Carmi, the son of Zabdi, the son of Zerah, of the tribe of Judah, took of the accursed thing”.
But the children of Israel committed a trespass in the accursed thing: for Achan, the son of Carmi, the son of Zabdi, the son of Zerah, of the tribe of Judah, took of the accursed thing: and the anger of the Lord was kindled against the children of Israel.
The lot takes the tribe of Judah, the family of the Zarhites, the household of Zabdi, and then Achan the son of Carmi.
So Joshua rose up early in the morning, and brought Israel by their tribes; and the tribe of Judah was taken: And he brought the family of Judah; and he took the family of the Zarhites: and he brought the family of the Zarhites man by man; and Zabdi was taken: And he brought his household man by man; and Achan, the son of Carmi, the son of Zabdi, the son of Zerah, of the tribe of Judah, was taken.
Joshua and all Israel take “Achan the son of Zerah”, with the stolen goods and all he had, to the valley of Achor.
And Joshua, and all Israel with him, took Achan the son of Zerah, and the silver, and the garment, and the wedge of gold, and his sons, and his daughters, and his oxen, and his asses, and his sheep, and his tent, and all that he had: and they brought them unto the valley of Achor.
“Did not Achan the son of Zerah commit a trespass in the accursed thing”, so that wrath fell on all Israel?
Did not Achan the son of Zerah commit a trespass in the accursed thing, and wrath fell on all the congregation of Israel? and that man perished not alone in his iniquity.
The objection
Joshua 7:1 says that Achan was “the son of Carmi”. But Joshua 7:24 and 22:20 call him “Achan the son of Zerah”. Critics ask which man was his father.
The answer
Joshua 7:1 answers the question itself by giving Achan’s full descent: he was “the son of Carmi, the son of Zabdi, the son of Zerah, of the tribe of Judah”. Carmi was his father, and Zerah his forefather. Zerah was Judah’s son, the twin of Pharez (Genesis 38:30), and the founder of the clan called after him, “the family of the Zarhites” (Joshua 7:17). In Hebrew, ben, ‘son’, is regularly used of a grandson or any later descendant, so to call Achan ‘the son of Zerah’ is to name him by his clan, much as the New Testament calls Jesus “the son of David” (Matthew 1:1).
The story itself moves through the same family tree. When the lot was cast, it fell first on the tribe of Judah, then on the clan of Zerah, then on the household of Zabdi, and finally on Achan (Joshua 7:16–18). Barnes’ Notes observes that several generations between Zerah and Zabdi are probably passed over, as in other genealogies of this period. So Joshua 7:24 and 22:20 do not give Achan a different father; they use the shorter form of the same descent.
Other answers Christians give
Achar and Zimri
1 Chronicles 2:6–7 gives the same line with two names in other forms: Zabdi appears as Zimri, a son of Zerah, and Achan as “Achar, the troubler of Israel”, a play on the Hebrew ʿakar, ‘to trouble’, which Joshua also makes (Joshua 7:25–26).
From the classic commentators
In this genealogy, as in others, several generations are omitted, most likely those which intervened between Zerah and Zabdi, and which covered the space between the migration of Jacob's household to Egypt and the Exodus.Barnes’ Notes on the Bible, on Joshua 7:1