Matthew Henry on 1 Chronicles 26:1-19
Observe, I. There were porters appointed to attend the temple, who guarded all the avenues that let to it, opened and shut all the outer gates and attended at them, not only for the state, but for service, to direct and instruct those who were going to worship in the courts of the sanctuary in the decorum they were to observe, to encourage those that were timorous, to send back the strangers and unclean, and to guard against thieves and others that were enemies to the house of God. In allusion to this office, ministers are said to have the keys to the kingdom of heaven committed to them (Mat 16:19), that they may admit, and exclude, according to the law of Christ.
II. Of several of those tha…
Read the whole note in the consoleJamieson-Fausset-Brown on 1 Chronicles 26:6
mighty men of valour--The circumstance of physical strength is prominently noticed in this chapter, as the office of the porters required them not only to act as sentinels of the sacred edifice and its precious furniture against attacks of plunderers or popular insurrection--to be, in fact, a military guard--but, after the temple was built, to open and shut the gates, which were extraordinarily large and ponderous.
Adam Clarke on 1 Chronicles 26:6
They were mighty men of valor - They were not only porters or door-keepers in the ordinary sense of the word, but they were a military guard for the gates: and perhaps in this sense alone we are to understand their office.
John Gill on 1 Chronicles 26:6
Also unto Shemaiah his son,.... His firstborn, 1 Chronicles 26:4.
were sons born, that ruled throughout the house of their father; were heads of families, eminent and principal men:
for they were mighty men of valour; which their office sometimes required them to be, to guard the temple at night as well as day from thieves and robbers, and to hinder resolute men entering in, unfit for it, and seize on rioters, and quell tumults raised.
