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Comments on Ancestry of the Mishmarot Kehunah
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Ancestry of the Mishmarot Kehunah
In 1 Divrei Hayamim 24:4 it says about the dividing of the Mishmarot Kehunah:
"The sons of Eleazar turned out to be more numerous by male heads than the sons of Ithamar, so they divided the sons of Eleazar into sixteen chiefs of clans and the sons of Ithamar into eight clans."
And then it lists all of the Mishmarot.
Is there any way of knowing which Mishmarot were descended from Elazar and which from Itamar? I would have thought it would be simply the first 16 go to Elazar and the last 8 to Itamar, but verse 5 says the order of the Mishmarot was decided by lottery, so I guess not.
(Edit: Note: I've just found an essay by Prof. Yehoshua Meir Grinetz in which he discusses at length different aspects of the Mishmarot of the time of Ezra and Nechemiah and somehow manages to deduce which belonged to Elazar and which to Itamar)
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