Tilgath - pilneser. — The Assyrian monarch known as Tiglath Pileser II. See 2 Kings 15:29, for his deportation of the people of the northern and trans-Jordanic districts of Israel, in the reign of Pekah. Some MSS., with LXX. and Syriac, read Tiglath, which is more correct than Tilgath. Vat., LXX., ΘαγλαΦαλλασὰρ, Syr., Teglath-Palsar. The Assyrian name, of which these forms are transcripts, is Tu-kulti-pal-Esarra, “the servant of the son of Esarra.” (The “Son of Esarra” is a title of the god Ninip.) Tilgath-Pilneser (Vulg., Thelgath-Phalnasar) is the invariable spelling of Chronicles.
He was prince of the Reubenites. — Beerah was tribal prince of Reuben, and not merely chief of a Reubenite clan, as some will have it. The Hebrew construction is parallel to that of Numbers 7:24; Numbers 7:30 seq., with which comp. Numbers 7:18.
(7) And his brethren by their families. — “And his fellow-tribesmen, each after his clan (Numbers 2:34), in the registration after their pedigrees, were the chief, Jeiel, and Zechariah.” Jeiel was the chief of the second Reubenite clan, as Beerah of the first. Zechariah and Bela were heads of the other chief houses. It appears that these four chieftains correspond to the four divisions of Reuben mentioned in 1 Chronicles 5:3. Numbers 26:7 says expressly that “the Hanochite, the Palluite, the Hezronite, and the Carmite” were “the clans of the Reubenite.”