MACHIR (TOO, sold; LXX., Maxelp), the eldest and apparently the only son of Manasseh by an Aramitish or Syrian concubine. His wife was Maacah, of the family of Benjamin, the sister of Huppim and Shuppim,' and it is specially recorded that his children were brought up' (the Targum says circumcised ') in the house of their aged great-grandfather, Joseph (Gen. 1. 23 ; Citron. 14, 15). It may be remarked in pass ing, that in the Pesch. Syr. Maacah is named as the mother of Machir. The only son of Machir whose name is recorded is Gilead (Num. xxvi. 29 ; Josh. xvii. t ; 1 Chron. ii. 21, 23 ; vii. But when we remember the early date at which the district bore this name (Gen. xxxi. 21, 23 ; Deut. iii. 12-16), and the loose manner in which we find the word father' used in the O. T. (cf. 1 Chron. ii. 51 ; iv. ix. 35), we can hardly venture to interpret the name Gilead of a person, or deduce more from it than that the mountain-range known under this designation was occupied by Machir's descendants. From 1 Chron. ii. 2 / we learn that Hezron, a chief of Judah, the natural or adoptive ancestor of Caleb, took as the wife of his old age, when he was threescore years old,' a daughter of Machin, who appears from the LXX. reading of ver. 24 (though the whole genealogy is sadly dis located) to have been named Abiah. Zelophehad, whose death without male offspring led to the pro mulgation of the law of succession of heiresses, was one of Machir's descendants (Num. xxvii. i ; Josh. xvii. 3).
The family of Machir come forward prominently in the history of the conquest of the Trans-Jordanic portion of the Promised Land. In the joint expe dition of Israel and Ammon, their warlike prowess expelled the Amorite inhabitants from the rugged and difficult range of Gilead, and their bravery was rewarded by Moses by the assignment to them of a large portion of the district, half Gilead' (Josh. xiii. 31), with its rich mountain-pastures, and the towns of Ashtaroth and Edrei, the capitals of Og's kingdom (Num. xxxii. 39, 40; Deut. iii. 15 ; Josh. xiii. 31 ; xvii. /). The warlike renown of the family of Machir is given as the reason for this grant (Josh. xvii. /), and we can see the sound policy of assigning a frontier land of so much im portance to the safety of the whole country, exposed at the same time to the first brunt of the Syrian and Assyrian invasions, and to the never-ceasing predatory inroads of the wild desert tribes, to a clan whose prowess and skill in battle had been fully proved in the subjugation of so difficult a tract (Stanley, S. and P., p. 327).
Machir being the eldest, and probably the only son of Manasseh, his name appears to stand for that of the whole tribe in Josh. xiii. 31, cf. 29 and xvii. t. This is perhaps the case in Judg. v. 14, where the name of Machir appears among other western tribes as having sent representatives bearing some high title (A. V. governors '), which distinguished them from the surrounding chiefs' (Stanley, Jewish Church, p.3 z9), to the aid of Barak.
2. A wealthy Trans-Jordanic sheikh, the son of Ammiel (called by Josephus, vii. 9. 8, the chief of the land of Gilead'), residing at Lo Debar, among the mountains of Gilead, not far from Mahanaim. The district in which he lived was emphatically the refuge of exiles' (Gen. xxxii. 2-10; 2 Sam. ii. 8 ; Stanley, S. and P., p. 32S), and Machir's con nection with the 0. T. history is as affording shelter and hospitality to royal fugitives—first to Saul's grandson Mephibosheth, and then to David himself during Absalom's rebellion. The house of Machir is where we first hear of the unhappy Mephihosheth after the hasty flight which followed on the fatal rout of Gilboa, and it was from this safe and happy refuge, in which he probably ex pected to end his days in the midst of the family which he was beginning to form (2 Sam. ix. 12), that David summoned him to share his fortunes at Jerusalem (2 Sam. iv. 4 ; ix. 1-13). Twenty years later his royal patron is himself a fugitive, and we again hear of Machir uniting with the neighbour ing sheikhs, Shobi and Barzillai, in welcoming their dethroned monarch, and lavishing on him and his weary and famished soldiers the abundant produce of their rich lands and pastures, and pro viding them with the furniture necessary for their hasty encampment (2 Sam. xvii. 27).—E. V.