Commentaire sur Les Nombres 26:46

ושם בת אשר שרח AND THE NAME OF THE DAUGHTER OF ASHER WAS SERAH — Because she still remained alive after all these long years (Sotah 13a) it exceptionally mentions her here (Seder Olam 9).

AND THE NAME OF THE DAUGHTER OF ASHER WAS SERACH. “Because she was still alive [at the end of Israel’s period of bondage in Egypt, and after forty years in the desert, and was one of the seventy people mentioned in Genesis 46 who went down to Egypt with Jacob], Scripture mentions her here.” This is Rashi’s language. And Onkelos translated [the verse as follows]: “and the name of the daughter of Asher’s wife, was Serach.” By this he intended to say that she was a daughter that possesseth an inheritance⁸³Further, 36:8. [in the Land in her own right], and therefore Scripture mentions her here just as it mentions the daughters of Zelophehad,⁸⁴Further, 27:7. for she [Serach] is included amongst [those referred to in the verse], Unto these the Land shall be divided.⁸⁵Verse 53. Now had she been the daughter of Asher himself, she would not have inherited [a portion in the Land], since he had male children [as stated in Verse 44]. But she [Serach] was the daughter of his [Asher’s] wife from another man [namely Asher’s wife’s first husband], who did not have a son; therefore his inheritance [in the Land] passed to his daughter. In that case, the reason [why Scripture uses the phrase] and Serach their sister⁸⁶Genesis 46:17. The verse reads: And the sons of Asher: Imnah and Ishvah and Ishvi and Beriah and Serach their sister. Ramban here is pointing out that the verse avoids calling her Asher’s daughter, and describes her especially as the sister of his sons, because she was in actual fact not his daughter at all, but only their half-sister. is because she was a [half-]sister to Asher’s sons, but was not his daughter. And therefore it says [here], And the name of the daughter of Asher was Serach, and it does not say “and Asher’s daughter [was Serach],” because [the intention of the verse] is to say that her name was [i.e., she was known as] “Asher’s daughter,” and she was [actually] called Serach.⁸⁷The meaning of the verse is thus: “And the name of the person known as ‘the daughter of Asher’ was Serach.” Now if she were still alive [at the end of the period of Israel’s sojourn in the desert], as Rashi explained, then she was like the daughters of Zelophehad as regards [receiving] an inheritance [in the Land in her own right], but if she had died [by then, Scripture mentions her here to indicate that] her family received [a portion in the Land] because of her [since she was amongst those who went down to Egypt].
According to the simple meaning of Scripture, Serach had a large family which was called by her name, and she is included in the phrase, These are the families of the sons of Asher according to those that were numbered.⁸⁸Verse 47. Scripture, however, did not want to trace their ancestry to a woman, by saying: “Of Serach, the family of the Serachites,” but instead alluded to this matter [briefly].

ושם בת אשר,”and the name of the daughter of Asher, etc.” Rashi writes that the reason that lady was singled out by name as the only daughter of whom there must have been many, was that she was still alive at the time when this census was taken. Nachmanides writes that if that were the reason, why did Onkelos translate this verse as ושום בת אחת אשר, “and the name of Asher’s only daughter was Shum.” [This is not the version of Onkelos that appears in our editions where we have ושום בת אשר סרח, “Asher’s daughter’s name was Serach.” Ed.] According to Nachmanides her name was mentioned because seeing that he had only a daughter and no sons, she inherited her father’s portion of the ancestral land when Joshua distributed same. She was mentioned for the same reason that Tzelofchod’s daughters were mentioned by name. If Serach had been the daughter (instead of granddaughter or great granddaughter) she would not have qualified for such an inheritance seeing that Asher did have sons of his own as we know from Genesis 46,17 where 4 sons and their sister Serach are listed. What made her different was that although Asher’s wife was her mother, she did not have the same father as had Asher’s sons who were listed as her “brothers” i.e. half-brothers. This is why the Torah does not simply introduce her as ובת אשר, “and Asher’s daughter, but with the prefix “and the name of Asher’s daughter.” She was known as Asher’s daughter, her name being Serach, although Asher was not her biological father.. I do not understand his words (our author concerning Nachmanides) for the mystery deepens as we do not know who the man was who fathered Serach, and on the strength of her father not having any sons she inherited her father’s portion of the land. After all, Serach was of the people who took part in the Exodus and the people who descended to Egypt were only seventy in number and all of Yaakov’s sons had sons so that they qualified as males. Furthermore, seeing she is listed as being alive when the Israelites arrived in Egypt she must have survived past the Exodus (210 years +) in order to qualify under the heading of the generation that left Egypt. According to the plain meaning of the text, Serach presumably had a great and numerous family, all of whose members were known by the name of their matriarch. The Torah decided to include her in the list of the families of the sons of Asher for purposes of the census, but the Torah did not want to list their genealogy as descended from a female i.e. לסרח משפחת סרח, and that is why the Torah abbreviated here. All of the tribes are listed in the same order as they had been listed in Parshat Bamidbar, i.e. in the order in which the tribes were encamped around the Tabernacle. The only change is that in this census Menashe is mentioned ahead of Ephrayim. Ibn Ezra writes that this change of the order in which Ephrayim and Menashe are listed is because the members of the tribe of Ephrayim had decreased by approximately 8000 souls during the 40 years in the desert. Previously, the members of the tribe of Ephrayim had outnumbered those of the tribe of Menashe by approximately 10000, whereas now the members of Ephrayim numbered approximately 20000 fewer than those of Menashe. 26, 54.

ושם בת אשר שרח, “And Asher’s daughter was called Serach.” Seeing that she had been mentioned by name already in Genesis, when eligibility for army service was quite irrelevant, the Torah mentions her here again. [According to our tradition she was still alive after 250 years after Yaakov had come to Egypt. Ed.] There is reason to wonder why the verse mentioning her commences with the connective letter ו, “and.” There is also reason to wonder why the Targum apparently understood Serach as not being Asher’s daughter though she was the daughter of Asher’s wife. Asher apparently had raised her after her mother had died when she was a baby. This is why the Torah describes her as being Asher’s daughter. This would also account for the letter ו at the beginning of this verse, as if to hint that she did not become his daughter already at her birth. The difficulty with this interpretation is that if she had been born to one of the other tribes why did the Torah not mention this? If she was not born to any of the members of the 12 tribes, why is she listed as such in the count of the people Yaakov brought with him to Egypt? Perhaps she was indeed the biological daughter of Asher, and because already before the family descended to Egypt she had acquired a reputation of being especially pious, the Torah decided to mention her name.

.ושם בת אשר שרח, “whereas the name of Asher’s daughter was Serach.” We would have expected the Torah to write simply בת אשר סרח, “Asher’s daughter was Serach.” It appears that the reason why the Torah chose this longwinded version of saying the same thing was because it wished to give us a reason for why she was called “Serach.” She was generally referred to as “Asher’s daughter,” seeing she had grown up in his house although she was not biologically his daughter but his wife’s daughter. This also seems to be confirmed by the Targum who wrote: “and the name of Asher’s wife daughter was Serach.” The question remains open what was the name of her mother, if one of the sons of Yaakov had sired her, why did he not give her his name? If she was sired by a gentile, why was she counted as part of Yaakov’s offspring in Genesis chapter 46 and as a sister to Asher’s sons?Perhaps we may speculate that since she was known by her first name primarily as she had performed many worthy deeds, the title: “and her name was,” preceded her actual name, as a compliment. In the list of Yaakov’s offspring who went down to Egypt with Yaakov her name is listed preceding her status. (Genesis 46,17). This may have been due to her being much older than her younger brothers. The word: ושם, “and the name of,” before her actual name, suggests that “her name preceded her,” she had been well known for her deeds of charity, etc.