Nethinim

The name given to the hereditary temple servants in all the post-Exilian books of Scripture. The word means given, i.e., "those set apart", viz., to the menial work of the sanctuary for the Levites. The name occurs seventeen times, and in each case in the Authorized Version incorrectly terminates in "s", "Nethinims;" in the Revised Version, correctly without the "s" (Ezra 2:70; 7:7, 24; 8:20, etc.). The tradition is that the Gibeonites (Josh. 9:27) were the original caste, afterwards called Nethinim. Their numbers were added to afterwards from captives taken in battle; and they were formally given by David to the Levites (Ezra 8:20), and so were called Nethinim, i.e., the given ones, given to the Levites to be their servants. Only 612 Nethinim returned from Babylon (Ezra 2:58; 8:20). They were under the control of a chief from among themselves (2:43; Neh. 7:46). No reference to them appears in the New Testament, because it is probable that they became merged in the general body of the Jewish people.

given or offered

The Nethinims were servants who had been given up to the service of the tabernacle and temple, to perform the meanest and most laborious services therein, in supplying wood and water. At first the Gibeonites were appointed to this service, Joshua ix, 27. Afterward the Canaanites who surrendered themselves, and whose lives were spared, were consigned to the performance of the same duties. We read, Ezra viii, 20, that the Nethinims were slaves devoted by David and the other princes to the ministry of the temple; and elsewhere, that they were slaves given by Solomon; the children of Solomon’s servants, Ezra ii, 58; and we see, in 1 Kings ix, 20, 21, that this prince had subdued the remains of the Canaanites, and had constrained them to several servitudes; and, it is very probable, he gave a good number of them to the priests and Levites for the service of the temple. The Nethinims were carried into captivity with the tribe of Judah, and there were great numbers of them near the coast of the Caspian Sea, from whence Ezra brought some of them back, Ezra viii, 17. After the return from the captivity, they dwelt in the cities appointed them, Ezra ii, 17. There were some of them also at Jerusalem, who inhabited that part of the city called Ophel, Neh. iii, 26. Those who returned with Ezra were to the number of two hundred and twenty, Ezra viii, 20; and those who followed Zerubbabel made up three hundred and ninety-two, Ezra ii, 58. This number was but small in regard to the offices that were imposed on them; so that we find them afterward instituting a solemnity called _Xylophoria_, in which the people carried wood to the temple with great ceremony, to keep up the fire on the altar of burnt sacrifices.