Acts 7:16

Were carried. Apart from the burial of the bones of Joseph in Shechem (Gen. 50:25; Ex. 13:19; Joshua 24:32) there is no record in Scripture of the carrying of the bodies of the patriarchs to Canaan. Josephus says, “Their bodies were carried some time afterwards by their descendants [and their sons] to Hebron and buried there” (Antiquities ii. 8. 2 [199]; Loeb ed., vol. 4, p. 251). An ancient Jewish tradition has the bodies of the patriarchs carried out from the land of Egypt with the departing Israelites.

Into Sychem. This Sychem is the Shechem of the OT (see on Gen. 12:6).

Abraham bought. Abraham’s purchase of the cave of Machpelah, to the east of Mamre, near Hebron, is the only recorded transaction of this kind (see on Gen. 23:3-20). Here Abraham, Sarah, Isaac, Rebecca, and Leah were buried. However, the region of Shechem was the place of Abraham’s first settlement upon his entrance into Canaan, and there he built an altar (Gen. 12:6, 7). It may be that he bought land for that purpose, although there is no record of the purchase.

Jacob’s purchase of the field at Shechem is the only recorded transaction in which the sons of Hamor appear as sellers (Gen. 33:19). Here an altar was erected (Gen. 33:20), and Joseph’s bones were buried, but there is no record of its being a burial place for his brothers (“our fathers,” Acts 7:15). Jerome, a Christian writer of the 4th century, states (86th Epistle, Benedictine ed.) that the tombs of the 12 patriarchs were shown at Shechem in his day, and this corresponds to a Samaritan tradition preserved for many centuries. This may coincide with information available to Stephen but unknown to us today.

Emmor. The Greek form of the OT Hamor.

Father of Sychem. Textual evidence favors (cf. p. 10) the reading “in Sychem [Shechem].”