All these, who were chosen as gatekeepers at the thresholds, were 212. They were enrolled by genealogies in their villages. David and Samuel the seer established them in their office of trust.
We have here a further account of the good posture which the affairs of religion were put into immediately upon the return of the people out of Babylon. They had smarted for their former neglect of ordinances and under the late want of ordinances.
Commenting on 1 Chronicles 9:14-34
In four quarters were the porters,.... For, according to the Targum on Ch1 9:22 there were twenty four wards: towards the east, west, north, and south; and, as the same paraphrase has it, six wards to the east, six to the west, six to the north, and six to the south.
1Ch 9:22 With 1Ch 9:22 the narrative seems to return to the enumeration begun in 1Ch 9:17-19, so that the reflections on the earlier times, 1Ch 9:19-21, are to be regarded as a parenthesis. 1Ch 9:22 runs: “They all who were chosen for doorkeepers for the thresholds, 212 (men): they, in their villages were they registered; they were ordained by David and Samuel the seer...