What Does 1 Chronicles 16:5 Mean?
Asaph the head, and next to him Zechariah, Jeiel, Shemiramoth, Jehiel, Mattithiah, Eliab, Benaiah, and Obed-edom; and Jeiel with harps and with lyres, but Asaph caused the cymbals to sound.
Key words are shown with the Hebrew or Greek and what each word meant.
Selah Decoded Version The Selah Decoded Version renders what the Hebrew and Greek words meant to the people who first heard them.
King James wording
King James Version
Asaph the chief, and next to him Zechariah, Jeiel, and Shemiramoth, and Jehiel, and Mattithiah, and Eliab, and Benaiah, and Obed-edom: and Jeiel with psalteries and with harps; but Asaph made a sound with cymbals;THE KEY
The chief is named Asaph, from a root meaning “gather,” and his cymbals make that gathered music heard.
THE MEANING
This verse brings distinct people and instruments into one audible arrangement. Asaph is chief, Jeiel carries psalteries and harps, and Asaph makes the cymbals heard. As you read, praise takes shape through named people and differentiated sounds.
THE ROOT
אָסָף
ʾĀsāp̄
GROWS FROM
אסף
ʾ-s-p
To gather, collect, or bring in.
Asaph’s name grows from אסף, “gather, collect.” That root resonates with the verse’s company of named musicians: the chief’s name carries gathering within a scene where distinct parts sound together.
ALSO GROWS
neʾesaf: Was gathered or collected.
נֶאֱסַף
This form makes the root’s gathering concrete, echoing the assembled people named in the verse.
ʾāsîp̄: The gathering in of a harvest.
אָסִיף
The harvest word shows how the root can name many separate things brought together as one yield.
מַשְׁמִיעַ
mashmiaʿ
GROWS FROM
שמע
sh-m-ʿ
To hear or listen; in this causative form, to make heard or announce.
“caused the cymbals to sound” in this verse is mashmiaʿ. The Hebrew form is causative: Asaph makes the cymbals heard. This root spans hearing and what is heard, presenting the instrument’s sound as something that reaches an ear.
ALSO GROWS
shāmaʿ: To hear or listen.
שָׁמַע
The same root underlies the act of hearing that Asaph’s cymbal sound brings about.
shemuʿah: A report or something heard.
שְׁמוּעָה
This branch shows the root can name a message carried to a listener, giving the cymbal sound a communicative edge.
THE PATTERN
Praise becomes audible through distinct people and instruments contributing recognizable parts.
Praise him with the thrust of the ram's horn; praise him with the harp and the lyre.Make music to the LORD with the lyre; with the lyre, and the voice of song.And even things without a living soul, giving sound, whether pipe or harp, unless they give a separation in the sounds, how shall it be known what is piped or what is harped?THE THREAD
Praise him upon the ringing cymbals that sound; praise him upon the ringing cymbals that shout.Psalm 150 describes the first cymbals as צִלְצְלֵי־שָׁמַע (tsiltsele shamaʿ, “cymbals of hearing or sound”), using the same שׁמע (shamaʿ, “hear”) root as “made a sound.” The shared root joins the cymbal’s resonance to the act of hearing, opening Asaph’s part toward the listener.
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