What Does 1 Chronicles 17:13 Mean?
I will be his father, and he shall be my son; and I will not turn my faithful love aside from him, as I turned it aside from him who was before you.
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
I will be his father, and he shall be my son: and I will not take my mercy away from him, as I took it from him that was before thee:THE KEY
The promise makes succession a change of bearer, not a withdrawal of faithful love.
THE MEANING
The father-son bond is held in faithful love, and that love remains with the one named even as it is withheld from the one before. The reader sees that one person’s ending does not dictate the bond given to another.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
When love is withdrawn from one, it must be withdrawn from the one who follows.
THE ROOT
חֶסֶד
ḥesed
GROWS FROM
חסד
ḥ-s-d
Faithful love expressed through loyal kindness.
The word translated “mercy” carries the sense of faithful love: a bond that stays, not only a feeling of pity. The verse makes that staying the difference between the one before and the one who follows.
ALSO GROWS
ḥāsad: To show loyal kindness.
חָסַד
This verb reveals the active quality inside the promise: the love is shown through sustained action.
ḥāsîd: A person marked by faithfulness or devotion.
חָסִיד
The same root can describe the one who embodies faithful love, connecting the bond to the character of the one who receives it.
בֵּן
bēn
GROWS FROM
בנה
b-n-h
Build, establish, build up.
The word for “son” is traditionally linked to בָּנָה (bānâ), “to build.” Sonship therefore carries an image of a line being built forward; beside faithful love, it describes continuity that is sustained rather than merely named.
ALSO GROWS
bānâ: To build or establish.
בָּנָה
This root link gives the father-son bond the sense of something built forward through a continuing line.
binyān: A structure or building formed from the same root.
בִּנְיָן
The image of structure illuminates the promise as a bond that holds beyond a single bearer.
THE PATTERN
God’s covenant bond is expressed through named kinship and faithful love that remains across generations.
Perceive therefore that the LORD your God is God, the steady God, who guards the covenant and faithful love for those who love him and guard his commands to a thousand generations.I will guard my faithful love for him for the ages, and my covenant stands firm with him.For to which of the messengers did he ever say, You are my Son, today I have brought you forth? And again, I will be to him a Father, and he will be to me a Son?THE THREAD
I will guard my faithful love for him for the ages, and my covenant stands firm with him.The word translated “mercy” here is the same Hebrew word, חֶסֶד (ḥesed), as in the current verse. Psalm 89 makes the promise’s staying power explicit: faithful love is kept with the son, and the covenant stands.
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