What Does 1 Chronicles 2:11 Mean?
And Nahshon brought forth Salma, and Salma brought forth Boaz,
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
And Nahshon begat Salma, and Salma begat Boaz,THE KEY
The repeated “begat” makes this genealogy a relay: each life received becomes the threshold of another.
THE MEANING
The verse places you inside a life that arrives through others. Salma brings Boaz into the line, and the repeated verb makes continuity an act of bringing forth. Your own life, too, carries what you receive into what comes next.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The belief that your life begins with itself and belongs only to itself loosens here: the verse presents life as received and carried forward.
THE ROOT
הוֹלִיד
holid
GROWS FROM
ילד
To bear, beget, or bring forth.
“brought forth” in this verse is holid. The Hebrew הוֹלִיד (holid, “begat”) is a causative form of ילד (yalad, “bear, bring forth”). The same root appears in יֶלֶד (yeled, “child”) and תּוֹלְדוֹת (toledot, “generations”), joining the act of bringing forth to the lineage it creates.
ALSO GROWS
yalad: To bear, give birth, or beget
יָלַד
This is the verb’s root: Salma brings Boaz forth into the line.
yeled: Child
יֶלֶד
The child is the one brought forth, making each new name in the genealogy the result of a living connection.
toledot: Generations or an account of origins
תּוֹלְדוֹת
This related word names the unfolding line itself, the pattern repeated in the verse.
בֹּעַז
Boʿaz
GROWS FROM
עזז
To be strong; the related noun עֹז (ʿoz) means strength or might. Boaz is commonly understood as “in him is strength.”
“Boaz” in this verse is Boʿaz. The name holds strength within the person: בּוֹ (bo, “in him”) and עֹז (ʿoz, “strength”). In this verse, the one named for strength enters the line through another life, making inheritance part of the name’s setting.
ALSO GROWS
ʿoz: Strength or might
עֹז
This is the strength element commonly heard in Boaz’s name.
maʿoz: Stronghold or refuge
מָעוֹז
This related form shows strength as something that can hold and shelter, adding depth to the quality carried in the name.
THE PATTERN
A life is carried forward through generation: each one brought forth becomes a link in a longer line.
And Adam lived one hundred and thirty years, and brought forth a son in his own likeness, after his image, and called his name Seth.And Salmon brought forth Boaz, and Boaz brought forth Obed.Salmon brought forth Boaz out of Rahab, and Boaz brought forth Obed out of Ruth, and Obed brought forth Jesse.THE THREAD
And Adam lived one hundred and thirty years, and brought forth a son in his own likeness, after his image, and called his name Seth.Genesis uses the same ילד (yalad, “bring forth”) root when Adam begets Seth, then names the likeness Seth carries. The shared verb opens “begat” as more than a genealogical marker: what is brought forth can carry something of its source.
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