What Does 1 Chronicles 2:4 Mean?
And Tamar, his daughter-in-law, brought forth to him Pharez and Zerah. All the sons of Judah were five.
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 Tamar his daughter in law bare him Pharez and Zerah. All the sons of Judah were five.THE KEY
The verse makes rupture part of the genealogy: Pharez names a breach, and Zerah carries the image of a rising.
THE MEANING
You encounter a family line that holds rupture and rising together: Pharez names a breach, and Zerah carries the image of light rising. Tamar bears them, and both are counted among Judah’s five sons. The line continues with the breach preserved in its name.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
A breach in a family’s story means the line can no longer continue.
THE ROOT
פֶּרֶץ
Perets
GROWS FROM
פרץ
To break through or burst open; as a noun, a breach or opening.
“Pharez” in this verse is Perets. The name carries the word for a breach, so the genealogy preserves an opening as part of its own history. The English name keeps the sound but hides the word-picture.
ALSO GROWS
parats: To break through, burst out, or spread.
פָּרַץ
This verb names the action behind the proper name: an emergence that forces an opening.
happorets: The breaker, one who breaks through.
הַפֹּרֵץ
Micah uses this form for the one who breaks through a gate, turning the breach into a passage.
perets: A breach, gap, or breaking forth.
פֶּרֶץ
Genesis 38:29 uses this noun for the birth event that gives Pharez his name.
זֶרַח
Zeraḥ
GROWS FROM
זרח
To rise or shine, like the sun coming into view.
Zerah’s name belongs to the word-family of rising and shining. Beside Pharez, it lets Judah’s genealogy hold a breach and a rising in its names.
ALSO GROWS
zarach: To rise or shine, often of the sun.
זָרַח
This verb supplies the image carried by Zerah’s name: light rising into view.
mizrach: East, the direction of sunrise.
מִזְרָח
The east takes its name from the place where the sun rises, extending the same image in the root.
וַתֵּלֶד
wattēled
GROWS FROM
ילד
To give birth, beget, or bring forth.
“brought forth” in this verse is wattēled. Hebrew uses this root for a woman giving birth and a man begetting children; English separates the word-family into “bare” and “begat.” Tamar’s bearing belongs to the same language of lineage that continues through Judah’s genealogy.
ALSO GROWS
yalad: To bear, give birth, or beget.
יָלַד
This verb is the shared source of the distinct English renderings “bare” and “begat.”
yeled: A child or boy.
יֶלֶד
The child is the branch that makes the root’s meaning of bringing forth concrete.
moledet: Birth, kindred, or native place.
מוֹלֶדֶת
This form connects birth with the family line and place from which someone comes.
THE PATTERN
A breach can become a named passage and remain inside the line that continues.
And it came to be, as he drew back his hand, and behold, his brother came out, and she said, How have you broken through? Let this breach be upon you. Therefore his name was called Pharez, the breach.The one who breaks through goes up before them. They break through, pass through the gate, and go out through it. Their king passes before them, and the LORD is at their head.Judah brought forth Perez and Zerah out of Tamar, and Perez brought forth Hezron, and Hezron brought forth Ram.THE THREAD
And it came to be, as he drew back his hand, and behold, his brother came out, and she said, How have you broken through? Let this breach be upon you. Therefore his name was called Pharez, the breach.“Broken forth” and “breach” are forms of פרץ, the root heard in Pharez. Chronicles compresses the birth story into the name; Genesis opens that name back into the moment it was given.
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