What Does 1 Chronicles 23:17 Mean?
And the sons of Eliezer were Rehabiah the head, and Eliezer had no other sons, but the sons of Rehabiah multiplied greatly.
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 the sons of Eliezer were, Rehabiah the chief. And Eliezer had none other sons; but the sons of Rehabiah were very many.THE KEY
Eliezer has one son, but that single branch becomes many, and Rehabiah’s name carries the sense of being made wide.
THE MEANING
This verse holds a narrow beginning and a wide outcome together: Eliezer has no other sons, yet Rehabiah’s line is very large. Its shape is clear now, a single branch can open into abundance.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the assumption that abundance requires many beginnings: one son’s line becomes very many.
THE ROOT
רְחַבְיָהוּ
Reḥavyahu
GROWS FROM
רחב
r-ḥ-b
To be wide, make room, or enlarge.
Rehabiah’s name joins the root for widening with the name of Yah: “Yah has made wide.” The verse places that name beside a line that grows from one son into very many, letting the name’s spaciousness echo in the family’s abundance.
ALSO GROWS
rāḥab: To be wide or grow spacious.
רָחַב
The root gives Rehabiah’s name its sense of widening.
merḥav: A broad place or open space.
מֶרְחָב
This branch appears in the image of being brought into a “large place,” where constriction gives way to room.
hirḥiv: To enlarge or widen.
הִרְחִיב
This form names the act of making room, a widening that lets a line or life extend beyond its former bounds.
THE PATTERN
Widening makes room for life to flourish and for others to be received.
And he pulled up from there, and dug another well, and over that they did not strive. And he called the name of it Rehoboth, the wide places, and he said, For now the LORD has widened a place for us, and we shall bear fruit in the land.He brings me out into a broad place; he pulls me loose, because he delights in me.O Corinthians, our mouth is open toward you, our heart is widened.THE THREAD
And he pulled up from there, and dug another well, and over that they did not strive. And he called the name of it Rehoboth, the wide places, and he said, For now the LORD has widened a place for us, and we shall bear fruit in the land.Rehabiah’s name carries רחב (raḥab, to widen), the same root heard in Rehoboth and “made room.” Both verses place widening beside fruitfulness: here it is carried in a name and a growing family line; there it is spoken over an open place and the life to come from it.
Read the SDV Bible.
Every verse has a Deep Dive in the app.
The iPhone Bible app with the Selah Decoded Version.
Does something in this reading look wrong? Tell us