What Does 1 Chronicles 23:22 Mean?
And Eleazar died and had no sons, but daughters, and their brothers, the sons of Kish, took them as wives.
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 Eleazar died, and had no sons, but daughters: and their brethren the sons of Kish took them.THE KEY
The Hebrew verb for “took” also means “to carry,” and here it describes marriage: the daughters remain within the kinship that carries on.
THE MEANING
A family’s continuity is not measured by sons alone: daughters remain within the kinship web, and marriage can carry that connection forward. The verse holds death and continuity together: Eleazar has no sons, yet his daughters are joined to his male kin.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It unsettles the assumption that a family’s future ends when there are no sons; the daughters remain part of the family’s continuing bonds.
THE ROOT
וַיִּשָּׂאוּם
vayissa'um
GROWS FROM
נשא
nasa
to lift, carry, or bear
“took” in this verse is vayissa'um. The same Hebrew verb can mean carrying or bearing, and it is also used for taking a wife. That overlap gives this marriage a sense of kinship carried forward through the daughters.
ALSO GROWS
nasa: To lift or carry something, or to bear a load.
נָשָׂא
This is the root’s concrete sense beneath the verse’s marriage verb.
massa: A burden or something carried.
מַשָּׂא
It shares the root’s sense of bearing, making the carrying image visible in another Hebrew word.
nasi: A chief or leader; literally associated with one raised up.
נָשִׂיא
It shows the root’s other direction: what is carried or lifted can also be raised to prominence.
THE PATTERN
When a household has no sons, daughters and their kinship can still carry its bonds and name forward.
The daughters of Zelophehad speak what stands firm. You shall surely give them a holding of inheritance among their father's brothers, and you shall cause the inheritance of their father to pass over to them.Moreover, Ruth the Moabitess, the wife of Mahlon, I have bought to be my wife, to raise up the name of the dead upon his inheritance, that the name of the dead not be cut off from among his brethren, and from the gate of his place. You are witnesses this day.Salmon brought forth Boaz out of Rahab, and Boaz brought forth Obed out of Ruth, and Obed brought forth Jesse.THE THREAD
And Abram and Nahor took wives for themselves. The name of Abram's wife was Sarai, and the name of Nahor's wife was Milcah, the daughter of Haran, the father of Milcah, and the father of Iscah.Genesis uses the same נשא (nasa), “carry, bear,” verb for taking wives. That shared root opens the marriage here as a carrying of kinship through the daughters.
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