What Does 1 Chronicles 4:10 Mean?
And Jabez called on the God of Israel, saying, Oh that you would surely bless me, and widen my border, and let your hand be with me, and keep me from harm, that it may not pain me! And God brought him what he requested.
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 Jabez called on the God of Israel, saying, Oh that thou wouldest bless me indeed, and enlarge my coast, and that thine hand might be with me, and that thou wouldest keep me from evil, that it may not grieve me! And God granted him that which he requested.THE KEY
The name tied to sorrow does not set the boundary of Jabez’s life: he asks for room to widen, and God grants it.
THE MEANING
The prayer is alive wherever pain seems to mark the limits of life: Jabez asks for blessing, a wider boundary, God’s hand with him, and protection from what would wound him. The answer is concrete: God grants what he asks. The verse before this ties Jabez’s name to sorrow at his birth, but sorrow does not get the final word here.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
A life associated with pain is not therefore destined to be defined by pain.
THE ROOT
עָצְבִּי
ʿāṣbî
GROWS FROM
עצב
ʿ-ts-b
To hurt, cause pain, or grieve.
“grieve me” in this verse is ʿāṣbî. The verse before this ties Jabez’s name to sorrow at his birth; here the same pain-root returns in his request that sorrow not keep reaching him. His name carries the story of pain, but it does not settle what his life can hold.
ALSO GROWS
ʿōṣev: Sorrow, pain.
עֹצֶב
The preceding verse uses this word for the sorrow associated with Jabez’s birth.
ʿāṣav: To hurt or grieve.
עָצַב
This verbal form shows the pain-root active in the plea that grief not come upon him.
הִרְבִּיתָ
hirbita
GROWS FROM
רבה
r-b-h
To increase, become many, or grow.
“widen” in this verse is hirbita. The request is for the boundary to increase, not merely for the present boundary to be endured. “Coast” here means territory or border, so the image is of more room to inhabit.
ALSO GROWS
rav: Many, much, or great.
רַב
This related form makes the root’s sense of increase visible in a word for abundance.
ribbui: Increase or multiplication.
רִבּוּי
This noun carries the same movement toward more, clarifying the force of Jabez’s request.
תְּבָרְכֵנִי
tevarḵēnî
GROWS FROM
ברך
b-r-k
To bless; the same root also names the knee and bending the knee.
“surely bless me” in this verse is tevarḵēnî. The root joins blessing with the body’s bending knee, giving the request a posture as well as a meaning. Here blessing stands alongside a widened boundary and God’s hand with Jabez: the gifts he names are concrete forms of life opening.
ALSO GROWS
berekh: Knee.
בֶּרֶךְ
The shared root gives blessing a bodily echo of bending the knee.
berakhah: Blessing.
בְּרָכָה
This noun carries the same root into the blessing Jabez asks to receive.
THE PATTERN
Life moves from constriction into a wider place, whether the space that opens is territory, shelter, or the heart.
He brings me out into a broad place; he pulls me loose, because he delights in me.Widen the place of your tent, and let the curtains of your dwellings stretch out. Do not hold back; lengthen your cords, and grip your pegs.O Corinthians, our mouth is open toward you, our heart is widened.THE THREAD
From the narrow place I call out to the LORD, and the LORD answers me in a wide place.Both verses use the Hebrew root קָרָא (qara, call out): Jabez calls on God as he asks for a wider boundary, while the psalmist calls from distress and is set in a large place. The shared call-and-widening pattern reveals the spaciousness as the answer to the cry.
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