What Does 1 Chronicles 6:71 Mean?
Unto the sons of Gershom were given out of the family of the half tribe of Manasseh, Golan in Bashan with her pasturelands, and Ashtaroth with her pasturelands.
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
Unto the sons of Gershom were given out of the family of the half tribe of Manasseh, Golan in Bashan with her suburbs, and Ashtaroth with her suburbs:THE KEY
Gershom’s name carries the language of the sojourner, and his descendants receive cities with open land around them: belonging takes material form.
THE MEANING
This verse shows belonging taking material form: Gershom’s descendants receive named cities and the open ground around them. A dwelling is more than the space inside walls; the community’s allocation includes the surrounding margin that makes a place usable.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The verse undoes the assumption that a life of service has no material share in the community: the allotment includes both a city and its surrounding land.
THE ROOT
גֵּרְשֹׁם
Gershom
GROWS FROM
גור
gur
Sojourn; dwell as an outsider.
“Gershom” in this verse is Gershom. Exodus 2:22 explains the name through גֵּר (ger), “sojourner,” when Moses says he is a stranger in a foreign land. That name sits beside a concrete allocation of cities and surrounding land: the passage gives dwelling a material shape.
ALSO GROWS
ger: Sojourner; resident outsider.
גֵּר
Exodus 2:22 links this word with the explanation of Gershom’s name, bringing the language of being a stranger into the verse.
megurim: Sojournings; places of residence.
מְגוּרִים
This branch holds temporary dwelling and residence together, illuminating the verse’s grant of places to dwell.
מִגְרָשֶׁיהָ
migrāsheha
GROWS FROM
גרש
garash
Drive out; expel; send away.
“pasturelands” in this verse is migrāsheha. The related noun מִגְרָשׁ (migrash) names the open land around a settlement. The Hebrew holds the city and its outward ground together, giving the Levites an inhabited center and a surrounding margin.
ALSO GROWS
garash: Drive out; expel; send away.
גָּרַשׁ
This is the verbal root associated with the noun for the land beyond a city’s built area.
migrash: Open land around a city; common land.
מִגְרָשׁ
This is the land named in the verse alongside each city, extending the allotment beyond its walls.
THE PATTERN
A community’s sanctuary service has a material footprint: those who serve receive dwelling and provision from shared life.
The cities shall be theirs to settle in, and the pasturelands shall be for their cattle, for their goods, and for all their beasts.All the cities of the Levites within the holding of the children of Israel were forty and eight cities with their pastures.Do you not know that those who serve the set-apart things eat from the temple, and those who sit beside the altar share with the altar?THE THREAD
The cities shall be theirs to settle in, and the pasturelands shall be for their cattle, for their goods, and for all their beasts.Numbers uses the same Hebrew noun, מִגְרָשׁ (migrash), for the land around the cities. It names what Chronicles compresses into the word suburbs: the grant includes room for cattle, goods, and the life built beyond the city walls.
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