What Does 1 Chronicles 7:23 Mean?
And when he went in to his wife, she conceived and bore a son, and he called his name Beriah, in harm, for in harm it had been in his house.
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 when he went in to his wife, she conceived, and bare a son, and he called his name Beriah, because it went evil with his house.THE KEY
Beriah’s name closely echoes the phrase for calamity in his house, carrying the household’s trouble into the name spoken over the newborn.
THE MEANING
The verse holds a birth and a household’s calamity in the same moment. Beriah’s name echoes the phrase for what has gone wrong in the house, letting the event remain audible in the family story.
THE ROOT
בְּרָעָה
bᵊrāʿāh
GROWS FROM
רָעַע
to be bad or bring harm
“in harm” in this verse is bᵊrāʿāh. The verse pairs the name בְּרִיעָה (Beriah) with בְּרָעָה (bᵊrāʿāh, calamity), creating a close sound echo. Here the word points to harm that has befallen the household, and that trouble becomes part of the name the family speaks.
ALSO GROWS
raʿ: bad, evil
רַע
This form names the condition of harm or badness within the root family.
rāʿāh: evil, trouble, calamity
רָעָה
This form gives the verse’s trouble the sense of calamity affecting the household.
hērēaʿ: to do harm, act wickedly
הֵרֵעַ
This verbal form shows the same root family describing harm in action as well as a condition.
THE PATTERN
A name can carry the event or purpose surrounding a birth into the word by which that life is known.
And it came to pass, as her living soul was going out, for she died, that she called his name Benoni, son of my bowing low. And his father called him Benjamin, son of the right hand.And she named the child Ichabod, Where-Is-the-Weight, saying, The weight has gone into exile from Israel, because the ark of God was taken, and because of her father-in-law and her husband.And she will bring forth a son, and you will call his name Jesus, the LORD's deliverance, for he will deliver his people from their missing.THE THREAD
Thus says the LORD, Behold, I will raise up evil against you out of your own house. I will take your wives before your eyes and give them to your neighbor, and he shall lie with your wives before the eyes of this sun.The same Hebrew word רָעָה (rāʿāh, calamity) appears beside house language in both verses. Here calamity marks a child’s name; there, harm is described as rising from within a house.
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