What Does 1 Chronicles 4:25 Mean in the King James?

Shallum his son, Mibsam his son, Mishma his son.

1 Chronicles 4:25 · KJV

The analysis reads the King James wording.

King James Version The King James Version, first published in 1611. Selah Verse shows the standard text.

THE KEY

Three consecutive names make this genealogy more than a count: beneath Shallum, Mibsam, and Mishma lie wholeness or recompense, fragrance, and hearing.

THE MEANING

You meet this verse as someone held in a chain of lives: identity is received through relation, yet each person remains named. Shallum, Mibsam, and Mishma carry root associations of wholeness or recompense, fragrance, and hearing. Their meanings sit side by side, while the verse leaves their relationship unexplained.

WHAT THIS UNDOES

A life is self-originating and detached from everyone who came before it.

THE ROOT

מִשְׁמָע

Mishma

GROWS FROM

שמע

sh-m-ʿ

Hear, listen, or heed; where response is implied, hear and respond.

Mishma means hearing, so the name carries a root that English leaves hidden inside a proper name. The verse gives no account of Mishma’s character; the connection is in the name’s root itself.

ALSO GROWS

shema: Hear and respond.

שְׁמַע

This imperative form makes the root’s movement from hearing toward response especially clear.

shemuah: A report or something heard.

שְׁמוּעָה

It shows the root extending from hearing to the message that is received and passed on.

שַׁלּוּם

Shallum

GROWS FROM

שלם

sh-l-m

Be whole or complete; in another form, repay or make good.

Shallum carries a root with a range that includes wholeness and recompense. The English name preserves the person, while the root also holds this wider field of meaning.

ALSO GROWS

shalom: Wholeness, well-being.

שָׁלוֹם

This branch shows the root’s sense of completeness, in keeping with the established understanding of shalom as wholeness.

shillem: Repaid, compensated, or made good.

שִׁלֵּם

This form reveals the root’s related sense of settling what is owed or restoring what is due.

מִבְשָׂם

Mibsam

GROWS FROM

בשׂם

b-ś-m

Fragrance or aromatic spice.

Mibsam carries the concrete image of fragrance inside a name that English leaves untranslated. The verse does not say that the name forms part of a larger message; its root simply preserves that image.

ALSO GROWS

bosem: An aromatic substance or spice.

בֹּשֶׂם

This related word shows the root’s direct link to fragrance.

besamim: Spices or fragrances.

בְּשָׂמִים

The plural form extends the same root into a collection of aromatic substances.

THE PATTERN

Scripture carries identity forward through lineages that name each generation in relation to another.

And Adam lived an hundred and thirty years, and begat a son in his own likeness, after his image; and called his name Seth:

Genesis 5:3 · KJVA named child is placed within a lineage while remaining distinct through his own name.

And the women her neighbours gave it a name, saying, There is a son born to Naomi; and they called his name Obed: he is the father of Jesse, the father of David.

Ruth 4:17 · KJVObed’s name and his place in the line from Jesse to David carry identity forward across generations.

The book of the generation of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham.

Matthew 1:1 · KJVThe opening of Matthew presents identity through a named chain of descent.

THE THREAD

Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God is one LORD:

Deuteronomy 6:4 · KJV

Mishma’s name shares the root ⁨שמע⁩ (sh-m-ʿ) with the opening command, “Hear” (shema), here. The shared root connects a name in this genealogy to Scripture’s wider language of hearing as attentive response, without claiming that hearing defines Mishma’s character.

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