What Does 1 Chronicles 5:23 Mean in the King James?

And the children of the half tribe of Manasseh dwelt in the land: they increased from Bashan unto Baal-hermon and Senir, and unto mount Hermon.

1 Chronicles 5:23 · 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.

This verse in the Selah Decoded Version

THE KEY

The verse pairs becoming numerous with a widening inhabited reach, so increase is visible in the land itself.

THE MEANING

You can be rooted in a place and still grow beyond a narrow boundary. This verse holds dwelling and increase together: a people becomes numerous, and that growth is seen across the land from Bashan toward Hermon.

THE ROOT

רָבוּ

rābû

GROWS FROM

רבה

r-b-h

To be many, become numerous, or grow abundant.

“increased” in this verse is rābû. The root names a people becoming many. The place names that surround it give this increase a geography: the verse shows where that growing presence is found.

ALSO GROWS

yirev: May multiply.

יִרֶב

This form appears in the creation blessing over living creatures, linking increase with the multiplication of life.

hirbah: To increase or make numerous.

הִרְבָּה

This causative form shows the same root from the angle of what brings a multitude into being.

מְנַשֶּׁה

Menaššeh

GROWS FROM

נשה

n-sh-h

To forget; in the name’s form, to cause to forget.

“Manasseh” in this verse is Menaššeh. The name is linked to Joseph’s words, “God hath made me forget all my toil” (Genesis 41:51). Here that name marks a people whose presence extends across the land, placing the memory of toil beside a picture of increase without making one the cause of the other.

ALSO GROWS

nāšāh: To forget.

נָשָׁה

This verb is the seed behind the name Manasseh.

naššannî: He has made me forget.

נַשַּׁנִי

Joseph uses this form when he names his son, giving the tribal name its remembered phrase.

THE PATTERN

Across scripture, increase becomes visible as life multiplies and fills the place it inhabits.

And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth.

Genesis 1:28 · KJVCreation’s blessing takes visible form as living beings multiply across the earth.

And the children of Israel were fruitful, and increased abundantly, and multiplied, and waxed exceeding mighty; and the land was filled with them.

Exodus 1:7 · KJVThe people’s increase becomes visible as the land fills with their presence.

And the word of God increased; and the number of the disciples multiplied in Jerusalem greatly; and a great company of the priests were obedient to the faith.

Acts 6:7 · KJVThe pattern reaches beyond a people’s numbers as the word increases and the assembly multiplies.

THE THREAD

And the children of Israel were fruitful, and increased abundantly, and multiplied, and waxed exceeding mighty; and the land was filled with them.

Exodus 1:7 · KJV

The Hebrew verb translated “increased” here and “increased abundantly” there grows from the same root, ⁨רבה⁩ (r-b-h), meaning “to become numerous.” Exodus shows that abundance filling the land; Chronicles shows it alongside a stretch of named territory.

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