What Does Nehemiah 10:5 Mean?
Harim, Meremoth, Obadiah,
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
Harim, Meremoth, Obadiah,THE KEY
The covenant becomes concrete through named people, and Obadiah’s name carries service inside belonging.
THE MEANING
The covenant is visible in particular people, not only in a collective promise. Obadiah’s name gathers service into belonging, making faithfulness something embodied and particular in the life of the reader now.
THE ROOT
עֹבַדְיָה
ʿŌḇaḏyāh
GROWS FROM
עבד
The root עבד (ʿābad) means serve or work; the name עֹבַדְיָה (ʿŌḇaḏyāh) means “servant of Yahweh.”
English lets Obadiah pass as a label, but the name carries the root of serving within it. The same seed grows into “servant” and “service,” joining belonging to a lived way of serving rather than separating identity from action.
ALSO GROWS
ʿāḇaḏ: To serve or work.
עָבַד
This verb uses the same root embedded in Obadiah’s name, linking the named person with the act of service.
ʿeḇeḏ: A servant.
עֶבֶד
This noun makes explicit the servant identity carried in Obadiah’s name.
ʿăḇōḏāh: Service or work.
עֲבֹדָה
This branch shows the root extending from the person who serves to the work itself.
THE PATTERN
Covenant and sacred work become concrete through individually named people and their service.
See, I have called by name Bezaleel the son of Uri, the son of Hur, of the staff of Judah.Also of the given ones, whom David and the princes had set for the serving of the Levites, two hundred and twenty; all of them were marked by name.Embrace Priscilla and Aquila, my fellow workers in the anointed one, Jesus.THE THREAD
And he said, Surely I will be with you, and this shall be a sign to you that I have sent you. When you have brought the people out of Egypt, you shall serve God on this mountain.Obadiah’s name carries the root עבד (ʿābad, “serve”), which also appears in Exodus 3:12 as “serve God.” The shared root joins a person’s named nature to a lived action: belonging and service are held together.
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