What Does Numbers 26:40 Mean?
And the sons of Bela were Ard and Naaman. Of Ard, the family of the Ardites. And of Naaman, the family of the Naamites.
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 the sons of Bela were Ard and Naaman: of Ard, the family of the Ardites: and of Naaman, the family of the Naamites.THE KEY
Naaman’s name, linked to pleasantness, does not end with one person: it becomes the shared name of a family.
THE MEANING
This verse speaks to how a person’s name can continue within a larger belonging. Naaman’s name carries the sense of pleasantness, and the Naamites bear his name as a family designation; Ard’s name likewise passes into the Ardites. Individual names and collective identity appear side by side.
THE ROOT
נַעֲמָן
Naʿaman
GROWS FROM
נעם
n-ʿ-m
To be pleasant or delightful; pleasantness.
Naaman’s name is linked to the root for pleasantness, and the verse carries that name forward into “Naamites.” What begins as one person’s name becomes a shared family identity, preserving the root’s echo as the name travels.
ALSO GROWS
noʿam: Pleasantness, delight.
נֹעַם
Psalm 16:11 uses this form in the KJV phrase “pleasures for evermore,” echoing the root carried in Naaman’s name.
naʿim: Pleasant, delightful.
נָעִים
This related form makes the root’s quality clear: the name belongs to a word-family describing what is pleasant.
THE PATTERN
Scripture carries identity through named descent, as a person’s name enters the line that follows.
No longer shall your name be called Abram, but Abraham, father of multitudes, for I have set you as a father of many nations.And the women who were her neighbors called out a name for him, saying, A son is born to Naomi, and they called his name Obed. He is the father of Jesse, the father of David.The book of the origin of Jesus, the anointed one, son of David, son of Abraham.THE THREAD
You make me perceive the path of life; before your face is the fullness of joy, and at your right hand are sweetnesses forever.Naaman’s name is linked to נעם (n-ʿ-m), the root for pleasantness; Psalm 16:11 uses a form of that same root where the KJV says “pleasures.” The shared root lets the name that becomes a family designation echo elsewhere as delight.
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