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1 Chronicles 1 Bible study: From Adam
1 Chronicles opens with Adam and nothing but names, following Genesis. It gives the other lines first, Japheth and Ham, Joktan, Ishmael, Keturah's sons, and Esau, and comes back each time to the line it is following: Shem to "Abram (also called Abraham)" (1:27), to Isaac and Israel (1:34). Luke runs the same names the other way, back from Jesus (Luke 3:34-35).
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“Abraham became the father of Isaac. The sons of Isaac: Esau and Israel.”
Try it · Did you catch it?
“1 Chronicles 1:27 names Abraham by his first name, Abram, as well as by Abraham.”
Is that in 1 Chronicles 1, or not? Make your call.
What's really going on
It begins with Adam
1 Chronicles doesn't open with a story. Its first verse is three names: "Adam, Seth, Enosh" (1:1). The list runs on to "Noah, Shem, Ham, and Japheth" (1:4) with nothing between the names: no "became the father of", no years, no "then he died". Genesis 5, where these names first come as a list, gives each man his years, and eight of its entries end "then he died" (Genesis 5:5, 5:31). Here only the names are left. The book begins further back than Israel and further back than Abraham, with the first man. It doesn't say why. What the chapter does show is where its lists are going: through "Abram (also called Abraham)" (1:27) to "The sons of Isaac: Esau and Israel" (1:34), and on to chapter 2's opening words, "These are the sons of Israel" (2:1).
Where it leads to Jesus
The same line in Luke
1 Chronicles 1:24leads toLuke 3:34-35
1 Chronicles runs forward: "Shem, Arpachshad, Shelah" (1:24), "Eber, Peleg, Reu" (1:25), "Serug, Nahor, Terah" (1:26), "Abram (also called Abraham)" (1:27), and "Abraham became the father of Isaac. The sons of Isaac: Esau and Israel" (1:34). Luke gives Jesus' family line the other way, beginning, "Jesus himself, when he began to teach, was about thirty years old, being the son (as was supposed) of Joseph" (Luke 3:23), and going back through the same names: "the son of Jacob, the son of Isaac, the son of Abraham, the son of Terah, the son of Nahor" (Luke 3:34), "the son of Serug, the son of Reu, the son of Peleg, the son of Eber, the son of Shelah" (Luke 3:35). Luke doesn't name 1 Chronicles, and where 1:34 says Israel, Luke says Jacob.
Honest questions
Questions people ask about 1 Chronicles 1
That was a taste
The rest of 1 Chronicles 1 is waiting in Favor
- The other lines first, then back again
- Abram, then Abraham
- Kings in Edom before Israel had one
- Where the list slows down
- Israel, not Jacob
- Who are the sons of Seir?
- 15 questions as you read
- 10 more Hebrew words
- A short check at the end
- Your notes, saved as you go
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The Hebrew word behind it
אַבְרָהָםAvrahamsay av-ra-HAHM
Strong's gives the name's meaning as "father of a multitude", and calls it "the later name of Abram". The old name, Avram (H87), Strong's gives as "high father". In Hebrew 1:27 is three words, Avram hu Avraham; the middle word, hu, is "he (she or it)" (Strong's). God gave the new name himself: "Your name will no more be called Abram, but your name will be Abraham; for I have made you the father of a multitude of nations" (Genesis 17:5). After that verse the Hebrew Bible uses the name Abram only twice: here, and in Nehemiah 9:7, "the God who chose Abram… gave him the name of Abraham". From 1:28 on, this chapter calls him Abraham (1:28, 1:32, 1:34).
For your group
1 Chronicles 1 Bible study questions
- 1Most of the names in this chapter come with no story at all, yet they are written down (1:5-23). What does it mean to you that names nobody remembers are kept in the Bible?
- 2The chapter keeps Abraham's old name beside his new one: "Abram (also called Abraham)" (1:27). What has God changed in your life that you would want remembered next to who you used to be?
- 31 Chronicles runs these names forward from Adam, and Luke runs them back from Jesus (Luke 3:34-35). If you traced your own faith back, whose names would be in your list?
Leading a group? In Favor, everyone reads 1 Chronicles 1 during the week and answers these questions privately. Answers stay sealed until you meet, then appear together, and you can print the week's sheet.
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Favor is a Bible study app that explains every chapter as you read: the Hebrew and Greek behind the words, the details most readers miss, and how each part of the Bible leads to Jesus. Read on your own, or start a Bible study with friends, family or your church.
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Scripture quotations are from the World English Bible, which is in the public domain. Hebrew and Greek words are checked against the original-language texts and public-domain lexicons. What we believe · Favor home