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Ezra 2 · a question people ask

Whose son was Zerubbabel?

In the text

Ezra 2:2 names him without his father. In the next chapter Ezra calls him "Zerubbabel the son of Shealtiel" (3:2), and the same words come in 3:8 and 5:2. Matthew has "Shealtiel became the father of Zerubbabel" (Matthew 1:12), and Luke has "the son of Zerubbabel, the son of Shealtiel" (Luke 3:27). But 1 Chronicles has "The sons of Pedaiah: Zerubbabel and Shimei" (1 Chronicles 3:19). 1 Chronicles 3's honest question sets these verses side by side. The Bible doesn't explain the difference, and this chapter leaves it there too.

The verses

“who came with Zerubbabel, Jeshua, Nehemiah, Seraiah, Reelaiah, Mordecai, Bilshan, Mispar, Bigvai, Rehum, and Baanah. The number of the men of the people of Israel:”
Ezra 2:2 · World English Bible
“Then Jeshua the son of Jozadak stood up with his brothers the priests and Zerubbabel the son of Shealtiel and his relatives, and built the altar of the God of Israel, to offer burnt offerings on it, as it is written in the law of Moses the man of God.”
Ezra 3:2 · World English Bible
“Now in the second year of their coming to God’s house at Jerusalem, in the second month, Zerubbabel the son of Shealtiel, Jeshua the son of Jozadak, and the rest of their brothers the priests and the Levites, and all those who had come out of the captivity to Jerusalem, began the work and appointed the Levites, from twenty years old and upward, to have the oversight of the work of the LORD’s house.”
Ezra 3:8 · World English Bible
“Then Zerubbabel the son of Shealtiel, and Jeshua the son of Jozadak rose up and began to build God’s house which is at Jerusalem; and with them were the prophets of God, helping them.”
Ezra 5:2 · World English Bible

From Favor's study of Ezra 2

Ezra 2: Everyone to his city

Ezra 2 is more than a list: it names the returning people family by family and town by town, "everyone to his city" (2:1), still counts those who "could not show their fathers’ houses" (2:59), and ends with gifts "according to their ability" (2:69) for the LORD's house before it was rebuilt; Nehemiah 7 gives the list again, with the same total and some different details.

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Scripture quotations are from the World English Bible, which is in the public domain. Every answer cites the verses it rests on. What we believe · All Bible questions