1 Chronicles 4:34–38

1 Chronicles 4:34 — Meshobab, Jamlech, Joshah the son of Amaziah: The list opens with three names, the last anchored by a patronymic ("son of Amaziah"), a recurring device in the Chronicler's genealogical method. The name Meshobab likely derives from a root meaning "brought back" or "restored," carrying within the name itself a theology of return and renewal fitting for descendants of a displaced tribe. Jamlech means "may God reign" — a theophoric name testifying to Israel's foundational conviction that YHWH, not any earthly king, is the ultimate sovereign of his people. Joshah is linked by lineage to Amaziah, a name borne also by a king of Judah (2 Chr 25), reminding readers that Simeon's story is inseparable from the broader Davidic and Judahite narrative within which the Chronicler embeds it.

1 Chronicles 4:35 — Joel, Jehu the son of Joshibiah, the son of Seraiah, the son of Asiel: Here the Chronicler extends the genealogical chain back four generations for Jehu, the deepest lineage traced in this particular cluster. This extended pedigree signals Jehu's status among the group — the greater the ancestral depth, the greater the claim to honor and legitimate authority within Israel's tribal memory. The name Asiel ("God has made" or "God's work") at the root of this line frames the entire lineage as a work of divine agency. Nothing in this family came about by accident; it was made by God.

1 Chronicles 4:36 — Elioenai, Jaakobah, Jeshohaiah, Asaiah, Adiel, Jesimiel, Benaiah: Seven names in rapid succession without further genealogical elaboration. The density of the list here is itself meaningful: the Chronicler is insisting on the individuality of each member. They are not a undifferentiated mass but seven distinct persons, each named before God and before Israel. Elioenai ("my eyes are toward the LORD") and Jesimiel ("God has set" or "God has established") are especially theologically rich: the first expresses total dependence on divine vision and guidance, the second a confidence that one's existence is positively willed and established by God.

1 Chronicles 4:37 — Ziza the son of Shiphi, the son of Allon, the son of Jedaiah, the son of Shimri, the son of Shemaiah: Like Jehu in verse 35, Ziza is honored with a five-generation ancestral chain. Ziza may relate to a root meaning "abundance" or "brightness," and he closes the list as a figure of flourishing. His great-great-great-grandfather Shemaiah ("heard by the LORD") anchors the lineage in a theology of divine attentiveness: God heard, and from that hearing sprang five generations of Israelite life.

1 Chronicles 4:38 — "these mentioned by name were princes in their families; their fathers' houses increased greatly": This editorial summation is theologically loaded. The phrase "mentioned by name" (niqvim beshemot) is a formula of honor in the Chronicler's vocabulary (cf. 1 Chr 12:31; Num 1:17). To be named is not merely a bureaucratic fact but a mark of divine acknowledgment. The "increase" of their fathers' houses echoes the creation and patriarchal blessings (Gen 1:28; 12:2; 17:20), suggesting that the Simeonites' demographic growth is not incidental but a continuation of the pattern of divine blessing woven through all of Israel's history.

Typological and Spiritual Senses: In the fourfold sense of Scripture developed by the Church Fathers and codified in medieval exegesis (CCC §115–119), this passage yields multiple layers of meaning beyond the literal. Allegorically, the naming of Israel's tribal leaders points forward to Christ, who knows each of his sheep by name (Jn 10:3) and who, as the new Israel, gathers the scattered tribes into one Body. Tropologically (morally), the passage invites reflection on the vocation of every baptized Christian to be "named" — that is, uniquely known, called, and commissioned — within the household of God. Anagogically, the list anticipates the Book of Life (Rev 21:27), in which every name of the redeemed is inscribed before the Father for eternity.

Catholic tradition, rooted in the conviction that "all Scripture is inspired by God" (2 Tim 3:16) and that no part of the sacred text is theologically inert, has consistently resisted the temptation to treat genealogical passages as filler. St. Jerome, translating and commenting on Chronicles in the Vulgate tradition, noted that the names of Israel's tribes carried the weight of salvation history: each name is a stone in the edifice of the covenant people from whom the Messiah would come. The Catechism of the Catholic Church reminds us that God's covenant is communal and historical in structure: "It pleased God, in his goodness and wisdom, to reveal himself and to make known the mystery of his will… in the course of time" (CCC §54). These genealogies are precisely that: the course of time made visible in flesh and name.

The Church's understanding of the communio (communion) of the Church illuminates the thirteen named princes here. The Second Vatican Council's Lumen Gentium (§9) teaches that God "willed to make men holy and save them, not as individuals without any bond between them, but rather to make them into a people." The Simeonites are not saved as isolated individuals but as a tribe, a clan, a father's house — a structure the Church sees prefigured in the ecclesial family constituted by Baptism.

Furthermore, the theology of the name in Catholic tradition is profound. In the Rite of Baptism, the child is named before the Church, just as these princes are named before Israel. The Catechism teaches: "God calls each one by name… the name one receives is a name for eternity" (CCC §2158). Every name in 1 Chronicles 4 is therefore a theological statement about the irreducible dignity and eternal vocation of the human person — a dignity rooted not in achievement but in being known and called by God.

For contemporary Catholics, 1 Chronicles 4:34–38 offers a quietly radical counternarrative to a culture that prizes only the famous, the powerful, and the well-documented. These thirteen men are remembered in Scripture not because they built empires or performed miracles, but because they faithfully led their families and their clans increased. This is the vocation of the vast majority of the baptized: faithful, unspectacular, generative leadership within the household.

Practically, this passage invites Catholics to reflect on three concrete things. First, consider the names you carry — your baptismal name, your family name — as theological realities, not mere labels. You are named before God. Second, consider the "father's house" you are building: your family, your parish community, your circle of disciples. The Chronicler measures blessing not in heroic deeds but in whether the household increased greatly — in faith, in number, in virtue. Third, for Catholics involved in parish life, RCIA, or family ministry, this passage is a reminder that maintaining the ordinary structures of communal faith — the unglamorous work of showing up, passing on the tradition, staying rooted — is itself a form of sacred witness inscribed, as it were, in God's own record.