Baby names can mean a lot of important things to a married couple. My name, as you can guess, means hope. The biblical kind of hope we can have in Jesus. We can imagine that we’d be a bit horrified if, at a gender reveal, some parents named their child “evil” or “misfortune.”
It can sometimes feel jarring to read certain baby names in the Bible, knowing they have less-than-pleasant meanings attached to them. Such is the case with three baby boys who turned into men named Beriah. Today, we’ll uncover what we know about them and what we can learn from them.
What Does Beriah Mean in Hebrew?
First, we must define the meaning of the name Beriah. There are a variety of meanings connected to the name, but most have a common theme:
- In envy
- In calamity
- Misfortune
- In evil
- The evil
All names we’d probably hope not to give our offspring.
Interestingly, according to Strong’s Concordance, when the word is used as a noun instead of a name in Numbers 16:30, it means something very different. It means “a created thing” or “a new thing.” But we will see later that the name typically meant an unfortunate new thing—a tragedy.
Let’s first discuss the person who goes by the name Beriah in Genesis, and then we will move on to the other two in 1 Chronicles.
Who Was Beriah in Genesis?
We meet the first Beriah in Genesis 46 in a genealogy of the founders of the tribes of Israel.
Israel had 12 tribes, all known for their distinctive roles, cultures, and people.
Beriah comes from the tribe of Asher. He appears to be Asher's lastborn son. Now, what do we know about Asher and his tribe?
We don’t know much about Asher himself besides who his mother was. We do know that Jacob blesses him by saying his tribe will be very well off.
Given the forefather’s blessing, It seems odd that Asher would name his son “misfortune.” Unless Asher decided upon the second meaning of Beriah, which meant “a new thing.”
For all we know, perhaps Asher and his wife had experienced a miscarriage between the births of Beriah’s previous sibling and him. We will perhaps never know.
But we also see that the genealogy only focuses on Beriah’s sons instead of his brothers' sons. This means that Beriah’s sons were considered more important than all the other grandchildren to Asher. Beriah has two sons: Heber and Malkiel.
Unfortunately, we know little else about Beriah. But we know that his life would have been anything but unfortunate if his children had ended up in an important genealogy when other family members hadn’t.
Who Are the Two Men Named Beriah in 1 Chronicles?
Two men go by the name Beriah in 1 Chronicles, and they appear in back-to-back chapters.
1 Chronicles 7 tells us that Ephraim (one of the tribes of Israel) had a number of children. Unfortunately, tragedy struck, as his descendants were killed off by the inhabitants of Gad (think Goliath). Ephraim’s wife gets pregnant again, and they name this son “Beriah” because of the tragedy they experienced (in other words, they went with the misfortune meaning of the name). We hear nothing else about this Beriah in the Bible.
1 Chronicles 8 tells us about a man, Beriah, who came from the tribe of Benjamin. Benjamin’s tribe is described as a wolf in Jacob’s blessings, scrappy fighters. This Beriah drives out the inhabitants of Gath. He had to have been very intimidating and a good fighter to do that. Interestingly enough, he comes from the lineage of King Saul.
Here's the scoop if you don’t know much about King Saul. He was a brilliant fighter and quite an intimidating war general. For some time, he walked in God’s ways and obeyed Yahweh. Unfortunately, he started to turn away from God and disobey.
The biggest tragedy we see with King Saul is when he doesn’t decimate a group of people God tells him to. Because of that, they live on to continue to plague Israel and try to wipe them out entirely in the Book of Esther.
Saul wanders from God and eventually tries to kill David, his successor.
However, Beriah, Saul’s ancestor, would have no way of knowing this. We don’t know how he would’ve reacted to Saul’s reactions.
Something interesting to note about every person named Beriah is that they come from one of the tribes of Israel. We see Ephraim, Benjamin, and Asher represented in these passages. And often, they’re highlighted in their genealogies for doing something important.
The Bible often doesn’t take time to pause and focus on someone unless they have done something noteworthy. We should observe that these three men named Beriah had something to offer to the ultimate story of God. And although their name means “unfortunate,” they still make do with their circumstances.
What Can We Learn from Beriah in the Bible?
It may seem like these men had not done much with their lives, considering we don’t get enormous chapters dedicated to them. That said, we have to understand ancient texts. Genealogies only included the important people—hence why we make such a big deal out of the fact that Jesus included prostitutes and interracial marriages in his genealogy.
More importantly, if an author ever includes an aside about someone’s life other than their name in a genealogy, that means they really didn’t do something important.
All the men named Beriah seemed to get special treatment in their genealogies. So we should pay attention to them and the life lessons we can glean from them.
Names are important, but they don’t define everything.
Biblical names had power. If a child was named something negative, they often had negative lives. If they were given a positive name, the reverse was true. But the men named Beriah proved that an unfortunate name didn’t mean they had to live unfortunate lives. They could drive out giants and continue to have families through their line.
We need to pay attention to the little things.
It’s very easy to skip over genealogies, and I’ve been guilty of doing so. But every name, every listing, and every side story has an important role in the Bible. When we do our daily Bible readings, it won’t hurt to look into the “side stories” or “little guys.” After all, most of us would be that in a genealogy. We have to wonder what one sentence they would say about our lives.
People are part of important families in the Bible.
We probably know the name King Saul, but we don’t know the name Beriah. The same guy who ruled Israel had an ancestor who dealt with giants. Knowing someone’s family history can give us insight into a person. We know from Saul’s history why he used certain battle tactics and was rather ruthless in certain instances (like a wolf, as Jacob had predicted). The more we know the history of the Bible, the more it can come alive to us.
The three men named Beriah came from three different tribes and lived three different lives. Although their names meant “misfortune,” that didn’t have to be the legacy they left behind. In the same way, no matter what our names mean or what history precedes us, we can choose to leave a beautiful mark for God for “that sentence” or “cameo” in our genealogy.
Photo Credit:©GettyImages/ChristianChan
Hope Bolinger is an acquisitions editor at End Game Press, book editor for hire, and the author of almost 30 books. More than 1500 of her works have been featured in various publications. Check out her books at hopebolinger.com for clean books in most genres, great for adults and kids. Check out her editing profile at Reedsy.com to find out about hiring her for your next book project.
This article is part of our People of Christianity catalog that features the stories, meaning, and significance of well-known people from the Bible and history. Here are some of the most popular articles for knowing important figures in Christianity:
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