🔼The name Amasai: Summary
- Meaning
- Yah Has Borne, Burden Of Yah
- Etymology
- From (1) the verb עמש ('amas), to carry, and possibly (2) יה (yah), the name of the Lord.
🔼The name Amasai in the Bible
The name Amasai is assigned to four different men in the Bible, but none is mentioned outside the books of Chronicles:
- A son of Elkanah the Levite, whose brother was Ahimoth, and who possibly is the same as Amasai the son of Elkanah, the ancestor of Heman the Temple singer (1 Chronicles 6:35).
- The captain of the warriors of Judah and Benjamin, who came to join David at Ziklag. When the Spirit comes upon this Amasai, he exclaims, "...peace, peace to you, and peace to him who helps you," which is curious for a man of war, but perhaps not for the Spirit of the God of love (1 Chronicles 12:18).
- A trumpet player who performed when David transported the Ark of the Covenant from the house of Obed-edom of Gath to Jerusalem (1 Chronicles 15:24).
- The father of Mahath the Levite, who was part of king Hezekiah's great effort to cleanse the Temple of YHWH (2 Chronicles 29:12).
🔼Etymology of the name Amasai
The name Amasai consists of two elements. The first part comes from the verb עמש ('amas), meaning to carry:
עמש אמס
Both the verbs עמש ('amas) and עמס ('amas) mean to load or carry a load. Noun מעמסה (ma'amasa) means load or burden.
The second part of the name Amasai is letter י (yod), which may denote an adjective (burdensome), or (as appears to be preferred by scholars) it may be a remnant of the appellative יה (Yah) = יהו (Yahu) = יו (Yu), which in turn are abbreviated forms of the Tetragrammaton יהוה, YHWH, or Yahweh.
🔼Amasai meaning
For a meaning of the name Amasai, NOBSE Study Bible Name List proposes Yahweh Has Borne and Jones' Dictionary of Old Testament Proper Names reads Burden Of The Lord.