🔼The name Shealtiel: Summary
- Meaning
- I Have Asked God
- Etymology
- From (1) the verb שאל (sha'al), to ask for, and (2) the word אל ('el), God.
🔼The name Shealtiel in the Bible
There's only one man named Shealtiel in the Bible. He is the son of king Jeconiah and father of Zerubbabel, the leader of the great return from exile, and an ancestor of Jesus the Nazarene (1 Chronicles 3:17, Ezra 3:2, Haggai 1:1, 2:23, Matthew 1:12, Luke 3:27; spelled Σαλαθιηλ, Salathiel). In Haggai 1:12, 1:14 and 2:2 this name is spelled שלתיאל (Shaltiel).
🔼Etymology of the name Shealtiel
The name Shealtiel consists of two elements, the final one being אל (El), the prominent Canaanite deity, whose name became applied to the God of Israel, or the common abbreviation of Elohim, the genus God:
אל אלה
In names אל ('el) usually refers to אלהים ('elohim), that is Elohim, or God, also known as אלה ('eloah). In English, the words 'God' and 'god' exclusively refer to the deity but in Hebrew the words אל ('l) and אלה ('lh) are far more common and may express approach and negation, acts of wailing and pointing, and may even mean oak or terebinth.
The first part of our name is a first person singular from the verb שאל (sha'al), meaning to ask for:
שאל
The verb שאל (sha'al) means to ask. Noun שאלה (she'la) means request or petition, and noun משאלה (mish'ala) means petition or desire. The difficult noun שאול (she'ol) refers primarily to the grave and by extension to death and decomposition.
🔼Shealtiel meaning
For a meaning of the name Shealtiel, NOBSE Study Bible Name List reads I Have Asked God. Jones' Dictionary of Old Testament Proper Names has I Asked For From God. And BDB Theological Dictionary proposes I Have Asked (Him) Of God.