Seraiah
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This entry incorporates text from Easton's Bible Dictionary, 1897, with some modernisation.
Seraiah or Sraya (שְׂרָיָה "Soldier/Prince of/is the LORD", Standard Hebrew Səraya, Tiberian Hebrew Śərāyāh) is the name of several people mentioned in the Old Testament:
- The father of Joab (1 Chronicles 4:13, 14).
- The grandfather of Jehu (1 Chr. 4:35).
- One of David's scribes or secretaries (2 Samuel 8:17).
- A Netophathite (Jer. 40:8), a chief priest of the time of Zedekiah. He was carried captive by Nebuchadnezzar to Babylon, and there put to death (2 Kings 25:18, 23).
- Ezra 2:2.
- Father of Ezra the scribe (7:1).
- A ruler of the temple (Nehemiah 11:11).
- A priest of the days of Jehoiakim (Neh. 12:1, 12).
- The son of Neriah. When Zedekiah made a journey to Babylon to do homage to Nebuchadnezzar, Seraiah had charge of the royal gifts to be presented on that occasion. Jeremiah took advantage of the occasion, and sent with Seraiah a word of cheer to the exiles in Babylon, and an announcement of the doom in store for that guilty city. The roll containing this message (Jeremiah 50:1-8) Seraiah was to read to the exiles, and then, after fixing a stone to it, was to throw it into the Euphrates, uttering, as it sank, the prayer recorded in Jer. 51:59-64. Babylon was at this time in the height of its glory, the greatest and most powerful monarchy in the world. Scarcely seventy years elapsed when the words of the prophet were all fulfilled. Jer. 51:59 is rendered in the Revised Version, "Now Seraiah was chief chamberlain," instead of "was a quiet prince," as in the Authorized Version.