Ezra 2:38 Meaning and Explanation
“The children of Pashur, a thousand two hundred forty and seven.”
King James Version (KJV)
Read this verse in context with translation switching:
Read Full Chapter →Size is worth noticing here. No other single family in the priestly section comes close to this total, and few families anywhere in the chapter do. A house that large returning together suggests a decision made across an entire extended family. It also raises a question the register answers only by its silence: what became of a priestly name once tied to the rough treatment of a prophet?
The house of Pashur brought back one thousand two hundred forty-seven men, the largest priestly family in the register, and one whose name carries a complicated history in Jerusalem.
The Context of Ezra 2:38
The priestly roll of Ezra 2 runs from verse 36 to verse 39 and lists four houses: Jedaiah, Immer, Pashur, and Harim. Pashur's twelve hundred forty-seven stands between the thousand fifty-two of verse 37 and the thousand seventeen of verse 39. Added together, the four houses give four thousand two hundred eighty-nine priests inside a whole congregation of forty-two thousand three hundred sixty, reported in verse 64. Roughly one returning adult in ten belonged to a priestly family. The list was compiled for a community about to rebuild an altar, and verse 63 shows how seriously priestly credentials were checked.
What Does Ezra 2:38 Mean?
Everything in this line is weight and precision. The formula matches its neighbors exactly, which lets the number carry the emphasis: a thousand two hundred forty and seven. The KJV keeps the Hebrew habit of naming the large unit first and adding the smaller pieces, so the ear hears the size before the remainder. Pashur receives no title, no city, and no explanation of his relation to the other priestly houses. The register treats him as a fixed point that its first readers recognized. What the verse does supply is a head count, and it is the highest of the four priestly entries.
A priestly name like this one reaches back into the years before the exile. Jeremiah 20:1 introduces Pashur the son of Immer, a priest and chief officer in the house of the LORD who struck Jeremiah and put him in the stocks for prophesying the fall of Jerusalem. Whether the returning house of Pashur descends from that man or from another priest of the same name, the register makes no comment. Scripture has already shown that priestly office and priestly faithfulness could come apart, and the men counted here are walking back toward the city that judgment emptied, ready to serve at the altar their fathers left behind.
Numbers of this size also say something about the priesthood itself. It took twelve hundred men of one house, and more than four thousand priests in all, to keep the service of a single house of God running, because every one of them would in time hand his work to a son. Hebrews 7:23 makes exactly that observation about the older order, where there were many priests since death kept any one of them from continuing. The verse before us is a snapshot of that reality, a whole generation of Pashur reporting for duty while the ministry itself waited for the one whose priesthood continues without a successor.
Bible Verses Related to Ezra 2:38
“Now Pashur the son of Immer the priest, who was also chief governor in the house of the LORD, heard that Jeremiah prophesied these things.”
- Jeremiah 20:1
“And of the sons of Pashur; Elioenai, Maaseiah, Ishmael, Nethaneel, Jozabad, and Elasah.”
- Ezra 10:22
“The children of Pashur, a thousand two hundred forty and seven.”
- Nehemiah 7:41
“The whole congregation together was forty and two thousand three hundred and threescore,”
- Ezra 2:64
Where Ezra 2:38 Echoes in Scripture
Ezra 10:22 brings this family into view again roughly eighty years later, naming six sons of Pashur among the men who agreed to put away foreign wives when Ezra called the assembly to repentance. The house counted in our verse had by then settled, married, drifted, and been summoned back to covenant faithfulness. Reading the two passages together keeps the register from feeling like a museum piece. These were living households with a long road ahead of them.
How to Apply Ezra 2:38 Today
Family names carry history, some of it painful. A house associated with a bad chapter in the past turns up here in the front rank of those going home to serve. That is worth remembering when we feel defined by what our relatives did, or by what we ourselves did years ago. God keeps enlisting people whose record is mixed. It is also worth remembering when a task looks too large for the few who volunteer. Twelve hundred men from one family answered a call that promised hard work in a ruined city, and their willingness is part of why worship began again.
Reflection & Prayer
Is there a history we assume disqualifies us from serving God, whether our own or one we inherited? Lord, You keep records more merciful than ours. Where our past accuses us, meet us with mercy; where our family story is heavy, redeem it. Give us courage to answer when Your work needs willing hands, and let our children remember us among those who went home. Amen.