Zeruiah

Well known in David’s history. Perhaps from Tsarar, chains.

Zerui´ah (wounded), daughter of Jesse, sister of David (1Ch 2:16), and mother of Joab, Abishai, and Asahel (2Sa 2:18; 2Sa 3:39; 2Sa 8:16; 2Sa 16:9).

Sister of David, and mother of his famous generals, Joab, Abishai, and Asahel, 1Ch 2:16 . Her husband is unknown.\par

Zeru’iah. (balsam). The mother of the three leading heroes of David’s army -- Abishai, Joah and Asahel -- known as the "sons of Zeruiah." Of Zeruiah’s husband, there is no mention in the Bible. (B.C. before 1046).

Mother of Abishai (called so from Ishai = Jesse), Joab, and Asahel, "the sons of Zeruiah"; sister of Abigail and of the sons of Jesse (1Ch 2:13-17). The father of her three sons is nowhere mentioned, because their more famous mother challenged the greater attention. Josephus preserves a tradition that he was named Souri (Ant. 7:1, Section 3). Nahash was father of Zeruiah and Abigail. (See NAHASH.) At his death their mother married Jesse, by whom she bore David (2Sa 17:25; 1Ch 2:16). Therefore Zeruiah and Abigail are called "David’s (half) sisters," but not Jesse’s daughters.

[Zerui’ah]

Described with Abigail as ’sisters of the sons of Jesse.’ They may have been half-sisters (Abigail was the daughter of Nahash, 2Sa 17:25). Zeruiah had three sons, Joab, Abishai, and Asahel, the leaders of David’s army; but it is not stated who was her husband. David declared, after the murder of Abner, that the sons of Zeruiah were too hard for him. 1Sa 26:6; 2Sa 2:13; 2Sa 2:18; 2Sa 16:9-10; etc.

ZERUIAH.—The mother of David’s officers Abishai, Joab, and Asahel, who are always referred to as ‘sons of Zerulah.’ The father’s name is never mentioned, and he may have died early; or the mother may have been so remarkable a woman that her husband’s name was not preserved; or we have a survival of the ancient custom of tracing kinship through the female line.

In 1Ch 2:16 Zeruiah and Abigail are called ‘sisters of the sons of Jesse,’ but in 2Sa 17:25 Abigail is called the daughter of Nahash. It seems more probable that for Nahash in 2Sa 17:25 we ought to read Jesse, than that Jesse’s wife had previously been married to Nahash the Ammonite. According to this view, Zeruiah would be the daughter of Jesse and sister of David.

W. F. Boyd.

zḗ-rōō-ı̄´a, zḗ-rōō´ya (צרוּיה, c^erūyāh, צריה, c^eruyāh (2Sa 14:1; 2Sa 16:10), meaning uncertain; Σαρουία, Sarouı́a): In 2Sa 2:18; 2Sa 17:25; 1Ch 2:16, and elsewhere where the names Joab, Abishai, occur. According to 1Ch 2:16 a sister of David and mother of Joab, Abishai and Asahel, the two former being always referred to as sons of Zeruiah. This latter fact is explained by some as pointing to a type of marriage by which the children belonged to their mother’s clan (compare Abimelech, Jdg 8:31; Jdg 9:1 ff); by others as being due to her husband’s early death; and again as a proof of the mother in this case being the stronger personality. Either of the last two reasons may be the correct one, and plenty of parallels from the village names of boys today can be produced to illustrate both explanations. According to 2Sa 2:32, her husband was buried at Bethlehem. In 2Sa 17:25, “Abigal the daughter of Nahash” is said to be her sister. See ABIGAIL.