People and genealogy
The people of Scripture
The people this site has written or filed, set in the period each one stands in, from before Abraham to the letters of the apostles.
Summary
111 lives are written here in full, and 117 more names carry a register row with the verses that hold them. Five studies take a whole group at once and are counted apart.
- Genesis opens with every nation. It narrows to the family God calls in Abraham.
- The family goes into Egypt, comes out under Moses, and takes the land under Joshua.
- Judges lead until Israel asks for a king. Then 39 reigns follow the split.
- Assyria takes the north and Babylon the south. Persia sends the people home.
- The Gospels open four hundred years later. The Twelve carry the story into Acts.
The people by era
Show the groups
- Five walks across the familyeach takes a whole group at once0 group studies
- Before AbrahamAdam to the tower2 in the register
- The patriarchsAbraham to Joseph1 written life
- The conquest and the judgesJoshua to Samuel1 written life
- The united kingdomSaul, David and Solomon3 written lives
- Judah, the southern throneRehoboam to Zedekiah1 in the register
- Israel, the northern throneJeroboam to Hoshea1 written life
- Jesus and the Gospelsthe birth to the ascension1 in the register
- The church, from Acts onwardPaul, his circle and the letters1 written life, 5 in the register
Before Abraham
The first eleven chapters of Genesis, from the garden to Babel. The rest of Scripture keeps looking back to these names.
2 in the register
The register: 2 names in this era, each with the passages that hold them
The patriarchs
One family across four generations, carrying a promise it could not keep, and Job, whom the record sets in the same age. Every later covenant is spoken back to these names.
1 written life
The conquest and the judges
The land taken, then nearly lost again, under leaders God raised one at a time. Ruth belongs to these years.
1 written life
The united kingdom
Three reigns over one nation, with the prophets who stood beside them. The throne is given, built up, then split at Solomon's death.
3 written lives
SamuelThe transitional figure between the period of the judges and the monarchyFrank W. W. Topham, Samuel Dedicated by Hannah at the Temple (19th c.)
SaulThe first king of united Israel, chosen by God but ultimately rejected for his disobedienceSalvator Rosa, The Shade of Samuel Appears to Saul (1668)
SolomonThe wisest and wealthiest king, who built the Temple but whose heart was turned away by foreign wives in his old ageNicolas Poussin, The Judgment of Solomon
Judah, the southern throne
The line of David held Jerusalem for twenty reigns, from the split under Rehoboam to the fall of the city, with the prophets sent to them.
1 in the register
The register: 1 names in this era, each with the passages that hold them
Israel, the northern throne
Nine dynasties rose and fell in two hundred years, each judged by the calves at Bethel and Dan. Elijah and Elisha were sent against this throne.
1 written life
Jesus and the Gospels
The Twelve stand here, where a reader first meets them, with the family, the friends, the rulers who tried Jesus, and the witnesses of the resurrection.
1 in the register
The register: 1 names in this era, each with the passages that hold them
The church, from Acts onward
Paul and his circle, the men and women of Acts, and the churches the letters were written to. The Twelve stand one period back, where they were called.
1 written life, 5 in the register
The register: 5 more names in this era, each with the passages that hold them
- SilasA leading man among the brethren, sent from Jerusalem to carry the Council's letter to Antioch, and then Paul's companion on the second journey — singing hymns at midnight in the Philippian jail when the earthquake came12 passages
- Simon MagusThe sorcerer at Samaria who believed and was baptized, then offered the apostles money for the power to give the Holy Spirit — and gave his name to the sin of simony
- SosthenesCo-sender of 1 Corinthians (1:1); traditionally identified with the synagogue-ruler beaten before Gallio in Acts 18:17 — an identification held loosely2 passages
- StephanasHead of a Corinthian household called the firstfruits of Achaia, baptized by Paul himself; part of the delegation that brought the Corinthians' news to Ephesus (1 Cor 1:16; 16:15-18)3 passages
- SyntychePhilippian laborer in the gospel, exhorted with Euodia to be of the same mind in the Lord (Php 4:2-3)1 passage
Keep studying
On this page
Where they stood3
The written lives come from this site’s own character pages. The register rows come from its person dossiers. The number in a register row is how many passages Orville J. Nave lists under that name in Nave’s Topical Bible (1896), a public domain work.