There are hundreds of named men and women in the Old Testament.
Merely to list all of their names would fill many pages and be of little
profit. If you want to investigate every one of them, I recommend
Herbert Lockyer's books, All the Women of the Bible and All the Men of
the Bible, or any good Bible dictionary, such as Nelson's New
Illustrated Bible Dictionary.
Here are the 100 most significant
Old Testament people, based not on what I think or who I like, but on
how many chapters are devoted to their lives. You will meet peasants and
princes, queens and harlots, shepherds and soldiers.
I have
identified each with a short description and a Bible reference. This
doesn't mean the reference cited is the only place this person is
mentioned. Keep in mind that these are in alphabetical order, not in
either chronological order or in the order in which they appear in the
Hebrew Scriptures.
Aaron - Brother of Moses and Israel's first high priest.
Abner - The general of King Saul's army, treacherously killed by David's general, Joab.
Adebnego
- One of Daniel's three friends who were thrown into the fiery furnace
for refusing to worship the golden image of Nebuchadnezzar. "Abednego"
is the Babylonian name assigned to him by his captors. His Hebrew name
is Azariah.
Abimelech - One of the "Judges" of Israel who for a short time ruled as a king.
Abraham
- The man whose life of faith and covenant with God established the
nation of Israel, his descendants, as the people of God.
Absalom -
The son of King David whose bitterness at how his father treated him
led him to usurp his father's throne. David's general Joab killed
Absalom to end the rebellion.
Adam - The first human being, created out of the dust of the ground. His wife's name was Eve.
Adonijah - A son of David and half-brother of Solomon who tried to steal the throne during David's declining years.
Ahab
- Powerful king of Israel (though in fact he only ruled over the
northern 10 tribes). As a result of marrying Jezebel, Ahab introduced
his kingdom to Baal worship.
Ahasuerus - King of the Persian empire and husband to the Jewess Esther.
Amos - Farmer-shepherd whom God call to denounce the northern nation of Israel.
Athaliah - Wicked daughter of Ahab and Jezebel who ruled over Israel until she was executed to make way for the boy-king Joash.
Baalam
- Non-Israelite prophet who prophesied blessing for Israel rather than
the curses he was being paid to declare. Balaam is also known for
beating his donkey, who then spoke to him by God's power.
Bathsheba
- Wife of Uriah with whom David committed adultery before murdering her
husband. Bathsheba's second child, and the only to survive more than a
few days, was Solomon.
Belshazzar - The last ruler of the Babylon
before it was conquered by the Medes and Persians. Daniel prophesied his
destruction--a prediction fulfilled that very night.
Bildad - One of the three friends who visited Job and ended up discouraging him rather than comforting him.
Boaz - A godly man in an ungodly age, Boaz married Ruth of Moab and was great grandfather of King David.
Caleb
- A tribal leader who, along with Joshua, counseled Israel to
courageously conquer the land they and the 10 unbelieving leaders had
spied out.
Cyrus - As the first great leader of the Medo-Persian
empire, Cyrus abruptly changed the policy of the Babylonians, allowing
exiled peoples to return to their ancestral homelands. In doing this,
Cyrus was unwittingly fulfilling Isaiah's much earlier prophecy that he
was actually carrying out God's will.
Daniel - One of the
Israelites taken into Babylonian exile who, because of his faithfulness
to God and to the king, rose to great power and influence in both the
Babylonian and Medo-Persian empires.
David - Second king of Israel
and famous as "the man after God's own heart," as a singer of psalms,
and the slayer of the giant, Goliath. David's reign and that of his son
Solomon, was the time of greatest power and prosperity for the nation in
ancient times.
Darius - The first ruler of Babylon in the
Medo-Persian empire, Darius the Mede appointed Daniel to be his advisor.
Darius was manipulated into throwing Daniel to the lions, but was
greatly relieved when God's prophet emerged unharmed.
Deborah - As
the only woman who served as a "Judge" of Israel, Deborah led the
Israelites to a military victory over Sisera of Damascus.
Delilah -
This Philistine woman deceived Samson into revealing the secret of his
great strength so that she could deliver him to his enemies.
Eli -
The high priest who took in Samuel when his mother Hannah dedicated him
to the Lord. God punished Eli for not restraining the wickedness of his
sons.
Elihu - A young man who became angry as he listened to the
discourse between Job and his three friends. In contrast to the friends,
Elihu believed that God imposed suffering on Job, not to punish him for
sins but to prevent him from sinning.
Elijah - One of the
greatest of the prophets, Elijah stood for God virtually alone during
the time King Ahab and his wife Jezebel were persecuting true believers
and promoting the worship of Baal.
Eliphaz - One of the three friends of Job, all of whom were convinced that God was punishing Job for his wickedness.
Elisha
- The successor of Elijah as God's prophet. Elisha sought and
apparently received a double dose of Elijah's miraculous power.
Esau
- The elder brother of Jacob, who sold the birthright of firstborn to
his brother and later also lost his father's blessing to his brother.
Although at the time of this second incident Esau vowed to kill Jacob,
he later on was reconciled to him declaring how much God had blessed
him.
Esther - A beautiful Jewess whom the Persian king Ahasuerus
married and made his queen. Esther later on saved the Jews from certain
destruction by exposing the plots of Haman against her uncle, Mordecai.
Ezekiel
- Prophet among the Hebrew exiles in Babylonia who saw visions of why
God would destroy Jerusalem and how He would restore it.
Ezra - A
righteous priest and one of the exiles who returned under the
sponsorship of the Persian government. Ezra helped Nehemiah to turn the
hearts of the people back to the Lord.
Eve - The first woman, created from the side of the first man, Adam.
Gideon
- One of the "Judges" of Israel, convinced to lead the army against the
Midianites by two miracles involving a fleece and dew. At God's
prompting, Gideon reduced his large army down to 300 men, and still won
the victory.
Gomer - Wife of the prophet Hosea, whom he married
despite her prostitution. Gomer's unfaithfulness to Hosea was symbolic
of Israel's unfaithfulness to God.
Habakkuk - A prophet who
struggled to understand how God could punish the wicked of his nation by
the Babylonians, who were even more wicked. God's reply, to which
Habakkuk complied, was simply to trust him.
Hagar - The slave of
Sarah, the wife of Abraham. When Sarah remained childless after many
years of trying to conceive, she gave Hagar to her husband--a practice
common to the culture of that time. Hagar conceived and bore Abraham his
first son, Ishmael.
Haggai - Worked closely with his
fellow-prophet Zechariah to inspire the people returned to Jerusalem
from Babylonian exile to finish rebuilding the temple of the Lord.
Haman
- An advisor to King Ahasuerus whose arrogance and pride led him to
plot against Mordecai, the righteous uncle of Esther. When Esther
uncovered Haman's plot, the king ordered that he be hung on the gallows
he had built to hang Modecai.
Hannah - Mother of Samuel who dedicated him to the Lord as soon as he was weaned.
Hezekiah
- Righteous king of Judah who sought and received God's deliverance
from the Assyrian army, reformed the worship of God, and brought about a
second golden age similar to that of David and Solomon. Hezekiah
benefitted greatly from having the prophet Isaiah for an advisor.
Hiram
- King of Tyre who entered into a treaty and a close personal
friendship with King Solomon. Hiram supplied the cedars for the building
of the temple and Solomon's palace.
Hosea - Prophet of God who
obeyed God's command to marry the prostitute Gomer, as a living parable
of God's relationship to wayward Israel.
Isaac - Second son of
Abraham but regarded as the firstborn, since he alone was son of
Abraham's wife Sarah. Isaac also entered into covenant with the Lord and
prospered under His blessing.
Isaiah - Prophet of God who advised King Hezekiah and, along with Micah, inspired the nation of Judah to return to the Lord.
Ishmael - First son of Abraham, by Hagar, the slave-woman of Abraham's wife Sarah.
Jacob
- Also known as "Israel" (Prince of God), Jacob was son of Isaac,
grandson of Abraham, husband of Leah and Rachel, and father of twelve
sons, who became tribal leaders of what would be known as "The Sons of
Israel." Jacob also had a daughter named Dinah.
Jehu - The
successor of Ahab as king of the northern nation of Israel. Appointed by
the prophet Elijah, Jehu had Ahab's wife, Jezebel killed, as well as
all of Ahab's sons.
Jephtha - A judge of Israel who delivered the
nation from the oppression of the Ammonites (Judges 10 - 11). Jephthah
foolishly vowed that if the Lord gave him the victory, he would
sacrifice whatever came out to greet him upon his return home. Little
did he know that it would be his only daughter (Judges 11:30-40).
Jeremiah
- Called by God when very young and serving as a prophet for many
years, denouncing Judah for its sin and predicting its fall to the
Babylonians and a 70-year exile. Jeremiah lived to see his prediction
fulfilled when Nebuchadnezzar captured Jerusalem in 586 B.C.
Jeshua
- High priest for the Israelites allowed by Cyrus to return to
Jerusalem. Along with Zerubbabel, Jeshua led the people to complete the
reconstruction of the Lord's temple, in response to the prophetic
ministry of Zechariah.
Jezebel - Princess of Sidon who married
Ahab and led the northern nation of Israel into the practice of Baal
worship. Jezebel tried to kill off all of the faithful prophets of the
Lord, including Elijah. Among her other sins, Jezebel ordered the murder
of Naboth in order to sieze his vineyard. She was killed at the order
of Jehu.
Joab - The nephew of David who served as the general of
David's army once David became king. Joab was a treacherous and violent
man who nevertheless was fiercely loyal to David.
Joash - A
righteous king of Judah contemporary with Jehu, king of Israel. Joash
became king when he was only six years old, having survived the wrath of
Queen Athaliah, daughter of Ahab and Jezebel. Among his other righteous
deeds, Joash repaired the temple of the Lord. He was assassinated at
age 22.
Job - (pronounced "jobe"). A righteous man whose severe
trials and enduring faith are the subject of the book that bears his
name. The book is a series of dialogues between Job and his friends
regarding the cause of his suffering.
Joel - A prophet the Lord
sent to the northern nation of Israel, calling them to repentance on the
occasion of a locust plague that happened during a drought. Joel
describes the spiritual renewal that awaits those who heed his call.
Jonah
- A prophet the Lord sent to warn Nineveh that the city was about to
suffer destruction. Jonah tried to run from God but eventually delivered
the message, prompting the city to respond in fear and repentance.
Jonah was angry that the Lord spared the penitent Ninevites and received
a rebuke from the Lord in the form of an object lesson.
Jonathan -
As son of Saul, Jonathan was prince of Israel and should have been next
in line for the throne. But the Lord had chosen David as Saul's
successor, and Jonathan, who was David's best friend, was willing for
David to assume the throne in his place. Jonathan lost his life in a
battle against the Philistines on Mount Gilboa.
Joseph - As the
favorite son of his father Jacob, Joseph provoked the jealousy of his 10
older brothers, who sold him into slavery. God blessed Joseph, however,
so that he eventually rose to become the ruler of Egypt, second only to
the Pharaoh. From this position of authority, Joseph was able to save
his entire family from a famine after he had demonstrated to his
brothers that he had forgiven them.
Joshua - The assistant of
Moses who after the Lawgiver's death, became his successor and led the
Israelites in their conquest of the land of Canaan. The book of Joshua
relates the history of his life.
Josiah - A righteous king of
Judah who led important religious reforms. Unfortunately, Josiah lost
his life in a battle near Megiddo against Pharaoh Neco.
Judah -
One of the sons of Jacob whose descendants became one of the most
populous tribes of Israel. Judah's was the tribe of both David and
Jesus.
Laban - Brother of Rebekah and father of Leah and Rachel, Laban
Leah
- Wife of Jacob, sister of Rachel, and daughter of Laban, Rachel was
the mother of Joseph and Benjamin, during whose childbirth she died.
Rachel was her husband's favorite wife.
Lot - Nephew of Abraham
whom Abraham had to rescue from being a prisoner of war. After barely
escaping from the destruction of Sodom, Lot fathered a son by each of
his two daughters after they got him drunk on two successive nights. The
descendants of the two boys became the nations known as the Moabites
and the Ammonites.
Malachi - Prophesied during the period after
the return from Babylonian exile. Malachi predicted the coming of both
John the Baptizer and Jesus.
Manasseh - Succeeded his father,
righteous Hezekiah, to the throne of Judah, Manasseh was one of the most
wicked, responsible, according to tradition, for stuffing the prophet
Isaiah into a hollow log and then sawing the log in half. After being
punished by the Lord by going into exile, Manasseh turned back to the
Lord at the end of his life.
Meshach - One of the three friends of
Daniel who refused to bow to the image of Nebuchadnezzar and were
thrown into a fiery furnace. The Lord rescued the three from martyrdom
as a testimony to Nebuchadnezzar of His greatness. "Meshach" is the name
the Babylonians assigned to him; his Hebrew name was Mishael.
Micah - A prophet of the Lord who prophesied to the nation of Judah. Micah was an older contemporary of the prophet Isaiah.
Michal
- Daughter of Saul given in marriage to David. When David fled from the
wrath of Saul, Michal's father gave her in marriage to another, who was
forced to return her to David when David became king. Later on in their
marriage, Michal came to despise her husband. She died childless.
Miriam
- Sister of Moses and Aaron and a prophetess. Miriam led the women in
their song of rejoicing after the Lord drowned the Egyptian army in the
Red Sea (Exod. 15:20-21). Miriam was temporarily struck with leprosy as
punishment for joining with Aaron in questioning Moses' unique authority
(Num. 12:1-15).
Mordecai - Uncle of Esther who raised her as his
own daughter. Mordecai enjoyed a position of favor in the court of
Ahasuerus after exposing a plot against the Persian ruler. Esther
rescued him from a plot against his life by wicked Haman
Moses -
Used by God to deliver the Israelites from Egyptian slavery. Among the
men of the Old Testament Moses was unequaled as a prophet and the
lawgiver for the Israelites. His life is recorded in Exodus, Leviticus,
Numbers, and Deuteronomy. He is believed to be the author of Genesis,
and Psalm 90 is also ascribed to him. Moses was brother to Aaron and
Miriam.
Naaman - Syrian military leader who sought a healing of
his leprosy from the prophet Elisha. The Lord healed his leprosy after
he dipped seven times in the Jordan River, as Elisha directed him.
Naomi
- The mother-in-law of Ruth, who brought the young widow with her when
she returned to Bethlehem from Moab after the death of her husband and
both of her sons. It was Naomi who advised Ruth to seek protection from
Boaz, resulting in Ruth's eventual marriage to the rich kinsman.
Nahum
- A prophet of the Lord who predicted the fall of Nineveh. His
predictions were fulfilled in 612 B.C. when the Babylonians conquered
the Assyrian capital.
Nathan - Faithful prophet of the Lord who
served as David's trusted spiritual advisor. Nathan had the honor of
announcing to David that his dynasty would last forever (2 Sam. 7), a
prophecy ultimately fulfilled in the eternal reign of Jesus Christ. To
Nathan also fell the unpleasant task of confronting David with his sin
of adultery and murder and announcing that his infant child would die (2
Sam. 12).
Nebuchadnezzar - King of the Neo-Babylonian empire, who
deported nobles from Judah, including Daniel and his three friends,
Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah, better known as Shadrach, Meshach, and
Abednego. A few years later, in 586 B.C., the Babylonian army laid siege
to Jerusalem, captured it, and destroyed it. Nebuchadnezzar recognized
the potential of the young Hebrews and promoted them to leadership
positions in his kingdom.
Nehemiah - Cupbearer to the Persian king
Artaxerxes and appointed by him to be governor of the exiles returning
to Jerusalem to rebuild the walls of the city. Against strong
opposition, Nehemiah led his people to rebuild the walls of the city and
helped Ezra in turning the people's hearts toward the Lord.
Noah -
A man who found grace from the Lord in a desperately wicked generation
and built the ark that rescued from the Great Flood his entire family
and representatives of all of the land animals then living upon the
earth. Upon leaving the ark, Noah entered into a covenant with the Lord
and received from Him gracious promises, including the promise never
again to destroy all life by a flood.
Obadiah - A prophet the Lord
used to denounced the Edomites for celebrating the fall of the
Israelites and even cutting down their refugees. Obadiah's predictions
that Edom would be utterly destroyed were fulfilled.
Rachel - The
wife whom the patriarch Jacob loved more than his other wife, her older
sister Leah, and who gave birth to Jacob's two favorite sons, Joseph and
Benjamin. Benjamin became the head of one of the tribes of Israel,
almost wiped out in a war against the other tribes.
Rahab - A
prostitute of the pagan city of Jericho at the time the Israelites were
about to invade. Rahab hid the Israelite spies in exchange for their
protection in the coming battle. After the spies kept their word and
spared her at the fall of the city, she married an Israelite, becoming
one of the ancestors of Jesus Christ.
Rebekah - Wife of Isaac
chosen by Abraham's servant because of her willingness to serve him by
drawing water for him from a well and watering his camels. Rebekah was
the daughter of Nahor and the sister of Laban. When Isaac became blind
in his old age, Rebekah conspired with her son Jacob to deceive him into
giving Jacob the Father's Blessing in place of his older twin, Esau, to
whom it rightly belonged. When Rebekah heard Esau threaten his revenge,
she sent Jacob off to her father's people and died without ever seeing
him again.
Reuben - The firstborn son of Jacob who lost his
position over his brothers because of his sin with his father's
concubine. When his brothers wanted to kill their younger brother
Joseph, Reuben intervened and persuaded them not to kill him. Reuben's
descendants became one of the twelve tribes of Israel.
Ruth - A
woman from Moab who, after the death of her Israelite husband, firmly
committed herself to attend her widowed mother-in-law, Naomi, the
Israelite. After the two women returned to Bethlehem, Naomi's home, Ruth
married Boaz, Naomi's kinsman. Their son Obed turned out to be the
grandfather of king David.
Samson - An Israelite dedicated to the
Lord from before he was born, who nevertheless was vain, selfish,
sensual, and violent. God used him despite his sinfulness to bring
deliverance to Israel from their Philistine oppressors. Samson was
deceived by a Philistine woman Delilah to reveal the secret of his great
strength, his long hair, uncut as a sign of his dedication to God. When
Delilah cut off Samson's hair while he slept, Samson lost his great
strength and fell victim to his enemies, who put out his eyes and bound
him with chains. Samson got his revenge, however, for when his hair grew
back, he pulled down a Philistine temple to which he was chained,
killing not only Samson, but all of the Philistines who had assembled
there to mock him.
Samuel - Another Israelite dedicated to the
Lord before he was born and raised as the servant of the high priest
Eli. Samuel grew up serving God and after Eli's death, became the last
judge of Israel and also one of the greatest prophets of the Old
Testament. Under the Lord's guidance, Samuel anointed both Saul and his
successor, David as the first two kings of Israel.
Sarah - Wife of
Abraham and mother of Isaac. Sarah was very beautiful even as an older
woman. The Lord blessed her to conceive her child after she was beyond
the age of bearing children, in fact, when she was 90 years old.
Saul
- The first king of Israel and a powerful warrior who led Israel's
armies against the Philistines. Because Saul sinned against the Lord and
apparently did not repent, the Lord took his kingdom away from him and
gave it to David. Saul compounded his sin by trying to kill David again
and again. Saul committed suicide on the battlefield after he realized
the Philistines had won the battle and were about to capture him. Saul's
son, Jonathan was killed in the same battle.
Sennacherib - King
of Assyria who led an invasion that swept through Syria, Israel, and
Judah at the end of the eighth century B.C. Sennacherib destroyed all of
the fortified cities of Judah except Jerusalem. He surrounded Jerusalem
and would have destroyed it as well, had not Hezekiah prayed and
received from the Lord a mighty deliverance--in one night an angel of
the Lord struck down 185,000 soldiers of Sennacherib's army. Sennacherib
returned to Assyria in humiliation, where two of his own sons
assassinated him. Sennacherib's palace in Nineveh has been excavated, on
the walls of which he depicts the taking of Lachish, an Israelite city
near Jerusalem. He boasts, "I walled up Hezekiah in his city like a bird
in a cage," but makes not mention of taking Jerusalem or of the
decimation of his army.
Shadrach - One of the three friends of
Daniel taken into exile by the Babylonians before they destroyed the
city of Jerusalem. His Hebrew name was Hananiah. With his two friends,
Mishael and Azariah, better known as Meshach and Abednego, Shadrach
refused to worship the golden image of Nebuchadnezzar. Although the
three of them were thrown into a furnace of blazing fire, God sent
someone Nebuchadnezzar described as "someone like a son of man" to
rescue them, and they escaped unharmed.
Solomon - King of Israel,
succeeding his father David to the throne. At the beginning his reign,
the Lord offered to give him whatever he wanted. Although quite young,
Solomon asked for wisdom rather than riches or long life. In response,
the Lord gave him all three, blessing his reign until he became renowned
as the wisest and richest king in history. Tragically, however, his
many marriages to foreign women turned his heart away from the Lord.
Despite being remembered for building a glorious temple to the Lord in
his capital city of Jerusalem, Solomon actually became an idolater.
Uriah
- A Hittite warrior among the elite soldiers in the army of King David,
whom David treacherously ordered to be exposed to the enemy in battle
and killed to hide the king's adultery with Uriah's wife, Bathsheba. The
Bible has nothing but praise for this victim of a king's lust and the
subsequent, self-serving cover-up.
Uzziah - King of Judah and
father of King Hezekiah. Uzziah was also known as Azariah (not the much
later Azariah also called Abednego). He was a righteous king, but at the
end of his reign became conceited and wrongly offered incense in the
temple of the Lord. The Lord punished him with a leprosy that remained
with him until his death.
Zechariah - A prophet of the Lord who,
along with Haggai, persuaded the returned exiles to complete the temple
they had begun four years earlier and neglected to finish while they
built their own houses. Zechariah greatly encouraged the governor,
Zerubbabel, that the Lord could care for the nation's se while he
devoted himself to finishing the sanctuary of God. Zechariah also
encouraged the high priest, Jeshua, that the Lord Himself purified him
for his duties as the spiritual leader of God's people.
Zephaniah -
A prophet of the Lord chosen from among the royal household to urge the
people to return to following after the Lord.
Zerubbabel - The
Persian-appointed governor of the exiles who returned to Jerusalem to
rebuild the temple. Supported by the prophetic ministries of Zechariah
and Haggai, along with the ministry of the high priest, Jeshua,
Zerubbabel was able to motivate the people to complete the rebuilding of
the temple of Solomon in 516 B.C.
Zophar - One of the friends of
Job, who, in the guise of trying to comfort him in the loss of all of
his children, his possessions, and his health, instead sought to accuse
him of deserving God's punishment because of some hidden sin. Eventually
the Lord vindicated Job and prompted him to pray for his three friends.
* * *
Copyright ©2006 Steve Singleton
Steve Singleton
has written and edited several books and numerous articles. He has been
an editor, reporter, and public relations consultant. He has taught
college-level Greek, Bible, and religious studies courses and has taught
seminars in 11 states and the Caribbean.
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DeeperStudy.com
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