Search
Uriah
URIAH, URIAS, URIJAH (ū-rī'a, ū-rī'ăs, ū-rī'ja, Heb. ’ûrîyâh, Jehovah is light)
URIAH yŏŏ rī’ ə (אֽוּרִיָּה, Jahweh is light). KJV URIJAH. 1. An officer in David’s army, who was one of the elite corps called “the Thirty,” most of whom seem to have been of foreign origin, and were prob. mercenaries (
In order to cover his adulterous connection with Bathsheba, David recalled Uriah from war in order that he might visit his wife, but he refused to do so, even though David tried to make him drunk. When David failed to make this device effective, he gave Uriah a sealed dispatch to Joab, the commander of the army, requesting that Uriah be placed in a dangerous position and that support be withdrawn. Joab complied, and Uriah was killed in battle. Upon his death, David married Bathsheba. The child conceived in adultery was born, but did not survive. A second child by Bathsheba was Solomon, who became David’s successor. Uriah is mentioned in the genealogy of Christ (
2. A priest who served as a witness to a prophecy of Isaiah (
3. A chief priest during the reign of Ahaz, prob. identical with the priest mentioned in the preceding paragraph. When Ahaz returned from Damascus after an interview with Tiglath-pileser, the king of Assyria, on political affairs, he brought with him a model of an Assyrian altar. He requested Uriah to build a replica for use in the Temple (
4. A prophet, son of Shemaiah of Kirjathjearim. Uriah protested the policies of the king, who sentenced him to death. He escaped to Egypt, but was captured, brought back to Jerusalem, and executed (
5. The father of Meremoth (
6. One of the men who assisted Ezra in the public reading of the law (
International Standard Bible Encyclopedia (1915)
u-ri’-a, u-ri’-ja (’uriyah, in
(2) A priest under Ahaz, who carried into effect the latter’s commands to introduce an Assyrian altar into the Temple and to use it for the sacrifices (
(a) "faithful witness" means simply "one whom the people will believe," and
(b) the articles in the sanctuary were not held as immutably sacred in the time of Ahaz as they were in later days.
The omission of Uriah’s name from the list in
(3) A son of Shemaiah, of Kiriath-jearim, and a contemporary of Jeremiah. He was a prophet, and his prophecy agreed with Jeremiah’s in regards. Jehoiakim, roused to anger, arrested him, even at the trouble of a pursuit into Egypt, put him to death and desecrated his body (Jer 20-23). The story is told partly in order to show the greatness of Jeremiah’s dangers, partly to bear record of the goodness of AHIKAM (which see), Jeremiah’s protector.
(4) A priest, the father of MEREMOTH (which see) (
(5) One of those on Ezra’s right hand reading of the Law (