Maaseiah

Maaseiah is a Hebrew personal name meaning "the work of the LORD" (from ma'aseh, "work, deed," with the divine name), and it is borne in Scripture by a number of different men, most of them Levites, priests, and temple staff. Because it was a common name, the English spelling also varies between translations and even within a single version: Jeremiah 32:12 names "Mahseiah," the grandfather of Baruch the scribe, and the same Hebrew name stands behind the "Maaseiah" spellings elsewhere.

Several bearers serve in the temple and in the public reading of the Law. In 1 Chronicles 15:18 a Maaseiah is listed among the Levites of "the second rank," appointed as a doorkeeper when the ark was brought up to Jerusalem under David. In Nehemiah 8:4 a Maaseiah stands at Ezra's right hand on the wooden platform while the Law is read aloud, and Nehemiah 8:7 lists him among the Levites who "caused the people to understand the law." A further temple figure appears in Jeremiah 35:4, where a chamber in the house of the LORD is identified as belonging to "Maaseiah the son of Shallum, the keeper of the threshold," that is, a gatekeeper of the sanctuary.

The book of Jeremiah also places the name in the last years of the kingdom of Judah. Zephaniah son of Maaseiah is a priest whom King Zedekiah sends to Jeremiah to inquire of the LORD (Jeremiah 21:1) and later to ask for prayer (Jeremiah 37:3), and he is the priest addressed in the letter quoted at Jeremiah 29:25. A different Maaseiah is the father of the false prophet Zedekiah, who prophesied falsely in the LORD's name and whom Jeremiah announces would be handed over to Nebuchadnezzar (Jeremiah 29:21).

Christian traditions attach no doctrinal weight to the name and read these references in much the same way; the differences are mostly matters of translation and historical judgment. Versions differ on how to transliterate and vocalize the name, which is why the same person can appear as Maaseiah, Mahseiah, or Maasiah across editions. More substantively, traditions that treat the Chronicler's Levitical and genealogical lists as straightforward records read 1 Chronicles 15:18 as evidence of an organized temple personnel system in David's time, while historical-critical scholarship commonly regards such lists as reflecting later temple arrangements projected backward — a disagreement about the lists generally, not about this name. Nehemiah 8:7 has also been read differently across traditions: as warrant for an ordained teaching office, as a model for lay instruction in Scripture, or simply as a description of translation and explanation of the Hebrew text for Aramaic-speaking hearers.

AI-generated reference entry, grounded in the passages where this term appears — history and Scripture stated as such, interpretation labeled as interpretation. Not a substitute for the text itself.