Person Old Testament
Abinadab
Abinadab, in whose house the ark of God was kept for 20 years. Mentioned in 3 verses across 3 books, first at 1 Samuel 7:1.
Why it matters. Kept the ark of God in his house
- Primary passages
- Last reviewed
- 2026-08-30 by the FaithGraph team
About Abinadab
Abinadab was a man from Kiriath-jearim in whose house the ark of God was kept for twenty years after it was returned by the Philistines (1Sa.7.1). The ark had been captured by the Philistines in battle, but after God afflicted them with plagues, they sent it back to Israel (1Samuel 5-6). The men of Beth-shemesh, where the ark first arrived, were struck down by God for looking into the ark, so they sent messengers to Kiriath-jearim to take the ark away (1Sa.6.19-21).
The ark remained in Abinadab's house until King David decided to bring it to Jerusalem. David and the Israelites went to Abinadab's house to retrieve the ark, placing it on a new cart driven by Abinadab's sons, Uzzah and Ahio (2Sa.6.3; 1Ch.13.7). However, when the oxen stumbled and Uzzah reached out to steady the ark, God struck him down for his irreverence (2Sa.6.6-7). After this incident, David left the ark in the house of Obed-edom the Gittite for three months before successfully bringing it to Jerusalem (2Sa.6.10-12).
Description from STEPBible TIPNR (Tyndale House, Cambridge), CC BY 4.0, lightly reformatted. This is background reference material, not Scripture and not a FaithGraph editorial claim.
Connections
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Family
Family links from STEPBible TIPNR (CC BY 4.0). Where the dataset marks an identification as uncertain, the mark is kept. Matthew and Luke give different genealogies for Jesus; see the Lineage page, which never merges them.
Appears in Scripture
Named in 3 verses across 3 books. Occurrence data from STEPBible TIPNR (CC BY 4.0); references only, no translation text.