The fourth son of Jacob, whose name means "praise"; his tribe became Israel's leading royal tribe, from which David and the Messiah would come.
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Life & Story
Judah was the fourth son of Jacob and Leah. When Leah finally bore a son after years of fruitfulness, she named him Judah (יְהוּדָה, H3063), meaning "praise," as a testimony of thanksgiving to God. He grew up among his brothers in the land of Canaan as Jacob's family settled there. During the plot against Joseph by his brothers, Judah had earlier proposed selling Joseph to Ishmaelite traders. Years later, when famine drove the family to Egypt, Judah emerged as a leader among the brothers and personally stepped forward to plead with Joseph for Benjamin's release, offering himself as surety—an act of repentance and courage that showed how he had grown from his earlier failure into a man willing to bear responsibility for his brothers. On his deathbed, Jacob pronounced a special blessing upon Judah: his brothers should praise him, his hand should be on the neck of his enemies, his father's sons should bow down before him, and he is compared to a lion's whelp. Jacob further prophesied that the scepter would not depart from Judah until Shiloh came—a royal and messianic promise rooted in this tribe. Judah's descendants formed the tribe of Judah, which rose to become Israel's leading royal tribe. King David came from this lineage, and the Messiah—later called "the Lion of the tribe of Judah"—would also come through it, fulfilling the kingly and salvific hope embedded in Jacob's ancient blessing.