The word Hanani ( he, חנני ''Ḥănānî'') means "God has gratified me" or "God is gracious".
Hanani is the name of four men mentioned in the
Hebrew Bible
The Hebrew Bible or Tanakh (;"Tanach" '' Heman (1 Chronicles 25:4, 25).
* A "seer" or prophet who was sent to rebuke king
Asa of Judah
Asa (; el, Ασά; la, Asa) was, according to the Hebrew Bible, the third king of the Kingdom of Judah and the fifth king of the House of David. The Hebrew Bible gives the period of his reign between 40–41 years. His reign is dated betwee ...
for entering into a league with
Ben-Hadad I
Ben-Hadad I ( he, בן הדד, translit=bn hdd; arc, בר הדד, translit=br hdd), son of Tabrimmon and grandson of Hezion, was king of Aram-Damascus between 885 BC and 865 BC. Ben-Hadad I was reportedly a contemporary of kings Baasha of the K ...
northern kingdom of Israel
The Kingdom of Israel (), or the Kingdom of Samaria, was an Israelite kingdom in the Southern Levant during the Iron Age. The kingdom controlled the areas of Samaria, Galilee and parts of Transjordan. Its capital, for the most part, was Sama ...
. Hanani was imprisoned in stocks by Asa (2 Chronicles 16:7-10). This Hanani was also probably the father of the prophet
Jehu
) as depicted on the Black Obelisk of Shalmaneser III
, succession = King of Northern Israel
, reign = c. 841–814 BCE
, coronation = Ramoth-Gilead, Israel
, birth_date = c. 882 BCE
, death_date = c. 814 BCE
, burial_place ...
, who rebuked Baasha, king of the northern kingdom (1 Kings 16:1-4, 7) and
Jehoshaphat
Jehoshaphat (; alternatively spelled Jehosaphat, Josaphat, or Yehoshafat; ; el, Ἰωσαφάτ, Iosafát; la, Josaphat), according to 1 Kings 22:41, was the son of Asa, and the fourth king of the Kingdom of Judah, in succession to his fathe ...
, king of the southern kingdom (2 Chronicles 19:1-3). The
Pulpit Commentary
The ''Pulpit Commentary'' is a homiletic commentary on the Bible created during the nineteenth century under the direction of Rev. Joseph S. Exell and Henry Donald Maurice Spence-Jones. It consists of 23 volumes with 22,000 pages and 95,000 entri ...
suggests both "belonged to the Kingdom of Judah". Hanani's criticism of Asa's treaty with Syria does not appear in the parallel narrative in 1 Kings 15. Hanani would appear to have had a group of supporters who shared his criticism or disapproved of his arrest, whose protests were also "crushed" by Asa.: Evangelical Heritage Version
*A member of the priestly family of Immer, listed in Ezra 10:20 as having married a foreign wife.
* Probably a brother of
Nehemiah
Nehemiah is the central figure of the Book of Nehemiah, which describes his work in rebuilding Jerusalem during the Second Temple period. He was governor of Persian Judea under Artaxerxes I of Persia (465–424 BC). The name is pronounced o ...
(Nehemiah 1:2; 7:2), who reported to him the melancholy condition of
Jerusalem
Jerusalem (; he, יְרוּשָׁלַיִם ; ar, القُدس ) (combining the Biblical and common usage Arabic names); grc, Ἱερουσαλήμ/Ἰεροσόλυμα, Hierousalḗm/Hierosóluma; hy, Երուսաղեմ, Erusałēm. i ...
. Nehemiah afterwards appointed him to have charge of the city gates.