Perida is a name found in the King James Bible, appearing 1 time in the text.
Who This Was
Perida was one of the families of temple servants who returned to Jerusalem after the Babylonian exile. He is mentioned in the Book of Nehemiah, in a register of the people who came back from captivity in Babylon to resettle Judah and rebuild the life of worship in Jerusalem. In the King James Bible, his name appears only once, in Nehemiah 7:57.
The record lists him among “the children of Solomon’s servants,” a group named alongside the children of Sotai and Sophereth. These servants of Solomon were a distinct class attached to the temple service, counted separately from the priests, Levites, and ordinary Israelites in the returning community. The passage itself says nothing more about Perida personally; he stands in Scripture as the head of a family line whose members came back to the land and were numbered among those who served the house of God.
What Scripture records of him, then, is his place in the restoration. After decades of exile, the returning remnant had to be organized and registered, and the temple servants were included in that accounting. Perida did not build the wall or read the Law aloud, so far as the text tells us. His contribution was quieter: he belonged to a family that answered the call to return, and his name was preserved in the list of the faithful who came home.
The Name
The name Perida is a Hebrew name, but its meaning is not clearly recoverable. It appears only here in the King James Bible, in a list of temple servants, and no explanation of its sense is given in the text. Some Hebrew names yield their meaning readily from their root letters, but for this name no meaning is well established, and it would be dishonest to assign one. It is enough to note that it belonged to a real family, remembered by name in the record of those who returned.
A Closing Thought
Most of us will never be listed among the famous or the prominent. Perida’s whole legacy in Scripture is a single line in a long register of names. Yet that line matters: he was among those who came back and served. God’s work has always depended on ordinary households quietly doing their part, and He keeps His own record of them. If your service is unseen and your name unknown to the crowd, take heart—the One who counts the returning exiles by name has not overlooked you.
At a Glance
- Gender: Male
- Testament: Old
- Mentions in the KJV: 1
Where It Appears in Scripture
- Nehemiah 7:57 — The children of Solomon’s servants: the children of Sotai, the children of Sophereth, the children of Perida,