CIS

of Judaism, and the chief symbols of the religion

of

and of membership of the religious common-

wealth.

For this reason neither Greek nor Roman

culture was able to suppress this relic of barbarism.
Antiochus Epiphanes

prohibited circumcision,

but with

no

great effect

(

I

Macc.

1 4 8 60

246).

On the

other hand, however, the spread of Grecian culture
wrought among those Jews who had yielded to its
influence, that they became ashamed of their circum-
cision, as in the exercises and games of the arena it
exposed them to pagan ridicule they accordingly took
steps by means of a special operation to obliterate the
signs of it

I

Macc.

I

Cor.

In order to remove the

possibility of this in future the Talmudists and Bar
Cochba ordered that after the ordinary cut had been
made the flesh should

also

be torn with the thumb nail.

Michaelis,

Saalschiitz,

1246

;

the commentaries on Gen.

17 ;

the handbooks of biblical

archaeology,; Hamburger’s

‘Be-

9.

Literature.

schneiduiig

.

A T

Smend,

A T

37

.

43

etc.

;

Berlin 1896.

customs connected with the rite,

see

Syn.

and Otho,

Lex.

For the practice

of Judaism, Schiirer,

3

etc.

On

the present

diffusion of the rite, Ploss,

on

circumcision

among the Arabs, We.

A

Y

.

154.

CIS

[Ti. WH]),

RV

K

I

S

H

Esth.

RV

CISTERN

Jer.

etc.

See

CITHERN

[AKV]),

I

Macc. 454.

See

CITIMS

I

AV.

See

CITRON.

See A

PPLE

,

(3).

CITY

almost confined to poetry and

place-names

;

frequent in

but only

I.

K

ISEUS

.

See

5

M

U

S

IC

,

CITY

Gen. 1 1 4 the builders of Babylon

Let

us

a

city and

a

tower’ the

five

O T ; cp also K

AKTAH

,

A

synonym of

‘settlement, city’; cp

C

AI

N

I

;

for Heb.

and

cp Aram.

Ar.

The influence

of

the old Babylonian culture is manifest.

W e note, too, that

in virtue of its origin, is an elastic

term including the settlements of those who were once
nomads (see

V

ILLAGE

), and thus we can

account for the ‘cities (read

with

Klo.)

of

Amalek in

I

and the description in

K.

‘in all their cities, from the tower of the watchmen

(see

T

OWER

)

to the fortified city.’ Dillmann, too, thus

explains the phrase ‘the wilderness and its

Is.

and some have supposed that the city’ built

by Cain was but

a

settlement such as we have just

referred to- a most uncritical supposition !

We

may

safely assume that the Israelites acquired the word
in Canaan. There they encountered highly civilised
peoples and strongly fortified cities. The Deuteronornist
remarks (Josh.

11

cp Jer.

30

that places which

stood upon

on

artificially heightened

mounds or hills-the Israelitish

did not

burn down, with the single exception of Hazor.

Of

course, mountain cities were still more difficult to take

FORTRESS).

For

‘and its cities’ we

should read

and the desert’ (see

T

ad

It

was

a dweller in the land of Nod (‘wandering who

built (or whose son built) a city and obtained the first place in
the Hebrew

of culture.’

was originally a divine

being, or semi-divine hero.

Read

cp D e Dien,

Sacra

49.

T h e

(see

or

on which

was huilt is a good specimen of these hills.

in the

Arabic geographical

of

Syria and the Euphrates

Valley.

T h e text, however, is corrupt.

See

3.

27

833

or tower here represents the citadel.
Elsewhere

i t

is the

that is the

the city

of

David,’ city

of

(see

but observe that in

ler.

appears to be used of the lower cities as

to the

or citadels.

(6)

the

of the town (see

F

ORTRESS

)

.here were broad places,’ expressly distinguished

he ‘street’ in Prov.

devoted in turn to judicial

traffic, popular assemblies, and gossip. See

326

Neh.

81

16

Job 297; also Ps.

5511,

we might render, ‘Extortion and deceit depart

from its

( c )

Streets.

-Except in Graeco

-

Roman cities like

and

the importance of which

s

shown by the continuance of their names

in

almost unmodified form-the

streets

were presumably

as narrow

as

those in a modern Oriental city. That

the houses before the Greek period were for the most
part poor and perishable is remarked elsewhere (see
H

OUSE

,

I

).

Still, the increase of wealth must have

had some effect

on

the architecture (cp Jer.

my rate, in the merchants’ quarters, the existence of
which may be inferred from Zeph.

1

11

Jer.

37

(the bakers’ street

’).

Whether the

merchants in

had

whole streets

(MT of

I

K.

2034)

or simply caravanserais

Klo., for

may be left undecided.

On

the question whether the

streets were paved it may be said that the soil was so
often rocky that paving would frequently be uncalled
for.

We have no evidence of paving in Jerusalem

before the Roman period (Jos.

Ant.

xx. 97). Herod

the

is said to have laid

an

open road in

Antioch with polished stone (Jos.

xvi.

5

3).

On

the street called Straight,’ see D

AMASCUS

.

( d )

Watchmen.

-Watchmen, apart from the keepers

of the gates, are mentioned only in two almost identical
passages

of

Canticles (33

a work possibly of the

Greek period; it is, of course, the capital that is
referred to.

( e )

- The excellent water-supply of

ancient Jerusalem is treated elsewhere (see CONDUITS)
smaller places had to be content with the fountains
which were the original cause of the settlements.

The student will now be able to judge how far the

Hebrew and the Greek conception of

a

city differed.

Pausanias

cent.

A.D.)

thus presents the Greek

conception

(Paus.

Frazer,

1 5 0 3 ) :

‘ I t is twenty

furlongs from

to Panopeus, a city of Phocis,

if city it can be called that has

no

government-offices,

no gymnasium,

no

theatre,

no

market-place, no water

conducted

to

a

fountain, and where the people live in

hovels, just like highland shanties, perched on the edge
of

a

ravine. Yef its territory is marked off by boun-

daries from that of its neighbours, and it even sends
members to the Phocian parliament.’ Jerusalem, a t

any

rate, had its conduits and a substitute for a

place, nor were large and high houses

altogether

unknown (see H

OUSE

,

I).

The gymnasium spoken of

‘City of the house of

is not a correct

phrase.

For ‘city’

read ‘sanctuary’

See

JEHU.

I n E V

I

K. 37

Ch. 6

Ruth 3

is actually

rendered ‘city’ (and in this sense is characteristic of

but

practically

is equivalent to ‘jurisdiction.’ Cp ‘ T h e

Porte’ and the Japanese ‘Mikado,’ literally ‘exalted gate.’

So

in

and

are often confused.

So

R V for

in Prov.

Cant. 3 E V has ‘broad

ways’: cp

Ch. 32

6 ;

see Neh. 8

I

.

always

except

Is.

15

3

because

of

preceding.

4

has

five times,

five or

six

times,

once or twice,

more than twelve times but most fre-

quently renders, with reference to the etymology: simply

or

Prov.

Eccl. 1 2 4 5 Cant.

In

N T the words are

and

(in

Lk. 14

cp

Ecclus.

97.

See G

ATE

.

CITY

O F MOAB

CLEAN AND UNCLEAN

in

I

Macc. 114 Macc.

was only

a

temporary in-

the crystalline but the materials are

so

varying that

novation.

)

Store-cities.

-This phrase means cities in which

grain

Ch.

or other royal provisions, valuable

for war or for peace, were stored

(

I

K.

9

19

etc.

).

It is

implied that such cities were fortified. In Ex.
gives

cp

R

AAMSES

.

On citizenship, cp

4

;

L

AW

AND

J

USTICE

,

:

and

1 5 .

For the

cities

of the Plain

see A

DMAH

,

etc. ;

on

the

cities

of refuge

see A

SYLUM

,

CITY

OF MOAB

N

U

.

2236.

See

A

R

OF

M

OAB

.

CITY

OF SALT.

CLASPS

Ex.

266

R V ;

AV

‘taches.’ See

CLAUDA,

RV C

AUDA

[Ti.

with

13,

etc.],

[WH with

is

described as a small island

under the lee of

which

Paul‘s

ship ran for shelter

when

blown off the Cretan shore. She was driving before an
ENE. wind

which caught her between Cape

(called also Cape Matala) and Lutro harbour

(see

Hence Clauda must be the small

island now called

or

lying about

m. due

S.

of Lutro.

Ptolemy

1711)

has

and remains of a small

town are found

on

the island. There is some variety

in the ancient appellation

328

;

Pliny,

iv.

12

61).

I t

became the seat of

a

bishop (cp Hier. Syn. p.

14,

and

8

240,

etc.

).

See

S

ALT

,

C

ITY

OF.

T

ABERNACLE

.

W.

J. W.

CLAUDIA

[Ti.

WH]) unites with

Paul

at

Rome in sending greeting to Timothy at Ephesus

Tim.

4

Nothing further is known concerning her.

For the

hut unconvincing argument

which it has

been sought

identify her with the Claudia who marries Pndens

in Martial‘s e igram

and to prove her the daughter of the

British king

Claudius Cogidubnus, see Alford,

vol.

Prol. to Tim.

CLAUDIUS,

the fourth emperor of Rome

was the son of Nero Claudius

and the successor of

Caius

His advancement to this position came

chiefly through the energies of Herod Agrippa I., whom
he rewarded with consular honours and the enlargement
of his territories by the addition of

Samaria, and

certain districts in Lebanon.

For the history of the

Jews during his reign, see I

SRAEL

.

Claudius is twice

mentioned in the NT.

In Acts

11

28

the

fore-

told by

is said to have been

the time

of

Claudius

[Ti.

W H ]

AV after

T R ,

Kh.

but see

and in

18

reference is made to the

of

the Jews from

Rome which he was induced to order (as Suet.

tells us) on account of their tumults :

tnmultuantes Roma

The precise dates of

famine

expulsion have

been disputed see C

HRONOLOGY

,

CLAUDIUS LYSIAS

(

Acts

chief captain

tribune, or chiliarch)

in command of the Roman

of Jerusalem in the

governorship of Felix (Acts

21

CLAY

is derived mostly from the decomposition of

felspathic rocks (especially granite and gneiss) and of

The Heb. phrase is

cp Ex. 1 (AV treasure

cities’),

(L

17

(EV ‘cities of

store’).

is omitted in

Ch.

(EV ‘storehouses,’

[BAL]).

In

I

K.

9

renders

apparently

BL

10

23)

omit.

Ch. 1 6 4 is corrupt ; see

I

IC. 15

and cp

For the question of the identity of Chrestus, see

C

HKISTIAN

,

N

AME OF,

6,

835

here is clay of several kinds suitable for several nses.

The term ‘clay

’

is often applied loosely to

‘

loam

of

for example, is the clay of Egypt and of Palestine,

although

a

bituminous shale, easily convertible into clay,

is

said to occur at the source of the Jordan and near the

Dead Sea see B

ITUMEN

.

In Palestine, and indeed throughout the

E.,

clay is

used chiefly

(I)

in building, either retained in its

natural state (for ceilings and floors) or manufac-
tured into bricks (see B

ABYLONIA

,

B

RICK

, C

HAM

-

BER

,

H

OUSE

) ;

in the manufacture

of

utensils (see

P

OTTERY

)

( 3 )

in providing a material for documents

public and private and a means of safely preserving
them. Very many deeds and other records have been
Found in the form of inscribed clay tablets in Assyria
and Babylonia.

The deed or

was

first written

on a small

or

brick, of clay, with the names of

the principals, witnesses, etc., appended.

This tablet

was

then enclosed in

an

envelope of clay, on which was

written, apparently from memory, the

of the

document, the names of the witnesses,’ etc. (Peters).
In Palestine, where,

so

far

as

we know, clay tablets were

not customary in the historic Israelitish period, clay,
instead

of

wax, was used for sealing. See, besides, Job

where

‘sewest up’ should rather be

(clay) over ‘-parallel to sealed up in

In Egypt jars, mummy-pits, etc., were frequently sealed
with clay.

T h e Heb. and Gr. words which are rendered ‘clay’ are

(I)

Gen. 11 3, etc.

;

used

of

the mire of

streets, also of

(Nah. 3 14) and potter’s clay (Is. 41

25)

; (3)

the

Aram. representative

2 33);

and

(4)

Rom. 9

see fnrther

P

OTTERY

.

Jer. 439

A

possible meaning is ‘earth’ (Giesebr.) ; hut it may

be

a

corruption for

‘secretly’ see Ges.

CLEAN

and UNCLEAN, HOLY and PROFANE.

Of

the Heb. terms which convey the idea of cleanliness

or holiness the most prominent is

(I)

etc.), the original

of which is not clear. Smend

in AT

334

(cp, however,

ed.

2 2 3 ,

expresses the common uncertainty of the

moment. The older view of Ges.

defended

now only in

a

much modified form, is that the root

means clear,’ ‘brilliant.’

writing

1878,

finds the fundamental idea in separation,’

a

view which

is still widely held.

[Baudissin says, A comparison with

makes it natural

to conjecture that

meant from the first to he separated

”-

“ t o he pure

that

was from the beginning synonymous

with

cp

“ t o cut‘’ or “cut out.”’ I t

is certain too, that Yahwb‘s holiness and his glory are correlative
ideas (as: in the

In

this is

very clearly indicated, and in

the thought of Yahwb’s

holiness suggests to Isaiah that of his own (moral) uncleanness

(cp Ps.15

2 4 3 3 ) .

May there not have been a time when

suggested

idea of purity without any moral reference?

Zimmern, followed

Whitehouse

July 1892,

p.

connects

with Ass.

37, n.

;

Assyr.

1

;

n. 3),

which means ‘bright, ‘pure, or, more precisely

bright,’ pure (very frequently), illustrious holy (so

in a private letter). According to

(in

words

which originally denoted ‘purity’ are used in Coptic to denote
the divine or the consecrated. This is quite in accordance with
the spirit of the old Egyptian religions and with that of the old
Semitic religions. If, however, this tempting comparison be

accepted, we must frankly admit that the original meaning had
become forgotten, or was but obscurely felt,

the O T writers.

Only once is ‘the Holy One’ distinctly parallel to ‘light’ (Is.

but the ideas are, a t any rate, implicitly synonymous

in

Is. 31

33

In usage,

Davidson

xxxix.),

remarks, the term ‘holy‘ expresses, not

particular attribute

Possibly, however,

represents

and

is omitted

2

(in his important dis-

sertation, ‘Der

der Heiligkeit

Alten Testament ‘).

CLEAN AND UNCLEAN,

HOLY AND PROFANE

rather the general notion of godhead.

In a secondary

though still early sense it is

to

that ‘which belongs

to the sphere of deity,

lies near God‘s presence or has

into it (Ex. 3 5 Nu. 16

or

belongs to

him, whether as part of himself or as

Davidson

also remarks that the root ‘probably expressed some physical
idea though the idea is not now reasonable.’ See also

WRS

who points out (after Noldeke) that the Arabic

evidence for the supposed root-idea of purity will not hold.

150

the same scholar finds ‘some

that

the original Leaning was ‘separation’

or

‘withdrawal.

Other less prominent terms are

and

of which are rendered indifferently by ‘clean‘ and

Of these the most definitely religious in its applica-

tion is

N o doubt gold may he

refined

(Ex.

25

28

so

also a

(Zech. 3 5), vessels (Ex.

etc. hut the

sense is

prominent (Lev.

7

Nu.

9

etc.) The eyes of God also can be

(Hah. 1

therefore he cannot tolerate wickedness. Similarly innocence
man

Job 17

Ps. 51

[

TO

].

God‘s promises are

perfectly veracious

(3)

eak,

also means refined (as oil, Ex.

27

incense

(Ex.

30

morally pure, ‘upright (Job 8

6

Prov. 20

21

8).

It is used

of

a prayer

16

of the heart (it has to

be made or kept ‘pure’ or ‘clean,’

Ps.

73 13

Prov.

or the conduct (Ps. 119 9).

(4)

‘separated’-;.e.,

‘pure’

above). Some

Rabhins interpret

in

Ps.

2

it would

he easier (though not rhe best solution) to read

I n a

physical sense

beautiful (Cant.

Spotless

purity belongs to God‘s commandments

I t

is used

of moral purity

4

244 731).

T h e N T terms which have to he noticed are (5)

pure

’

in a physical sense of modesty or chastity

Cor.

11

Tit.

2

I

Pet. 3

sacred, for ceremonial use

Macc. 13

8)

pure-ethically-of men

Cor. i

T

I

Phil.

I

Tim. 5

of

God (

I

Jn. 3

and of his wisdom (Ja. 3 17).

worthy of veneration, whether

of

things connected

1 4

Heh. 9

I

Baptist,

Christian disciples, Acts9

etc.). Thus the church

Israel (Tit. 2

see

P

ECULIAR

called

(cp Ex.

196,

stands

the same relation

as

(see

and cp A

SSIDEANS

) to

(see Thayer, Lex.

chieflv with

: see

above

:

property.

pure.

.

also in

I t is used

of

men (Tit.

1 8

of the

Messiah (Acts 2 27 13

of

Messianic blessings (Acts 13 34

and of God (Rev. 15

4

16 cp Ut.

4 Heb.

consecrated to the deity, belonging to God, used of

the sacred’ writings

Tim. 3 15 RV, AV ‘holy’). I n

I

Cor.

means all the sacred

pertaining to the

worship of God in the temple. For the negatives of these

qualities, see

C

OMMON

, P

ROFANE

.]

Baudissin’s view (above

[

I

])

suits many passages : the

holiness of the

and the

(see

I

DOLATRY

,

6),

who were certainly found in Israel

very early, can have consisted only in their separation:
either they were dedicated to foreign gods, or perhaps
they were set apart at puberty from the households in
which they grew up, according to a custom which ranges
from the Gold Coast to Tahiti (see Frazer’s

Bough,

and never returned to them or entered others.

T h e hire of the harlot Tyre

(Is. 23

is to be holiness

unto

not because the reviving trade of Tyre is to

be conducted in a better spirit than before, but because it
is to be taxed at the new Jerusalem (which is presumably
to be

a

staple town

of

the wool and spice trade) in

a

way to absorb all its profits.

Again

everything in the new Jerusalem after its last great trial
is to be so holy,

so

perfectly the property of God, that

the very horse-bells will bear the same motto as the

Priest’s mitre; the pots in which the sacrificial

flesh is boiled for priests are to be as holy as the bowls
which hold the sacrificial blood reserved for God the
common cooking pots of Jerusalem are to be holy
enough for pilgrims to boil their sacrifices

Jerusalem

(Joel

3

[4]

17)

is to be ‘holy’

no

stranger is to pass

[See Dr.

1

;

Die

1

Benzinger

( H A

remarks

I t

safely he

affirmed that this form

the deity, and es-

pecially the violation of nature combined with it, was unknown

to the Israelitish nomads;

also that with so many other

details of Baal-worship, it penetrated into the service of

and there spread to a considerable extent.’]

837

through. There is to be through the wilderness of Judah

a

holy way

(Is.

8)

in which

no

unclean shall walk.

So far it seems as if holiness might be explained as a

relation rather than a quality. The flesh and blood of
the sacrifice are holy because they belong to God

the

pots and bowls have to be holy that they may hold the
flesh and blood.

So,

too, the vessels (the bodies? or

the wallets

of David’s followers

(

I

21

have

to be holy that they may receive the shewbread, which

is

holy because it is set before God. David (whom all

the writers who speak of him regard, from their several
points of view, as

a

model of wisdom and piety) vouches

for the negative holiness of his men, and any accidental
defilement which he does not know will have had time
to

wear off : he appears to think that the shewbread

will

sanctify their vessels,’ and implies that if they had
been specially sanctified, as for

a

holy war or

a

pilgrimage, they might have eaten the shewbread
though they were not priests.

The sanctification of persons and things falls under

the same notion.

‘Holiness,’ as Robertson Smith

observed

is contagious :

whatever

a

‘holy‘ thing or

a

‘holy’ person

touches becomes holv.

casts his mantle over

the

has to

till Elijah releases him; the worshippers of Baal,
whose ordinary dress might ‘profane’ the house, are
provided with special vestments

the stores of the

house of Baal otherwise, when they came outside, their
ordinary dress would make whatever it touched holy to
Baal,’ and unavailable to the former owners. The priest
on the great Day of Atonement (the rule is older than the
day) is to take off the holy linen garments and leave
them in the holy place, and to wash his flesh in water
lest any of the contagion of holiness should cling to
him.

In a text which, though belonging to the main

stock of

P,

seems to represent a later state of the law,

the consecration of Aaron and his successors seems to
consist in their investiture with the (hereditary?) state
dress of Ex.

28

cp

Nu.

According to another

view, which is older than Zech.

the consecration

consists in the anointing

(cp

A

N

OINTING

,

3,

The doctrine of the contagion of holiness is at its height

Ezek.

(4624).

who provides special kitchens where

the priests are to cook the most holy things, and special
chambers in which they are to eat them,
bringing them forth into the outer court to sanctify the
people (who are eating their own sacrifices). Other-
wise, they might become the property of the sanctuary,
or at least would be subject to the same obligations as
the priests.

For the same reason, it is expressly stated,

they are to leave the holy garments in the holy place,
though all the top of the mountain is most holy.

So,

too,

a

little later, the profane sacrificers

of

Is.

65

5

either

threaten to sanctify the poor who approach them, or
claim to be too holy to be approached.

Hag.

we find

a

distinct change. The contagion of uncleanness

is stronger than the contagion of holiness.

A

garment

in which holy flesh

is

carried does not sanctify;

a

garment which has touched the dead pollutes (cp
E

GY

PT

,

19,

and see D

RESS

, 8). The stricter view is

still presupposed, at least for the ‘most holy’ things; any
garment sprinkled with blood has to be washed in the
holy place (Lev.

6

otherwise it would sanctify.

For the same reason the earthen pots used in cooking
are to be broken; brass pots (too valuable to break)
may be used, but only after having been rinsed and
scoured-obviously to remove the last vestige of

Everybody dedicated a new house

(Dt.

205) :

was it ever a

custom to dedicate vessels?

They wish to forsake

God’s

holy mountain and set u p a

temple of their own’ they are rebuked in a way to imply that
no temple exists or

needed (cp

Is.

and see

I

SAIAH

,

Is

this the reason why the holy garments are of linen?.

Woollen garments would naturally he

to the fuller a t long

intervals.

CLEAN AND UNCLEAN, HOLY AND PROFANE

holy food. The rank of the priests is determined
by their right to eat of both the holy and the most

holy, which are often cited as if they were
known, and never described : though we

are told that the sin and the trespass

offering are most holy and must be eaten in the holy place,
and hence could not be eaten by the households of the
priests. Why these special offerings are specially holy
is discussed elsewhere (see

S

ACRIFICE

).

The scribes,

to whom we owe this law, are the fathers of those who
decided that a book was or was not canonical according
as it did or did not defile the hands.'

After touching

a

really holy book, a man had to wash before touching

common food lest his hands should sanctify it (cp C

ANON

,

4). In the oldest practice, it would seem, it is the

contact with the holy flesh that is the essence of the con-
secration

of

priests

:

the sacrificer who wishes to institute

a

priest fills his hand.

'

As sacrifice and slaughter are

nearly synonymous (as late as Is.

ISAIAH, ii.,

we seem to find in one of the stories of the golden calf
that the share of the Levites in the slaughter of the
worshippers is virtually their consecration.

They

have filled your hand for YahwB

'

Ye have been

appointed priests

'),

for every man was against

his son

his brother'

(Ex.

In

I

K.

Jeroboam fills the hand for the priests

of

the high

places

:

in

Ch.

each candidate brings a bullock

and seven rams to fill his

This seems an echo

of old tradition; for in Ex. 29

(P),

Moses takes only

rams and a bullock when he fills the hand of Aaron

and his sons : the blood of the ram of the fill offering'
is put

on

the right ear, the right thumb, the right great

toe, of each priest the pieces, which as a rule are burnt,
and one

of

those which in

sacrifices fell to the

priest as his fee, are both laid with cake on the hand of
each priest and waved before God (to assert the priest's
right to the wave-breast and the heave
and then burnt.

There seems to be an afterthought

(v.

26)

in which Moses as the officiating priest takes the

wave breast to himself; the priests eat the rest of the
sacrifice (which in ordinary cases the worshipper would
eat) in the holy place.

The idea seems to be that just

as the worshipper in the old profession (Dt.
declares

' I

have put away the holy out of my house,

so

the sacrificer passes on the

holy food to a

priest who will take the risk and the privilege of sharing
the table of God, and bear the iniquity of the people in
their holy things.

Possibly the Levites in Ex.

may point to a

when the priest was not chosen by

the sacrificer, but handselled his office by laying hands
on the holy flesh.

The question whether

holiness' to begin with is

nothing more than separateness

'

bears very directly

on

the holiness' of God.

If

holiness is

originally a relation rather than a quality,

if

things and persons are holy to God as persons and

acts are righteous before him, then God himself is holy
simply as the centre of the circle of sanctity : if all that
belongs to the sanctuary is holy, how much more he
who dwelleth between the cherubim, who inhabiteth

the praises of Israel (Ps.

H e is the object of

worship whom his worshippers sanctify.'

He is the

Holy One' :

I

am God and not man, the Holy One

If Micah (Judg. 17 5) had begun with the Levite we might

suppose that the filling of his hand consisted in his salary. H e

is

not

to

have given his son a salary; yet he 'filled his

bands.

[So

who re.

marks,

In the story before us the consecration

the bene Levi

to the priesthood is explained

by

having filled

their hand with the

of

their brethren.

I t is doubtful

whether 'they have filled your hand' is the meaning of the Heb.
The expression Fill your hands' (if this be the meaning),

is

admitted, however, by Baudissin

des

Go)

to he 'very suspicious.'

It is always another who fills the new

priest's hands. Perhaps in an interpolation (see Kue. Hex.

247)

the phrase may he conceivable.]

Can we suppose that if anybody

was

allowed

to

qualify

Jeroboam found the qualification for

all

comers?

839

of Israel in the midst of thee'

(Hos.

cited Is.

1 2 6

:

Rejoice and shout,

0

inhabitant of Zion, for great is

the Holy One of Israel in the midst of thee').
is the God, the Holy One of the prophet (Hab.
So Jacob (Gen.

cp

42

[E]) swears by the fear

of his father

the God whom his father

feared.

There are other texts, however, in which holiness seems

to be absolute.

The men of Beth-shemesh

(

I

Sam.

6

ask, Who can stand before YahwB, this holy god?

In Am.

42

swears by his holiness. Does that

mean his character? or the reverence due to him?
T h e answer will govern the sense in which his name
is holy in

27.

In

Is.

516

(authoritative enough by

whomsoever written) God's being exalted through

judgment and sanctified through righteousness are

closely parallel.

The

song

ascribed to the mother of

Samuel

(

I

2)

is an unambiguous echo of the song of

the seraphim (Is.

6

3)

Holy, holy, holy is Yahwb

the whole earth is full of his glory,'-where

holiness and glory are clearly parallel.

So,

too, in

Jer.

17

a high throne is the place of our sanctuary,'

and in Ex.

1511,

' W h o is like thee, glorious in holi-

ness, fearful in praises, doing wonders?

the holiness,

the praises, the wonders, seem to belong to God's

majesty. Throughout the OT

God's

worshippers

rehearse his acts much oftener than his attributes.
W e find his 'righteous acts' as early as the song

of

Deborah (Judg.

but not till Jer.

do we read,

righteous art

YahwB, when I plead with thee

where the sense is still half forensic, as in

Ex.

(JE)

Ps.

51

4

In

Ps.

11

7

we have The righteous

loveth righteousness.

The parallel between holiness

and glory is reinforced by the contrast between holy
and profane, for profane certainly seems to mean what
is cast down to be trodden under foot (Ezek.

28

Cast

thee as profane out of the holy mount

89

39

Thou

profaned his crown to the ground

cp

44).

Israel, again (Dt.

is made high above all people,

that it may be a holy people.

The demand that Israel shall be holy is common to

every stage and aspect of the Law.

In Ex.

and

it is the ground on

Israel is to abstain from all meat

not killed by men for human food in Dt.

Israel

as a holy people

is

forbidden to make to the dead

blood- or hair-offerings, intended, doubtless, to keep
a physical communion with them (cp E

SCHATOLOGY

).

The spiritual tie between God and his peculiar people
who are his children is not to be impaired by a rite the
sense of which was still clear when the book which

Hilkiah found was written, though in Jer.

1 6 6

the rite

seems harmless and unmeaning.

Again, the tithe of

the third year is profane if any

of

it has been eaten in

mourning or

'

given for the dead (Dt.

26

14).

Are we

to think of the mere unluckiness of any thing connected
with the dead (Hos.

or of some form of worship,

as in Is.

8

? Consecration for one mode of worship

would be a defilement for another.

In

(cp

21

5)

we have the law against cuttings for the dead pre-

ceded by a law against an Arab tonsure, which probably
marked consecration to an Arab god.

This might go

back to Hezekiah, who, according to Sennacherib

2

entertained Arab mercenaries. Gratian adopted

the dress of his Alan guard.

If we suspect with

Robertson Smith a n invasion

of

Arab totemism in the

Holiness in the same sense is ascribed to other gods

of

Zidon on his sarcophagus (circa

400

speaks of

the holy gods in the same way as do

and the

queen-mother in the

Book

of Daniel.

Here therefore we have a clear case of the re-emergence

into the

of

day

a cult of the most primitive totem type

which had been banished for centuries from public religion, but
must have been kept alive in obscure circles of private or local
superstition, and sprang up again on the rising of the
faith

like

some noxious weed in the courts of a deserted temple

357). See the context, and cp Che.

Is.

GLEAN AND UNCLEAN,

HOLY

AND

PROFANE

time of Ezek.

Lev.

will forbid the tattooing

of totem marks.

In the Book of the Covenant and in Deuteronomy

the holiness of the covenant people is demanded, so to

speak, incidentally, and without ex-
press reference to the holiness of the

covenant God.

If one were to try to find

a

keynote for

the older book it would be 'Justice

for Deuteronomy

perhaps Loving-kindness,

the dutiful love of

the worshipper to his God, which includes kindness
for God's sake to men (see also

L

OVINGKINDNESS

).

Holiness is certainly the keynote of the oldest stratum

of the Levitical law (see L

EVITICUS

).

Deuteronomy is clearly a development,

as

compared

with the Book of the Covenant

a

deeper insight into

the vocation of the chosen people has been gained.

Is

the Law of Holiness a development in the same sense,
compared with Deuteronomy?

The interval between

Ezekiel and Jeremiah is shorter than that between
Deuteronomy and the Book of the Covenant; yet
Ezekiel is almost as full of the ideas of H

the

of Holiness) as Jeremiah of those of D.

Has he

inherited a relatively old tradition? Short as

H

is,

it is full of variations and repetitions.

Would not

an

elder or

a

younger contemporary of Ezekiel, giving

expression to

a

new religious movement that had grown

out of

covenant, have imparted more unity to

his work? Again, in more than one way H seems to
be older. No reader of Frazer .(see especially Golden

Bough,

n.

would think the law which forbids

the reaping of corners later than the law against gleaning
(Lev.

Nor is the holiness required of priests

yet extended to the whole people thus if a layman eats

he is defiled for the day and must wash his clothes

but for priests the prohibition is absolute.

There seems,

too, to be a recognition of other gods (Dt.

24

)

: if a

man curses his own god he shall bear his iniquity

e . ,

he must not come to the priest of the God of Israel to
make atonement for him). Certainly in D the demand
for 'holiness is based on the more characteristic de-
mand for monolatry, whilst in

H,

though the demand

for monolatry is not superfluous-Israel, we are told,

went after the

(see D

EMONS

,

4)

in the wilder-

ness (Lev.

is not fundamental.

The giving of

the seed to

is treated as analogous to the moral

abominations of the nations, for which the land spewed
them

rather than to turning away to idols

or

making molten gods. It was

a

profanation of God's

holy name just because those under his wrath (Ezek.

regarded it

as

part of his service.

Upon

the whole, the demand for holiness in H seems to
be an intensification of the demand that worshippers
shall sanctify themselves, which we may

the

better priests to have insisted upon as long as there
were feasts in Israel.

In many ways the holiness is

still external

:

ye shall be holy, for

I

YahwB am holy,'

appears (Lev.

2026)

as a

sanction for the law against

abominable food (cp

11

in

19

21

8

the con-

text takes

off

nothing from the text. These passages

mark the culmination, not the starting point, of a line
of teaching.

Generally the sanction of the precept is,

I

am YahwB,'

I

am

your god,'

I

am YahwB

your god who brought you out of Egypt,' I am YahwB
who sanctify you.

Logically and theologically God's

holiness is the source of all others

:

he is holy in himself

and therefore what he takes for his must be holy too
but possibly, as Robertson Smith held, holiness may in
the beginning have been regarded as a mysterious
virtue inherent in things external to the worshipper-in
trees, in waters, in stones, in the mysterious animal
life

of

well-wooded and well-watered spots,-each

of

which may have served to suggest a higher power
beyond the phenomena in which it

was

first recognised.

Historically, however, the evidence that holiness is an
attribute of the object of worship is neither

so

early nor

so

copious

as

the evidence that holiness is

a

relation

bringing the Worshipper and his holy things into a new
sphere with something worshipped at its centre.

Obviously holy and profane,' clean and unclean,' is

a

cross division : holv thinns and

are. or mav

as

unavailable for common life as

they were unclean, though, on the

other hand, holiness necessarily pre-

supposes and includes cleanness. Again, uncleanness
often seems, like holiness, to have something super-
natural about it : unclean animals often seem to be

abominable,' like idols

the uncleanness of the dead,

and of women at certain times, is

as

likely to

of awe as of disgust.

In historical times clean and unclean beasts are those

which are fit or unfit for food rather than for

(see however below,

but

the law of clean and unclean animals

is

The law which limited the eatable

quadrupeds to the old order of ruminants (with the
exception of the camel) was valuable incidentally from
thehygienic point of view.

If this was the origin of

the law, it must have rested rather on instinct than
on observation

at most, shepherds and herdsmen

may have noticed what beasts they found feeding in the
pastures of the wilderness, and decided that these were
as fit for food as their own flocks and herds.

All the

patriarchs have camels, and Rachel (Gen.

3134

[E]) hides

the teraphim in the camel's furniture : in later, perhaps
more historical, times camels seem to belong to aliens
(cp C

AMEL

,

In the oldest stratum of the story

of Gideon (Judg. 8

we find the gold rings round the

necks of the camels of the

in the oldest

stratum of the story of David

(I

30

17)

400

of the

Amalekites escape on camels. As far as we know, camel-
riders have always killed, eaten, and sacrificed their
camels, though the meat is inferior to beef and mutton.
Possiblythe camel wasunclean becauseit was the domestic
animal of alien nomads.

If

so,

the rule 'whatever

the hoof and cheweth the cud shall be clean'

may have been settled before the question of eating camels
became practical. This question was decided by the ob-
servation that the camel does not strictly divide the hoof,
or at least rests part of its weight on an undivided pad.

T h e express prohibition of eating hares, rock-badgers,

and swine, as food, is curious.

No reason except

a

possible connection with totemism has yet been suggested
why the rock-badger was forbidden

and for the prohi-

bition of the hare we have only guesses-perhaps it is
worth while to mention the idea that hares' flesh is
unhealthy.

The uncleanness of swine

is

at its height

when they are kept in sties and left dirty but in O T and
N T times they seem to have fed in herds out of doors.

with sheep and goats, they are fond of mud

-but

so

are buffaloes in modern Palestine, which are

not regarded with the same horror

as

swine.

On

the

other hand, tribes of herdsmen and shepherds have much
more in common with each other than with swineherds,
and if we are to look for a natural explanation of the
abhorrence of swine we may look for it here : the droves
of swine of the alien were abominable to the flocks and
herds of the Hebrew.

As

for the actual feeling, whatever

its cause, it is significant that in

traditionally

the last station of Abraham on his way to Canaan and the
land to which Jacob returned, the land where he won his
wives and his wealth, swine were sacrificed once a year
and eaten only then.

A

sacrifice which is, for whatever

With regard to sacrifices it is men that are clean

or unclean.

When men sacrifice

of

the flock and the herd, only the clean

may eat (when Saul misses David at table the first thought that
occurs to him is

is unclean')

:

that was the common law till

slaughter without sacrifice was allowed in

D

in the interest of

one sanctuary.

Of game, on the other hand, of the roebuck

and the hart the clean and the unclean may eat alike-thou h
possihly there

a trace of a blood-offering by hunters

rule in

H

(Lev.

13)

that the blood is to he not simply poured

out but covered with earth-aprescription which might be either
a

survival

or a development.

Dr.

164

WRS

366; Now.

H A 1

CLEAN AND UNCLEAN, HOLY AND PROFANE

reason, rare, is also mysterious, awful, and potent..

Dogs

too were sacred in

and both swine and

dogs seem to figure in the profane sacrifices of Is.

65

and

Whatever the reason for the express prohibition of

camels, hares, rock-badgers, and swine, the prohibition

is

old as any part of the law which we can trace

but the list of prohibited animals in Lev.

11

has

integral relation to the rest of the law the weasel, the
mouse, and different

of lizards are the uncleanest

with you of swarming things'

except dry sowing seed,

everything that comes into contact with their carcase

is unclean.

The rule is meant to

work:

one of these abominations does

not

defile a whole cistern or fountain every earthenware vessel

which they touch is to be broken other vessels are to be washed
in water and to he unclean until even. the water which washes
the vessels pollutes all meat on which'it falls any drink

in

the

polluted vessels is of course unclean.

Two questions arise

:

Why should people wish to eat

weasels, mice, and different kinds of lizards? and why
are these charged with special uncleanness?

The

traditional answer to the second is that they are in a
sense domestic vermin which haunt houses and are
always getting into whatever

is

stored there, and so are

worse than vermin

out

of doors

but, as most com-

mentators think that one of the lizards enumerated is
an iguana or a land crocodile

3

or 4 ft. long (see L

IZARD

[

I

]),

the explanation has to bear a heavy strain. If

Robertson Smith's theory of totemism

is

established,

much will become

The elders of Israel who wor-

shipped creeping things

'

in chambers of imagery

(Ezek.

made it necessary to cultivate a special

religious horror of their low-class totems : they were at
the same stage as the

who are said to have

worshipped field-mice. Indications of high-class totems,
however, are not wanting see

L

EOPARD

,

There is neither a category nor a list of clean birds :

of

the unclean, as enumerated, most are

either birds of

feeders

on

carrion.

The lapwing is especially forbidden

:

the only

possible reason yet discovered is that it haunts marshy
places and that its flesh has sometimes a bad smell.

Nothing is said one way or other of doves or pigeons,-
which

is

remarkable, as they do not appear at Solomon's

table, and, though they are the only birds which, as far
as we know, were sacrificed, they were used for sacrifices

of

which the worshipper at least did not eat.

In

Syria,

at any rate, they were always associated with the worship
of Astarte, and, wherever that worsliip spread to the
West, they went with it, and according to Lucian

14,

54)

none of the worshippers at Hierapolis

ventured

to

eat or touch them-they were too holy,-and

whoever touched them was

or unclean' for

a

day, and it was a question whether swine were holy'

or 'abominable.'

Probably the question of clean or

unclean birds was only of secondary importance : it was
not easy to keep ducks or geese there were no cocks

(see

C

OCK

)

or

hens

the fowls of heaven' generally

appear

as

feeding on sacrifices

or

corpses the fowler

(who appears as early as Hos.

9 8 )

probably caught small

birds for the

The prohibition

of

flying swarming things that go on

all fours looks as if at first it included locusts, the only

which anybody could wish to

if so,

subsequent scribes discovered that,

as they leap

on

their hind legs and do not strictly go on

[See

WRS

Were these sacrificial rites

practised

the early Samaritans? Cp Che.

Zs.

367.1

[Cp Stade

1896

n.

I

,

col.

I

O

,

who remarks

against

that

'

W. R.

hypothesis has the special

merit

of

explaining why certain animals are sacred, and why

certain kinds of flesh may not he eaten. The theory that these
animals were regarded as the property of the Godhead only
throws the question back. For how came people to
such a remarkable theory?' For

view see his

H A

I n

I

if

the

t e x t

is

right, partridge.

seem; to he beneath

dignity

of a

See

See D

OG

,

4.

3

See

F

OWL

I

.

843

fours, they might be eaten in all stages of their

rowth.

The law of aquatic food is clear

:

whatever hath fins

nd scales

is

clean this limits the dietary to true fishes,

and, among these, excludes eels and
popular and common articles of food in Egypt,

and Italy.

According to Pliny

10

I

),

thought fish without scales unfit for funeral

anquets Piankhi Meri-Amen thought well of a king of

Egypt who ate

no

fish; according to Lucian

fish in general is forbidden food. The Law

nothing of sacrificial fish. Perhaps the prohibition

fish was general, and the permission of what had fins

nd scales an exception: see

8

There

is

ertainly

a

tendency to identify what is clean and what

is

t for sacrifice. Thus Hosea

(93)

regards food eaten

put of the land of Israel as unclean, because

cannot be purified by acceptable sacrifice

o

the God of Israel

in Amos

a

foreign land is

for the same reason and in H the fruit of all

rees

is

to

be uncircumcised the first three years

e . ,

he fruit is to be picked off as fast

as

it forms while the

rees are establishing themselves

for the fourth year

he whole crop is to be holy to praise Yahwb withal

e . ,

o

be used for sacrificial feasts). There is no distinction

between clean and unclean herbs

the first

ruits of all are to be offered, though only corn and wine

oil figure in sacrifice.

In P (Gen.

every herb

and tree that yieldeth seed is given for
meat from the first

so

after the flood is

all animal food

as sacrifice was instituted

according to P ) for the first time at Sinai, the distinction

clean and unclean animals was still in abeyance.

The distinction between clean and sacrificial animals
which is presupposed throughout

D

is perhaps to be

by the transition from the nomadic state.

If

Levi the sacred tribe be

a

metronymic formed from

Leah the wild cow, wild animals must have been sacred

(see

L

EAH

).

T h e law of clean and unclean meats obtained special

in the Greek period : the first proof of the

fidelity of Daniel and his companions

is

their

not to defile themselves with the

meat

when Antiochus Epiphanes resolved to abolish 'Jewish
particularism eating swine's flesh was the test of con-

If we

go

back fifty or seventy years, Joseph,

the enterprising revenue farmer, whom his namesake
idealised (Jos.

Ant.

4

I O)

as

did

had clearly no scruple of the kind

yet even

he, though his kindred in the next generation

5

I

)

were prominent on the heathen side and he himself
[ell in love with a pagan

8),

was heartily thankful

when

his

own niece was substituted for her in order to

save him from polluting his seed among the heathen.

A

psalmist (see Ps.

who still instinctively draws his

imagery from a time before the institution or revival of
the evening burnt sacrifice, may be an older witness for
the view (hardly to he traced in Ezra or Nehemiah) that
the law of clean and unclean meats is given to separate
Israel from the heathen: he appears to be thinking
simply of fellowship at the table, not, like the author of

Is.

of sacrificial communion. If

so,

a Maccabean

editor may have revived

a

psalm which suited the times.

Probably older psalms from 18 onwards lay the stress

rather on cleanness of hands and innocency in

Is.

6

5

the unclean lips of prophets and people are generally
explained as relating to sins of speech, after the analogy
of Zeph.

3 9

13.

After the destruction of the temple,

and still more after Palestine ceased to be the centre
of Jewish life, the law of clean and unclean was less
zealously observed, though portions of it prove still

Observe that in

P's

account of the deluge there is no dis-

tinction between clean and unclean beasts (D

EL

UGE

,

6).

His

son

Hyrcanus (Jos.

A n t .

49) is

the first person we

know of whom they tell the story of

wise man whose place

at

the

king's board is piled with bones by envious detractors.

GLEAN AND UNCLEAN, HOLY AND PROFANE

to be

of

considerable sanitary value.

See

It

may arise

from external contact, or from something

the man or

The unclean-

ness of death falls under both

;

the dead

is

unclean and makes others unclean.

Diseases like leprosy or issue, natural processes like
menstruation and probably copulation, cause unclean-
ness too.

If, as

Wellhausen holds

151

;

but cp

Lev.

implies Lev.

the law of un-

cleanness after childbearing might be an extension by
analogy of the older law of the uncleanness of

If

so,

as the

has much to say respect-

ing the uncleanness of childbed, we might suspect
Persian influence-the rather that there is no hint of it
in the older Hebrew literature, while the menstruous
cloth’ appears (Is.

in a passage still generally

assigned

to

the Assyrian period.

Cp F

AM

ILY

,

Perhaps a common element in all cases of unclean-

ness

not

caused by external contact is that the unclean

in some way

is

disgusting or alarming.

T h e law of

leprosy is not to be explained from the

of contagion :

ordinary sickness, even pestilence, does not occasion
uncleanness

the leper is

unclean

because he is

smitten of God, just as the madman in Moslem coun-
tries is ’holy,’ and epilepsy was the

in

Greece.

In general, persons who are in a state to

make ordinary people shrink from them, because their
neighbourhood is uncomfortable or terrifying, are un-
clean.

Casual uncleanness, according to P in

its

final state,

does not require an offering for its removal. It

is

Human uncleanness

1

is

of two kinds.

woman who is unclean.

enough to observe the prescribed term
of seclusion, generally ‘until the even,’
and the prescribed washing; if either

be neglected and the unclean negligently or ignorantly
intrude among the clean, a sin-offering is necessary.
This

is

Dillmann’s inference from Lev.

5

According

to

Nu.

the unclean is excluded not only from the

congregation,’ but also from the

not only

from the temple, but also from, at any rate, walled
towns. No offering is prescribed for the menstruous
woman but after childbed and after issues a sin

ing’

is prescribed, whilst the leper has also

to bring a trespass offering before he
can come into the congregation,’ though

he is admitted to the camp’ after the performance of

an

(older?) rite with two birds, running water, cedar,

hyssop, and scarlet. After he comes into the camp he
must still wait several days before he comes to his

‘tent.’ Here it is hard to doubt that the law has

a

sanitary purpose: it imposes a short

to

make sure that the cure

is

complete, and not improbably

to guard against the hereditary transmission of the dis-
ease. The trespass offering of the leper loolrs like

a

development

it is necessary to assert expressly that

it belongs to the priest (Lev.

1433)

the leper is anointed

with the blood and oil of the trespass offering, exactly
as Aaron and his sons (Lev.

822)

are anointed with the

blood of the ram of consecration, whose flesh is boiled
for Aaron and his sons to eat, while the wave breast
falls to Moses as the sacrificer’s fee, Possibly the re-
consecration

of

the leper as one of the holy people by

sacrificial blood is older

the theory that he was not

to eat of the sacrifice. The

sin

and the burnt-offering

prescribed after all the graver kinds of uncleanness are
to ‘make an atonement,’ which may imply that the
uncleanness was a penal infliction, though this is
nowhere stated. T h e (older?) rite, which readmits the
leper to the camp, is the only one prescribed for the
cleansing of a house from the plague of leprosy, whilst

WRS

428,

According

to

surviving

folklore,

many things will

not

‘keep

if

handled by

a

person in

a

state

of

Levitical ‘unclean-

ness.

...

845

leprosy in a garment, if it ceases to spread, is sufficiently

.purged by two

Much of the rite is still

transparent.

One of the birds is to be held over an

earthen vessel full of living water into which the blood
of the dead bird falls

the living bird, the cedar, the

scarlet, and the hyssop are to be dipped in the water and
blood the leper who

is

to be cleansed

is

to be sprinkled

with both and then the living bird is to

fly

away with

the plague of leprosy, as the women with the wind in
their wings (Zech.

fly away with the wickedness

of

the land of Israel, or as the goat for

(see

carries away the sin of the congregation into the wilder-
ness.

Probably the living bird

is

dipped

in

the blood

and water to establish

a

kind of blood brotherhood

between it and the leper.

If the blood and water were

on

the leper alone, the release of the living bird might

symbolise that he who was hitherto shut up in Israel
was now free as the fowls of the air.

Living water is,

of course, a natural element of all purifications

H

Y

S

S

O

P

certainly a popular

of purification (Ps.

51

7

according to Pliny

76)

is good for

the complexion, and according to others is a

herb.

What are the cedar and the scarlet

for? Cedar wood is aromatic

the bright colour of

scarlet may betoken strength and splendour.

In the

ancient domestic rites of India

30

children are

made

to

touch gold and

that when they grow up

they may have riches and food.

Remote as the analogy

is, we may ask, Is the leper,

in

virtue of the rite, to

dwell in cedar and be clothed with scarlet? See

The cedar, hyssop, and scarlet appear

i n the

mysterious rite of the Red

whose ashes are used

for the water of separation.

It had

a

whole treatise to itself

in

the

where its qualifications were

elaborated to such a point that at

R.

Nisin said

that no one since the days of Moses had been able to
find one fit to be slain. There is an analogous rite in

D (Dt. 21

)

When the land is

blood the

ordinary way of putting away bloodguiltiness is to shed
the blood of the

If he cannot be found the

land is made clean again with the blood of an unyoked
heifer killed, either by beheading or by breaking the
neck (the meaning of the verb

is not clear), in a

barren valley with a running stream in it, where the
elders

of

the city nearest the place where the dead man

is found wash their hands of bloodguiltiness over the
heifer.

A

barren valley is chosen, according to

mann, Ewald, and

order that the purifying

blood

be uncovered and lose itsvirtue according

to Robertson Smith

to avoid all risk

of contact with sacrosanct flesh. W e might ask, Would,
running water in a fertile valley used for such

a

rite

pollute the fields of offerings? The goat for

is

sent into the wilderness.

If

the heifer

beheaded, her

blood is almost certainly intended to cover’ the blood
of the slain.

If not, are we to think of Saul’s first,

muster

(I

Do the elders by implication

on

themselves the doom of the heifer if their

testation is false? What

is

the meaning of the obviously

popular rite (see

COVENANT,

of

dividing victims

when acovenantismade (Gen.

The

rite of the Red Heifer is more general in its intention.

Its principal use

is

not to do away bloodguiltiness, but

to

cleanse those who are defiled

contact with the dead.

Incidentally

learn that it was required for the purifi-

cation of the vessels of all spoil which will not abide the
fire

(Nu.

and the Levites on their consecration

are to be purified by what is probably the same, ‘the
water of sin

87).

[Aaron and his sons (Ex.

and

parallels) are washed at their consecration with common

Neither

of

these

laws belongs

to the main stock

of

P

though

if they were

later

we

should

expect

’that

thd

cleansing

of

a

house,

at

any rate,

would have

required

an

offering.

In

the dedication

of

a house has

all the look

of

a survival,

and

was

probably accomplished

at

one

time by sacrifice.

GLEAN AND WNCLEAN

,

water.]

Both texts are late, and represent the views

of antiquaries rather than the claims of legists with
practical interests to satisfy. The tendency to ascribe
the whole law to Moses naturally brought with it an
increasing zeal for the oldest rites that could be recol-
lected it does not follow that the water

of

separation

was invented in or after the Exile, because the occasions
for its application were prescribed then.

Possibly, as

the Persians removed the uncleanness of the dead by
elaborate ceremonies with

the priests thought

that in similar cases water hallowed with the ashes of

a

cow would be specially efficacious. The law of

a

purification on the third and the seventh day

(Nu.

or 14-16?) loolrs older than the original law of

the Red Heifer, which seems to end at

IO

we have the rule for its application.

For one

thing, at every stage its

must be clean, and

they become unclean by their ministry the priest
superintends the burning is unclean till the even so is
he who burns he who collects the ashes (though they

must be laid up in

a

clean place) is unclean

so

is he

who sprinkles or even touches the water, which is the
one means which can make those defiled by

with

the dead clean.

Naturally, we suppose that those who

were unclean at the stage of the law implied in

our

records were sanctified’ at an earlier stage. Twice

the heifer

17)

is called a sin-offering. The ritual

has interesting analogies with, and differences from, that
of other sin-offerings.

Like the sin-offering for the

priest’s own sin, and that for the sin of the congregation,
it is to be burnt outside the camp-hide, dung, and all.

Unlike them it is to be killed, not in the place of the

burnt offering, but without the camp.

There

is

another

contrast.

The blood and fat of all sin-offerings, includ-

ing the sin-offerings for priest and congregation

the

bullock offered at the consecration of Aaron, is presented
in the sanctuary the blood seems specially used there,
as

in the ritual of the Day of Atonement, to

the

altar profaned by sin.

The heifer’s blood is not brought

into the sanctuary it is sprinkled towards it seven times.

But

for this we might suppose that the uncleanness of

death

was

driven away from the camp or the city and

burnt with the heifer but her blood is hallowing-else
why is it sprinkled toward the holy place? Are all
these rites compromises between the old custom of wor-
shipping outside the city, which maintained itself

as

late as David

and the new custom of

hallowing the city by a sanctuary ? As late as the

As-

syrian period (Is.

if this be Isaiah’s), the close

neighbourhood of an ever-burning altar made many

For this reason, among others, the

rarer and more solemn sacrifices were still performed
outside. Then perhaps the old rite in the old place

took on a new meaning.

Kings were, as a rule, buried

in the city, and it was customary (Jer.

345)

to make a

‘burning for

In

we read of

a

very

great burning for Asa: the Chronicler, who may be
quoting a relatively old authority, thinks of perfumes,
at which Jeremiah does not hint.

Were valuables burnt

in honour of kings? Have the cedar, the hyssop,
the scarlet burnt with the heifer any analogy to such

I s the putting away of the heifer with something

a

royal funeral an almost

reminiscence

of

a

well-nigh forgotten

of sacred animals? Is

the red heifer the last trace of

a

cow goddess (see C

ALF

,

G

OLDEN

)? There are, of course, many instances

of

mortal representations of the Godhead, honoured for a
time, and then ceremoniously put away. In any case,
the efficacy of the heifer’s ashes seems to lie in the fact
that they reconsecrate rather than purge the unclean.

Israel were originally hallowed (Ex.

248

J E ) by the

Is

not a

fenced

city

on God‘s Holy Hill at

once

superfluous when God

delivers his

people,

and also in some

sense profane

The rite itself is

as

obscure as its history.

Have

we a trace

of the same feeling in Is.

32

C p

1 3

and the Gemara.

CLEOPATRA

blood of the covenant

so

the priests are hallowed by the

blood of the fill offering’

so

the blood of the atone-

ment rehallows the holy place and the altar that has
been profaned

so

the leper is rehnllowed after his

uncleanness with blood, and the ashes of a peculiar
offering serve the same end.

On the other hand, water

and fire (except in

Is. 6

)

seem simply to remove ex-

ternal pollutions, not to renew communion with aholylife.

Robertson Smith

(Kinship

Wellhausen

are the best authorities

for

the Semitic

world.

The subject is

best

18.

Literature.

studied from

a

comparative point of view,

for

which Frazer’s

Golden

(‘go)

is indis-

pensable. The

critical

treatment

of

the subject

is

of

recent

growth and is capable

of

further development. Cp C. Matthes,

begrippen rein

en

in

het OT,’

T. 33

The

only

earlier work

of

importance is Spencer’s

De

1727)

Robertson

Smith‘s estimate in

p.

vi.

CLEMENT (

a Philippian Chris-

tian who had taken an active part in building up the
church at Philippi, in which he had the co-operation of

and Syntyche (Phil.

43).

In the allusion to him

there

is

nothing to imply that he was a companion of

Paul in his journeyings, or to justify his traditional
identification (in the Western Church) with the Roman
Clement.

I n the

list

of

the ‘seventy disciples’ compiled by

the

Dorotheus he is spoken

of as

having

the

first of

the

Gentiles

and Greeks to believe

in Christ,

and as

having

afterwards become

of

Sardica. The Pseudo-Hippolytus has Sardinia,

for

which, however, we should probably read Sardica.

CLEOPAS

[Ti.

WH], abbrev. from

according to Lk.

the name of

of the two disciples who accompanied the risen Jesus to

The narrative in question, however, is one

of the latest of those which attached themselves to the
accounts of the resurrection of Jesus.

Paul, who had

spent fifteen days in the society of Peter (Gal.

1 1 3 )

and

was strongly interested in establishing the fact

of

the

resurrection, knows nothing of it.

.

.

.

.

. .

. . .

.

.

.

of

I

Cor.

15

5-8

he

unquestionably intends to enumerate exhaustively all the
appearances of the risen Lord which were known to
him; and he had the most urgent occasion to do

so,

for the resurrection of Jesus had been brought in
question at Corinth.

The narrative of the third evan-

gelist conveys in a highly concrete form the thought
that it is from Jesus himself we receive the knowledge
that his Passion and Resurrection had been foretold by

Moses and all the prophets

(24

25-27).

In reality,

however, this conviction

have been gradually

reached

as

the result of a prolonged and ever-deepening

of

the

by the whole church.

That it

is

in

the Eucharist that his presence is made known to his
church is, in like manner, an experience still reaented
in every renewal of the act.

Here too, accordingly,

the thought, that in the nearness of Christ as experi-
enced in the sacrament which commemorates his death
we have our most convincing assurance that he truly
lives, finds concrete expression.

After what has been said, it becomes a question

whether Cleopas is

a

historical person at all, though

there is nothing in the mere name to suggest that he
is not.

There is no sufficient ground, philological or

other, for regarding him

as

a

veiled representation of

the apostle Paul.

Several

MSS

of the Itala and

as also the Coptic

and the Armenian, versions, read

or

in Jn.

also but if this were the original reading,

the substitution of the more difficult form
would be incomprehensible.

For the evidence that

different persons are intended in Jn. and in Lk., and
that the confusion of the two is due to later writers,

CLEOPATRA

(

[AKV]),

I

.

sister and

wife of Ptolemy Philometor, Est.

11

I

.

RV

. . .

then

.

.

.

then

. . .

then

. .

.

last of

all,’

AV

‘then.

. .

after that

.

.

.

after that

.

.

.

then

. . .

last

of

all.

G. A.

si.

see

w.

s.

CLEOPHAS

(At the cross.)

Daughter of

no.

I

(

I

Macc.

see P

TOLEMIES

.

Mary Magdalene.

CLEOPHAS

Jn.

1 9 2 5

and

RV

.

. .

a r b

CLOAK (

C

LOKE

).

For

Is.

see

T

UNIC

.

I n this passage the

was a military over-garment, and cloak well expresses

this.

For

(see especially Mt. 5

in

19 5,

AV 'robe

'

RV 'garment '), the outside mantle

a s distinguished

from the

or

representing the Hebrew

see M

ANTLE

.

Other garments rendered cloak are the Macedonian

or military cloak of

Macc.

RV ('coat'

AV) and

or

travelling cloak of Tim. 4

CLOPAS (

This name cannot

be derived from the same Hebrew (Aramaic) word as

I n the first place, the vocalisation is not the same

:

Clopas

would require some such form as

while

pre-

supposes

or

(see

In the

second place, a s regards

all that

is

certainly

known is that it becomes

a t the end and in the

middle of certain words

Ch. 301 Neh. 36

Gen. 22 24

Josh.

6

has been con:

jectured that the same holds good a t the beginning of words
(H. Lewy,

Die

17 27

add conversely,

a s transliteration of

comes into consideration however, in

the present case, for a Hebrew (or Aramaic)

is never

probable in the case of a word beginning with two consonants.
I n Greek transliteration of Hebrew names, initial

is

always represented by a full vowel

: the

opposite instances given by

206,

246

are more nr less doubtful,

and relate to words which were susceptible of such a
modification in the transference as was hardly possible
in the case of biblical proper names.

Further, the Syriac

versions of the

N T

betray no consciousness that both names

are derived from a common Semitic source: with them
the initial letter of

is always (or

of

invari-

ably

It is not likely that

is derived by metathesis

from

( ' c l u b ' ) nor is there the least certainty

that

is a contraction from

On purely Greek soil, a t any rate,

when contracted would

become either

especially in Doric) or

(as

becomes

;

see Meisterhans,

and cp

At

the same time, the contraction of

into

he

admitted to be a t least possible, inasmuch a s we know

of no

Greek word from which the syllable

can come. In this

case the original form of the name will be

For this

reason the accentuation

is preferable to

especially a s the accent is allowed to retain its original place

See

In Jn.

the only place where the name occurs in

NT.

Clopas is mentioned

as

somehow related to a

Joanna.

-

-

certain Mary. Hegesippus

(Eus.

HE

11

22

4)

informs

us

that

Clopas was the brother of Joseph the

not = Jesus'

Whether this is the

referred to in

father of Jesus.

,

in the first instance,

on

the answer to the question, who

is intended by the Mary of Clopas there.

As

,there

is no ' a n d ' before her name, she would seem to be

identical with the sister

the mother of Jesus who has

been referred to immediately before but it is quite
improbable that two sisters alive at the same time
should have borne the same name, at least in a
plebeian family.

Of the

sons of Herod the Great, two who never attained royal dignity
bore the name of their father:

by his marriage with the

second Mariamme, and one by his marriage with Cleopatra of

(Jos.

Ant.

1 3

562).

was,

besides, his second son

who, however, as far as we

know,

took the name only as a

prince (see Lk. 3

I

and

frequently), whilst before his accession he is in Josephus invari-
ably designated by his other name,

His first son by

too, whom Josephus always names Archelaus, is

called Herod on coins and in Cassius

(5527 ;

cp Scbiir.

1375,

ET

2 39).

Thus the name Herod seems already, to some

extent, to have acquired the character of a family name.

If

he the correct reading in Mk. 6

(so also in Mt.

143,

though not according to the western group), the son of

Mariamme just mentioned, who, in point of fact, was the first
husband of Herodias, must have borne the name Philip also, in
addition to that of Herod, while a t the same time this name
Philip, was borne by his brother, who

is

known to us

3 1 as

the tetrarch of NE. Palestine. As we are without

evidence that the former Herod was called Philip, doubtless
we must here conclude that Mk. and Mt. have fallen into a n
error which however, has been avoided by Lk. (3

to Jos.

not only

(high priest till

died

B

.c.)

and Jesus

(Jason) his successor (high priest

hut also Onias

(usually known as Menelaus) who came after Jason were sons
of the high priest Simon

2

Macc. ( 3 4

however,

which is here very detailed expressly speaks of

as

brother

of

a Benjamite

Simon, whilst the high priest

Simon

was of the tribe of Levi.

If,

accordingly, one is determined to hold by the

identity of Mary of Clopas with the sister

the mother

of Jesus, this must be on the assumption not only
that she and the mother of Jesus were not children of
the

same

marriage, hut also that they had neither father

nor mother

common-that, in fact, each spouse had

brought into the new household a daughter by a former
marriage,

Mary.

It is no argument for the

identity of the two to allege that we are not at liberty
to find more women mentioned in

than

Mt.2756

(161)

and

Lk.

for John

mentions the mother of Jesus, though she does

not

appear in any of the synoptists.

In other words, he

did not hold himself bound by what they said, though,
according to all scholars, their narratives lay before him.
The only point on which he is distinctly in agreement
with them is as to the presence of

Mary

Magdalene.

If we will have it that he enumerates also the
of Mark (whose identity with the mother of James and

John the

sons

of Zebedee

seriously be doubted),

we can find her only in the sister of the mother of
Jesus.

Mary of Clopas must in that case be distinct

from the latter, and may possibly be identified with the
Mary who in Mt. is called the mother of James and
Joses (or Joseph), in

Mk.

the mother of James the Less

and Joses,

or,

more briefly, Mary [the mother] of Joses

(so

or Mary of James

(so

1 6 1

and

In

this case, however, not only is it remarkable that the
relationship of the apostles, James the Greater and John,
with Jesus-as children of sisters-is nowhere mentioned

With a royal house the case

is

somewhat different.

[The name is possibly the same as

Palm.

(Chabot, no.

In M H the name 'Cleopatra' usually appears under

the form

For

a somewhat different

of these relations, see

M

K

. 16

I

.

Sa om e.

M

T

.

27

56.

Zebedee.

849

L

K

. 2349.

Mary of James.

19

(At the cross.)

Mary the mother

The sister of the

of Jesus.

mother of Jesus.

Mary

Clopas.

Mary Magdalene.

CLOPAS

or

in

any way alluded to but

also

it is almost unthink-

able that the fourth evangelist presupposes the presence
of the mother of John when in

he proceeds:

when Jesus therefore saw his mother, and the disciple

standing

whom he loved, he saith, etc.' As'far

as

the fourth evangelist is concerned, this scene furnishes
a

clear motive for thinking not only

of

the mother of

Jesus

as

present, but also of the mother of John

as

absent. Lk.

24

(at the sepulchre) puts in the place of

the mother of John

a

certain Joanna.

If,

as

he often

does, the fourth evangelist is here taking Lk. rather
than Mt. or Mlr for his guide, it would he impossible
to identify Mary

of

Clopas with the sister of the mother

of Jesus, whose

on this assumption must be taken

to be Joanna.

It

is

certain, however, that in Lk. this

Joanna is identical with the Joanna who is mentioned
in

as the wife of a certain

and not stated to

have been related to the mother of Jesus.

Thus we

may take it that it was not she, any more than any

of

the others, that was intended

the fourth evangelist,

and that most probably his

for mentioning the

sister of the mother of Jesus is that, according to Llc.

'all

his acquaintance'

are standing

the cross.

There is no evidence of any allegorising

intention that he could have had in the enumeration of
these four (or three) women. Apart from the mother
of

Jesus and her sister, therefore, the names of the

women seem simply to have been taken over from the

Synoptists.

Who was the mother

of

James and

with whom,

according to this view,

of

Clopas would have to he

identified? The James in question is often
supposed to be the second James

in

the list

of the apostles. With this it seems to agree

that Mk. calls

James the Less. Now, this James was

a son

of

Thus Alphseus would appear to he

the husband of the Mary mentioned by the Synoptists

as

present at the cross. From this it is not unusual to

proceed to the further combination that in Jn. Clopas
is named as the husband of Mary and that he is
identical with Alphseus.

Philologically the names are

distinct (see above,

I

)

but the identification is possible

if, according to a not uncommon Jewish custom (Acts

9

Col.

Clopas had two names. A

further step is to bring

at this point the statement of

Hegesippus that Clopas was

a

brother of Joseph the

father of Jesus. Over and above this, many proceed
to the assumption-shown above

to be untenable

-that his wife Mary was identical with the sister of the
mother of Jesus.

this case two brothers would have married two sisters, and

the second James in the list of apostles would

a

cousin of

Jews and that

the father's and on the mother's side.

Even: however,

if we regard Mary of Clopas as a different

person from the sister of the mother of Jesus, her son, the
second James, as long as he is regarded a s the son of Clopas
the uncle of Jesus, remains a cousin of Jesus, whilst, according
to

the identification of the sister of the mother of Jesus with the

wife of Zebedee (spoken of above,

z ) ,

this honour would

rather to the first James and John the sons of Zehedee as being
sons of the aunt of Jesus.

The next question that arises is, Who was Joses,

the second

son

of Mary, according to the Synoptists?

In

Mk.

63

a

Joses is named, along with

Judas, and Simon, amongst the

rethren of Jesus.

This

has

given

occasion for crowning the series

of

com-

binations which has been already ex-

plained, and

it with a hypothesis whereby

it becomes possible

to

deny the existence of literal

brethren of Jesus, and to affirm the perpetual virginity
of his mother.

Once it is admitted that James and

Joses were

sons

of Clopas

and of Mary his

wife, the same seems to hold good of all the brethren
of Jesus.'

In that case they would be 'brethren of

Jesus only in the sense in which 'brethren

is

used instead of

(children of two brothers or

two sisters) in

S.

(cp

CLOPAS

Finally, to this is added, not

as

a

necessary but

as

welcome completion

of

the hypothesis, the suggestion

.hat of the brethren of Jesus', not only James but

Simon and Judas were among the apostles.

Both names,

in

point of fact, occur, a t least in

Lk.

Acts

(Simon alone in Mk. 3

Mt.

10

the fourthofthe 'hrethrenof

out the same hypothesis) that it was he who, according to Acts

was nominated (though

chosen) as successor to the

vacant place of Judas Iscariot.

It is true that all the better

authorities here read Joseph, not Joses (see

B

A

R

S

ABAS

);

but, on

the other

this reading being accepted,

it

can he pointed

that

to the better MSS

(at

least

Mt.

oseph, not as in Mk.63 Joses, is the name of the fourth

'brother' of Jesus.

This whole identification of the brethren of Jesus'

with apostles or aspirants to the apostleship, however,

is

quite untenable.

According to Mk.

3 2 1

Mt.

Lk.

Jn. 75, the brethren of Jesus disbelieved his

Messiahship while he was alive, and in

I

Cor.

95

they are distinctly separated from the apostles.

Even

if

we give up the identification with apostles,

Mary cannot be the mother of the cousins of Jesus.

Had she been so related to Jesus,

and Mk., in seeking

to indicate her with precision, would have named not two
sons

four or rather they would have mentioned no name:

a t

all,

simply said 'the mother of the cousins of Jesus.

Moreover it is only of Symeon, the second bishop of Jerusalem,
that

says he was son of Clopas and

of Jesus.

If Hegesippus had regarded the four 'brethren of Jesus' a s his
cousins, he would surely have designated Symeon's predecessor
also (James the brother of Jesus) as son of Clopas, and Symeon
himself, by whom in this case the Simon of Mk.

Mt. 13 55

would be meant he would have designated as brother of James.

This,

however,

what he does not do : he calls James simply

'the Just

and says (Eus.

H E

iii. 32

6)

that men of

the race of the Lord'

had presided over the

Palestine) in peace until Symeon the son of Clopas, the

uncle

of

Jesus, was arraigned and crucified; cp

Lastly, it is idle to deny the existence of actual

brethren of Jesus : that is distinctly vouched for by the

of Lk.

2

7-

an

expression all the weightier

because it has been already suppressed in Mt.

If James and Joses, the

of Mary according to

the synoptists, are thus

no

cousins of Jesus, we could all

With regard to

.

-

Conclusion

.

the more readily

that they were

really apostles or at least constant com-

panions (Actslzr) of

Such

an

assumption, how-

ever, is not borne out by a single hint, and at the stage

of

the discussion we have now reached

has no more

interest than the other which makes Clopas identical
with Alphseus and regards him

as

the husband of Mary.

The Mary in question, we are forced to conclude, was
simply

a

woman not known otherwise than as the mother

of

a

James and a Joses. Why

is

it, then, that the fourth

evangelist designates her, not

reference to these

sons

of

hers, hut

calling her of Clopas

'

That he here

intends the Cleopas

of

Lk.

2418

is quite improbable (see

but neither is it likely that he can have

meant a man named Clopas who was wholly unknown
to his readers.

His allusion must rather have been to

Clopas

we know from Hegesippus

as

the

brother

of

Joseph.

There is no trace of any allegorising

intention in this : we may take it that the evangelist

is

following tradition.

I t is possible, therefore, that

Clopas was the husband of Mary, in which case James
and Joses are cousins of Jesus, but not to he identified
with his brothers of the same name, nor yet with the
apostle James and the Joseph (or Joses)

of

Acts

It

is more probable, however, if the prevailing

In Eus.

H E

20

Hegesippus speaks of

and in

22 4

he says that

was

Inasmuch as he does

not regard James as

a s has been shown the

words

and

As

can mean only that he

Symeon as cousin

Jude as

'

brother of Jesus in a modified

sense. H e appears, then, to favour the assumption of the
of Mary at Jesus'

All the more remarkable is

it

that he

does not yet seem to have drawn the further consequence of
denying other sons to her. His statement that Clopas was the
uncle of Jesus therefore does not proceed upon any such theory
as that

in

of

it

has (as we have seen) been applied

and

therefore in respect of trustworthiness is open to no suspicion:

CLOTH, CLOTHING

usus

is to be taken

as

a

guide, that Clopas is

designated

as

the

father

of Mary.

In this case it is

Mary herself who is the cousin of Jesus.

In

either case

is remarkable that in the synoptists she should be

characterised not by her relationship to Jesus, but simply
by mention of her sons; and this on the assumption
that it is the uncle of Jesus who is intended, suggests a

doubt as to whether the mention of Clopas in this con-
nection is correct.

The apocryphal Acts of the Apostles following the

mentioned above

for the

part identify Symeon

son

of Clopas, the second

of

spoken of

Hegesippus, with the apostle

Simon the

(AV the Zealot ; some

give him in addition the name of Judas and

some make the name of his father his own proper

but

in the form Cleopas or Cleophas, so that he is identified also
the disciple mentioned in Lk. 24

IS

.

H e is a t the same time

enumerated among

‘

the Seventy’ of Lk. 10

I

(Lipsius,

2

According

t o

the

ed.

1888,

p. 267,

see

ed.

col.

Syriac collection of legends dating from the

sixth century, he was brother not only of

statement

made of the apostle Judas also in a Latin list of apostles given

hut also of

of

CLOTH, CLOTHING.

see, generally,

I.

The words are used with considerable looseness and fre-

quently interchange with others of similar meaning.

Cloth’

(and ‘clothes

occasionally render

(D

RESS

,

1

[

I

]),

and

(M

ANTLE

), also once

K.

AV

(B

ED

,

;

for

59

see L

INEA

.

Cloth

to

denote material

or

’is found

in Esth.

1 6 ,

For ‘cloths

of service’ (Ex. 31

etc., A V ;

see D

RESS

,

3

For ‘striped cloths’ (Pr.

RV,

see L

INEN

.

RV prefers ‘cloths’ in Ezek. 27

Lk. 2 4

where AV has ‘clothes,’ and ‘clothes’

recurs in

Gen.

49

15 AV

R V ‘vesture ’),

I

S.

4

Ezek. 27

AV

RV ‘wrappings : see D

RESS

,

I

is used to render the general terms

(Job

(il.

22

(Is.

23

59

as

well as the specific

CLOUD, PILLAR

OF

see

P

ILLAR

C

LOUD

.

CLUB

Job

RV, AV

dart

’).

CNIDUS

Ti. WH]), a city on Cape

Crio

the extreme

SW.

of Asia Minor,

between Cos and Rhodes.

It

was originally built upon

the rocky island

Strabo, 656)

forming the cape, united

to

the mainland by a causeway,

-thus making two harbours, one

on

the N. and the

other on the

S.

of the isthmus (cp Mitylene and

Myndus).

The inhabitants soon spread eastwards over the

the peninsula. The moles of the large southern port are

still

in existence, as well a s much of the ancient city. The

situation of Cnidus was eminently favourahle to its development
a s a commercial and naval power ;

hut, curiously like Cos in this

respect, it played no part a s a naval state-probably owing to
the repressive influence of Rhodes.

The commercial importance of the city was inevitable.

I t lies upon the maritime highway

Thuc. 835,

Very early

it

had trade with Egypt

and shared in the Hellenion at

(Herod.

2178).

At least

as

early

as

the second century

Cnidus had

attracted Jewish settlers, for in

I

Macc.

1 5 2 3

it appears

in the list of places to which the circular letter of the
Roman senate in favour of the Jews

B

.c.)

is said to have been addressed.

Paul must have passed

the city on his way to

(Acts

21

)

;

but its

name occurs only in Acts

27

7

after Myra had been

For

Gra. reads

hut we should more

probably emend to

‘with young

(cp

H

ORSE

,

a

end);

became

and from the

transposition and confusion of letters

easily arose (Che.).

6.

On these and similar words

Clothing

IS.

6

(M

ANTLE

).

Read

‘javelin,’ and see W

EAPONS

.

853

COAL

passed,

on

the voyage

to

Rome. The continuous NW.

(Etesian) winds had made the voyage over the 130 m.
between Myra and Cnidus tedious and rendered the
direct course from Cnidus, by the

N.

side of Crete,

impossible

The wines of Cnidus, especially the kind called Protropos

excelled any produced in

637).

The best claim of

city to renown lies in the intellectual activity of its inhabitants
and their encouragement of art. They possessed a t the Lesche

a t Delphi, two pictures hy

(middle

fifth century.

Paus. x.

25

They

the Aphrodite of

masterpiece,

ut

5 4

: the Cnidians especially worshipped

dite, Paus. 13). I n addition, they had works

and

Scopas. Eudoxus the astronomer, Ctesias the physician and

historian, Agatharchides, and Sostratus the architect who built
the

of Alexandria, all belonged to Cnidus (cp Str.

For plan and views of the remains see Newton’s

Discoveries

at

etc.,

and

Discoveries in ike

W.

J.

W.

COACH

Is.

6620

COAL.

The coal of O T and N T is undoubtedly char-

coal. A piece of black charcoal was termed

cp perh. Ass.

[or

‘fire’

Prov.

26

Is.

44

54

carbo])

pieces in process of combustion,

‘live coals,’

cp Ar.

to glow, and perh.

Ass.

a shining precious

stone ;

and often, more precisely,

(coals

Lev.

etc.

In

this distinction,

which

is

not

observed (cp

Is.

44

54

lies the point of the vivid comparison Prov.

26

(RV

as coals are to hot embers,’ etc.

).

Of the other words rendered by ‘coal’ in the O T it is sufficient to

say that

(Is.

6 6 )

is rather a ‘hot stone’ (so

the

of

I

K.

1 9 6

in

the hot stones on which Elijah‘s

cake was baked (see B

READ

,

that

identified

by the

with

and twice rendered ‘coals’

86

AV, Hab.35 AV,

diseases’),

is rather ‘flame’ or fire-bolt (cp

and that

(Lam.

EV, their visage is blacker than

is properly

(so the margins; others ‘soot’

Hebrews doubtless used for fuel as great a

variety of woods as the modern Syrians now use (see

Post in

pp.

Several

are named in

Is.

44

14-16.

Ps.

mentions coals of broom

a

desert shrub which,

when reduced to charcoal, throws out

an

intense heat

(on

the text see J

UNIPER

). The references to thorns

as

fuel

are many particular mention is made

of the buckthorn or perhaps bramble

Ps.

5 8 9 [

IO

]),

of chaff-chopped straw

the refuse of the

threshing-floor (Mt.

of withered herbage

(Mt.

630

Lk.

At the present time the favourite

fuel of the Bedouin

is

the dung of camels, cows (cp

Ezek.

asses,

which is carefully collected, and,

after being mixed with

or chopped straw, is made

into flat cakes, which are dried and stored for the
winter’s use.

W e may assume that this sort of fuel

was not

so

much required before the comparative

denudation of the country, though Ezek. 4

12-15

certainly

suggests that it was not altogether unknown.

The charcoal was burned in

a

brasier

Jer. 36

AV ‘hearth,‘ RV ‘brasier’) or chafing-dish

See

L

ITTER

.

.

126,

RV pan of fire’),-at least

in the houses of the wealthy.

The

‘fire of coals’

at which Peter warmed

himself in the high priest’s palace was no doubt

a

fire

of

( s o

in a

(Jn.

‘coal’

ray

is to he kept distinct from

‘pavement’ (cp

in Cant. 3

I

O

)

which

onds

t o

Ar.

‘to

arrange side

side’ :

Dr.

elaborate note on

3

For the arrangement of a modern Syrian ‘hearth,’ see

Landberg’s

et

(with illustration).

854

COASTLAND

I n the houses of the humbler classes, the hearth
only of altar-hearth Lev.

62

mod. Ar.

was probably

a

mere depression in the floor, the smoke

escaping, as best it could, through the door or the
latticed window

Hos.

13

EV

’).

See

L

ATTICE

.

Chimneys there were none the

render-

ing,

‘

ere ever the chimneys in Zion were hot ’ in 4 Esd.

6

4,

is based on

a

corruption of the Latin text

(RV

or

ever the footstool of

was established

’).

Thus

‘ t o quench one’s coal’

cp the classical

Coal and coals supply

a

variety of metaphors.

key

the difference of usage is supplied by Ar.

to make a shrill noise’

hence

is used in

Arabic for both the cricket and the cock.

The kin-

dred Hebrew word also might be widely used :

(

I

)

for

the cock,

for the starling. The second element in

the phrase

is seemingly a difficulty.

The

word is no doubt corrupt.

Dyserinck and Gratz would

read

T o keep nearer to

the Hebrew and to find

a

more striking phrase, it is

better to read

and render the

who loves to

take up a quarrel.’

EV

rather uncritically gives G

REY

-

There is a word in Job

3836

which

Vg.,

the

two Targs.,

Delitzsch

cock

(AV

heart,‘

RV ‘mind,’ mg. ‘meteor’).

As,

however, it is evident

that some sky-phenomenon

is

meant, we should almost

certainly read for

‘the bow star,’ to cor-

respond to

(so

read for

‘the lance star.’

The bow star is Sirius, the lance star Antares.

See

Che.

COCKATRICE

is an

word, derived

or corrupted from the

[see the

New

Eng.

but often confounded with

crocodile

the form of the word suggested the fable

that the animal was hatched by a cock from the egg of
a viper.

For Pr.

AV

A

DDER

‘basilisk‘) and

Is.

1 1 8 5 9 5

Jer.

(RV ‘basilisk,’

‘or adder‘

see S

ERPENT

,

I

(7).

For

Is.

EV

as

before, Vg.

see

S

ERPENT

,

I

(6).

has

in

(EV V

IPER

, Heb.

and

Ps.

(EV A

DDER

, Heb.

Horapollon

(1

I

)

identifies

the basilisk with the Egyptian

a

golden image of

which is the usual ornament of the divine or royal
head-dress.

Probably this was the kind of serpent

meant by

the

being divine, had of course

extraordinary powers (see

I,

nos. 6 and

7 ) .

HOUND

)

:

F

O

W

L

,

§

2.

T.

K.

C.

.

and see Dr.

ad

is a

pathetic figure for depriving

person

of the privilege of

otherwise expressed as a

putting out of

candle (rather, lamp ‘)-Prov.

etc. T o heap coals of fire,‘ or glowing charcoal,

an enemy’s head must, it would seem, be to adopt

a mode of revenge calculated to awaken the pains of
remorse in his breast (Prov.

(MT). Rom.

1220).

Again, kindle not the coals of

a

sinner’-that is, do

not stir up his evil passions-is the sage advice of the
son of Sirach (Ecclus.

;

cp Ecclus.

1132,

‘from

a

spark of fire

a

heap of many coals

is

kindled,’ which finds an echo in Ja.

35.

Is.

11

11

2 4

59

Jer. 25

Ezek.

3Y

6

Dan. 11

18

Zeph. 2

Jer.

47 4 ‘sea coast

;

a rendering of

E V usually

or

island,’

occasionally

‘

cnuntry

’

or ‘region ’). See I

SLE

.

A.

COASTLAND

RV

COAT,

an inexact rendering :

(

I

) Of

(see T

U N I C

)

Gen. 373 E V

‘long

garment ’),

284, etc.

of

in

I

2

AV (RV ‘robe’

;

see

T

UNIC

)

(3) of

in Dan.

AV

‘mantle’, R V

see B

REECHES

); (4) of

in Mt.540 E V (see

in Macc.

AV (see M

ANTLE

). For

COAT

OF

MAIL

occurs as a rendering of

(Ex. 28 32 39 23 RV AV habergeon ’),

59

E V ‘breastplate’), and

I

S.175 E V ;

see B

REASTPLATE

.

COCK

M t . 2 6 3 4 7 4

Mk.

Lk.

Jn.

1 3 3 8 1827.

On the ‘cock-crowing’

spoken

of

in Mk.

information is

given elsewhere (see DA

Y

,

4).

Mt.,

and Jn.

speak of

this cock-crowing. The tradition preserved

in Mark, on the other hand (though the text in the MSS
differs), refers to a second.

Thus the cock had

completed its journey to Palestine.

Its home was in

India; thence it came to Babylonia

2

and Persia.

Homer indeed gives

as the name of

a

man ;

but Aristophanes

438)

considers the cock the

Persian bird.’ T o the Jews, too, as well as (presum-

ably) to the Egyptians, it was a Persian bird, even
though the

and Talmudic word for cock

may have a Babyldnian

Not improbably we have in Prov.

3031

a

reference to

the impression which it produced not

so

long after its

introduction into Palestine.

The evidence of the

versions in favour of the rendering cock cannot be
regarded lightly, and there is no proof whatever of the

sense of

‘

well girt

up’

for

or for the application

of the term to the greyhound.

The Talmudic

also

certainly means some bird (a kind of

The

For another view of this passage, involving an emendation

of

the text, see Che.

142, who follows Bickell.

There is said to be a representation of a cock on

a

cylinder

seal of the reign of

So, a t least, Hommel, Hastings’

1214.

(2466)

larly Aq., Theod.,

Pesh.

(Vg.). Wildeboer (‘97) speaks inconsistently, but favours

the rendering ‘cock,’ if

may be altered. For ‘greyhound’

he has nothing to say.

5

See the

of Levy and Jastrow: Rashi here renders

‘starling (cp

Syr.

Ar.

broidered coat see

I

.

,

According

the cocatrix (cockatrice) is a kind

The

basilisk which

caverns and pits.

however properly means the ichneumon.

Under the form

we find it in the

Secrets

I

15

I

),

where, however, the writer may he thinking of the crocodile.
See

T. K.

COCKLE,

better

‘

weeds

[BKAC]), Job

31

The cognate verb

means in Hebrew

to stink‘

but the primary sense

of the root, according to Noldelce
is the more general one of badness or worthlessness.

A

kindred substantive is

wild grapes (Is.

5

4).

As

occurs only once in Hebrew and is unknown

to the cognate languages, there

is

no evidence to

justify the identification with a particular plant, such as

the

‘

cockle of EV still, as etymology seems to point

to some stinking weed,’ there is something

to

be said

for the suggestion

of

Sir Joseph Hooker, that perhaps

the reference is to the stinking

Several of the arums are plentiful in

Sihth.

r u m

Boiss. a n d species of

(cp

439).

Thk ancient versions, in

supposing that a thorny plant

is

were no doubt guided

by the parallelism of the verse. T h e older English Versions use

‘cockle as the rendering of

in Mt. 13.

.

.

See

N. M.

-

W.

T. T.

-D.

(

‘hollow

Syria,’ first mentioned

I

Esdras, where

K

.

represents

the

Aram. equivalent of the Heb.

(cp

Ezra

836

Neh.

37).

T h e name occurs in

I

Esd. 63 27

Ezra 5 3

6

6

6 8 ;

I

Esd.

7

I

6

13

version of the canonical Ezra regularly renders by

(but

Ezra

6

7

25

once, however,

Pesh.,

So

renders

by

in

Is.

5 4.

K.

is a few times

I

Esd.

63, etc.

however, ‘carobs’ (see

COFFER

COLOSSE

after the death of Holofernes (Judith

Possibly the

of Josh.

may be intended

Zockler).

identifies the place with K

EILAH

Josh.

COLROZEH

as

if ‘he seeth

all’),

Jerusalemite of Nehemiah’s time (Neh. 3

15

om.

BKA,

4s

misleading a name as Pahath-moab or as Hallohesh.

4

clan of ‘seers a t this period would of course be

uteresting

but the name is miswritten for

(EV

Hallohesh

’),

probably under the influence of the name

which follows in Neh.

itself is

COLIUS

[A]),

I

Esd.

K

ELAIAH

COLLAR.

I

.

Collars

’

in AV Judg. 8

26

become in

RV pendants

See

2.

Collar’ is

also

applied, inappropriately, to the

round hole

for the head and neck in a garment.

in

‘ I t bindeth me about

as

the collar of

my coat’ (EV), and

Ps.

‘ t h a t

flows

down to the collar of his robes (Kay).

Collar

’

here

should be opening.

In

Ps.

however, it is thought that the border of the

opening rather than the opening itself, must he
Sym.

the

trimming or edging

on the

Tg.,

E V , however,

ventures on skirts (skirt) of his garments

.

the revisers felt

that even if AV gave an

rendering, they had

better to set in its place. The text

can

perhaps he

corrected (see Che.

it is certainly not right as it

In Job

Budde and Duhm prefer

‘even as my tunic

but this does not make the passage clear.

There is reason

to think (Che.

10

3826

[May

that we should

read

in

and

and

in v. 186,

and render

miswritten.

See

T. K. C.

By (his) great power he takes hold of my garment,

By the opening of my tunic he grasps me.

T h e word rendered in these two passages ‘collar’ becomes

in E V of Ex.

2 8 3 2

the

suggested this. T h e

‘hole for the head (RV) in the priestly

was to

have a ‘binding (lit. lip) round

the material cut out

was to he folded over, and so to make what might fairly he
called a collar. In later Heb.

we

find the terms

(opening)

or

(receptacle of the neck).

gives collar for

a

certain instrument

of

Jer.

AV ‘stocks,’ RV

‘shackles’).

The root (like

in Aramaic and

Talmudic means to bind, to confine.

takes it

to be

a

manacle for hands, not a collar. Orelli, on the

other hand, compares Arab.

(necklace).

represents

and can scarcely be

correct.

COLLEGE,

RV S

ECOND

Q

UARTER

Vg.

Secunda), as

if

the ‘new town of Jerusalem

K.

Ch.

34

Zeph.

1

IO

).

The rendering college is due

to Tg. Jon.

K.

in the house of

instruction.’ See J

ERUSALEM

.

In Zeph. 1

natural parallel to the ‘fish gate’ is the

of the old

(see

Neh.

39,

where these gates are mentioned together).

For

therefore, read

from the gate of the

old city.’ Similarly in

K.

and

Ch.

(see H

ULDAH

). See

also

In

K.

22 14,

second part,’

Heb.

I n Ch. 34

[B],

[A],

[L]

‘in the school

or ‘in the second part,’

Heb.

I n Zeph. 1

AV ‘the second.’

.

The text is, however, plainly corrupt.

COLONNADE

Ezek.

16,

See

P

ORCH

,

T

EMPLE

.

in Ezra4

With this we

the

a v

which;

(Asia

NW. of Taurus) appears in the famous Ga

inscription of

I.

13

14

;

cp

Meyer,

same Aramaic designation

is

found upon a coin of the Persian period

. . .

who is

well-supported view, see A

RABIA

and

occur together a s one archonship

epilogue to

(see Marq.

That the

is

to

be

connected with

though affirmed by Hartmann

Meyer

and Marq.

cp E

BER

,

I

) ,

is

strenuously

Glaser (cp

1897,

3

; see

A H T

who is, however, perhaps too strongly

prejudicdd in

of an exceedingly remote date for the

inscriptions in question.

Ccelesyria is, strictly, the designation applied since

the

of the

to the depression between the

two Lebanons, otherwise known as the

of Lebanon (cp Josh.

11

17

the

mod.

cp

In the Grecian period

the term includes all

E.

Palestine. Thus, according to

Josephus

(Ant.

11

5),

the seats of the Ammonites and

Moabites were in it, and among

its

towns he mentions

Scythopolis and Gadara

xiii.

In its widest

sense it included Raphia ( s o Polyb.

and stretched

as

far

as

the river Euphratesand Egypt’

(Ant.

xiv.

45).

In

I

Esd. and Maccabees (see below) these are its

limits

;

and, roughly used, rather in

a

political than in

a

geographical sense, it and Phcenicia constitute the more
southerly part of the kingdom of the

At

this period the districts referred to appear

as

one fiscal

domain, under the suzerainty of one governor

Macc.

Ptolemy

Under the Romans the term was again restricted, and

Ccelesyria (with Damascus

as

its capital; cp

Ant.

xiii.

48)

was officially separated from Phcenicia and

4

Pliny,

5

7).

When, therefore,

in 47 and 43

Herod was in

of

he seems to have possessed no authority over the

southern province.

S.

A.

C.

COFFER

I

S .

has : in

; in

15,

T O

0.

and

TO

0.

Aq.

(or

Sym.

Jos.

Vg. always

The foreign-looking but really corrupt word

illustrates the need

of a

more correct Hebrew text (see

T

EXT

,

§

We cannot accept the far-fetched etymologies of Lag.

85)

and

Klo. (Sam.,

The

7

probably sprang

of a ‘final

which was attached as a correction to

a n ordinary

(cp

In this case the

was really not distinguished

name from the ark

cp

-‘in a

pile may

the true text

;

but more probably

See Che.

(Aug.

and on

the narrative which contains the word, see Budde

who

carefully separates the interpolations.

T. K. C.

COFFIN

Gen.

also Lk.

COHORT

See A

RMY

,

I

O

;

COLA,

See D

EAD

,

I

.

C

ORNELIUS

,

I

.

Vg. Syr.

with

THAM, B

EBAI

, and Chobai (see

as

places to

which orders were sent to follow up the pursuit of the

I t is mentioned in the

Inscription of

Hystaspis between Babylonia and Assyria.

I n another in-

scription of the class however, this position is occupied

A s .

10

On the supposed reference

t o

this valley (rich in heathen

remains) in Am. 1 5 valley of Aven

of Sin), see

3.

This district is also called

(Straho

17,

ed.

or

(Polyb. 5

a name

may be derived

from a hypothetical

‘depression’; cp

3

Considerable confusion appears in the treatment of this and

the preceding names in the Greek Versions.

COLONY

[Ti.

WH]),

See

P

HILIPPI

.

COLOSSE,

better

(

[Ti.

WH,

and coins and inscrip.]

later

MSS,

Byz.

COLOSSE

writers, and some

edd. : the latter form was

possibly the native pronunciation

a

town on the

S.

bank of the Lvcus

a

tributary of the Maeander, in that part

of the Roman province of Asia which the Greeks
called Phrygia.

In the neighbourhood of Colossae were

Hierapolis and Laodicea (cp Col. 21

4 1 3

As

those two cities rose in

Colossae seems

to have continuously declined

Rev.

where

the church in Laodicea ranks among the seven great
churches of Asia).

Herodotus

(730

cp Xen.

i. 2 6 ) speaks of

Colossae as

' a city of great size' :

but in Strabo's time Laodicea is numbered among
the greatest of the Phrygian cities,

Colossae,

although it had some trade, is only a

(Strabo,

576,

578).

In Paul's time Pliny

enumerates

among the

of the district but that

is merely historical retrospect. Its geographical position,
on the great route leading from Ephesus

to

the Euphrates

(it was passed,

by Xerxes in his march through

Asia Minor, Herod.

was important. Hence arises

the question as to whether the place was ever visited by

Paul.

On his third journey Paul 'went over all the country

of

Galatia and Phrygia in order'

and, 'having

passed through the upper coasts

came to Ephesus

I

).

The natural route would certainly be that
followed by commerce, which would pass

through Colossae, though travellers might,

as

suggests

i n

R.

take a road to the north-

ward, avoiding the Lycus valley entirely. It is, how-
ever, open to us to admit that the apostle may have
passed through the town without making any stay.

It

seems distinctly to follow from Col.

21 ( 'as

many as

have not seen my face in the flesh') that at the date

of

writing Paul was not personally acquainted with the

Colossian church but it would be unsafe to argue that
he had not seen the town itself. If he did no missionary
work there on his third journey through Asia Minor, it is
impossible to assign his assumed activity at Colossae
to the second journey on the strength of the expression

gone throughout Phrygia and the region of Galatia'

(Acts 166) : on that occasion he diverged northwards

from the eastern trade route leading by way of Colossae
to Ephesus, and ultimately reached Troas

7

Further, although ethnologically

ranked as

a

Phrygian town, politically it belonged to Asia, a province

which was altogether barred to missionary effort on the
occasion of the second journey (Acts166

see

P

HRYGI

A

).

It would still be possible to argue that Paul established

the Colossian church on an unrecorded visit made from

Ephesus during his three years' stay there (cp

so

that

they which dwelt in Asia heard the word ').

Nevertheless, Col.

1 4

since we

heard

of your faith

1 8

2

I

are opposed to the idea-of personal effort on his

part, especially when contrasted with such passages

as

Gal.

1 6

I

Cor.

where we have positive claim to

the foundation of the churches addressed.

Nor is it

allowable to insist that Epaphras and Philemon, who
were certainly Colossians (Col.

4

must necessarily

have been converted by Paul at Colossz itself. The
Colossian church was an indirect product of the apostle's
activity at Ephesus.

T o whom, then, must the actual

foundation be

? Probably to Epaphras, who

is called a faithful minister of Christ for the Colossians

so

AV

:

better

'

on our behalf,'

RV), and their teacher (Col.

cp

although the

honour has been claimed for Timotheus, on the ground

that his name is

with that of Paul in the Salutation

1 1 ) .

The name is probably connected with

(lake near

the form being

to suggest

a

connection

with

The more educated ethnic was

the illiterate form

perhaps nearer the native

word. See Rams.

and

1

859

COLOSSIANS

AND EPHESIANS

It is clear from Philem.

2 2

that Paul looked forward

to visiting

after his first imprisonment at Rome :

whether he effected his purpose is not known
(but cp

T i m .

Among the members

of the Colossian church', besides Epaphras,

Philemon with his wife A

P

PHIA

and slave

Onesimus (Philem.

we hear of Archippus, perhaps

son

of Epaphras (Philern. Col.

4 1 7 ) .

With regard to

the composition of the church, we may say that it con-
sisted chiefly of Gentiles, in this case the descendants of
Greek settlers and native Phrygians, deeply

with

that tendency to mystical fanaticism which

was

charac-

teristic

of

the Phrygian race. Very soon, therefore, they

fell away to angel-worship and a misdirected asceticism
(Col.

21-23).

The former heresy is illustrated by

the famous

or

(church dedicated to Michael), mentioned by

as

standing at the chasm of the Lycus.

The tradition is that the archangel opened the chasm
and

so

saved the Christians of Chonas from destruction

by an inundation.

In the fourth century a Council at

Laodicea condemned this angel-worship. Theodoret
also

of the existence of the heresy in this region.

C p A

NG

E

L

,

The construction of a strong castle at

(mod.

3

m.

S.

of Colossae, was perhaps the work of

During

the seventh or eighth century

A.D.,

under

of

incursions, the town in the plain was

deserted and

forgotten. Hence Nicetas says that Chonai (his own birthplace)
and

were one and the same place (ed. Bonn, 403). The

idea even arose that the Colossians of the epistle were the
Rhodians (cp Rams.

Cit. and

1

The Colossians of

Cedr.

are the

of the Church of Argaous in

Armenia.

[Authorities

:

Lightfoot,

Colossians, see Rams.

and

vol.

with map id.

Church

in

19

with map of the Lycus valley.]

J.

W.

COLOSSIANSz and

Epistles t o the.

These two epistles are related

so

closely that they

cannot without disadvantage be considered separately.

Colossians consists of two distinct portions

:

the one

didactic and polemical, the other practical and hor-

tatory, the whole being rounded off by

the superscription

(1

at the

and by commendations of the

bearer, greetings

other -messages, and the writer's

autograph greeting at the close

In the introduction

Paul as his custom is, gives thanks

for the conversion of

is addressing and expresses

the wish that they may continue to grow in all wisdom.

At

a gentle transition, he passes over into a

logical discourse setting forth the transcendent glory of the Son
and how he is head of the universe and of the Church, in whom
heaven and the whole earth are reconciled to God (w. 14-20):
io

21-23

the readers' personal interest in Christ's work

of

reconciliation is affirmed and in

24-29

Paul goes on to say

that he has had it

to

his special charge to proclaim

the great secret

of

the

of salvation, whence

it

is that

he

labours and

sa

specially for the interests of his readers.

I n 2 1-23 the main

of the epistle is entered upon-an

earnest warning against false teachers who, holding ont hopes
of an illusory perfection, wish to

all sorts of Gentile

and Jewish religious observances in the place of 'Christ alone.'

With the exhortation (3

to live their lives in the heavenly

manner, and conformably to the new life, the apostle passes to
the practical portion of the epistle. Here in the first instance

5-17) the sins of the old man that are to he laid aside and the

of the new man that are to be put on are indicated

somewhat generally; then

I

)

the duties of wives and

husbands, children and parents, servants and masters are
specially described, with

an urgent call to continual

prayer (including prayer for the success of his own mission) and
to wise and discreet employment of speech in their dealings
with the unconverted.

The contents of Ephesians are, on the whole, similar to

those of Colossians but the polemical part and epistolary

accessories are given much more briefly
(only a superscription

1

I

,

and

6

21-24,

a sentence devoted to the bearer of the

epistle, with parting good wishes), whilst all the rest is

Cp

. .

3

k ;

and

482

3

[Ti.

[Ti.].

860

COLOSSIANS AND EPHESIANS

treated with greater amplitude.

The doctrinal poi-tion

extends from

1 3

to

Here it cannot be said that any

one has as yet quite succeeded in pointing out any very
clear and consecutive process of thought, or methodical
elaboration of definite themes.

T o find,

example,

in

the operations of divine grace,’ and, more

explicitly, in

vv.

‘what God the Father,‘ in

‘what God the Son,’ and in

‘what God the

Spirit has done,’ is to force the text into moulds of
thought that are foreign to it.

Strictly, this part

of the epistle is simply a parallel, carried out with
unwonted fulness, to the thanksgivings with which Paul
is accustomed to introduce all his letters

act of

praise to God who has wrought for all mankind deliver-
ance from sin and misery through Christ and his
gospel, and who has made the Church, of which Christ
is the head, to be the centre of a new and glorious
world.

In

Paul begins, then, with praise to God who from all

eternity has graciously chosen his people to salvation ; in
he expresses his special joy that his readers are among those
who have thus been chosen.

brings into a strong and

vivid

light the absoluteness of the contrast between their former

and their present state, and the fact that the happy change is
due to divine grace alone further, it is taught that the distinc-
tion between the uncircumcised and the circumcised people of
the promise has been obliterated by the blood of Christ (2
and that, in the new spiritual building, where Christ is the chief
corner stone, those who were afar off are incorporated as well
as those who were nigh

14-22).

there are no more strangers

and foreigners.

To

proclaim the)

and unimpaired interest

of the Gentiles in the gospel

has

been the noble function divinely

assigned to Paul (3

his readers must not allow his

tribulations to shake their confidence in any way (3

His

prayer (3

closing with a doxology

is that they

may ever go on growing in faith,

in

love,

and in knowledge,

at last nothing more

is

wanting in them

of

all the

fulness

of God.

4 1-16,

a t the beginning of the practical section, urges the

readers to give practical effect to the union that

has thus been

brought about, to walk worthily of the Christian vocation, and
each to take his part in the common task according to the measure
of his power, so that the whole may ever grow up more fully into
Christ.

What yet remains of the old man and heathen life

must be sedulously put

truthfulness, uprightness

and kindliness of speech and act must be cultivated as the
bases of social life (4

25-32)

; of these we have the best examples

in the love of God and Christ (5

I n 5

personal holiness

and the walk of believers as wise and pure children of light are
further described. I n 5 22-6 the

of members of

holds in their several places and relations are treated

the

same order as in Col. 3

and the very elaborate figure of

the Christian panoply in 6

with the exhortation to carry

on the warfare aqainst the powers of evil with courage and
boldness-a

in which he too would he so glad to join

them as a free man-forms a fine close.

lay not far from the larger cities of

Laodicea and Hierapolis, with the churches of which

the

Christians, it is clear, had

kept up intimate relations from the first

These churches were

21

4 1 3 1 5

not among those which

been directly founded by

Paul; according to

21 (1

23)

they had not yet seen

him personally; their founder, according to

1 7 ,

had been a certain Epaphras.

The fact that at the

time when the epistle is being written Epaphras is with
Paul of itself goes far to prove that he stood to him in
the relation of a disciple in any case Paul recognises
the gospel proclaimed by him as the true one and not

requiring correction. When these churches were founded
is not said but they do not seem to have had a long
history; we may venture to fix the date somewhere
between the years

55

and 60

As, according to

4

their founder was a Gentile Christian, we may

take it that the great majority of the members also
were Gentile Christians, an inference that is enforced by

Thus Paul had a double right to regard

them as belonging to his missionary field.

is the city in which, according

to

(cp

Paul for more than two years-

*.

approximately between

55

and

58

A .

D

.

(see C

HRONOLOGY

,

68J

teeth

of great hindrances (see

I

Cor.

had laboured with

unwonted success in the cause of the gospel, which,

until his arrival, had been practically unheard

of

there.

At last the riot stirred up by Demetrius the silversmith,
described in Acts 19

23

exposed his life to such serious

danger

Cor.

)

that he was compelled to abandon

the city for good, and betake himself elsewhere-to
Macedonia, in the first instance

events

of

that period did not prove fatal to the

at

Ephesns: in Rev.

it stands at the head of the

churches in Asia, and it is highly probable that Rom.

16

is a fragment of

a

letter addressed to it by Paul (Aquila

Prisca,

as well as

who

is

the

first-fruits of Asia unto Christ,’

are among the

saluted).

In any case the apostle kept up a lively

interest in this church, and maintained intimate rela-
tions with it.

The writer of the ‘we-source,‘ however, in

Acts

20

17-30,

describes a most affecting leave-taking

between Paul and the elders of Ephesus, whom the
former had asked to

him at

he was on

his way to Jerusalem, and

he regards it as having

been final. Of what elements the Ephesian church was
composed we have no means of judging, apart from
Rom.

the probability

is

that the majority were

converted pagans

it is nevertheless certain that the

Jews in Ephesus were numerous, and we can well
suppose that others of their number besides Aquila and

Prisca had joined themselves to the company of believers

in Jesus

the risen Messiah. In fact, when Paul, in

in

looking forward to the time after his

departure, speaks

of

the appearance

of

false teachers

and ravening wolves in Ephesns, Judaisers may very
weil have been meant.

Unfortunately the references

to Ephesus in the Pastoral Epistles

(

I

Tim.

1 3

Tim.

throw no light on the subsequent history of

Christianity there. All we can be sure of is that the
apostle,

so

long a residence, must have become

acquainted in a very special manner with the peculiarities
of the situation.

Even without

special occasion, perhaps, Paul

might very well have written

epistle to the church

of

at the time he did.

Its

founder had informed

of the orderly

walk and steadfastness in the faith of its

members, and doubtless also of their sympathy with
himself.

I t was natural enough, therefore, that he

should at least assure them of his gladness over the
good beginnings they had made, all the more as a
suitable opportunity had offered itself for communicating
with them.

Onesimus (49) was being sent back to

his master, Philemon, with a short letter Tychicus, a
member of the Pauline circle, was accompanying him,
and

was

almost

a

matter of course that he should be

entrusted with letters of introduction to the churches
whose hospitality he expected to enjoy. The epistle to
the Colossians, however, is more than a mere occasional
writing. The probability is that Paul’s determination

o

write it was formed immediately on receiving the

communication from Epaphras as to the condition
of Christianity in the Lycus valley false teachers had
made their appearance in

and Epaphras

himself felt unable, single-handed, to cope with their
sophistries. T o deal with these is the writer’s main
object even where he is not expressly polemical, as in
chaps.

1

and

3,

his aim is to establish

a

correct under-

of the gospel

as

against their wisdom, falsely

so

called.

If the picture

of

the Colossian false teachers does not

present such well-marked features as that of the

false apostles, there is no occasion for sur-

prise, for Paul knew the latter personally,

That the

Colossian agitators must have belonged to the same class
as

others that we read of in other places is too much to

Many of the observations of Paul would apply

well to Judaisers-as for example the marked emphasis
with which it is said

that the Colossians are

circumcised with a circumcision not made with hands,

862

the others only by hearsay.

COLOSSIANS AND EPHESIANS

and

that the handwriting against us has been nailed

to the cross and

so

cancelled. In particular the exhorta-

tion of 2

Let no man judge you in meat or in

or in respect of a feast day or a new

or

a

sabbath

day,' seems decisive as to the Jewish character of the
new teachers in this connection the question of

(cp

28) cannot fail to suggest Gal.

and one is strongly

inclined to presume the condition of matters in
to have been similar to that in Galatia.

Only, it is

commands and precepts of men that are being imposed
with

a

'touch not, taste not, handle not'

it

is

an arbitrary religion

that is being thrust

upon the Colossians

such terms Paul could

hardly have described

a

return to compliance with the

injunctions of the

O T

law.

As the ascetic interest

(223, 'severity towards the body'

'humility')

has

a

foremost place with the false teachers, many take

them to have been Christian Essenes or ascetics of an
Essene character (cp E

SSENES

,

But it has-to

be remembered that ascetic tendencies were very

spread at that time, and that they first came

into Judaism from without.

According to

28

the agitators gave themselves out to be philosophers.
Paul indeed regards their wisdom as 'vain deceit'
-according to

they are vainly puffed up by their

fleshly mind,' and with deceiving speeches seek to
lead their hearers astray-and when he

so

strikingly

emphasises that in Christ Christians already possess the

truth

all

and spiritual understanding,' all

treasures of wisdom and knowledge,'

1 6

9

26

and

so

zealously points out what

is

the right way to

perfection

(1

28

3

4

all that we can infer from this

is, that the innovators in Colossae came forward with

a

claim to be able to lead their followers from faith to
knowledge, true wisdom, and a perfect Christianity.
In doing so they appealed to visions they had seen ( 2

18)

their knowledge of the celestial world entitled them, they
contended, formally to set up a worship of angels, by
which, however, Christ was thrust

from his central

position as the only redeemer (219). Paul supplies no
details of their speculations as to the powers and functions
of these celestial spirits but any such theosophy as this
cannot be called Jewish in any specific sense. How far

a

religiously objectionable dualistic view- of the universe

lay at the bottom of the peculiar doctrines and precepts
of these men will probably never be known but that
Paul should raise his voice

so

earnestly against them

while taking up an attitude

so

different towards the

Essenising weak brethren in Rome

14

although they do not appear to have attacked him
personally at all-shows that he, for his part, discerned
in them a spirit that was foreign to Christianity and
hostile to it.

As their philosophical tendencies and their

worship of angels do not fit in with the theory that they
were Jews (here Alexandrianism helps

us

no better than

Essenism), it will doubtless be best to regard these
Colossian false teachers as baptised mysteriosophists,'
who sought to bring their ascetic tendencies with them
into the new religion, and had found means to satisfy
their polytheistic instincts by the forms of a
invented worship of angels.

In doing

so

they prided

themselves on their compliance with all the demands of
the

OT,

though in detail they of course interpreted

these in an absolutely arbitrary way.

It was this method

of an

interpretation of the OT, claimed by

them to be

a

guarantee of wisdom, that gave them

something of a Judaising appearance but in

so

far

as

their ideas had any individuality (as, for example, the
notion that between man and the extra-mundane God
there is a series of intermediate beings, and that the thing

of essential importance is to secure the favour of these
mediators or to

how to avoid their evil influences)

they were of heathen not Jewish origin.

The

authorship of Colossians has been denied

in various quarters since Mayerhoff

and, in

particular, by the

School en

The

testimony to its genuineness is the best possible

-ever since a collection of Pauline
letters existed at all, Colossians seems

to have been invariably included.

In

form, nevertheless, the epistle presents

many

peculiarities. It contains a large number

of words which Paul nowhere else uses-amongst them,
especially, long composites such as

(218) and on the other hand many of the

apostle's most current expressions, such

as

E n ,

are absent, and in the structure of the sentences there are
fewer anacoloutha than elsewhere in Paul, as well

as a

greater number of long periods built up of participial
and relative clauses.

These difficulties, however,

apply only to the first half of the epistle, and even here
the genuine Pauline element is still more in evidence
than the peculiarities just indicated the difficulty and
obscurity

of

the style,

so

far

as

old age or passing

health may not be regarded as sufficient explanation,
can be accounted for on the ground that Paul had not

so

lively and vivid a realisation of the exact opponents

with whom he had to do,

as

in the case of those of

Galatia or Corinth.

But in substance also the

I t

has been held to represent the transition

stage between the

and the Johannine theology

-a

further development of the Pauline conception of

the dignity of Christ

in the direction of the

Alexandrian Logos-doctrine, according to which he is
regarded as the centre of the cosmos, the first-born of
all creation

no longer as the first-born among

many brethren only (Rom.

8

29).

Formulae like that in

in him dwells all the fulness of the Godhead bodily,'

it is

have

a

somewhat gnostic ring the repre-

sentation of the Church as being the body of Christ

(1

further, is said to be post-Pauline, whilst Paul him-

self never gave ethical precepts in such detail

as

we find

in

In

to all this, it can hardly be denied that

Colossians exhibits

a

new development of Pauline

Christology but why should

Paul

himself have carried it on to this de-
velopment in view of new errors, which

demanded new statements of truth? The fact is, that
in some cases, probably, he has simply appropriated
and applied to Christ formulae (as, say, in

which

the false teachers had employed with reference to their
mediating beings and his theology as a whole never
became fully rounded and complete in such a sense

as

to exclude fresh points of view or new expressions.

Unmistakable traces of an undoubtedlylater agecannot

be shown in the epistle, while whole sections, such as
chap. 4, can hardly be understood

as

the work even of

the most gifted imitator.

None of the gnostic systems

of the second century known to us can be shown to
be present in Colossians, whilst the false teachers with
whom the epistle

us

acquainted could have made

their appearance within the Christian Church in the
year Go

A.D.

just as easily as in

There seems no cogent reason even for the invention

of

a

mediating hypothesis-whether that of Ewald, which

makes Timothy, joint-writer of Colossians, responsible
for certain un-Pauline expressions, or that of
mann, according to which an epistle of Paul was gone
over in the second century by the author of Ephesians.

the one hypothesis it is impossible to figure clearly

to oneself how the work of writing the letter

gone

about and the other it is impossible to accept unless
we choose to admit irreconcilable traits in the picture
of the false teachers-as, perhaps, that Paul himself
wrote only against

Essenising ascetics, whilst the

theosophic angelology was due entirely to the inter-
polator, who had other opponents in his mind.

Even

in its most difficult parts, however, the connection in
the epistle is not so loose

as

ever to force upon one

the impression that there must have been interpolation

Epistle has been held to be un-Pauline.

COLOSSIANS AND EPHESIANS

and, as regards certain of the difficulties raised by
criticism, it is to be remarked that caution is always
necessary in dealing with literary productions of a period

so

obscure.

Colossians may be Pauline quite as well

as Philippians or

I

Thessalonians. The number of those

who doubt its genuineness does not grow.

Colossians was written in captivity

( 4 3

IO

at the

same time

as

Philemon, probably from Rome (not from

The apostle is

surrounded by friends-Epaphras, Mark,

Aristarchus, Demas, Luke, Jesus Justus.

Whether

Philippians was written before Colossians and Philemon,
or whether Philippians should be regarded

as

the apostle's

last writing is difficult to decide, quite apart from the
question of a second captivity.

The Christological

portion of Philippians

has much in common

with Colossians.

If

Ephesians also is really the work of Paul (see below,

it must have been written almost

poraneously with Colossians. It is true,
Indeed, that in Col.

as

in Phil.

1 1 ,

Timothy is named as joint-writer, while

he is not mentioned in Ephesians.

From this, however,

it cannot be argued that the situations were materially
different, any more than it could be argued that Colos-
sians and Philemon must be of different date because in
the list of those who send greetings in Philem.

23

we do

not find the Jesus Justus named in Col.

or because,

in Philem.

Epaphras is called

a

fellow-prisoner and

Aristarchus a fellow-worker, whilst in Col.

4

chus,

as

a

fellow-prisoner, heads the list

of

those who send

greetings, and Epaphras seems to be regarded as one of
the fellow-workers.

In Eph.

3

I

6

also Paul is

a

prisoner, yet as much burdened with work

as

in

1

Tychicus is introduced in Eph.

as

bearer of the letter, and as one who will be able to give
further particulars

as

to the apostle's state, in almost the

same words as in Col.

and although there is no

mention of Onesimus in Ephesians, we must hold that
both epistles refer to the same mission.

The frequent verbal coincidences between Colossians

and Ephesians even in points in which the phraseology
is a matter of indifference (cp, for

Eph.

and Col.

Eph.

2

I

and Col.

2 1 3

Eph.

and Col.

4 3 4 ) ,

unless we have here a case of deliberate

imitation by a later writer, are intelligible only if we
assume the one letter to have been written when
mind was still full of the thoughts and expressions of
the other.

Of Colossians the only portions not finding

a

parallel in Ephesians are

:

the polemical section,

27-34

(although indeed

is again an exception),

and the greetings in

of Ephesians, on the

other hand, the only portions not finding a parallel in
Colossians are,: the introduction

(1

3-14),

the

phrased section

( 3

13-21),

the exhortation to peaceful co-

operation

and the figure

of

the spiritual

although in this case also some reminiscences are not
wholly wanting in Colossians.

That the one letter is a pedantic reproduction of the

other cannot be said.

If we possessed only one

of

them

it could not be called a mere compilation

or

paraphrase.

The parallel passages to

1,

for example, lie scattered

up and down Eph.

1-4

(or

5)

in a wholly different order,

and there is no trace of any definite method according
to which the one writing has been used for the other.
There is

no

sort of agreement among critics on the ques-

tion as to which of the two is the original form

the

present writer inclines to consider Ephesians the later,
partly because in Colossians the various details and
peculiarities are better accounted for by the needs of a
church not yet far advanced ethically, and exposed to
danger from false teaching, and it would

been rather

contrary to what might have been expected if Paul had
first sought to meet these very special needs by means
of a letter of a

general character.

Of all Paul's epistles addressed to churches, Ephesians

about 63

A.D.

86;

s

certainly the least epistolary in character.

One

vainly examines the circumstances of
those to whom it is addressed to find
occasion for its composition.

The

which has a personal tinge in only

a

few

could have been written equally well

to

almost

other church; it is more of a sermon than of a

etter-a sermon on the greatness of that Gospel

able to bridge over all the old contradictions in

iumanity, and on the grandeur

of

that one Church of

by which salvation is made sure, and on the

by which the members of this Church ought to

their lives.

One commentator indeed goes so

as

to

say that in Ephesians 'we have the most

and sustained of all the statements of Christian

which have come down to

us

from the hand

the great apostle.'

Other students

perhaps

Galatians and Corinthians more vivid and

Romans richer, Philippians more sympathetic, but

so

far as the thing can be done at all within

compass of one short letter,

Paul

has laid down in

Ephesians something

an exhaustive outline of his

Viewed on its anti- Jewish or supra- Jewish

however, it is much too slightly wrought

With regard to the question, to whom Ephesians was

addressed, the only thing quite certain is, that if the

epistle was written by Paul it cannot
have been addressed to Ephesus. Even
after all has been said by the apologists

it remains incredible that he should have written to

a

church to which he had devoted three years of his life
and to which, even after his final parting, his heart still
yearned so tenderly, in

so

cold a tone

as

here,-without

a word of greeting to anybody, without reference to any
of their common memories, in short without a single

note of any kind.

Even apart from

and

3

no one could suspect that the apostle is here

speaking to a church with which his acquaintance was

so

intimate as it was with the Ephesians.

If his ac-

quaintance with the Colossians was formed only by
report, every reader of the present epistle must

the

same to be

of

this. If the words in Ephesus in

1

I

are to be held to be original, we have hkre no com-

position of

Paul

the prisoner,

in 63

but

the work of a later hand who has artificially adapted
himself to the part of the apostle but who wholly failed
to realise how grossly improbable were the relations
between Paul and the Ephesians as indicated by him.

But these decisive

critically

open to the gravest suspicion. It

is

true that from the

date of the Muratorian Canon (about

onwards

they are attested by witnesses innumerable; but an
older authority-Marcion-about

140,

cannot have

read them where they now stand, since he took the
epistle to be addressed to the Laodiceans; they are
absent also from both of the oldest extant

MSS.

and

B) and learned Church fathers, such

as

Origen in the

third century and Basil in the fourth, agree in their
omission. Not till the fifth century do we find the
words regularly established in the recognised texts.
But it is highly improbable that an original reading

should ever have come to be deleted (let

us

suppose) on critical grounds ; for the exercise of criticism
in this sense was unknown in the second century, and,
if it had been, its exercise here would not have been
content with a mere negative, but would have gone on
to substitute the reading that was considered to be more
appropriate. It is absolutely impossible that the oldest
text should not have

the name of some place

a

name is rendered quite indispensable by the context

' t o the saints which are

. .

The only remaining alternative is that we should

suppose the original name to have

disappeared and that

was conjecturally inserted in

its place, the determining consideration being that

866

COLOSSIANS AND EPHESIANS

Paul must surely, once at least in his life, have written a

letter to his beloved Ephesians.

If

read

insteaa

it was only because he

thought this

a

preferable conjecture what he had

his mind was Col.

416,

where an epistle to the

ceans is

of, which the Colossians also are bidden

obtain a reading of.

The letter alluded to must

have been nearly contemporaneous with that to the
Colossians we

venture to conjecture that the then

conditions in Laodicea were very similar to those in
Colossae, so that on the present assumption the corre-
spondences between the two letters become easily
explicable. Tychicus then also will become the bearer

both letters.

Only, on the other side again, it

is

not

easy to understand in this case how it is that Paul treats
the Colossians with

so

greater

and

cordiality than he treats their neighbours the
how, further, he should invite comparisons by bidding
the churches exchange letters with each other

and,

lastly, how in spite of the labonr expended in behalf of
the Laodiceans by Epaphras (Col.

Paul should not

think it necessary to enclose a greeting from
The attitude

of

Ephesians, with its absence

of

explicit

and detailed reference to the circumstances and stage

of

growth of its readers, is, on the assumption of its being

a

Pauline letter, intelligible only if its destination excluded

such individual reference in other words, if it was really
not addressed to any one church, but was a circular
intended for a number of Gentile Christian chnrches (in
the present case

in

Asia Minor, or, more precisely, in

Tychicus

on

the occasion of his

journey to

was to visit, conveying to them at

the same time also a direct message from the great
apostle of the Gentiles.

It is not, after all, beyond

possibility, however, that Ephesians may be the epistle

referred to in Col.

4

for there it is called, not the

epistle

Laodicea, but the epistle from Laodicea, by

which expression may have been intended nothing more
than a copy of Ephesians to be obtained at Laodicea.

In the original superscription, if this be

so,

we may sup-

pose Paul to have named the province or provinces to
the churches of which he wished to address himself (cp

I

Pet.

the epistle would then have an almost

'catholic' character, and, in point of fact, next to

Colossians,

I

Peter, of all the other N T epistles, is the

one that comes nearest Ephesians in substance.

The

preceding discussion

falls to the

ground if, as was done by the

school and still

is done by many recent writers,

the

Pauline authorship is denied.

ex-

ternal testimony is the best possible:

from Marcion's time onwards the epistle is included in
all lists of Paul's writings, and from the second century
onwards the citations from it are exceptionally frequent.

On

the other hand, in form and style it is removed still

fnrther than Colossians from the manner of the earlier
epistles of Paul; the number of

is

astonishingly great

whilst in Paul the devil is called

Satan, here (Eph.

he is called

or

( 2 2 )

prince of the kingdom of the air

the structure

of the sentences is strikingly lumbering

substantives

closely allied in meaning are constantly linked together
by

by the use of the

genitive, an expedient that conduces neither to freedom
nor to clearness of style. At the same time the epistle
has a number of characteristically Pauline expressions,
including some that do not occur in Colossians, and at
every step genuinely Pauline turns of thought are
recalled.

The absence of concrete details in Ephesians has

al-

ready been noted but, if it be true that we have here
a circular letter, the standards which we might apply
to Corinthians or Philippians cease to be applicable.

long ago, Usher and, recently, Lightfoot.

In

Paul

he is called aiso, however,

6

god

this world'

4

See

B

E

L

I

A

L

.

Peculiarities in statement of individual doctrines

or

in theological outlook generally, indifference of attitude
upon controverted points of the Pauline period, and
a preference for the ideas

of

the old Catholicism that

was beginning to take shape cannot be denied but here
again, as with Colossians, the case is met

if

we

postulate a growth in the apostle himself, under the
influence of new conditions.

We fail to find in the

epistle any direct evidence that the writer is a man
of the second Christian generation, addressing men
who have been born Christians;

on

the contrary, the

readers are addressed as persons who had formerly been
heathens.

The main obstacle to the traditional view of the

authorship of the epistle is found in

35.

In

the enumeration of church

officers, the peculiar spiritual

to

which so great prominence

given

I

12

are almost entirely passed over in

220

it is the glory of

the Church that she is 'built

on

the foundation of

apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the chief
corner stone,' and in

3 5 ,

as if there had never been any

such thing as a dispute in Jerusalem or in Antioch, the
present time is spoken of

as

that in which the Gentiles'

equality in privilege has been spiritually revealed to
his holy apostles and prophets.'

In

the mouth of the

apostle who has devoted

the

unremitting efforts of a

lifetime to the establishment of this equality of privilege,
this last expression has a peculiar sound.

In a disciple

of

the apostle, on the other hand,-one who has in view

the accomplished fact, the

one

and indivisible Church

for which all the apostles and prophets are equally
sacred authorities-the phrases quoted are natural
enough and on the whole the hypothesis that a Pauline
Christian, intimately familiar with the Pauline epistles,
especially with Colossians, writing about go

A.

has

in Ephesians sought to put in a plea for the true
cism in the meaning of Paul, and in his name, is free
from any serious difficulty. It is very hard to decide
perhaps the question ought to be left open as not yet
ripe for settlement, and Ephesians in the meantime used
only with caution when the Pauline system is being
construed.

the Pauline epistles in general, Colossians and

Ephesians are among the best preserved parts of the NT.

They have hardly at all been subjected
to smoothing revision the majority

of the variants (which, it must be said,

are very numerous) are clearly mere copyists' errors.
At the same

the readings vacillate at several

important

(Eph.

3 9 )

between

and

(Col.

between

and

(Col.

3

13)

between

and

Influence

of the text of Ephesians upon Colossians can be some-
times

Col.

3

6,

has been supplied from Eph.

56.

The obscurity of many of the sentences

have

helped to protect them from gratuitous change in any

case the exegete of either epistle has a much harder
task than the text-critic.

H. J.

der

a most careful comparison

of

the two letters with

other and with those Pauline epistles of

18.

Literature.

which the genuineness may he regarded as
certain.

hypothesis is that in

Colossians we have a genuine epistle of Paul to

which

has been expanded by later interpolations

;

the interpolator is

the author of the epistle to the Ephesians,-a Gentile Christian
of

Pauline training, who belonged t o the post-aposfolic

Alb.

Der

Brief

an die

and Der

Brief

die

a very thorough if somewhat stiff exposi-

tion

:

Colossians is held

t o

he genuine, Ephesians not.

H.

V

.

1885, pp.

and 1887

substantially accepted

hypothesis,

in the

has given a luminous commentary.

H.

Oltramare

S.

Paul

aux

aux

3

vols.

maintains the genuineness of both

epistles.

I n 'the case of Colossians this had already

argued most brilliantly by

J. B.

Lightfoot

Paul's

to

and

t o

1875, 8th ed. 1886).

J.

Mac-

pherson in

on

t o

the

has sought

with

a painstaking care, worthy

of

868

COLOURS

COLOURS

himself, to vindicate tradition and solve the difficulties

the

epistle. Er. Haupt

(die

1899,

a n entirely

new recast of the

of

A.

W.

Meyer)

takes, as regards the genuineness, a position similar to that of
the present article, but decides against the Roman

in favour

of

new points of view are offered

i.

hoth on the

of

introduction and on details of exegesis.

T h e once justly

popular commentaries

and Harless (and ed.

58)

on Ephesians are now somewhat out of date. See also

the (posthumous)

t o

to

and

('95)

by Prof.

J.

A.

;

T. K.

Abhott,

on

and Colossians

('97).

A.

J.

COLOURS.

If in certain branches of art the ancient

Hebrews fell far behind their contemporaries, they were

not without artistic feeling; if they had

no

drama, they were not devoid of dra-

C

ANTICLES

,

w

7

P

OETICAL

and

if,

through

no

inherent fault

of their own, they were unable to attain any degree of
competency in the highest form of art, yet they had, as
their poetry shows, a very real appreciation of the
sublime and beautiful. The neglect to cultivate this
taste was a necessary consequence of the effort to fulfil

.the ancient command

in

Ex.

command which

would of course apply as much to painting

as

to

ture-and of the monotheism to which they
quently attained.

(See Ruskin,

Paths,

7

Perrot'and

Art in

etc.,

and cp A

THENS

,

I

.

A

simple style of decoration and the use

of

some of

the dves and dvcd stuffs thev mav indeed have learned

at an early

When, however,

the Dost-exilic writers wish to describe

the decorations of

an

ideal sanctuary, they are obliged

to

borrow their ideas of ornament from Egypt, Baby-

lonia,

Persia, or Greece. (See

Ornament,

and cp

I

SRAEL

,

67.)

Character-

istic of this style of decoration was

a

love of costly

display combined with brilliancy of colour

( A n a l y s i s

and

18,

E

GYPT

,

36).

From these countries, then, in which

art was the ally, if not the offspring,

of

idolatry. came

the practice of decorating sculpture in the round with
bold colours and costly

a

practice condemnecl

by Ezekiel

as

being an insult to Yahwe. That

such cases, however, were exceptional among the

Hebrews appears probable from the fact that their
language contains

no

words for

paint,'

painting,'

and 'painter' (see

P

AINT

).

Nor does this striking

phenomenon stand alone. It is also noteworthy that
the original texts no term is found to express that
property of light known to us

as

When a Hebrew writer wishes to compare one

with another in respect to its colour he finds it

to use the word

eye in

of

S

O

in Lev. 13

the

is spoken of as changing

appearance'

(EV,

here and in the following examples, 'colour')

and in Nu. 11 7 the appearance of nianna is described as
like the appearance (so here RV) of bdellium. The same
is used of the appearance of wine (Prov.23

of

(Ez

1 4 27 8

of burnished brass (Ez. 1 7 Dan. 10

6),

of a

(Ez

and of crystal

Certainly the tern

occurs frequently in the EV but in such case:

the translation is seldom warranted by the original text

the Apocrypha, on the other hand, a word does

occur

Wisd.

15

4 )

with reference to a

On the natural stages in the expression of the imagination,

see Shelley's

Poetry, part

Already the poet who sang of the glorious victory ove

Sisera knew of dyed stuffs

and seems to

that Israel could be expected to provide its enemies with boot:
of this kind (Judg. 530). Of what colours, however, this
was composed is not stated; nor is it said with what colours th
needlework

cp

I

Ch.

Ez.

3)

mentioned in the

passage was embroidered.

3

For specimens of early Gr.

figures see

Richter,

die

Tafel-Band,

cp

the notes in Text-Band, 917,418.

nage but in this instance the

term

denotes rather the

aint

or

pigment used.

Just

as

the want of a word to express the idea of

painting' tends to prove that the art was very little

so

also the want of

a

word for

(found

Syriac

Arabic

suggests that colonrs were not much talked

by the Hebrews. This inference could indeed

shown to be unwarrantable if we found many names

for different colours, and could prove

that many colours

in use.

When, however, we

to examine the

colour-terms-and this applies also to those in

among the Greeks and the

any rate in

times, we find that very few of them are real

olour-terms at all, such terms being used as denote

a

contrast between light and darkness, brightness

dimness, than what we commonly understand by

Still,, if colours are not sharply distinguished

the languages of the ancient world it does not follow

hat the Hebrews

other primitive races were unable

o

distinguish shades of colour for which their

no distinct terms, or that they were, at least

respect to certain colours,

It

is not so much a question of deficiency of colour-sense (as

contended some years ago) as of an undeveloped colour-

rocabulary. (See Del.

and Benzinger,

under

; also Grant'

Sense, chaps. 11 13.) If

people arc in common life able to nxe correctly the

of

colours that they do not see so conversely

people

nay be able to

colours

which their language

not set apart names.4 Besides, it

seems clear that

the lower animals are sensitive

to

colour (see Grant Allen,

;

The Story

and cp

Ascent

Man, 165

Montaigne,

Essays [Cotton], 1394

From the

of the terms which the Hebrews did

possess, we are led to conclude

one and the same

word was used to denote several shades
of

colour the context or object to

which the colour was applied

.

.

.

.

.

the clue as to the

shade in-

tended. Sometimes, however, in order to distinguish
the shade of colour quite unmistakably, the thing
described is compared with another object of which the
colour in question is peculiarly characteristic

Eng.

salmon-pink, emerald-green, etc.

It is indeed remarkable how few real colour-terms

occur in the

OT.

Only three of the natural colours are

distinguished by names,

for blue and yellow dis-

tinct

are entirely wanting. The deficiency, how-

ever, is made up for by the use of the terms expressing
degrees of light or

and in addition to these are

found artificial colonrs with the name of the object from
which they were derived like our crimson, cochineal,
indigo, etc.

Substances, 'too, of which

a

particular

colour was characteristic, may have been used to repre-
sent the colonr itself (like Eng. orange, etc.

It will be convenient to group and examine the words

employed under the following headings

terms ex-

.

.

pressing

(

I)

light and degrees of light,

darkness and degrees of

(3)

natural colours,

variegated surfaces,

pigments, (6) objects.

it

be necessary

to point out instances in which the EV expresses or
implies a reference to colour where no'such reference

Cp

which means originally 'skin 'complexion.'

Cp D e

note'to chap. on

truth is, colours were as loosely and

distinguished by the Greeks and

as

degrees of affinity

and consanguinity are everywhere.

See further Smith's

colores,' and Robertson Smith in

Nature,

3

Broadly speaking we may say that all people see alike.

Where, however, a s

the case of artists, the colour-sense has

been specially trained, colours

are

seen differently.

blindness can only he regarded as a

Ruskin,

new ed. in

form

1

6.1

4

Even the modern

does not

more than ahout

half a dozen colour-names (red, yellow, green, blue,

white. and black), though

is quite able to distinguish

many other shades

of colour for which the

dictionary

has names,

as

well as probably others for

has none.

COLOURS

necessarily exists.

Except in the case of

and

(6)

it

is impossible to arrive at very definite conclusions, the
interpretation being based mainly on philological con-
siderations.

Light

and

light.-The word

(from

Syr.

' t o shine'), used in Cant.

to

denote the glow of a healthy complexion
and translated 'white' in the EV, means
primarily

or

(cp its

use in Jer.

4

if the text is correct, of a wind [AV

dry,' RV hot

in

Is.

184 of heat [EV clear

and

in 324 as an adverb

EV 'plainly']).

repre-

sents it in Cant. by

a word which originally con-

tained a similar idea, as is shown by its use in Mt.

17

Mk. 93 and Llr. 929.

Similarly

seems to mean literally dazzling,'

though in Judg.

it is applied to asses of a light

colour, perhaps reddish-white (cp Ass, col. 344,

n.

What particular shade of colour the word denotes in

this passage is doubtful but Moore may be right when,
following A. Muller

Lied

der

he supposes

it to be gray or tawny inclining to red.'

rendering,

is a

intended to connect the word

with

(cp Jer.

20

A

derivative

from the

same root is traditionally found in

Ez.

EV 'white wool'

but see J

AVAN

), and probably also

the name

(Gen.

see N

AMES

,

66)

is to be derived from the same root.

The term

(from

Ar.

glitter-

ing like gold,' starts with the same idea.

It is used of

leprous hair in Lev. 1330

32

36,

where the EV represents

it by yellow,' and in Ezr. 8

27

the Hophal participle of

the same root is applied to brass (AV fine copper,'
RV bright brass

').

In Lev.

13

translates it by

and in

by

whereas in Ezra

Esd. 857) it would seem to render by

To

express

brilliant,' as contrasted with

'white,' the N T employs

(EV

'gorgeous

'),

(EV bright

'),

Ja. 22

'goodly,' RV 'fine'), Rev. 156 (AV 'white,'
'bright

'),

and Rev.

1 9 8

(AV 'white,' RV 'bright

').

In Acts1030

2 2

Rev. 156 the Vulgate translates the

word by

Darkness

and

express the

idea

of

darlrness the term

(from

Syr.

It

used of the dark hair in a leprous

rising (Lev.

of a sunburnt

skin or complexion (Job 30 30,

[BK],

[A]

and of dark horses (Zech. 62)

and a diminutive form

is applied in

Cant.

1 6

to dark ringlets. When it is

desired to express

a

particularly dark' colour another

substantive is sometimes added, as oven-black,' Lam.

(of skin

raven-black,'

Cant.

(of hair), and in the N T sackcloth-black'

(Rev. 6

In the EV

is represented by black,'

and

in

and N T by

From the same root are

derived

(Lam. 4 8 ;

ably

(Josh.

another name for the Nile

(see

Another word

(from

applied to

sheep whose wool has been scorched by the

sun,

though really meaning simply 'dark,' may be trans-
lated

'

brown,' as is done by AV in Gen.

35 40.

In

it is rendered by

and once

40)

by

T o

express the idea of gloom and sorrow

The Heb. has

For this Esd. has

and

K

.

6 k a

There is also a form

(Job35

plur.

om.]) which occurs

in

blackness), and has often

been connected

Aram.

root

to be black.' BDB,

to be black

is employed.

COLOURS

meet with the root

which has the

meaning to be dirty.'

Thus it

be applied

the turbid water of a

(Job

to a sorrowful

(Jer.

to mourning garments

even to gates of a mourning city (Jer.

and to

.he heavens (Jer.

I

K. 1845). In

Is.

a derivative

from the same root is used

of

the mourning garb

the heavens (EV blackness

').

To the same root

ilso probably belong the names Kedar

Gen.

25

2

S.

see N

AMES

,

Further,

' t o be dark,' a word generally

used

of

the darlrness of approaching night (cp Job

186

Is.

is used in

517 of the eyes becoming

dim, in

Ps.

6924 of their becoming blind and in

4 8

the same term is applied to a dark complexion.

This root gives us the common word for

darkness

Both

and

are represented in

by

:

and

also by

Finally, to this class belong also apparently

(Gen.

and

(Prov. 2329

correctly

: both of

them seem to

to the

(EV red

appearance of

the eyes after excessive drinking (cp the name Hachilah

I

S.

23

and see N

AMES

,

( 3 )

-Under this heading are included

those Hebrew words which more closelv resemble our

natural colour-terms.

are three

classes:

( u )

white,

red,

( y )

green.

It is doubtless true that

white

denoted simply purity, green paleness, and

red depth of light but the

to which the words are

applied shows that the Hebrews attached to them fairly
definite ideas of colour.

White is commonly represented by

Thus it

is

used of the colour of goats (Gen.

of

of

133

I

O

), of

the leprous spot (Lev.

of garments

and of horses (Zech.

63

6).

Here also, as

with the shades of dark, different shades of colonr seem

to

distinguished, as milk-white' (Gen.

49

coriander-seed white' (Ex.

snow-white' (Nu.

K.

Ps.

68

14

Is.

and in the N T

white' (Rev.

'bright-white' (Mt.

Llc.

and harvest-white' (Jn. 435). We even find in Lev.

a compound expression

used to describe

a

shade

of

white

darkish white,' RV dull white

').

From the same Hebrew root seem to be derived the names

Gen.

Lihni

Ex. 6

Lihnah

Josh. 1 0 2 9 ;

but

see L

IBNAH

),

and

Lebanon

I

K.

so-called either on account of its

snow-capped

or

from the colour of its stone, as well as the

substantives

'moon' (Ca.

IO

),

'white poplar' (Gen. 30

and, possibly,

'brick' (Ex.

; see, however,

B

RICK

,

I

,

See

66,

The corresponding root in Aramaic is

which

in Is. 2922

is

used (as a verb) of the face becoming pale

with shame, and in Dan.

7

9

of a snow-white

Both these words are usually represented in

by

(cp, however, Gen.

where

and, more-

over, there occurs in the Apocrypha a word
which is used of a disease of the eyes (Tob.

2

IO

3

17

6

8

11

8

but in Ecclus.

43

18

Heb.

T o the same class, perhaps, belongs also

Gen.

40

In the RV it is translated white bread' but from

what follows in the context the word would seem to refer,
not to the contents of the baskets, but to the baskets
themselves (AV white baskets

').

Finally, to express

the idea of the hair becoming grayish-white through old
age, there is the root

(

I

S .

122

however, appends a query, and Che. denies the existence of
a root

in O T

June

1897,

p. 406;

July

575).

Cp

E

CLIPSE

,

Robes of state seem to have been of

white

well as of

purple (see below

Cp Jos.

A n t .

8 3

,

3,

8

1

I

;

see

380

[ET

6

enote

a

appearance of some kind:

whence the derivative

‘gray hair’ (Gen.

442931

Deut.

3225

Prov.

or ‘old

age’

(Is. 464).

In

it is usually represented correctly

by

or

Perhaps the most clearly distinguished

of

the

natural colours,

as

being the colour of blood, was red, to

express which the Hebrews commonly used
the root

That it denoted a

brilliant hue is evident from the fact that Isaiah uses
the verb

in the sense of becoming like scarlet

see below,

and the Priestly Code speaks of

skins dyed red

The adjective

is

applied to blood in

K.

to blood-stained apparel

in

Is.

632

;

and verbal forms, to

a

blood-besmeared

shield

in Nah.

and to wine

in Prov.

That the root, however, was also employed to

describe other colours of a reddish hue is apparent
from its use as applied to a heifer (Nu.

or

a

horse

(Zech.

to

a

reddish-brown

Gen.

I

S.

16

IZ

cp Lam. 47, Cant.

5

IO,

and see G

OLIATH

,

n.

)

skin, as well as to reddish or brownish-yellow lentils
(Gen.

The Priestly Code uses also a diminutive

form

to express merely ‘reddish,’ applying it to

the colour of the leprous spot (Lev.

13

24)

or sore

(Lev.

From the same root are derived the names

Gen.

25

Admah

Gen. 10

and

Adummim

Josh.

1 5 7 18

; see N

AMES

,

as

well as the precious stone

called

(see R

U B Y

and

P

RECIOUS

S

TONES

).

T o

corresponds

(lit. ‘having the colour of fire in

and N T ; and in

we find the verb

used of the sky.

Other roots, however, besides this are occasionally employed to

designate this colour. Thus the root

which usually

conveys the idea

of

acidity, fermentation,‘ seems to be used in

Is.

6 3

I

to

denote a colour ;

and the context requires a blood- or

wine-like appearance (cp Eng. sorrel, (

I

)

and

from

in Zech. 7

is also, from

the context, possibly

t o

be read

(Che.); cp

T h e root

be red,’ is traced by some

in

and, with more justice, in

form).

T o this class we may also probably assign

Ar.

‘a

sorrel-horse,’ and Heb.

term

used in Zecb.

1 8

of a horse.

(y) The third natural colour term describes, those

uncertain hues-colours which it has, in

ages,

been found difficult to distinguish-that
waver between blue, yellow, and green.

In Hebrew the adjective employed (from

‘ t o be pale,’ cp Assyr.

to grow pale’

[of the

‘yellow,’ and Aram.

‘tc

be pale’) can be applied to the colour of vegeta-
tion (Job

398

K.

1 9 2 6 Is. 3 7 2 7 ) ;

and a substan-

tive

derived from the same root

vegetable produce in general.

As,

moreover, the

idea of the word was originally, like that of
its Greek equivalent, merely

paleness

or faintness

colour, a derivative

can be used to describe

a

panic-stricken countenance (Jer.

3 0 6 )

or the fading

of decaying vegetation (Deut.

Amos

Hag.

217).

Further, to express simply palish,’ a diminutive

can be used of plague spots (Lev.

1 4

37)

or of the appearance of gold

On

word

(

to be yellow?’ ; cp N

AMES

,

66)

which is applied to gold (Ps.

68

etc.

)

and

to denote a shade of

see G

OLD

.

(4)

Variegated

few words occur which

though their precise meaning is uncertain, undoubted11

Che.,

cp Lam.

4 7

T.,

If

however

I

S.

refers not

t o

David’s

to

colour

his hair, the

will then mean

we point

(see

I

).

3

From this root some derive

Cp

(a doubtful place-name in Josh. 19

46).

‘clay,’

‘roebuck.’

their employment being for the most
part restricted to the description

of

animals. Of these the term rendered in

by ringstraked and applied to goats

30

35

31

8

I

O

probably has reference to

stripes on an otherwise dark skin

;

that translated

speckled

Gen.

30

32

35 39

31

8

IO

to

ght spots on a dark skin ; and that represented by

and used of both goats (Gen.

31

and horses (Zech.

6

3

6 )

to light patches on a dark

kin. The last word would, therefore, probably
pond to our

I n

.

f prey.’ T h e commentators have sought to justify and explain

but it remains

A comhination of different

olours is expressed in Gen. 30 32

by

probably

besprinkled,‘ ‘.flecked’ (cp

The same term is used in

16

16

the dyed stuffs of many colours

which other

were wont to decorate their shrines.

(5)

Pigments.-The Hebrews knew and made use of

everal

three of which were derived from

pigmen

t

s

.

animals.

These three dyes were all

manufactured

the

:

the

scarlet or crimson (whence its Gr. name
and Lat.

from an insect (coccus)

vhich gave its name to a species of oak on which it
vas found

;

the other two from

a

slimy

found in a special gland of a species of

ish called

and

infusing the insect (coccus) in boiling water a

red dye was produced, superior in effect and

to

cochineal; the other dyes when applied

o

articles became at first

of

a whitish colour, but

the influence of sunlight changed to yellowish

and finally to purple, the purple being red or

due according to the species of shell-fish employed.

three colours were held in high estimation by the

ancients on accdunt of both their brilliancy and their
costliness. The purple-blue is translated blue in the

EV,

but must have corresponded rather to our

by

which it is once rendered in the

AV

(Esth.

1 6

and in the

margin

8

T h e Hebrews knew no blue colour with which

to compare it, and hence it is said in

that ‘purple-

blue is like the sea,

the sea is like the plants, and the

are like the firmament of heaven (see also

4,

and cp

Del. in

488,

18

and

the articles

P

URPLE

,

S

CARLET

, B

LUE

,

( a )

To

designate the first of the dyes mentioned

above, the Hebrews sometimes used simply

‘worm,’ just as we speak of crimson

(fr. Arab.

Sansk:

and

cochineal (really

a

term denoting the insect

Coccus

cacti

found in Mexico). Thus it is used in

Is.

as

the

most natural example of

a

glaring and indelible dye,

and

Lam.

4 5

(where

gives the simple term

‘berry’

[A,

the insect being regarded in

early times as a species of berry) of princely raiment
It even occurs as a verbal derivative

with the meaning to be clothed

in scarlet’ (see, however, D

RES

S

,

3,

n.).

More

however, the form

is found

with the addition, either before or after it, of the
word

word which has been derived

from the root

(cp Assyr.

pos-

sibly fr.

supposed to

to glitter,’ and

is thought to refer to the brilliant colour derived from
the

In this form it is mentioned as a costly pos-

session (Ex.

35

and as being, therefore, suitable

for an offering (Ex.

3 5 6

Lev.

[“n

6495152

Nu.

1 9 6

for the hangings (Ex. 2636

(BNQ

; but

seems

to

be a n old word for hyaena (see Z

EBOIM

).

which

may have been miswritten

out

of which we may

a

false reading

(see

COLOURS

COLOURS

27663637

for the ephod (Ex.

for the

priests' girdle (Ex. 288

for the breastplate (Ex.

39

and for the embroidered. pomegranates (Ex.

2833

etc.

I n Ecclus.

also, it is used of

some kind of embroidered work (Gr.
vet. Lat.

A thread of this colour-expressed

by

alone-was commonly used in the times of the

Jahvist as

a

mark (Gen. 382830; Josh.

221,

J E ) , and

the single term is employed in two poetical passages

S.

1 2 4 ,

where the maidens of Israel are called upon

to lament Saul, who used to clothe them in scarlet;
and Ca. 43) as equivalent to the'longer expression. In
the acrostic on the Capable Woman the same word
is used in the plural

to describe the warm

clothing provided against the cold of winter (Prov.

31

and in Is.

to denote probably scarlet-stuff

as

distinguished from the dye itself

As a substitute

for these expressions we find the Chronicler using

a

word

Ch.

cp Ex.

derived from the Persian

'aworm,' see C

RIMSON

,

and cp above). In

is chosen to represent

all these expressions, and there can be no doubt that
where the same word occurs in the N T it. denotes this

dye (Mt.

Heb.

Rev.

Later

O T

writers knew of another pigment of a

like shade

of

colour, called

(EV vermilion

-perhaps oxide

lead

and see

'Mennig'). It

used for painting ceilings

(Jer. 22

and images (Ezek.

The Purple-blue

Assyr.

and Purple-red

Bib. Aram.

Assyr.

dyed stuffs also

largely in the decoration of the Taber-

nacle and the priestly robes but they can hardly have
been known

as

earlyas the scarlet (cp C

ANTICLES

,

their employment being characteristic of

P

and later

writers. They also can be used for an offering (Ex.
354

as

being a valuable possession (Ex.

as well as for the curtains

for the veil

(Ex.

3635). for the hangings (Ex. 2636

3637

for the priest's ephod (Ex.286

for the

girdle (Ex. 288

and for the breastplate (Ex.

etc.

A

late prophet knows both colours

as part of the splendour of heathen worship (Jer. 1.09).

It seems natural also to another late writer to assume
that the Midianitish chiefs would wear robes of purple-
red (Judg.

826)

;

and Ezekiel tells how the robes of

purple-blue worn by the Assyrians had struck the im-
agination of the women of Israel

whilst he also

knows (277) of purple-blue and purple-red from

In Ecclus., too, both dyes are men-

tioned

as

occupying

a

prominent place in the

raiment of Moses, and in 630 ribbons of purple-blue
are said to form part

of

the adornment of Wisdom.

On the defeat of Gorgias

stuffs of both colours

were taken by Judas

among the spoil

( I

Macc.

Of the two purples red seems to

have been preferred. Solomon's seat of purple (Cant.

3

is perhaps due to error (see

purple

robes

of

office were common. Judas was

by the

fact that the Romans, notwithstanding their power and
riches, were not clothed in purple

(

I

Macc.

8

When,

however, Alexander appoints Jonathan high priest, he
sends him a purple-red robe

[KV])

so

like-

wise Antiochns when he confirms him in the office

(11

58).

On

the other hand, when the treachery of Andronicus

is discovered, he is at once deprived of the purple robe

Macc.

Similarly in the N T

Mt.

Mk. 1517

and Jn.

the red-purple robe is used as a mock

image of majesty; while in Lk.

it is

one of the characteristics of a rich man.

In Rev.

174

however suggests

'double.'

So

Vg.

Schleusner, Gra., Che.

it is part

of

the attire of the

great harlot, and in

is referred to as

valuable merchandise (cp also

v.

16

It is

also

worthy of note that one of

Paul's

converts made

her living by selling this dye

Acts 16

In Cant.

7 6

the hair of the bride seems to be compared

with purple

and Greek parallels for this are

quoted.

The comparison, however, can hardly be

trusted, for

is a

of

which precedes. Each form of the clause

seems

to

be more correct in one half than the other.

Read, perhaps, with Cheyne The locks of thy head are
like Carmel

they are pleasant

as

orchard of pomegranates' (see G

ALLERY

,

z).

is plainly some word which should follow

probably

(written

and corrnpted

cp

H

AIR

,

I

). In the Gr.

is commonly represented

by

and

and

by

in

both

and N T (see Rev. 9

17

21

( 6 )

words included under this heading

denote objects of which

a

particular shade of colour

was Characteristic. Thus

Ch.

was the fine cotton or

linen manufactured by the Egyptians,

and

called elsewhere (Ex. 26

I

Gen.

41

42,.

etc.

)

(see

Life in

Ancient

Egypt,

448, and the

articles

E

GYPT

, 35,

C

OTTON

, and

L

INEN

).

in

Esth. 1 6 probably means white-stuff' (whence

Is.

and

(Pers.

'white cotton.'

Three

words occur in the same verse which have

been thought to denote different species of valuable stone
or plaster :

(also in Ca.

which has been

supposed to be identical with

(

I

Ch.

and to mean 'white marble' or 'alabaster'

denoting per-

haps 'porphyry'

(so

BDB;

EV 'red marble,'

'porphyry');

dnr, meaning possibly 'pearl' or

pearl-like stone

and

EV 'blackmarble,'

'stone of blue

'),

which

has been derived from

and taken to mean

black marble (see, however, M

ARBLE

).

Lastly it

a

few passages in which

the EV unnecessarily implies a reference .to colour.

Thus the colour green is sometimes
used in the EV to represent words

not colour but a healthy

and flourishing condition. Of such words
which means rather luxuriant,' is correctly translated
in

by various words expressive of

Dt. 122 Is.

3

K.

Ca.

Ez.

613;

4 K.

17

IO

Jer.

3 6

13

1 7 8

Ez.

276).

Very similar is the use of

fresh, moist

Gen. 3037

Ez.

Judg. 167

8)

and

'juicy'

Job8

16).

Again

denotes 'fresh, juicy ears of corn' (Lev.

and

can be used of fresh young plants (Job

8

1 2

Cant.

6

whilst

seems to denote tender young

fruits (Ca.

see Del. ad

and

(Lev.

applies to 'garden fruit' in general.

To

this category

also such compound expressions as

'grassy pastures

(Ps. 23

sprouts of

the field; (Ecclus.

In all these cases the 'term, 'green

used in AV, might indeed serve

a paraphrase but it'is

wise with the following examples:-In

6 6

the word

translated 'white' (of an egg) is thought

many

to

mean 'the

juice of

(so

but see

F

OWL

).

but whichever interpretation be adopted

will be admitted

that the Hebrew word contains no idea of colour. Similarly

the reading adopted by

in Is. 272 (AV 'red wine,' R V

'wine')

of

'a

pleasant vineyard'; see

means really 'foaming

on Dt.

8214)

; and

also gives

for

(Ex.

25

26

7

etc.),

taking it as

equivalent

of

876

COMFORTER

in the expression

(Ex.

etc., Wisd. 10

meaning ‘reed,’ contains no reference to colour.

Moreover, in the expressions

(AV ‘black night,’ RV

‘blackness of night

in

79 and

(AV ‘blackness’)

Joel

26

Nah. 2 the English renderings are purely paraphrastic.

I n the same way the long robe (perhaps white with a
border) worn hy Joseph (Gen.37 3) and

Tamar

13

transformed in the E V into

coat of many colours.’ I n

20

30

(nhan

AV ‘blueness’) and Ecclus.

words mean

Literature.

-

Riehm,

Farben, 1 436

Benzinger,

Arch.

Farben-namen ; Nowack,

HA

Del., Iris, and Farben’ in

;

and Chipiez (W.

Armstrong),

Hist.

A r t in Sardinia,

Syria,

and

Asia

Minor,

1

and, since the above was written, a n

article by

G. W.

Thatcher in Hastings’

DB.

A.

c.

COMMENTARY

RV,

C

HRONICLES

,

6

;

H

ISTORICAL

L

ITERATURE

,

COMMERCE. See

T

RADE

A

ND

C

OMMERCE

.

COMMON. The negatives of the qualities ‘clean,’

‘holy’ (see C

LEAN

,

I

)

are-

I

.

‘Common,’ a synonym for ‘unclean’ (see C

LEAN

), con-

stantly in R V for

(properly,

‘

that which is open,’

Baudissin

2 23).

AV, however, only twice renders

S.’

21

elsewhere it has unholy (Lev.

10

or

profane’ (Ezek. 22

26

42

44

23 48

In N T the RV is

less strict ,with

which is almost

rendered

‘common

unclean

‘

unholy,’, ‘defiled,’ polluted.’

So

in

I

Macc.

62,

R V (with AV) gives ‘unclean’ for

N o

injury is done to the sense; cp Acts 10

‘what

cleansed (=pronounced clean) that call not thou common

w.

common and unclean.’ T h k which is common is free, or a t

any rate

is

treated a s if free, from ceremonial restrictions ;

it can

he used in the common life-the life of the

the unin-

telligent ‘people of the land’

Jn. 7 49). And those who use what is only treated as if

‘common or open, when it has no right to he so treated, become

unclean-

themselves.

Common therefoie

becomes a

term, dangerously wide from a
What an irony in the evangelist’s expression

common (EV defiled), that is, unwashed hands’

!

Unclean,’ the strict rendering of

in N T , of

O T

Both ‘common’ and ‘un-

clean’ can he used

(I)

of forbidden foods or of animals which

may not be eaten (Acts

10 14 11

8

Rev. 18

Of persons who

are not Jews or who d o not belong to the Christian community
(Acts

Cor.

7

Cor. G

cp

Mk.

7

and

9 13

Rev. 21 27 [ R T

3.

Unholy,’ given in AV of Lev.

becomes

‘common’ in RV.

I n

2226

4423

(same formula)

AV renders

profane.

T h e influence of

and Vg.

suspected

versions respectively give

so also in Ezek. 4815,

AV profane,

‘Profane’ is

best reserved, however, for other Heh. words (see

P

ROFANE

).

RV of

N T retains ‘unholy’ in

I

Tim.

Tim.

3 2

Heh.

4.

On the peculiar technical term

‘ t o

be polluted,’ see

H

YPOCRISY

.

COMMUNITY

OF

GOODS,

in the widest sense

that expression,

is

usually considered (on the authority

of

to have been one of the

institutions of the earliest Christian society

a t Jerusalem.

This opinion requires strict limitation

but that limitation is not to be based, as it has been,
either on the intrinsic improbability of the institution
itself, or on a vague conjecture that the writer of Act:
has idealised the facts. It arises from an investigation
of the sources of his narrative (cp A

CTS

, 11)-a method

which has to record one of its most assured results in
connection with the subject of the present article.

W e have in Acts not one account of the institution

hut

three.

One account comprehensively record!

the sale of all lands and houses

:

Acts

according to

2 4 5

sale was of all possessions and goods what.

soever

common fund being thus formed, out of which all
supplied according as any man had need:

(6)

Accord.

to another account, the sale of property

5 3 )

cannot have been universally prescribed,

0 1

oint of view.

COMMUNITY

O F

GOODS

generally customary ; for Peter

( 5 4 )

expressly

:lares that Ananias was free to retain in his private

either

or the money for which it

vas sold. Moreover, although there is no hint of there

anything to mark out the act of Barnabas

( 4

)

rom

the universal practice assumed in (a)-such as that

he

was his only one, or was particularly valuable

-it is thought worthy of special honourable mention.

4

.therefore, it is not assumed, as it is in

4

.hat the sale of property was expected of all. (c) In

4 3 2 ,

where we find said

and not some

word implying ‘retained as private property,’ there is
io

idea of any sale of property at all. The idea simply

s

that the owners placed their property in a general way

the disposal of the community at large.

There is

no

issumption of a common fund.

( d ) A fourth account may possibly be distinguished

in Acts

44.

T h e statement in 2446-that they had all

common-

by itself alone agrees well enough with the last-mentioned and

simplest account of the

(that there

Possibly

wasnoactualsale),

whichdeclares

fourth account.

that all that believed were together in one

might

itself he taken, like

2

I

I

Cor. 11 14

23

to refer merely to the exigencies of social

worship

hut ’the

of the clause with the Statement

that

(that they had all things in common) appears to

imply that the entire community lived in common, dwelling in
the same house and having common meals.

This

inference, however, may safely be set aside, as

it may well be

whether the collocation in Acts

has not arisen from the author’s having inadvertently

combined two heterogeneous ideas without perceiving
the possible misleading effect.

A social institution of the nature indicated would scarcely

have been practicable in a community

of

persons (Acts 1

less in one of 3000

or more

The other

statements in Acts do not preclude the suppositton that the
meals, even love-feasts and the observance of the Lord’s Supper
associated with them, were held in different houses a t the same
time.

(AV ‘from house to house,’

and R V

at

home in 2 46 (cp 5 42) need not be intended

to

convey that

the whole community assembled on one occasion in one house
and on another

in another; it

have a distributive

meaning like

every city

in

15

(and

that is in every house,’ in 20

In

Rom. 16

5

we

find several household churches in the same city; cp also

I

Cor.

19

Col. 4

T h e complaint about the neglect of certain

widows in the daily ministration

which the word

proves to have referred to their sustenance, could

not have‘arisen if there had been common meals (although
indeed the expression ‘tables’

might seem to point

to

these). I t could have arisen only if the widows’ share of

provisions was brought to their houses.

A

misrepresentation of the original idea, similar

to

that which, as has just been shown, may be present in

244,

is unquestionably to be found in

The writer of this verse held Ananias to have

sinned in keeping back part of the money obtained by
selling his estate. The duplicity with which Peter charges
him does not consist in his having, when questioned,
passed off as the whole

a

part of the money thus obtained.

It is

(58)

who does this. Ananias, accord-

ing to

5

,

has already committed the crime of keeping

back some of the money before he could be questioned
by Peter.

This cannot possibly be reconciled with

declaration in

5 4 ,

that Ananias had a perfect

right to retain the whole.

Notwithstanding that plain

declaration, the author must have had before his mind,
in writing

the stricter view that it was an absolute

duty to sell all the property and to hand over the whole
of the money.

The hypothesis that the narratives are based

on

various sources receives material support
from the impossibility of discovering any
real coherence within the passages them-

selves.

Acts 4 33 treats of a subject quite different from the matters

This will also be the sense if we accept the reading of

WH,

which omits

and the following

they are retained in

their marginal rending.

i o

in the N T always refers to place

;

AV into one

place.

COMMUNITY

O F

GOODS

with in the preceding and the following verses. Nor can

4 34 he connected with 432. I t could be connected with it only
if the absence of poor persons were the reason

why all

property was

(v.

32) instead of being

result of

community of goods. Further, according to

the absence

of poor is due not to community of goods, but to the sale of all
property in land and

and the

of a

in 4

again, the sale of any property appears

as a

voluntary act of certain individuals. I n like manner 2 42

is so definitely repeated in 246 that the narrative can hardly he
a n independent composition.

I t must be a

Even

more marked

is the repetition of the first clause of 2 43,

in the third,

But even

this last clause he

with

W H (though it is

difficult to explain how it could have arisen as a variant to the
first clause), 244, with the reading

S i ,

cannot be con-

nected with what precedes. The opening, ' b u t also all that
believed (were) together,' implies that others were together as
well. The omission of the

sanctioned by

WH

is clearly an

attempt

to

remove the difficulty.

A n

attempt to prove that all these passages have been

compiled by an editor from various sources, could be

only on an examination of the whole book.

Such

proof is not needful to our present purpose.

I t will be

sufficient to have shown that the book presents three

views

on

the subject of community of goods.

If it be

which of the three

is

the most likely to

be the true view, it will be safe to answer that, if

simplest

I

is

to be preferred, it is that which

is

An account of any

institution of the kind. clothed with the

glamour of the ideal, is sure to have been

exaggerated by writers with incomplete information.

I t is certain, however, that the general idea of com-

munity of goods was not strange to the primitive
Christian society.

I t is indicated in such sayings of Jesus as those recorded in

G

109

and in

information ahout his own

life a s we find in Lk. 83. Besides, we know there was a

dis-

tinctly Ehionite tendency which applied a literal ,interpretation
t o

blessings pronounced

the poor and hungry (Lk.

and saw the path of salvation

giving away all property

1141 122133

I t

is not certain indeed

that this Ebionite tendency was dominant in the period im-
mediately following the death of Jesus. (The passages cited
were taken u p by the

Evangelist from a document which

upon a n older written collection of sayings of Jesus.

This is proved

the remodelled words in Lk.

G

which,

not having any reference

to

the disposition of

persons

addressed, certainly did not come in their present form from the
lips of Jesus.

Besides, what is here recommended

is not so

much community of goods as almsgiving.) The epistles of Paul,
which are our most trustworthy authority, only show that in his
time

years after the death of Jesus), the community a t

Jerusalem was poor, or,

at

least, contained a good many poor

members, and stood in need of assistance from

Gentile-

Christian churches (&

I

Cor.

I

Cor. 8 4 9

I

;

alone, Gal. 2

15

26).

The Gospels prove that many poor people had already

attached themselves to Jesus in his lifetime.

An

active

care for these, and consequently

a

more or less organised

must be assumed in the original church a t

Jerusalem.

We

may well suppose that, in as far

as

this ministration

the form of a community of goods,

it led, according to the usual lesson taught by other
attempts of the kind, to the increase of poverty.

It

may, moreover, be conjectured that in the earliest
Christian times the

of community of goods

increased the tendency to forego the pursuit of wealth,
which, even without that institution, was occasioned,
according to

I

Thess.

Thess.

36-13. by the

belief that the end of the

was near a t hand and

by the unrest to which this belief gave rise.

W e may

suppose that wealthy members of the community in
Jerusalem allowed their property to become available
for the

use

of poor brethren and this does not preclude

the belief that of their own free will certain persons, such

as

Barnabas and Ananias. went further and sold their

belongings for the benefit of the community.

Still, it is certainly not true that communism was

prescribed as obligatory.

The uncertainty of the subject is shown also by Acts 6

I t

can here only mention the possible influence of

See

3.

879

CONDUITS AND

RESERVOIRS

would be very remarkable if there were no necessitous persons
whose support could be neglected hut widows.

phrase

seems to be due to a usage of the

own (comparatively

late) period in which according to

I

Tim.

5

3-16

the 'widows

had an

in

community. It

strange also

that, although the mention of the names of the seven men
appointed to 'serve tables'

points to a

genuine tradition, their function

-

they are nowhere styled

never referred to afterwards (they are not t o he

identified with the

of

and that only the

Hellenists had to complain of

neglect of their widows. Just

as

in Acts 15 36-39 a less serious dispute is narrated in place of

one that had more important issues (see C

OUNCIL

O

F

J

ERUSALEM

so

here, a t the

narrative before us, there

lies, we may conjecture some dissension occasioned by different
conceptions of

entertained by the natives of Pales-

tine and by the Christian Jews who

come in from abroad.

I n any case, the community of goods did not last

long,

though the view that it

to an end when the

society was dispersed by the persecution (Acts

is

no more than

a

conjecture.

The subsequent influence of the idealised picture in

Acts is very noteworthy.

In the exhortation

to

works

of charity in the

Barnabas

and similarly in the

Teaching

the statement

of

is-repeated

as

a

command :

'Say not,

I t

is

private property"

Lucian,

13,

states that the Christians

supported those

need from

a

common fund

and ridicules the credulity with which they

allowed themselves to be cheated by impostors

in

so

doing. The influence of the same ideal on the monastic
life is

P.

w.

s.

COMPASS.

For

[Q

mg. ?]

om.), RV C

OMPASSES

, Is.

c p

H

ANDICXAFTS

,

For

Ex.

AV '

ledge,' see A

LTAR

,

9

(a).

CONANIAH

accord-

ing to Baer in

Ch.

3113

;

cp C

HENANIAH

,

31;

'God hathstablished,'

[BL]).

I.

Chief of the temple overseers, temp. Hezekiah, in

conjunction with his brother Shimei, according to the
Chronicler,

Ch.

31

(AV C

ONONIAH

)

[A],

[B

A 'chief of the Levites' (Ch.) or 'captain over thousands'

(

I

Esd.), temp. Josiah

Ch. 359

[A*],

I

Esd.

[BA],

[L] E V J

ECONIAS

).

CONCUBINE

Gen. 22

24

Bibl. Aram.

Dan.

See M

ARRIAGE

,

F

AMILY

,

5

a,

and

S

LAVERY

.

In

a

country

where the rain-supply is small and

which

possesses scarcely more than one perennial stream

(

cp Am.

5

and

is

not rich in springs, the

of water in cisterns and reservoirs, and the employ-

ment of trenches or conduits to convey it to the place

where it was most needed, must have been of paramount

importance.

Hence the indispensability of rain and

the trust placed in the continuance of its supply
form the basis of some of the best-known and most
beautiful metaphors in OT.

Leaving to the article

S

PRINGS

what needs to

be said

upon

the

supply of water, we propose

here to notice the

means by which it was

stored and conveyed.

The ordinary method of preserving water was to dig

or hew

out of the living rock

a

reservoir,

varying in size from a small pit to an
extensive subterranean vault lined with

masonry. Such cisterns

go

back to pre-Israelite times

T o dig them was the work of a

benefactor and deserving of special mention

Ch.

and the opening ceremony, on one occasion at

least, becomes the subject of a song (see B

EER

).

CONDUITS AND RESERVOIRS.

The ordinary Heb.

is

I

.

(for variant forms cp

[BAL]),

880

CONDUITS AND RESERVOIRS

properly

artificial excavation, and thus distinct from

a

natural well

(see

S

PRINGS

). When

dry

the

is

a

pit

(cp Gen.

which can be used

as a

prison (Jer.

38

6

Gen.

40

etc.;

cp

In poetical language

is applied

to

the pit

of the

grave

28

or to

(Ps.

In

only two

cases

does

occur

as

part of

a

place-name

: see

Ex.

Other terms are

:-

PI?:,

(cp

Ar.

‘watering trough’),

(AV ‘pit

; in Ezek. 47

E V

[morass]), and

3.

Jer.

143

3 i 6

(AV ‘ditch,’ RV ‘trench’), perhaps

used for purposes

of irrigation

(cp K.

25

=

Jer.

52

39

after

;

see

A

GRICULTURE

,

4.

is used of

an

pool,

(with

but elsewhere appears

to refer

to

springs.

Several pools

were

found in and around

Jerusalem (cp below, and

see

also

in

and Samaria

for

Cant.

7 4

see

5.

Is.

2211,

‘ditch,’ RV ‘reservoir.’

It was of the utmost importance that citadels should

be well supplied with

for collecting the rain-water

(so

at Masada and

Jos.

xiv.

146,

vii.

6

A cistern in the temple is mentioned

in Ecclus.

:

cp below, and see S

EA

,,

B

RAZEN

.

the towns it seems to have been customary

for every house to possess

a

cistern (cp

2

K.

18

31

Prov.

5

15).

The best example of this

is

found in Mesha’s stele

‘there was no cistern

in the midst of

the city in

amp,

and I said to all the people,. “Make

ye every man

a

cistern in the midst of his house.”’

The same king records that he made

‘the locks or dams of the reservoirs for water

but

whether

(the

25)

which Mesha made

with the help of his Israelite prisoners was a conduit
which fed these reservoirs is uncertain.

The view is

not improbable, however, since the art of forming
channels to convey water was common to all the Semitic
races and was not due to foreign influence.

Remains of conduits

[BAQL],

connected as a rule with pools, are to

be found in many places in Palestine;
they are usually mere trenches running

along the surface

of

the ground, subterranean channels

being

rarer.

Certain of the rock-cut

channels and cisterns in Jerusalem

(as

well

as

the

Siloam conduit) may be pre-exilic; in many cases,
however, they have been enlarged or repaired to such
an extent as to make it extremely difficult to tell to
what period they belong.

Perhaps

the most important of its supplies was that which came

from the so-called Pools of Solomon beyond
Bethlehem

m. distant). These pools

(situated close by the

are near

and

and must have been devised

for a more important

than that of merely irrigating

gardens (Eccles. 26 Ecclus.

see

There are three of them, partly hewn and partly enclosed
by masonry.

The lowest seems to have been .used at

one time as

an

amphithentre for naval displays.

The pools are fed by two large conduits.

The one,

after cutting through the valley of

(Etam) by a

tunnel, runs through the Wady

along the

(Valley of Springs), and ultimately enters

As

Robinson remarks

the

main

dependence

of

Jerusalem at

the present

on

its

cisterns,

and this

has

probably always been the

The meaning

is not

certain : perhaps

it is

‘two reservoirs.’

The Heb.

is

used

of

ditches for irrigating

trees (Ezek.

314

or

ofa trench round

an

K.

33

in

these passages

and

of

conduits or aqueducts

in the

ordinary

sense of

word

[om.

Is.

4

The

name

‘Solomon’s

Pools’

is

based

solely

upon Eccles.

26,

and, notwithstanding

the

statement

of

Josephus,

we have

no

evidence that the gardens of Solomon

were

situated in

the

W.

garden?);

Jerusalem was well supplied with water.

the Bir el-Derej (Spring

of

Steps). The other is much

longer and full of windings.

Starting from

a

large

reservoir, the Birket

(now converted into

a

garden), it leaves the

of the same name, and

after crossing the plateau of

flows into the

middle pool.

Conduits connect

also

the Sealed Spring

(mod.

identified by a modern tradition

with the

in Cant.

4

and the

with

this water-system.

From the Pools of Solomon the water is led into the

city by two conduits. The higher goes along the

N.

slope of the valley of

descending near Rachel’s

tomb and rising again.

(A

syphon was used and

remnants of the pipes

still be seen.)

It then

proceeds towards the hill of

and the

W.

(see

V

ALLEY OF).

I t

is

partly

hewn and partly made of masonry. The lower conduit
(still complete) goes with many windings from the
lowest pool, E. along the slope of the valley, and then

W.

above

One arm of the conduit was con-

nected (probably under

government) with the

spring of

and ran to the Frank mountain.

The

main arm passes Bethlehem and Rachel’s tomb

on

the

S . ,

proceeding sometimes above ground in a channel

about

I

ft. square, and sometimes underground in

earthen pipes.

It then crosses the

valley by

a

bridge of nine low arches and meets the other conduit
hard by the Birlcet

It finally runs

SE.

and

E. along the valley over the causeway, under the

(Chain-gate), and supplies the

and

the king’s cistern in the

These conduits were

repaired by the Sultan

of

Egypt about

1300

A.

Their date is unknown.

The

upper conduit

is

more artificial, and probably the older.

Some refer them to the golden age of Judah, and
tradition (oral and

ascribes them to Solomon.

I t has also been pointed out that they exactly resemble
the conduits which were made by the Arabs

in

The well-known Siloam conduit runs from the Virgin’s

Spring

to the Pool .of Siloam

(see J

ERUSALEM

). I t runs underground in a

circuitous course and is

586

yds. in length‘

(the direct distance between the two

pools

is

368

yds.).

At its lower

it has a height

of

16

ft. but this gradually decreases to

and then

to

ft.

This low part, however, is near the surface,

and perhaps was originally an

channel.

It

is

a

dangerous conduit to explore,

as

the water is apt to

unexpectedly and fill the passage.

In various places

false-cuttings and set-backs are found, indicating subse-
quent changes

the direction taken by the workmen.

About

19

ft. from the Siloam end, on the right-hand side

as

one enters, is

an

artificial niche which contained

a

tablet bearing

on

its lower face

an

inscrip-

tion. This was first observed in

and

was brought under the notice of Schick.

The tablet was about

square, and its top only

one yard above the bottom of the channel. The inscrip-
tion, known

as

the Siloam inscription, is the oldest

the

Talmnd it is stated, moreover, that

a

conduit

led from

(Etam)

to

the temple

41

;

cp

Lightfoot,

chap.

23).

Many subterranean passages and structures have been

found under the

Cp Jos.

7 3 8 4

and

Templum in

mobum

. . .

fons perennis

aquae, cavati

sub

terra

montes,

et

piscinae cisternaeque servandis imbribus

5

Many of these

were

for

removing the water

and blood of

the sacrifices,

or

for flushing the blood-channels (cp

56,

2

3 3,

3

Jos.,

indeed, speaks of

a

began to

taking funds

for

the purpose from

the temple treasury and

thereby causing

grave

disturbances (Jos.

32,

B3

and

in one place

gives the length

as

stadia-a

measure

which would

suit

the conduit which

leads

from the

It is

probable, however,

t h a t

simply repaired

the

existing conduits

;

his

reign was so

often disturbed by Jewish

seditions that he

could hardly have had

time to carry

out such

a n

undertaking. See Schiir.

and cp

HE

More

precisely,

ft. (Conder) ; but Warren gives

882