International Standard Bible Encyclopedia

Didache — Dowry

Didache

Didache - did'-a-ke.

See LITERATURE, SUB-APOSTOLIC.

Didrachma

Didrachma - di-drak'-ma: Two drachmas.

See DRACHMA, DRAM.

Didymus

Didymus - did'-i-mus (Didumos, i.e. "twin"): The surname of THOMAS (which see).

Die - (muth, gawa`; apothnesko, teleutao): "To die," etc., is of very frequent occurrence, and in the Old Testament is generally the translation of muth, meaning perhaps originally, "to be stretched out" or "prostrate." "To die," should be the consequence of eating the forbidden fruit (Genesis 2:17; compare Genesis 20:7; 2 Kings 1:4, 6). "Die" is commonly used of natural death (Genesis 5:8; 25:8). It is used also of violent death (Genesis 26:9, 11; Exodus 21:20); punitive (Exodus 19:12; 12, 14; 28:43; Numbers 4:15; Ezekiel 3:1:Ezekiel 8:1-18 ff); as the result of willfulness or indifference (Proverbs 10:21; 15:10; 19:16). To die "the death of the righteous" is something to be desired (Numbers 23:10).

In the New Testament the word for "to die," etc., is generally apothnesko, "to die off or away," used of dying in all forms: of natural death (Matthew 22:24); of violent death (John 11:50-51; 19:7; Acts 25:11); of the death of Christ (John 12:33); of death as the consequence of sin (John 8:21, 24; Romans 8:13); teleutao, "to end (life)," also occurs several times (Matthew 15:4); thnesko, "to die," occurs once (John 11:21), and apollumi, "to destroy" (John 18:14); in Acts 25:16 (Textus Receptus) we have eis apoleian, "to destruction."

Figurative Use:

The figurative use of "to die" is not frequent, if indeed it ever occurs. In 1 Samuel 25:37 it may be equivalent to "faint," "His heart died within him, and he became as a stone," but this may be meant literally. In Amos 2:2 it is said that Moab "shall die," i.e. perish as a nation. Paul describes the condition of the apostles of Christ as "dying, and behold, we live" (2 Corinthians 6:9), and says, "I die daily" (1 Corinthians 15:31), but the references may be to exposure to death. When in Romans 7:9 he says, "When the commandment came .... I died," he may mean that it rendered him liable to death. In Romans 6:2 we have "we who died to sin," i.e. in Christ, and in our acceptance of His death as representing ours; similarly we read in 2 Corinthians 5:14, "One died for all, therefore all died" (Revised Version (British and American)), i.e. representatively, and in Colossians 2:20 "if ye died with Christ"; 3:3, "for ye died," the Revised Version (British and American) (in Christ). Compare 2 Timothy 2:11; 1 Peter 2:24.

Of the changes in the Revised Version (British and American) may be mentioned "abode" for "died" (Genesis 25:18, margin "or settled, Hebrew fell"); "he that is to die" for "worthy of death" (Deuteronomy 17:6); "died" for "are dead" (John 6:49, 58, and the American Standard Revised Version 8:52,53); "though he die" for "were dead" (John 11:25); "many died" for "were dead" (Romans 5:15); "died for nought" for "in vain" (Galatians 2:21); "when his end was nigh" for "died" (Hebrews 11:22). Of special importance are the changes from "be, are, were, dead" in Romans 6:2, 7-8; 2 Corinthians 5:14; Colossians 2:20; 3:3; 2 Timothy 2:11, and "having died" for "being dead" in 1 Peter 2:24, as bringing out the truth that in the sight of God all men died in Christ.

Diet

Diet - di'-et ('aruchah, "prescribed"): A daily allowance or portion of food, as that given by King Evil-merodach to Jehoiachin, king of Judah (Jeremiah 52:34 the King James Version; compare 2 Kings 25:30).

Dig

Dig - (qur, "to dig", chathar; diorusso, "to dig through"): "I have digged (dug) and drunk strange waters" (2 Kings 19:24). In his campaigns on foreign soil, where the enemy had stopped up the watersprings, Sennacherib would at once dig fresh wells for his armies. "They dig through houses" (Job 24:16; Matthew 6:19-20 margin). Walls of eastern houses are often made of mud or clay, and frequently have no windows; and as the threshold of a Syrian house is sacred, the thief breaks in through the wall (see Trumbull, The Threshold Covenant).

M. O. Evans

Dignities; Dignity

Dignities; Dignity - dig'-ni-tiz, dig'-ni-ti (Hebrew marom, se'eth, gedhullah): Rank or position, not nobility or austerity of personal character or bearing, is denoted by this word in its Old Testament occurrences (Genesis 49:3; Esther 6:3; Ecclesiastes 10:6; Habakkuk 1:7). In 2 Peter 2:10; Jude 1:8, "dignities" (doxai) are angels, lofty spiritual beings, possible objects of blasphemy; compare the context in both passages.

Dike

Dike - di'-ke (dike, "justice"): The avenging justice of God personified as a goddess (Acts 28:4).

See JUSTICE.

Diklah

Diklah - dik'-la (diqlah, "place of palms"): One of the "sons" of Joktan (Genesis 10:27; 1 Chronicles 1:21). Perhaps a south-Arabian tribal or place-name connected with a palm-bearing district.

Dilean

Dilean - dil'-e-an (dil`an, "cucumber"): A town in the Shephelah of Judah named with Migdal-gad and Mizpeh (Joshua 15:38, the English Revised Version "Dilan"), which lay probably on the North of Lachish and Eglon. It has not been identified.

Diligence; Diligent; Diligently

Diligence; Diligent; Diligently - dil'-i-jens, dil'-i-jent-li: This word is used in various senses in our English Bibles.

1. In the Old Testament: In Ezra 5:8, "with diligence" means "with care"; in Ezra 6:12; 7:17, "with speed," "speedily"; in Proverbs 4:23 "watchfulness"; in Deuteronomy 4:9; 6:17; 19:18; Psalms 77:6; Proverbs 27:23; Isaiah 55:2; Micah 7:3, "with care," "scrupulously," "earnestly." Sometimes it means "early" "with haste" (Job 8:5; Proverbs 8:17). It may mean "industrious," "exacting" (Proverbs 10:4; 12:27; 22:29).

2. In the New Testament: The American revisers have rendered "diligence" for various words in the King James Version, e.g. for "business" in Romans 12:11; "giving diligence" for "endeavoring" (Ephesians 4:3); "give diligence" for "study" (2 Timothy 2:15,), for "labor" (Hebrews 4:11); "diligently" for "carefully" (Philippians 2:28; Hebrews 12:17); "be diligent in" for "meditate upon" (1 Timothy 4:15). It is well also to remember that the Old English meaning of diligence is "with love," from diligo, "to love."

G. H. Geberding

Dill

Dill - See ANISE.

Diminish

Diminish - di-min'-ish: the Revised Version (British and American) has retained nearly all passages of the King James Version where "to diminish" is used. Some of these uses have become obsolete: Deuteronomy 4:2, "neither shall ye diminish from it." "Diminish" generally means "to reduce," "to lessen." In this sense it is employed in Ezekiel 5:11 from the Hebrew gara`, literally, "to shear." The picture of shearing the beard, expressing degradation and loss of manhood, may underlie this passage.

Dimnah

Dimnah - dim'-na (dimnah, "dung"; Damna): A city of the Merarite Levites in the territory of Zebulun (Joshua 21:35). The name is probably a clerical error for Rimmon.

Dimon; Dimonah

Dimon; Dimonah - di'-mon, di-mo'-na.

See DIBON.

Dinah

Dinah - di'-na (dinah, "justice"): The daughter of Jacob and Leah, whose violation by Shechem, son of Hamor, caused her brothers, especially Simeon and Levi, to slay the inhabitants of Shechem, although they had induced the Shechemites to believe, if they would submit to circumcision, Shechem, the most honored of all the house of his father, would be permitted to have the maiden to whom his soul clave for wife (Genesis 34:1-31). The political elements of the story (compare Genesis 34:21-23 and Genesis 30:1-43) suggest a tribal rather than a personal significance for the narrative.

Nathan Isaacs

Dinaites

Dinaites - di'-na-its (dinaye'): A people mentioned in Ezra 4:9, as settled in the city of Samaria by Osnappar (Assurbanipal). The identification is uncertain.

Dinhabah

Dinhabah - din'-ha-ba, din-ha'-ba (dinhabhah): The royal city of Bela, son of Beor; king of Edom (Genesis 36:32; 1 Chronicles 1:43). There may be a resemblance in the name of Hodbat et-Teneib. about 8 miles East of Heshbon; but this is in the land of Moab, and probably much too far to the North. No satisfactory identification has been proposed.

Dinner

Dinner - din'-er (ariston; Matthew 22:4; Luke 11:38 (the Revised Version, margin "breakfast"); Luke 14:12; compare Ruth 2:14; John 21:13): In oriental as in classical lands it was customary, in ancient times, as now, to have but two meals in the day, and the evidence, including that of Josephus, goes to show that the second or evening meal was the principal one. The "morning morsel," as the Talmud calls it, was in no sense a "meal." The peasant or artisan, before beginning work, might "break (his) fast" (John 21:12, 15) by taking a bit of barley bread with some simple relish, but to "eat (a full meal) in the morning" was a reproach (Ecclesiastes 10:16). The full meal was not to be taken until a little before or after sunset, when the laborers had come in from their work (Luke 17:7; compare the "supper time" of Luke 14:17). The noon meal, taken at an hour when climatic conditions called for rest from exertion (the ariston of the Greeks, rendered "dinner" in English Versions of the Bible, Matthew 22:4; Luke 11:38, the Revised Version, margin "breakfast"), was generally very simple, of bread soaked in light wine with a handful of parched corn (Ruth 2:14), or of "pottage and bread broken into a bowl" (Bel and the Dragon 33), or of bread and broiled fish (John 21:13). Many, when on journey especi content with one meal a day, taken after sunset. In general, eating at other times is casual and informal; evening is the time for the formal meal, or feast.

See MEALS.

George B. Eager

Dionysia

Dionysia - di-o-nish'-i-a (Dionusia, "festivals of Dionysus" (Bacchus)): The rural (vintage) Dionysia were celebrated in the month of Poseideon (19th day), which is roughly our December. The celebration consisted of feasts, processions, songs and (sometimes) scenic performances. The Ascolia formed one of the most prominent features. After sacrificing a goat to the god, they filled the wine-skin with wine, made it slippery on the outside with oil, and then tried to hop on it with one leg. Whoever fell down furnished great sport for the spectators, but if anyone succeeded in maintaining an upright position to the end, he was declared victor. The demarch conducted the festival, the expenses of which were paid by the deme.

The Lenea were celebrated on the 12th of Gamelion (January) in Athens, and later in Ionia in Asia Minor. At this festival also the new wine was tasted. A procession was formed and they marched through the city, indulging in all sorts of jesting and buffoonery, to attend the pantomimic performances.

The Anthesteria (Flower-Feast) came in the month of Anthesterion (February), when the first flowers appeared. This festival resembled somewhat our Christmas. On the first day (11th of the month) the wine-cask was opened; on the second was the feast of pitchers. Wine was drunk, and contests in trumpet-playing were held. At the drinking contest everybody was permitted to make as much merriment as he pleased. There was also a mystic marriage of the king archon's wife to Dionysus (compare the marriage of the Doges of Venice to the sea). On the third day they offered pots filled with vegetables to Hermes, Conductor of the Dead. This day was sacred to the gods of the nether world and to the spirits of the departed (All Souls' Day); and the people celebrated Persephone's resurrection and reunion with the god.

The Greater, or City Dionysia, were held in Elaphebolion (March) as a spring festival. This is the most important of all the Dionysia (for us), since practically all the great tragedies of Aeschylus, Sophocles and Euripides were performed in conjunction with this festival. All the demes took part. They accompanied the ancient image of Dionysus Eleutherios (from Eleutherae in Boeotia, one of the first places in which the worship of the god was established in Greece), as it was carried in solemn procession from the Lenaeon (the original center of his cult in Athens) to a small temple in the Ceramicus in the northwestern part of the city, while choruses of men and boys sang the dithurambos (the ancient hymn to Dionysus). Crowned with the vine and dressed in unusual costumes, they greeted the god with loud shouts of joy.

The festival was revived with great pomp by the Pisistratidae. In theater of Dionysus all the people beheld an imposing rehearsal of their great achievements. Even the poorest and humblest were given an opportunity to see and hear the contests between the professional rhapsodists, who recited Homer, between choruses specially trained to sing the dithyrambs, and between poets, whose great dramatic productions were presented for the first time. The state set aside a special fund for the purchase of tickets for those who were too poor to buy for themselves. Comedies, tragedies and satyr dramas were presented after elaborate preparation and at a great expenditure of money. The prize, a bronze tripod, was erected with an appropriate inscription on the Street of Tripods. The awarding of prizes to the victors concluded the festival.

The quinquennial festival at Brauron in Attica was also celebrated with extraordinary license and merriment. The city of Athens sent delegates regularly to attend the festival.

There were also Dionysiac clubs in Athens at the time of the Peloponnesian War. These had peculiar doctrines and observances. They had their foundation in Orphic mysticism. The members refrained from eating the flesh of animals. They possessed holy scriptures and had peculiar propitiatory rites. The Dionysiac religious observance continued as a state cult down to 366 AD.

See BACCHUS.

J. E. Harry

Dionysius

Dionysius - di-o-nish'-i-us (Dionusios, surnamed "the Areopagite"): One of the few Athenians converted by Paul (Acts 17:34). We know nothing further about him (see AREOPAGUS). According to one account he was the first bishop of the church at Athens; according to another he suffered martyrdom in that city under Domitian. We are even told that he migrated to Rome and was sent to Paris, where he was beheaded on Montmartre (Mount of the Martyr). The patron saint of France is Denys; compare the French "Denys d'Halicarnasse" (Dionysius of Halicarnassus). The mystical writings which were circulated in the Middle Ages and are still extant, are pronounced by the best authorities to be forgeries, and date from a period not earlier than the 5th century.

J. E. Harry

Dionysus, (Bacchus)

Dionysus, (Bacchus) - di-o-ni'-sus (Dionusos): The youngest of the Greek gods. In Homer he is not associated with the vine. In later Greek legend he is represented as coming from India, as traversing Asia in a triumphal march, accompanied by woodland beings, with pointed ears, snub noses and goat-tails. These creatures were called satyrs. The vine was cultivated among European-Aryans first in Thrace, and here Dionysus is said to have established his worship first in Europe. Then the cult of Dionysus passed down through the Balkan peninsula to Thebes; and in the localized form of the myth the deity was born here--son of Zeus and Semele.

"Offspring of Zeus on high

..........................

Thou that carest for all

Who on Bacchus in Italy call

And in Deo's sheltered plain

Of Eleusis lord dost reign,

Whither worshippers repair!

O Bacchus that dwellest in Thebes,

On whose broad and fertile glebes

Fierce warriors from the dragon's teeth rose,

Where Ismenus softly flows,

The city that Semele bare!"

--Sophocles, Antigone.

Among all the Greek deities none appealed more vividly to the imagination than Dionysus. Greek tragedy is a form of worship, the ritual cult of the god of wine, who makes the initiate wise and the ungodly mad. Dionysus speaks most strongly to the sense and to the spirit at the same time. There is nothing monotonous in the Dionysiac legend; it is replete with both joy and sorrow--in some aspects it is a "passion" in others a triumph. All the passion plays of the world (even the Oberammergau Schauspiel) are in the ancient spirit. One Dionysus after another has been substituted, but from the first there has been a desire on the part of the devotee to realize his god vividly with thrilling nearness, to partake of his joys and sorrows and triumphs in his manifold adventures. In the early myths Dionysus was one of the lesser gods; he is mentioned only twice in the Iliad and twice in the Odyssey; but he is always represented as being more nearly akin to man than the great august deities of Olympus. He is a man-god, or god-man. To the inhabitants of the vine-clad slopes of Attica, to which his cult had been brought from Phrygia through Thracian Boeotia, he was particularly dear. At their vintage feasts last year's cask of wine was opened; and when the new year brought life again to the vines, the bountiful god was greeted with songs of joyful praise. The burial of the wine in the dark tomb of the jars through the winter, and the opening of these jars at the spring festival symbolized the great awakening of man himself, the resurrection of the god's worshippers to a fuller and more joyous life. The vine was not the only manifestation of the god--oil and wheat were also his; he was the god of ecstasy, the giver of physical joy and excitement, the god of life, the god of certain laws of Nature, germination and extinction, the external coming into being and the dying away of all things that are, fructification in its widest aspect whether in the bursting of the seed-grain that lies intreasured in the earth, or in the generation of living creatures. Hence, the prominence given to the phallus in the solemn processions in honor of the god.

Nicanor (2 Maccabees 14:33) and Antiochus Epiphanes (2 Maccabees 6:7) thought that the cult of Dionysus would not be objectionable to the Jews. Ptolemy Philopator branded the Jews with an ivy-leaf (3 Maccabees 2:29), which was sacred to Dionysus.

Dioscorinthius

Dioscorinthius - di-os-ko-rin'-thi-us: A certain (unidentified) month (2 Maccabees 11:21).

See CALENDAR; TIME.

Dioscuri

Dioscuri - di-os'-ku-ri (Dioscouroi; in Acts 28:11, the King James Version Castor and Pollux, the Revised Version (British and American) THE TWIN BROTHERS; in margin, "Dioscuri"): The sign of the ship on which Paul sailed from Melita to Syracuse and Rhegium. The Dioscuri (i.e. sons of Zeus), Castor and Pollux, are the two chief stars in the constellation of the Twins. Some 4,000 years BC they served as pointers to mark the beginning of the new year by setting together with the first new moon of springtime. The constellation of the Twins was supposed to be especially favorable to sailors, hence, ships were often placed under the protection of the twin gods.

E. W. Maunder

Diotrephes

Diotrephes - di-ot'-re-fez (Diotrephes): A person mentioned in 3 John 1:9-10 as contentiously resisting the writer's authority and forbidding others from exercising the Christian hospitality which he himself refused to show. The words "who loveth to have the preeminence, among them" may indicate that he was a church official, abusing his position.chief stars in the constellation of the Twins. Some 4,000 years BC they served as pointers to mark the beginning of the new year by setting together with the first new moon of springtime. The constellation of the Twins was supposed to be especially favorable to sailors, hence, ships were often placed under the protection of the twin gods.

Dip

Dip - Priests when offering a sin offering were required to dip a finger into the blood of the sacrificed bullock and "to sprinkle of the blood seven times before Yahweh" (compare Leviticus 4:6, et al.). See also the law referring to the cleansing of infected houses (Leviticus 14:51) and the cleansing of a leper (Leviticus 14:16). In all such cases "to dip" is "to moisten," "to besprinkle," "to dip in," the Hebrew Tabhal, or the Greek bapto. See also ASHER. In Psalms 68:23 "dipping" is not translated from the Hebrew, but merely employed for a better understanding of the passage: "Thou mayest crush them, dipping thy foot in blood" (the King James Version "that thy foot may be dipped in the blood"). Revelation 19:13 is a very doubtful passage. the King James Version reads: "a vesture dipped in blood" (from bapto, "to dip"); the Revised Version (British and American) following another reading (either rhaino, or rhantizo, both "to sprinkle"), translates "a garment sprinkled with blood." the Revised Version, margin gives "dipped in."

Diphath

Diphath - di'-fath (diphath): A son of Gomer, son of Japheth, son of Noah (1 Chronicles 1:6), called RIPHATH (which see) in the corresponding genealogy in Genesis 10:3.

Disallow

Disallow - dis-a-lou': "To disallow" as used in the Scriptures means either "to oppose," "not permit" (Hebrew no', Numbers 30:5, 8, 11), or "to reject" (Greek apodokimazo, literally, "to consider useless," 1 Peter 2:4, 7 the King James Version, the Revised Version (British and American) "rejected").

Disannul

Disannul - dis-a-nul'.

See ANNUL.

Disappoint

Disappoint - dis-a-point': "To disappoint" may be used transitively or intransitively. In the former case it naturally has a more forceful meaning. Therefore the Revised Version (British and American) changes the translation of the King James Version wherever "disappoint" is used with an object: Job 5:12, "frustrateth"; Psalms 17:13, "confront him," the Revised Version, margin "forestall"; Judith 16:6, "brought them to nought"; but the Revised Version (British and American) retains "disappoint" where the person wh disappoints is not expressed. Compare Proverbs 15:22.

Discern

Discern - di-zurn': Five Hebrew words are thus translated: bin, yadha`, nakhar, ra'ah and shama`. It may simply mean "observe" (bin), "I discerned among the youths" (Proverbs 7:7); or discriminating knowlege, "A wise man's heart discerneth time and judgment" (Ecclesiastes 8:5, yadha`); "He discerned him not, because his hands," etc. (Genesis 27:23, nakhar); "Then shall ye return and discern between the righteous and the wicked" (Malachi 3:18, ra'ah); "So is my lord the king to discern good," etc. (2 Samuel 14:17, shama`). In the New Testament the words anakrino, diakrino and dokimazo are thus translated, expressing close and distinct acquaintance with or a critical knowledge of things. Used in 1 Corinthians 2:14 the King James Version of "the things of the spirit of God"; in 1 Corinthians 11:29 of "the (Lord's) body" in the sacrament; in Matthew 16:3 of "the face of the heaven"; in Hebrews 5:14 of a clear knowledge of good and evil as the prerogative of a full-grown man. See also next article.

Henry E. Dosker

Discernings of Spirits

Discernings of Spirits - di-zurn'-inz, (diakriseis pneumaton, "judicial estimation," "through judgment or separation"): Occurs in 1 Corinthians 12:10 as being one of the gifts of the Spirit. The Greek word occurs in Hebrews 5:14; and Romans 14:1: "But him that is weak in faith receive ye, yet not for decision of scruples." This translation scarcely expresses the meaning, which Thayer has freely rendered, "not for the purpose of passing judgment on opinions, as to which one is to be preferred as the more correct." Taking these three passages together it is evident that the Greek term which is rendered "discerning" means a distinguishing or discriminating between things that are under consideration; hence, the one who possessed the gift of "discernings of spirits" was able to make distinction between the one who spoke by the Spirit of God and the one who was moved by a false spirit. This gift seems to have been exercised chiefly upon those who assumed the role of teachers, and it was especially important in those days, because there were many false teachers abroad (see 2 John 1:7; Acts 20:29-30).

Disciple

Disciple - di-si'-p'-l:

(1) Usually a substantive (mathetes, "a learner," from manthano, "to learn"; Latin discipulus, "a scholar"): The word is found in the Bible only in the Gospels and Acts. But it is good Greek, in use from Herodotus down, and always means the pupil of someone, in contrast to the master or teacher (didaskalos). See Matthew 10:24; Luke 6:40. In all cases it implies that the person not only accepts the views of the teacher, but that he is also in practice an adherent. The word has several applications. In the widest sense it refers to those who accept the teachings of anyone, not only in belief but in life. Thus the disciples of John the Baptist (Matthew 9:14; Luke 7:18; John 3:25); also of the Pharisees (Matthew 22:16; Mark 2:18; Luke 5:33); of Moses (John 9:28). But its most common use is to designate the adherents of Jesus. (a) In the widest sense (Matthew 10:42; Luke 6:17; John 6:66, and often). It is the only name for Christ's followers in the Gospels. But (b) especially the Twelve Apostles, even when they are called simply the disciples (Matthew 10:1; 11:1; 12:1, et al.). In the Acts, after the death and ascension of Jesus, disciples are those who confess Him as the Messiah, Christians (Acts 6:1-2, 7; 9:36 (feminine, mathetria); Acts 11:26, "The disciples were called Christians"). Even half-instructed be-lievers who had been baptized only with the baptism of John are disciples (Acts 19:1-4).

(2) We have also the verb, matheteuo, "Jesus' disciple" (literally, "was discipled to Jesus," Matthew 27:57); "Make disciples of all the nations" (the King James Version "teach," Matthew 28:19); "had made many disciples" (the King James Version "taught many," Acts 14:21); "every scribe who hath been made a disciple to the kingdom of heaven" (the King James Version "instructed," Matthew 13:52). The disciple of Christ today may be described in the words of Farrar, as "one who believes His doctrines, rests upon His sacrifice, imbibes His spirit, and imitates His example."

The Old Testament has neither the term nor the exact idea, though there is a difference between teacher and scholar among David's singers (1 Chronicles 25:8), and among the prophetic guilds the distinction between the rank and file and the leader (1 Samuel 19:20; 2 Kings 6:5).

G. H. Trever

Discipline

Discipline - dis'-i-plin (mucar): In the King James Version only in Job 36:10, where it refers to moral discipline, the strenuous cultivation of the righteous life; the Revised Version (British and American) "instruction." the Revised Version (British and American) in 2 Timothy 1:7 has "discipline" for a Greek word (sophronismos) meaning "sobering"; in 2 Timothy 3:16 margin, for Greek paideia, "instruction." In classic Greek paideia means "education," mental culture. Through the influence of the Septuagint, which translates the Hebrew mucar by paideia, the meaning of "chastisement" accompanies paideia in the New Testament. Compare Hebrews 12:5, 7-8, 11.

See CHASTISEMENT ; and for ecclesiastical discipline see CHURCH.

Discomfit; Discomfiture

Discomfit; Discomfiture - dis-kum'-fit, dis-kum'-fi-tur (hum, mehumah): These words are now obsolete or at least obsolescent and are confined in Biblical literature wholly to the Old Testament. The meaning in general is "to annoy," "harass," "confuse," "rout" and "destroy." The most common usage is that based upon the root meaning, "to trouble" or "annoy," sometimes to the point of destruction (Joshua 10:10; Judges 4:15; 1 Samuel 7:10; 2 Samuel 22:15).

The King James Version errs in the translation in Isaiah 31:8, where the meaning is obviously "to become subject to task work" or "to place a burden upon one." There seems also to be an unwarranted use of the word in Numbers 14:45, where it means rather "to bruise" or "strike." The purest use is perhaps in 1 Samuel 14:20, where the statement is made that "every man's sword was against his fellow, and there was a very great discomfiture."

Walter G. Clippinger

Discourse

Discourse - dis-kors': In the Revised Version (British and American) of Acts 20:7, 9, the translation of Greek dialegomai (the King James Version "preach"), elsewhere rendered, according to the implications of the context, "reason" or "dispute," as Acts 17:2; 19:9 (the King James Version "disputing," the Revised Version (British and American) "reasoning"); Jude 1:9.

Discover

Discover - dis-kuv'-er: In modern usage the word "discover" signifies "to get first sight or knowledge of," "to ascertain," or "to explore." Such usage appears in 1 Samuel 22:6 of the discovery of David's hiding-place, where the Hebrew uses yadha`. In the King James Version the word "discover" often occurs in a sense now archaic or even obsolete. (Note in the cases cited below the Hebrew word is galah, except Jeremiah 13:26 (chashaph, "to make bare") and Habakkuk 3:13 (`arar, "to make naked").) (1) "To exhibit," "uncover" (or "betray"), in which examples the English Revised Version also reads with the King James Version "discover"; the American Standard Revised Version "uncover" (Exodus 20:26; Job 12:22; Isaiah 57:8 ("discovered thyself" the King James Version and the English Revised Version); Jeremiah 13:26; Lamentations 2:14; Hosea 7:1; Nahum 3:5). (2) "To cause to be no longer a covering," "to lay bare" (2 Samuel 22:16 the King James Version). (3) "To bring to light," "disclose" (1 Samuel 14:8, 11 (the English Revised Version with the King James Version "discover")). (4) "To unmask" or "reveal oneself" (Proverbs 18:2 the King James Version). (5) "To take away the covering of" (Isaiah 22:8 the King James Version). (6) "To lay bare" (Habakkuk 3:13). In Psalms 29:9, the King James Version reads: "The voice of the Lord .... discovereth the forests," where the Revised Version (British and American) reads, "strippeth the forests bare," i.e. "strippeth the forests of their leaves" (Perowne, The Psalms, I, 248); "strippeth bare the forests" (Briggs, Psalms, I, 251, 253).

In the New Testament (the King James Version), the word "discover" occurs as a translation of the Greek anaphanantes in Acts 21:3, and for katenooun in Acts 27:39, where the Revised Version (British and American) reads in the first instance "had come in sight of," and in the latter case "perceived."

W. N. Stearns

Discrepancies, Biblical

Discrepancies, Biblical - dis-krep'-an-siz, bib'-li-kal:

1. Definition: By this term should be understood substantial disagreements in the statements of Biblical writers. Such disagreements might subsist between the, statements of different writers or between the several statements of a single writer. Contradictions of Biblical views from extra-Biblical sources as history, natural science, philosophy, do not fall within the scope of our subject.

2. Criticism versus Doctrine of Inerrancy: Observant Bible readers in every age have noted, with various degrees of insight, that the Scriptures exhibit manifold interior differences and contrasts. Differences of literary form and method have ever seemed, except to those who maintained a mechanical theory of inspiration, wholly natural and fitting. Moreover, that there was progress in the Biblical revelation, especially that the New Testament of Jesus Christ signifies a vastly richer revelation of God than the Old Testament, has been universally recognized. In fulfilling the law and the prophets Christ put a marked distance between Himself and them, yet He certainly affirmed rather than denied them. The Christian church has ever held to the essential unity of the Divine library of the Holy Scriptures. Moreover, the evangelical churches have recognized the Bible as "the only and sufficient rule of both faith and practice." Indeed, in the generation following the Reformation, the strictest and most literal theory of inspiration and inerrancy found general acceptance. Over against such a body of presuppositions, criticism, some generations later, began to allege certain errors and discrepancies in the Bible. Of course the orthodox sought to repel all these claims; for they felt that the Bible, whatever the appearances might seem to indicate, must be free from error, else it could not be the word of God. So there came with criticism a long period of sturdy defense of the strictest doctrine of Biblical inerrancy. Criticism, however, kept on its way. It has forced the church to find a deeper and surer ground of confidence in the authority of the Bible as the witness to God's self-revelation to man. In our day the church has for the most part overcome the notion that the certainty of the saving grace of God in Christ stands or falls with the absolute inerrancy of each several statement contained in the Bible. Still there remains, and doubtless ever must remain, a need of a clear understanding of the issue involved in the allegation--along with other "human limitations"--of Biblical discrepancies.

3. Synopsis of the Argument: Alleged discrepancies pertain (1) to statements of specific, concrete facts, and (2) to the utterance of principles and doctrines. Under the first head fall disagreements respecting numbers, dates, the form and order of historical events, records of spoken words, geography, natural history, etc. Under the second head fall disagreements respecting moral and religious truths, the "superhistorical" realities and values. Our inquiry resolves itself into three parts: (1) to determine whether there be discrepancies, of either or both sorts, in the Bible; (2) to obtain at least a general understanding of the conditions and causes that may have given rise to the discrepancies, real or apparent; (3) to determine their significance for faith.

4. Alleged Discrepancies Pertaining to Facts: As to the first point, it should be observed that apparent inconsistencies may not be real ones; as so often in the past, so again it may come about that the discovery of further data may resolve many an apparent contradiction. On the other hand, the affirmation a priori that there can be and are no real discrepancies in the Bible is not only an outrage upon the human understanding, but it stands also in contradiction to the spirit of freedom that is of faith. Besides, it should not be overlooked that the discoveries of modern historical and archaeological research, which have tended to confirm so many Biblical statements, seem just as surely to reveal error in others. In any event we must bow to reality, and we may do this with fearless confidence in "the God of things as they are." But are there real discrepancies in the Bible? It is no part of the present plan to attempt the impossible and at all events useless task of exhibiting definite statistics of all the alleged discrepancies, or even of all the principal ones. Passing by the childish folly that would find a "discrepancy" in mere rhetorical antitheses, such as that in Proverbs 26:4-5 ("Answer not a fool," and "Answer a fool according to his folly"), or instances of merely formal contrariety of expression, where the things intended are manifestly congruous (e.g. Matthew 12:30; Luke 11:23 contrasted with Mark 9:40; Luke 9:50: "He that is not with me is against me," "He that is not against us is for us"), it will serve our purpose to notice a few representative examples of real or apparent discrepancy. The chronologies of Kings and Chronicles are inconsistent (compare CHRONOLOGY OF THE OLD TESTAMENT). The genealogies in Genesis 46:1-34; Numbers 26:1-65; 1 Chronicles 2:7 show considerable variations. The two lists of exiles who returned with Zerubbabel (Ezra 2:1-70; Nehemiah 7:6 ff) show many discrepancies, including a marked difference in the enumeration. The accounts of the creation in Genesis 1:1-31 and 2 (compare CREATION)--to take an example dependent upon the results of modern criticism--are mutually independent and in important particulars diverse. But the center of interest in our inquiry is the gospel history. Since Tatian and his Diatessaron in the 2nd century, the variations and contrasts in the Gospels have not only been noted and felt, but many have striven to "harmonize" them. After all, however, there remain some irreducible differences. The Gospels, generally speaking, do not give us ipsissima verba of Jesus; in reporting His discourses they show many variations. In so far as the essential meaning is the same in all, no one speaks of discrepancies; but where the variation clearly involves a difference of meaning (e.g. Matthew 12:39-40 and Luke 11:29-30), one may say that at least a technical discrepancy exists. In recording sayings or events the evangelists manifestly do not always observe the same chronological order; Lk, e.g. records in wholly different connections sayings which Mt includes as parts of the Sermon on the Mount (e.g. the Lord's Prayer, Matthew 6:9 ff; Luke 11:1-4; compare JESUS CHRIST; CHRONOLOGY OF THE NEW TESTAMENT). We have two distinct genealogies of Jesus (Matthew 1:1-16; Luke 3:23 ff; compare GENEALOGY). We may even note that Pilate's superscription over the cross of Jesus is given in four distinct forms. Here, however, the discrepancy is not real except in the most technical sense, and is worth mentioning only to show that the evangelists' interest does not lie in a mere objective accuracy. That a perfect agreement as to the significance of an event exists where there are undeniable discrepancies in external details may be illustrated by the two accounts of the healing of the centurion's servant (Matthew 8:5 ff; Luke 7:1 ff). Of enormously greater interest are the various accounts of the appearances of the risen Christ. If a complete certainty as to the form and order of these events is necessary to faith, the case is not a happy one, for the harmonists have been unable to render a perfect account of these matters (compare JESUS CHRIST; RESURRECTION). Turning from the Gospels to apostolic history, we meet some real problems, e.g. how to relate Paul's autobiographical notes in Galatians 1:1-24 with the accounts in Acts.

5. Alleged Discrepancies Pertaining to Doctrine: The discrepancies thus far noted pertain to historical matters, and not one of them involves the contradiction of a fact in which faith is interested. But are there also real or apparent discrepancies in matters of doctrine? Many scholars maintain, for instance, that the ideal of the prophets and that of the priestly class stand in a relative (not absolute) opposition to each other (compare, e.g. Isaiah 1:11; Micah 6:8 with the ritualism of Lev and Dt). Or, to turn to the New Testament, some would assert--among them Luther--that James stands in opposition to Paul in respect to faith and works (compare James 2:17 ff in contrast with Galatians 2:16 and many other passages in Paul). But particular interest attaches to the problem of Christ's attitude toward the Old Testament law. His "but I say unto you" (Matthew 5:22 and passim) has been interpreted by many as a distinct contradiction of the Old Testament. Another question of acute interest is the agreement of the Johannine picture of Jesus with that of the Synoptists.

It can scarcely require proof that some of these alleged discrepancies are not such at all. For example, Jesus' attitude toward the Old Testament was one of profound reverence and affirmation. He was perfectly conscious that the Old Testament law represented a stage in the Divine education of mankind. His "but I say unto you" was not a denying of the degree of advancement represented by the Old Testament law, but a carrying out of the principle of the law to its full expression (compare LAW; FULFIL). Of course, the Divine education of Israel did not mean the mere inculcation of the truth in a fallow and hitherto unoccupied soil. There was much superstition and error to be overcome. If then one should insist that the errors, which revelation was destined to overcome, still manifest themselves here and there in the Old Testament, it may be replied that at all events the one grand tendency of Divine revelation is unmistakably clear. An idea is not "Scriptural" simply by virtue of its having been incidentally expressed by a Biblical writer, but because it essentially and inseparably belongs to the organic whole of the Biblical testimony. In the case of James versus Paul the antithesis is one of emphasis, not of contradiction of a first principle. And as for the variations in the gospel history, these do not deserve to be called real discrepancies so long as the Gospels unite in giving one harmonious picture and testimony concerning the personal life and the work and teaching of Jesus. Even from this point of view, John, though so much more theological, preaches the same Christ as the Synoptists.

6. Causes of Discrepancies: As to the conditions under which discrepancies may arise, it may suffice, first, to call attention to the general law that God in revealing Himself to men and in moving men by His Spirit to speak or write, never lifts them out of the normal relations of human intelligence, so far as matters of history or science are concerned. It is their witness to Himself and His will which is the result of revelation and inspiration. Their references to history and Nature are not therefore in any sense super-human; accordingly they have no direct authority for faith (compare REVELATION; INSPIRATION). On this basis the divergences of human traditions or documents as exhibited in different genealogies, chronologies and the like are natural in the best sense and wholly fitting. As for the rest, errors of copyists have played a part.

7. Their Significance for Faith: Faith, however, has no interest in explaining away the human limitations in God's chosen witnesses. It is God's way to place the heavenly "treasure in earthen vessels" (2 Corinthians 4:7). It seems that God has purposely led the church to see, through the necessity of recognizing the human limitations of the Bible, just where her faith is grounded. God has made Himself known through His Son. The Scriptures of the New Testament, and of the Old Testament in preparation for Him, give us a clear and sufficient testimony to the Christ of God. The clearness and persuasive power of that testimony make all questions of verbal and other formal agreement essentially irrelevant. The certainty that God has spoken unto us in His Son and that we have this knowledge through the Scripture testimony lifts us above all anxious concern for the possible errors of the witnesses in matters evidently nonessential.

LITERATURE.

Besides the literature noted under REVELATION and INSPIRATION, see J. W. Haley, An Examination of the Alleged Discrepancies of the Bible, Andover, 1873; M. S. Terry, Biblical Hermeneutics, New York, 1883; Kahler, Zur Bibelf rage, Leipzig, 1907.

J. R. Van Pelt

Discus

Discus - dis'-kus (diskos, "the summons of the discus," 2 Maccabees 4:14 margin, "to the game of the discus," the King James Version "the game of discus"): The discus was a round stone slab or metal plate of considerable weight (a kind of quoit), the contest of throwing which to the greatest distance was one of the exercises in the Greek gymnasia, being included in the pentathlon. It was introduced into Jerusalem by Jason the high priest in the time of Antiochus Epiphanes, 175-164 BC, in the Palaestra he had formed there in imitation of the Greek games. His conduct led to his being described in 2 Maccabees 4:13, 14 as that "ungodly man" through whom even the priests forsook their duties to play at the discus. A statue of a discobolos (discus-thrower) is in the British Museum. From discus we have the words "disc," "dish," "desk."

See GAMES.

W. L. Walker

Disease; Diseases

Disease; Diseases - di-zez', di-zez'-iz (chalah, choli; nosos): Palestine, from its position and physical conditions, ought to be a healthy country. That it is not so depends on the unsanitary conditions in which the people live and the absence of any attempts to check the introduction or development of zymotic diseases. The number of marshes or pools is fairly small, and the use of active measures to destroy the larvae of mosquitos might easily diminish or abolish the malarial fevers which now prevail all over the country. The freeing of Ismailieh and Port Said from these pests is an object-lesson in sanitation. When one examines the conditions of life in towns and villages all over the country, the evidences of the ravages of these fevers and their sequelae appear on every hand as they affect all ages from infancy to middle age, and one meets but few individuals of extreme old age. The absence of any adequate system of drainage and the pollution of the water supplies are also factors of great importance in preserving this unhealthiness.

In ancient times it was regarded as healthier than Egypt, as it well might be, hence, the diseases of Egypt are referred to as being worse than those of Palestine (Deuteronomy 7:15; 28:60; Amos 4:10). The sanitary regulations and restrictions of the Priestly Code would doubtless have raised the standard of public health, but it is unlikely that these were ever observed over any large area.

The types of disease which are referred to in the Bible are those that still prevail. Fevers of several kinds, dysentery, leprosy, intestinal worms, plague, nervous diseases such as paralysis and epilepsy, insanity, ophthalmia and skin diseases are among the commonest and will be described under their several names. Methods of treatment are described under MEDICINE; PHYSICIAN. The word "disease" or "diseases" in the King James Version is changed to "sickness" in the Revised Version (British and American) in 2 Kings 1:2; 8:8; Matthew 9:35, and left out in John 5:4; while in Matthew 8:17 "sicknesses" is replaced by "diseases." the Revised Version (British and American) also changes "infirmity" in Luke 7:21 to "diseases," and in Psalms 38:7 "a loathsome disease" is changed to "burning."

Alex. Macalister

Diseases of the Eye

Diseases of the Eye - See EYES, DISEASES OF THE.

Dish

Dish - The rendering in English Versions of the Bible in some connections of three Hebrew and one Greek word. The qe`arah of Exodus 25:29; 37:16; Numbers 4:7 was apparently a kind of salver, in this case of gold, for holding the loaves of the "presence bread." The same word represents the silver "platters" (Numbers 7:13 ff) brought by the princes as a dedication gift. The cephel of Judges 5:25 was a large bowl, so translated in Judges 6:38. "Lordly dish" is literally, "bowl of (fit for) nobles." The tsallachath of 2 Kings 21:13; Proverbs 19:24; 26:15 (last two the King James Version "bosom" after the Septuagint) refers probably to the wide, deep dish in which the principal part of the meal was served. Of somewhat similar form may have been the trublion Septuagint for qe`arah) mentioned in connection with the Passover meal (Matthew 26:23; Mark 14:20).

Benjamin Reno Downer

Dishan; Dishon

Dishan; Dishon - di'-shan, di'-shon (dishan, dishon, "antelope," "pygarg"): A Horite clan, mentioned as the youngest "son" and elsewhere as the "grandson" of Seir. The form Dishon occurs several times in the list of Horite clans, together with many other totem names (Genesis 36:1-43 passim; 1 Chronicles 1:38, 41). See Gray,HPN , 89.

Dishonesty

Dishonesty - dis-on'-es-ti: Only in 2 Corinthians 4:2, the King James Version rendering of Greek aischune; the King James Version elsewhere and the Revised Version (British and American) uniformly, "shame."

Disobedience; Disobedient

Disobedience; Disobedient - dis-o-be'-di-ens, (marah; apeitheo, parakouo): The word used chiefly in the New Testament has the general meaning of a lack of regard for authority or rulership. The stronger meaning of actual stubbornness or violence is perhaps conveyed in the Old Testament (1 Kings 13:26; Nehemiah 9:26; compare 1 Kings 13:21).

In the New Testament there seem to be two rather clearly defined uses of the word, one objective and practical, the other ethical and psychological. The first refers more to conduct, the second to belief and one's mental attitude toward the object of disobedience. To the first belong such passages as refer to the overt act of disobedience to one's parents (Romans 1:30; 2 Timothy 3:2). Illustrating this more fully, the translation according to the King James Version of 1 Timothy 1:9 is given as "unruly" in the Revised Version (British and American). By far the greater emphasis, however, is placed upon the distinctly ethical quality in which disobedience is really an attitude of the mind and finds its essence in a heart of unbelief and unfaithfulness (1 Peter 2:7-8; Ephesians 2:2; 5:6; Colossians 3:6). In the latter three references "children (sons) of disobedience" are mentioned, as if one should become the very offspring of such an unhappy and unholy state of mind. The classic phrase of New Testament literature (Acts 26:19) contains both the practical and the ethical aspects. Paul's convictions were changed by the vision and his conduct was made to conform immediately to it.

Walter G. Clippinger

Disorderly

Disorderly - dis-or'-der-li (ataktos): The word is found four times in the Epistles to the Thess (1 Thessalonians 5:14; 2 Thessalonians 3:6-7, 11), "Withdraw yourselves from every brother that walketh disorderly."; "We behaved not ourselves disorderly."; "We hear of some that walk among you disorderly." The word is a military term and has reference to the soldier who does not keep the ranks (inordinatus, Liv). Then it refers to people who refuse to obey the civil laws, and thus it gets its meaning, "disorderly." It points to members in the early church, who, by their lives, became a reproach to the gospel of Christ (compare 1 Thessalonians 4:11-12).

Henry E. Dosker

Dispatch

Dispatch - dis-pach': Occurs Tobit 7:8 in the sense of dispatch of business, "Let this business be dispatched" (the Revised Version (British and American) "finished"); 2 Maccabees 12:18, "before he had dispatched anything" (the Revised Version (British and American) "without accomplishing"); Wisdom of Solomon 11:19 (20) in the sense of finishing, destroying, "dispatch them at once" (the Revised Version (British and American) "consume"); 2 Maccabees 9:4 "dispatch the journey" (katanuein), which may mean "finish it q Revised Version (British and American) spells "despatch."

Dispensation

Dispensation - dis-pen-sa'-shun: The Greek word (oikonomia) so translated signifies primarily, a stewardship, the management or disposition of affairs entrusted to one. Thus 1 Corinthians 9:17, the King James Version "A dispensation of the gospel is committed unto me," the Revised Version (British and American) "I have stewardship entrusted to me." The idea is similar in Ephesians 3:2 parallel Colossians 1:25 (the Revised Version, margin "stewardship"). In Ephesians 1:10 God's own working is spoken of as "dispensation."

Dispersion of Nations

Dispersion of Nations - See BABEL; DISPERSION; TABLE OF NATIONS.

Dispersion, The

Dispersion, The - dis-pur'-shun, (diaspora):

1. Golah and Dispersion

2. Purpose of Dispersion

3. Causes of Dispersion

4. Extent of Dispersion

5. The Eastern Dispersion

6. The Egyptian Dispersion

7. Testimony of Aramaic Papyri

8. Jewish Temple at Syene

9. Theories of the Syene Settlement

10. Importance of the Discovery

11. A New Chapter of Old Testament History

12. Alexandrian Judaism

13. The Jews and Hellenism

14. The Septuagint

15. Early Evidence of a Jewish Community

16. The Dispersion in Syria

17. In Arabia

18. In Asia Minor

19. Among Greeks Proper

20. The Roman Dispersion

21. Jews and Pompey

22. Jews and the First Caesars

23. Influence of Jews in the Early Roman Empire

24. Jews in Italy, Gaul, Spain and North Africa. 25. The Numbers of the Dispersion

26. Jewish Proselytism

27. Internal Organization

28. Unity of the Jewish People

29. Dispersion Influenced by Greek Thought

30. The Dispersion a Preparation for the Advent of Christ

31. The Dispersion an Auxiliary to the Spread of the Gospel

1. Golah and Dispersion: The Dispersion is the comprehensive designation applied to Jews living outside of Palestine and maintaining their religious observances and customs among the Gentiles. They were known as the Golah (Aramaic Galutha'), the captivity--an expression describing them in relation to their own land; and the Diaspora, the Dispersion, an expression describing them in relation to the nations among whom they were scattered. On a notable occasion Jesus said, "Ye shall seek me, and shall not find me: and where I am, ye cannot come. The Jews therefore said among themselves, Whither will this man go that we shall not find him? Will he go unto the Dispersion among the Greeks, and teach the Greeks?" (John 7:34-35).

2. Purpose of Dispersion: In 2 Maccabees certain priests of Jerusalem are represented as praying to God: "Gather together our Dispersion, set at liberty them that are in bondage among the heathen" (2 Maccabees 1:27; compare 2 Esdras 2:7; James 1:1; 1 Peter 1:1). The thought of such a Dispersion as a punishment for the disobedience of the people finds frequent expression in the Prophets: Hosea (9:3), Jeremiah (8:3; 16:15, etc.), Ezekiel (1 Peter 4:13), and Zechariah (10:9). And it appears also in the Deuteronomic Law (Deuteronomy 28:25; 30:1). That the Dispersion of the Jews was for the benefit of the Gentiles is a conception to which expression is given in utterances of psalmists and prophets (Psalms 67:1-7; Micah 5:7, etc.). It is found also in the Apocrypha Baruch, a work belonging to the 1st century AD: "I will scatter this people among the Gentiles, that they may do good to the Gentiles" (1:7).

3. Causes of Dispersion: The causes of the Dispersion most obvious to the student of Old Testament history were the Assyrian and Babylonian captivities, when the king of Assyria carried Israel away into his own land and placed them in Halah, and in Habor by the river of Gozan, and in the cities of the Medes (2 Kings 17:5 ff); and when in the reign of Nebuchadrezzar, king of Babylon, Judah was carried away into Babylonia (2 Kings 24:14). See CAPTIVITY. But there were other captivities which helped to scatter the children of Abraham. Ptolemy I of Egypt (322-285 BC) by his expeditions to Palestine and his capture of Jerusalem added largely to the Jewish population of Alexandria. Antiochus the Great of Syria (223-187 BC) removed from the Jewish communities in Mesopotamia and Babylon 2,000 families and settled them in Phrygia and Lydia (Josephus, Ant, XII, iii, 4). Pompey after his capture of Jerusalem in 63 BC carried off hundreds of Jews to Rome, where they were sold as slaves, but, afterward, many of them obtained their freedom and civic rights.

4. Extent of Dispersion: There was, besides, a voluntary emigration of Jewish settlers for purposes of trade and commerce into the neighboring countries, and especially into the chief cities of the civilized world. The successors of Alexander, and their successors in turn, encouraged immigration into their territories and the mingling of nationalities. They needed colonists for the settlements and cities which they established, and with the offer of citizenship and facilities for trade and commerce they attracted many of the Jewish people.

"In this way," says Philo, "Jerus became the capital, not only of Judea, but of many other lands, on account of the colonies which it sent out from time to time into the bordering districts of Egypt, Phoenicia, Syria, Coele-Syria, and into the more distant regions of Pamphylia, Cilicia, the greater part of Asia Minor as far as Bithynia, and the remotest corners of Pontus. And in like manner into Europe: into Thessaly, and Boeotia, and Macedonia, and Aetolia, and Attica and Argos, and Corinth, and into the most fertile and fairest parts of the Peloponnesus. And not only is the continent full of Jewish colonists, but also the most important islands, such as Euboea, Cyprus, and Crete. I say nothing of the countries beyond the Euphrates. All of them except a very small portion, and Babylon, and all the satrapies which contain fruitful land, have Jewish inhabitants" (Philo, Leg ad Caium, 36).

About the middle of the 2nd century BC the Sibylline Oracles could say of the Jewish people: "Every land and every sea is full of thee" (3:271). About the same period the Roman Senate, being anxious to extend protection to the Jews, had a circular letter written in their favor to the kings of Egypt, Syria, Pergamum, Cappadocia and Parthia, and to a great number of provinces, cities and islands of the Mediterranean, where presumably there was a larger or smaller number of Jews (1 Maccabees 15:15 ff). It is no surprise, therefore, to read that for the Feast of Pentecost at Jerusalem, there were present after the ascension of Jesus: "Parthians and Medes and Elamites, and the dwellers in Mesopotamia, in Judea and Cappadocia, in Pontus and Asia, in Phrygia and Pamphylia, in Egypt and the parts of Libya about Cyrene, and sojourners from Rome, both Jews and proselytes, Cretans and Arabians" (Acts 2:9-12).

5. The Eastern Dispersion: The Eastern Dispersion, caused by the Assyrian and Babylonian captivities, seems to have increased and multiplied, and to have enjoyed a considerable measure of liberty, and of prosperity. When the return from the captivity took place Under Zerubbabel, it was only a small proportion of the exiles who sought a home again in the land of their fathers. Nor did the numbers who accompanied Ezra from Babylon greatly diminish the exiles who remained behind. In the time of Christ, Josephus could speak of the Jews in Babylenia by "innumerable myriads" (Ant., XI, v, 2). He also tells us of the 2,000 Jewish families whom Antiochus transferred from Babylon and Mesopotamia to Phrygia and Syria. Of the peculiarities of the Jews as a people living apart and observing their own customs and arousing the ill-will of the neighbors, we have a glimpse in the Persian period in the Book of Est (3:8). Babylonia remained a focus of eastern Judaism for centuries, and from the discussions in rabbinical schools there were elaborated the Talmud of Jerusalem in the 5th century of our era, and the Talmud of Babylon a century later. The two chief centers of Mesopotamian Judaism were Nehardea, a town on the Euphrates, and Nisibis on the Mygdonius; an affluent of the Chaboras, which were also centers of Syrian Christianity.

6. The Egyptian Dispersion: The Egyptian Dispersion is of special interest and importance, and recent discoveries have thrown unexpected light upon it. As far back as the days of Sheshenq, the founder of the 22nd Dynasty, the Shishak of 1 Kings 14:25 f; 2 Chronicles 12:2 f, who invaded Palestine in the 2 Chronicles 10:11-19th century BC, and engraved on the South wall of the great Temple of Karnak the names of many districts and cities he had captured, prisoners of war and hostages may have been carried off to Egypt by the conqueror. At a later time Jewish mercenaries are said to have fought in the expedition of Psammetichus II against Ethiopia, to which expedition belong the famous inscriptions of Abu Simbel (594-589 BC). So we learn from the well-known Letter of Aristeas. But the clearest and best-known example of a settlement of Jews in Egypt is that connected with the prophet Jeremiah. When Gedaliah, the governor of Judea, after the destruction of Jerusalem in 586 BC, had been treacherously murdered, the depressed and dispirited remnant under Johnnan, the son of Kareah, resolved to take flight into Egypt, against the counsel of Jeremiah. A host of fugitives, including Jeremiah and his friend Baruch, accordingly set out thither, and settled at Migdol and Tahpanhes and Noph (Memphis), and in the country of Pathros in upper Egypt (Jeremiah 43:1-13; Jeremiah 44:1-30). It was in Egypt with those fugitives that Jeremiah ended his life. Many of the fugitives were taken prisoners by Nebuchadrezzar on one of his latest expeditions to the west, and were transported to Babylon (Josephus, Ant, X, ix, 7; compare Jeremiah 43:8 f).

7. Testimony of Aramaic Papyri: Of this colony of Jews it is natural to see a strong confirmation in the recent discovery of Aramaic papyri at Assouan, the Syene of the ancients. The papyri were the contents of a deed box of a member of a Jewish colony in upper Egypt, and the deeds refer to house property in which Jews are concerned. Here then at Assouan, about 470 BC is a colony of Jews who have acquired houses and other property, and have become bankers and money lenders, within a century of the death of Jeremiah. In the papyri there is evidence of the existence of a tribunal of the Hebrews, a court where cases could be decided, as fully recognized by law as any of the other courts, Egyptian or Persian, for Egypt, "the basest of kingdoms," was then subject to a Persian suzerain. Most significant of all, Yahweh is acknowledged as the God of the Jews, and the existence of a chapel and even of an altar of sacrifice is beyond all doubt. Evidently these Jews in Egypt did not consider that an altar of Yahweh could not stand anywhere else than at Jerusalem, or that outside Jerusalem the worship of the synagogue was the only worship of the God of their fathers. These facts are rendered still more striking when we regard them as a fulfillment of Isaiah's prophecy: "In that day there shall be five cities in the land of Egypt that speak the language of Canaan, and swear to Yahweh of hosts; one shall be called the city of destruction. In that day there shall be an altar to Yahweh in the midst of the land of Egypt, and a pillar at the border thereof to Yahweh" (Isaiah 19:18-19). These papyri give information similar to that which the clay tablets discovered at Nippur give regarding the house of Murashu Sons (see CAPTIVITY) about the same time--the time when Ezra was setting out from Babylon to restore at Jerusalem the worship of the temple which Zerubbabel had rebuilt. It was just about a century from the time that Jeremiah had gone down to Egypt that we have the first of these deeds, and it was the grandfathers, or great-grandfathers, of the persons concerned whom he had accompanied thither so much against his will.

8. Jewish Temple at Syene: These papyri were discovered in 1904, and a year or two later, additional papyri were discovered in a mound which stands on the site of the ancient Elephantine or Yeb, an island in the Nile, on the frontier also. One of these papyri contains a petition from the Jewish colony in Elephantine addressed to Bagohi (called Bagoas by Josephus, Ant, XI, vii, 7), the Persian governor of Judah, about 408 BC. They ask for assistance to enable them to rebuild the temple of Yahweh in Elephantine, which had been destroyed at the instigation of the priests of the rain-headed Egyptian god Khnub, who had a temple in the fortress of Yeb or Elephantine. This Jewish temple had been erected to Yahweh at least 125 years before and had been spared by Cambyses in 525 BC when he destroyed all the temples erected to the gods of Egypt. The destruction of the temple at Yeb occurred in the 14th year of Darius, 411 BC. It contained an altar for burnt sacrifice, and there were gold and silver vessels in which the blood of sacrifice was collected. The head of the college of priests presenting this petition is Jedoniah, a name found in an abbreviated form in Jadon (Nehemiah 3:7).

9. Theories of the Syene Settlement: An attempt has been made to show that the bearers of these Hebrew names were descended from the captivity of the Northern Kingdom. It is suggested that they had come into Egypt with the Persian army under Cambyses from their adopted homes in Assyria and the cities of the Medes and had obtained possessions on the southern frontier of Egypt. Names believed to point to the Northern Kingdom, like Hosea and Menahem, occur very frequently, but this is too narrow a foundation for such a theory, and the Israelite origin of the Syene colonists is not established (JQR (1907), 441 ff). There is more to be said in favor of the view that they were the descendants of a Jewish military colony. That Jewish mercenaries fought in the campaigns of the Pharaohs we have already seen. And that Elephantine was an important garrison town on the frontier is also certain. Josephus (Ant., XIV, vi, 2) mentions a Jewish military colony holding a post at Pelusium in the century before Christ, and this might be a similar garrison stationed at the opposite extremity of the land in the 5th century. Such a garrison would attract Jews engaged in business and in the occupations of civil life, and so a distinct Jewish community would be formed. It has even been suggested that the tidings of the destruction of the temple at Jerusalem furnished the motive to these Egyptian Jews to build the temple and rear the altar of burnt offering which the heathen priests of Khnub had destroyed.

10. Importance of the Discovery: While the petition to the religious authorities at Jerusalem indicates that the priests of Elephantine regarded their temple as dependent upon the temple at Jerusalem, it is significant. that they were also, as is shown in their letter, in communication with Delaiah and Shelemiah the sons of Sanballat, the governor of Samaria. That this was Nehemiah's enemy (Nehemiah 4:1; 6:1, etc.) is impossible, for he lived nearly a century earlier. But the association with descendants of his, themselves Samaritans, gives a schismatical appearance to the position of the Elephantine temple. The existence of this temple with its priesthood, its altar of sacrifice, and its offerings, from 500 years BC, is an important fact in the history of the Dispersion. It was meant to keep those Jewish exiles true to the religion of their fathers and in religious fellowship with their brethren in Palestine. For a like purpose the Temple of Onias at Leontopolis was erected in the early years of the Maccabean struggle. Onias had to flee from Jerusalem with a number of priests and Levites, and for the aid he rendered to Ptolemy Philometor, the king of Egypt, he received a gift of land upon which he built a temple like to the Temple at Jerusalem. Professor Flinders Petrie believes he has discovered this temple of Onias IV at Tel el-Yehudiyeh (Hyksos and Israelite Cities, 31). The discovery confirms the account given of the temple by Josephus, who is our only authority for its erection (Ant., XIII, iii, 2; XIV, viii, 2).

11. A New Chapter of Old Testament History: The Elephantine-Syene papyri have added a new and valuable chapter to Old Testament history. We know now of a Jewish temple in Egypt which certainly reaches 400 years further into antiquity than the temple of Onias IV at Leontopolis, and we obtain important information as to the relations of its priesthood with the leaders of the Jerusalem Jews and the Samaritans. We know now from unbiased authorities that the Jewish settlements in the Valley of the Nile are much older than has hitherto been believed. We have valuable confirmation not only of the notices in the Book of Jeremiah, but also of the statements in the later Hellenistic literature. Moreover, it is now shown that the skepticism which has prevailed in some quarters as to the very existence of any considerable Egyptian Dispersion before the time of Alexander the Great is unwarranted (Peters, Die judische Gemeinde von Elephantine-Syene, 50 f; Schurer, GJV4, III, 19 f) .

12. Alexandrian Judaism: What exactly were the fortunes of this Jewish community at a later time, no record has yet been found to tell. Possibly it decayed in course of time, for Herodotus who visited Egypt about 450 BC makes no mention of it and found no Jews in sufficient numbers to attract his attention. It was undoubtedly with the founding of Alexandria in 332 BC that the flourishing period of Judaism in Egypt commenced. Alexander the Great had hastened from the field of victory at Issus 333 BC, through Syria by way of Tyre, the siege of which occupied him some months, showing clemency to the inhabitants of Jerusalem and severity to the recalcitrant inhabitants of Gaza till by its eastern gate he entered Egypt and took possession of the land of the Pharaohs. The Jews appear to have been friendly to Macedonian conquest, and in Alexander's new city they received the rights of citizenship and two quarters all to themselves. That they were restricted to their own quarters does not appear, and in the time of Philo, at the commencement of the Christian era, they had synagogues and places of prayer in all parts of the city. Alexander died in 323 BC but the favor which he had accorded to the Jews was continued by the Ptolemies who succeeded to his Egyptian empire. The first Ptolemy, Lagi or Soter (322-285 BC), increased the Jewish population of Alexandria by raids into Palestine on which he brought back a large number of captives, both Jews and Samaritans. Other Jews, hearing of his liberality and of the prosperity of their coreligionists, were attracted to Egypt and settled in Alexandria of their own accord (Josephus, Ant, XII, i, 1). Under their own ethnarch they enjoyed great prosperity and had full religious liberty. The principal synagogue of the city was on a scale of great magnificence. In the reign of Ptolemy Philometor (182-146 BC) they were allowed to set up the temple at Leontopolis, as we have already noticed. In the time of Philo the Jewish colony in Egypt was considered to number a million.

13. The Jews and Hellenism: It was in Alexandria that the Jews first came so powerfully under the influence of Hellenism, and here that the peculiar Greco-Jewish philosophy sprang up of which Philo was the most notable representative. The same soil was eminently favorable to early Christianity which had from the end of the 2nd century onward its greatest teachers and their learned catechetical school.

See ALEXANDRIA.

14. The Septuagint: The great monument of Hellenistic Judaism, which had its chief seat in Alexandria, is the Septuagint translation of the Old Testament, which became such a powerful praeparatio evangelica, and was the Bible of the Apostles and the first Christians, even of the Lord Jesus Christ Himself. It is ascribed in the Letter of Aristeas to the interest of Ptolemy II Philadelphus (285-247 BC) in a proposal to secure a copy of the Jewish Law in an accessible translation for the famous Royal Library. It is more likely that as familiarity with their Hebrew tongue diminished in their new surroundings, the need of an intelligible version of the Law to begin with was felt, and Jewish hands were set to work to produce it. In course of time the rest followed, but from the tradition of its being the work of 70 or 72 translators it is known as the Septuagint.

See SEPTUAGINT.

15. Early Evidence of a Jewish Community: The question has been raised whether too much has not been made of a Jewish community in Alexandria so early, and it has been asserted that we can scarcely speak of a Jewish Dispersion anywhere before the Maccabean period in the second half of the 2nd century BC. The evidence as we have seen points to the existence of Jewish communities continuously from the days of Jeremiah. Papyri prove the presence of Jews in Egypt, not only in the towns but in country districts from a comparatively early period. A remarkable inscription has recently come to light showing that at Schedia, some 20 miles from Alexandria, there existed a Jewish community which had built a synagogue and dedicated it to the honor of Ptolemy III Euergetes (247-222 BC) and his queen Berenice. If such a community was organized in the little town of Schedia at that date, we can well believe the cosmopolitan city of Alexandria to have had a considerable Jewish community at a still earlier date.

16. Dispersion in Syria: When we turn to Syria, we find large numbers of Jews, notwithstanding the hatred of Greeks and Syrians. Josephus (BJ, VII, iii, 3) says that it is the country which has the largest percentage of Jewish inhabitants, and Antioch among the towns of Syria had the preeminence. In Damascus, which seems to have had a Jewish quarter or Jewish bazaars in the days of Ahab (1 Kings 20:34 and Burney's note at the place), the Jewish population was numbered by thousands. From Galilee and Gilead and the region of the Hauran, Judas Maccabeus and his brother Jonathan brought bodies of Jews, who were settlers among a pagan population, for safety to Judea (1 Maccabees 5).

17. In Arabia: Even in Arabia Judaism had considerable footing. Edward Glaser, who prosecuted valuable archaeological researches in Arabia (see Hilprecht, Recent Researches in Bible Lands, 131 ff), professes to have found Himyaritic inscriptions of the 4th and 5th centuries of our era which are monotheistic and therefore Jewish, but there is still uncertainty as to this. In the beginning of the 6th century a Jewish king actually reigned in Arabia, and because of his persecution of the Christians he was attacked and overthrown by the Christian king of Abyssinia.

18. In Asia Minor: Of the widespread distribution of the Dispersion in Asia Minor there is abundant testimony, not only in the texts of the apostles, but in classical and early Christian literature and in the epigraphic literature which has been accumulating for the last 30 years. At Pergamum, in Lydia, in Karia, at Magnesia, at Tralles, at Miletum, in Cappadocia, Bithynia, and Pontus, considerable Jewish communities existed at the beginning of the Christian era. At Smyrna the Jews played a prominent part in the death of Polycarp 155 AD, being especially zealous in heaping up fagots upon the fire that consumed the martyr. In his Cities and Bishoprics of Phrygia Sir William Ramsay mentions numerous indications found on inscriptions of Jewish settlers, and his chapter on "The Jews in Phrygia" focuses the results of his inquiries (op. cit., 667 ff; compare 649 ff). He has also made it extremely probable that long before Paul's day there was a strong body of Jews in Tarsus of Cilicia, and he holds that a Jewish colony was settled there as early as 171 BC. "The Seleucid kings," he says, like the Ptolemies, "used the Jews as an element of the colonies which they founded to strengthen their hold on Phrygia and other countries." But it is difficult to trace out the profound influence they exerted in the development of their country from the fact that they adopted to such an extent Greek and Roman names and manners, and were thus almost indistinguishable. At Laodicea and Hierapolis there have been found many evidences of their presence: for example, at the latter place an inscription on a gravestone tells how the deceased Publius Aelius Glycon mortified a sum of money to provide for the decoration of his tomb every year at the Feast of Unleavened Bread.

19. Among Greeks Proper: The Dispersion among the Greeks proper had attained to considerable dimensions in the time of Christ. Philo, as noticed above, mentions Thessaly, Boeotia, Macedonia, Aetolia, Attica, Argos, Corinth and the fairest and most fertile parts of the Peloponnesus as having Jewish inhabitants. Inscriptions recovered from Delphi and elsewhere relating to the manumission of slaves in the 2nd century BC contain the names of Jews (Deissmann, Light from the Ancient East, 325 f). In Sparta and Sicyon, Jews lived in the days of the Maccabees (1 Maccabees 15:23). At Philippi we know from Acts 16:16 there was a proseuche, or place of of prayer, and at Thessalonica, Berea, Athens, Corinth there were synagogues in Paul's time. On the islands of the Greek archipelago and the Mediterranean there were Jews. Cyprus, the home of Barnabas, had a large Jewish population; and Euboea and Crete are named by Philo as Jewish centers. Rhodes has the distinction of having produced two opponents of Judaism in the first half of the 1st century BC. Clearchus of Soli, a disciple of Aristotle, introduces in one of his dialogues a Jew from Coele-Syria, Hellenic not in speech only but in mind, representing him as having come in his travels to Asia Minor and there conversed with Aristotle. Such an experience may have been rare so early; the incident may not be fact, but fiction; yet such as it is it tells a tale of the spread of Judaism.

20. The Roman Dispersion: The relations of Rome with the Jewish people lend special interest to the Dispersion there. Jews do not appear to have been settled in Rome before the Maccabean period. There is a certain pathos in the appeal made to the Roman state by Judas Maccabeus, amid the difficulties that were gathering round his position, for "a league of amity and confederacy" with the Roman people (1 Maccabees 8:17-32). His brother and successor, Jonathan, followed this up later (1 Maccabees 12:1-4, 16). And in 140 BC Simon sent a delegation which concluded a treaty, offensive and defensive, with Rome, which was duly intimated by the Senate to their allies in various countries, especially of the East. During the stay of the mission at Rome its members seem to have made attempts at religious propagandism, and the praetor Hispalus compelled them to return to their homes for attempting to corrupt Roman morals by introducing the worship of Jupiter Sabazius which is no doubt the Roman interpretation of the Lord of Hosts (Yahweh Sabaoth). But ere long in Rome, as in Alexandria, they formed a colony by themselves, occupying Trastevere, the Transtiberine portion of the city, together with an island in the Tiber. Their prosperity grew with their numbers. When Cicero in 59 BC was defending Flaccus he speaks of gold being sent out of Italy, and all the provinces, to Jerusalem, and there was present among his listeners a large body of Jews interested in the case.

21. Jews and Pompey: When Pompey had captured Jerusalem in 63 BC, he brought back with him to Rome a number of Jewish captives. They were sold as slaves, but many of them received their freedom and rights to citizenship. When Julius Caesar, who was a great patron and protector of the Jews, was assassinated, they wept over him for nights on end.

22. Jews and the First Caesars: Augustus protected and encouraged them. Tiberius, however, adopted repressive measures toward them, and 4,000 Jews were deported by him to Sardinia while others were driven out of the city. With the downfall of Sejanus, the unworthy favorite of Tiberius, this repressive policy was reversed and they were allowed to return to Rome. Claudius again devised measures against them (circa 50 AD), and they were banished from the city. They had, however, so multiplied and they had attained such influence that it was impossible to get rid of them altogether.

23. Influence of Jews in the Early Roman Empire: Their customs and religious observances brought down upon them the scorn of Juvenal and others, while Empire their faith and worship had attractions for the thoughtful and the superstitious.

"The Jews from the time of the first Caesar," says Sir Samuel Dill, "have worked their way into every class of society. A Jewish prince had inspired Caligula with an oriental ideal of monarchy. There were adherents of Judaism in the household of the great freedmen of Claudius, and their growing influence and turbulence compelled that emperor to expel the race from his capital. The worldly, pleasure-loving Poppea had, perhaps, yielded to the mysterious charms of the religion of Moses. But it was under the Flavians, who had such close associations with Judea, that Jewish influences made themselves most felt. And in the reign of Domitian, two members of the imperial house, along with many others, suffered for following the Jewish mode of life" (Roman Society from Nero to Marcus Aurelius, 84).

In recent excavations, which have laid bare much of subterranean Rome, many Jewish tombs have been examined and have yielded much additional knowledge of the conditions of Jewish life in the capital of the Caesars. Probably Jews gracing Pompey's triumph after his Syrian campaign, 61 BC, made the first Roman catacombs similar to those on Jewish hillsides and especially round Jerusalem; and in these Jewish catacombs pagans and Christians were never laid.

24. Jews in Italy, Gaul, Spain and North Africa: In Italy, apart from Roman and Southern Italy, where they were widely spread, the number of Jews at the beginning of our era was not large. In Southern Gaul they were numerous and in Spain they were numerous and powerful. In North Africa there were Jewish communities in many centers, and Cyrene was the home of a large and flourishing Jewish population.

25. The Numbers of the Dispersion: It is not easy to form a trustworthy estimate of the Jewish population of the world in the times of Christ. Harnack reckons up four or four and a half millions (Expansion of Christianity, I, 10) within the Roman Empire. The Judaism of the Dispersion would at least be several times more numerous than the Judaism of Palestine.

26. Jewish Proselytism: The question has been discussed how far the Jews of the Dispersion recruited their ranks by proselytism. That they should maintain a propaganda on behalf of their ancestral faith would only be in keeping with the character of their religion as a religion of revelation. Although they had to live within "the hedge of the Law" to protect them against the corruptions and idolatries of the Gentiles, there was nevertheless at the heart of Judaism a missionary purpose, as we see from the universalism of the Psalms and the Prophets. Judaism was burdened with a message which concerned all men, to the effect that there was one God, holy and spiritual, Creator of heaven and earth, who had committed to the family of Abraham in trust for the world His Law. To witness for the Living God, and to proclaim His Law, was the chief element of the Jewish propaganda in the Roman empire, and their system of proselytism enabled them to gain adherents in numbers. In this the Old Testament Scriptures and the observance of the Sabbath were important factors, and enabled them to win the adherence of intelligent and educated people.

27. Internal Organization: That the Jews of the Dispersion had an internal organization with courts of their own, having considerable jurisdiction, not only in spiritual but in civil affairs, there is no doubt. This would only be in accordance with the analogy of their constitution as seen in the New Testament, and of their commercial organization in many lands to this day.

28. Unity of the Jewish People: In all the lands of their Dispersion the Jews never lost touch with the land of their fathers, or Jerusalem, the city of the Great King. The bond of unity was maintained by the pilgrimages they made from all the countries where they were scattered to their three great national feasts; by the payment of the half-shekel toward the services of the Temple as long as it stood; and by their voluntary submission, so long as they had a national polity, to the decrees of the great Sanhedrin.

29. Dispersion Influenced by Greek Thought: That Judaism was influenced in its Dispersion by contact of the larger world of life and thought in which the Jews had their place outside of Palestine we can see by the example of Alexandria. It was there that it felt most powerfully the penetrating and pervasive influence of Greek thought, and the large apocryphal and apocalyptic literature which sprang up there is one of the most notable results. "The Alexandrian Jew was in reality both a Jew and a Greek; he held the faith of Yahweh and sincerely worshipped the God of his fathers, but he spoke the Greek language, had received a Greek education, and had contracted many Greek ideas and habits. Still those in his position were Jews first, and Greeks afterward, and on all `The fundamentals' were in thorough sympathy with their Palestinian brethren" (Fairweather, From the Exile to the Advent, 109 f).

30. The Dispersion a Preparation for the Advent of Christ:

The Jewish people thus widely distributed over the Roman world with their monotheism, with their Scriptures, and with their Messianic hopes, did much to prepare the way for the advent of the Redeemer who was to be the fulfillment of Jewish expectation and hope. It was due to the strange and unique influence of Judaism and to the circulation of the glowing visions of Israel's prophets among the nations, that there was so widespread an expectation, mentioned by Tacitus, by Suetonius and by Josephus, that from Judea would arise a Ruler whose dominion would be over all. It is now believed that Virgil's conception of the Better Age which was to be inaugurated by the birth of a child was derived from Isaiah's prophecies. And not only did the Jewish Dispersion thus prepare the way for the world's Redeemer in the fullness of the time, but when He had come and suffered and died and risen and ascended, it furnished a valuable auxiliary to the proclamation of the gospel. Wherever the apostles and the first preachers traveled with the good news, they found Jewish communities to whom they offered first the great salvation.

31. The Dispersion an Auxiliary to the Spread of the Gospel:

The synagogue services lent themselves most effectively to the ministry of Paul and his colleagues, and it was to the synagogue that they first repaired in every city they visited. Even to this day this preservation of "the dispersed of Israel" is one of the marvels of the Divine government of the world, proving the truth of the word of God by one of the earliest prophets: "I will sift the house of Israel among all the nations, like as grain is sifted in a sieve, yet shall not the least kernel fall upon the earth" (Amos 9:9).

LITERATURE.

Schurer, GJV4, III, 1 ff; Harnack, Expansion of Christianity, I, 1-40; Fairweather, Background of the Gospel and From the Exile to the Advent; Jewish Encyclopedia, article "Diaspora"; Sayce and Cowley, Aramaic Papyri Discovered at Assuan; Oestcrley and Box, Religion and Worship of the Synagogue.

T. Nicol.

Disposition

Disposition - dis-po-zish'-un diatagai): Only in Acts 7:53, "received the law by the disposition of angels," where it bears the meaning of "administration"; the Revised Version (British and American) "as it was ordained by angels."

Disputation

Disputation - dis-pu-ta'-shun: In Acts 15:2, the Revised Version (British and American) reads "questioning" for the King James Version "disputation" (Greek suzetesis). In Romans 14:1, the King James Version "doubtful disputations" becomes in the Revised Version (British and American) "decision of scruples" (Greek diakriseis dialogismon, literally, "discussions of doubts"). The Greek in neither case implies what the word "dispute" has come to mean in modern English, but rather "to discuss" or "argue."

Distaff

Distaff - dis'-taf (pelekh): This word occurs once in Proverbs 31:19; "spindle" is found in the same passage. In the Revised Version (British and American) the meanings of the two words have been exchanged.

See SPINNING.

Distil

Distil - dis-til': Only found twice in the English Bible (Deuteronomy 32:2; Job 36:27), in both cases in its original meaning of "to fall in drops," as dew or rain (derived through French from Latin de, "down," stillo, "to drop"). It does not occur in its later technical sense, for the process we call distilllation was not known in ancient times.

Distinctly

Distinctly - dis-tinkt'-li: Only Nehemiah 8:8, "They read in the book, in the law of God, distinctly." Probably the better rendering is the Revised Version, margin "with an interpretation," i.e. translating into Aramaic. The Hebrew word is a participle of the verb parash = "to make distinct." The corresponding Aramaic word occurs in Ezra 4:18 = "plainly" the King James Version and the Revised Version (British and American), better "translated" the Revised Version, margin.

Ditch

Ditch - dich: The word is used indiscriminately in the King James Version to represent at least three different ideas: a conduit or trench (2 Kings 3:16); a reservoir or cistern; or simply a pit or hole in the ground. In the Revised Version (British and American) this distinction is observed more carefully. Compare Job 9:31; Psalms 7:15 ("pit"), and Isaiah 22:11 ("reservoir"), the former meaning a pit or any similar place of destruction or corruption; the latter a reservoir or cistern of water. The New Testament usage (Matthew 15:14 the King James Version) corresponds somewhat with the former. See also 2 Kings 3:16 ("trenches").

Divers; Diverse; Diversities

Divers; Diverse; Diversities - di'-verz, di-vurs', di-vur'-si-tiz: "Divers" meaning "various," "different in kind," is now obsolete and used only as a synonym of "several," i.e. more than one. The distinction between "divers" and "diverse" in the King James Version seems to be that the former is the wider term, the latter being restricted to the meaning of "different in kind," while "divers" is also used to express difference of number. the Revised Version (British and American) retains "diverse" in all instances but changes "divers" nearly everywhere, except where it has the meaning "several." Compare Matthew 24:7; Luke 21:11; Hebrews 9:10, and others. It is hard to understand why the Revised Version (British and American) retains "divers" as a translation of poikilos, in Matthew 4:24; Mark 1:34, et al., because poikilos certainly cannot have the meaning "several" but "different in kind," and the idea expressed in these passages is not that some of the people had several diseases but that different people had different kinds of diseases. The same is true in Hebrews 13:9 where "divers" does not refer to number but to various kinds of teaching. Hebrews 2:4 and James 1:2 rightly change the reading of the King James Version "divers" to "manifold."

In other passages the Revised Version (British and American) changes "divers" to "diverse," and thus renders the idea of the original text "different in kind." Compare Deuteronomy 25:13 f; Proverbs 20:10, 23. Other passages are changed the better to render the original text: Deuteronomy 22:9, "two kinds of seed"; Judges 5:30, "dyed"; 2 Chronicles 30:11, "certain men"; Mark 8:3 and Acts 19:9, "some." the King James Version reads. in all these passages "divers." the Revised Version (British and American) changes the King James Version Hebrews 1:1 "at sundry times and in divers manners," an expression often found in Old English, to "by divers portions and in divers manners."

"Diversities" is found twice as translation of diairesis, literally, "distribution" (1 Corinthians 12:4 ff), but the Revised Version (British and American) changes the King James Version, 1 Corinthians 12:28, "diversities" to "divers kinds," as translation of gene, "kinds."

A. L. Breslich

Dives

Dives - di'-vez.

See LAZARUS.

Divide

Divide - di-vid': It is difficult to decide whether ragha` (Job 26:12; Isaiah 51:15; Jeremiah 31:35) should be rendered "to stir up" or "to still." The Hebrew has both meanings. Some render "He causes the sea to tremble." the Revised Version (British and American) reads "to stir" in text and "to still" in margin, while the King James Version has "to divide" in all three cases. 2 Chronicles 35:13, "carried them quickly" (the King James Version "divided them speedily"). Since cholaq, may mean either "to distribute" or "to be smooth," Hosea 10:2 reads "their heart is divided" in the text, but offers "smooth" in margin (the King James Version "divided"). The Greek orthotomeo, means "to cut straight," hence, the more literal translation of 2 Timothy 2:15, "handling aright the word of truth" (note "holding a straight course in the way of truth" or "rightly dividing the word of truth"; the King James Version "rightly dividing").

A. L. Breslich

Divination

Divination - div-i-na'-shun:

1. Definition

2. Kinds of Divination

3. Fundamental Assumption in Divination

4. Legitimate and Illegitimate Divination

5. The Bible and Divination

6. Modes of Divination Mentioned in the Bible: Those Approved and Those Condemned

7. Terms Used in the Old Testament in Connection with Divination

8. Divination and Prophecy

LITERATURE

1. Definition: Divination is the act of obtaining secret knowledge, especially that which relates to the future, by means within the reach almost exclusively of special classes of men.

2. Kinds of Divination: Of this there are two main species: (1) artificial, (2) inspirational, or, as it was called in ancient times (Cicero, Lord Bacon, etc.), natural divination. Artificial divination depends on the skill of the agent in reading and in interpreting certain signs called omens. See AUGURY. In inspirational or natural divination the agent is professedly under the immediate influence of some spirit or god who enables the diviner to see the future, etc., and to utter oracles embodying what he sees. Among the Romans artificial divination prevailed almost exclusively, the other having vogue largely among the Greeks, a proof surely of the more spiritual trend of the Greek mind. Yet that great Roman, Cicero, in his memorable treatise on Divination, says he agrees with those who take cognizance of these two distinct kinds of divination. As examples of inspirational divination he instances men dreaming or in a state of ecstasy (De Divinatione, i. 18). But though Cicero arranges diviners according to their pretentions, he does not believe in any superhuman communication. Thus he explains dreams on psychological principles much as modern psychologists would (op. cit. ii.63 ff). As a matter of fact Cicero was an atheist, or at least an agnostic.

The Latin word divinatio was confined almost exclusively to divination by outward signs, though its etymology (deus, "god") suggests that it denoted originally the other kind--that due to the inspiration of superhuman beings. Chrysippus (died at Athens 207 BC), though himself a Greek philosopher, defines the word in a way which would have commanded the approval of nearly every Roman, including Cicero himself who gives it. "Divination," Cicero makes him say (op. cit. ii.63), is "a power in man which foresees and explains those signs which the gods throw in his way." The Greeks were, on the other hand, a more imaginative and emotional people, and with them inspirational divination held much the larger place. The Greek (mantis) bears a close resemblance to the Old Testament prophet, for both claimed to be inspired from without and to be superhumanly informed. The Greek term for divination (he) mantike (= he mantike techne) has reference to the work of the mantis, and it hardly ever means divination of the lower sort--that by means of signs.

3. Fundamental Assumption in Divination: Underlying all methods of divination there lay the belief that certain superhuman spiritual beings (gods, spirits) possess the secret knowledge desired by men, and that, on certain conditions,, they are willing to impart it.

(1) The word "divination" itself, from deus, "god," or divus, "pertaining to god," carries with it the notion that the information obtained came from deity. Similarly the Greek mantike implies that the message comes to the mantis from gods or spirits by way of inspiration.

(2) Astrology, or astromancy, is but one form of divination and it rests upon the ultimate belief that the heavenly bodies are deities controlling the destinies of men and revealing the future to those who have eyes to see. According to the Weltanschauung or conception of the universe advocated by Hugo Winckler, Alfred Jeremias (see The Old Testament in the Light of the East) and others, terrestrial events are but shadows of the celestial realities (compare Plato's doctrine of ideas). These latter represented the mind of the gods (see ASTROLOGY secs. 1,2).

(3) On hepatoscopy, or divining from the liver, see below, 6, (2), (c).

(4) It can be proved that among the ancient peoples (Babylonians, Egyptians, Greeks, Romans, etc.) the view prevailed that not only oracles but also omens of all kinds are given to men by the gods and express the minds of these gods.

4. Legitimate and Illegitimate Divination: Among the ancient Babylonians, Egyptians, Greeks and Romans the diviner stood in the service of the state and was officially consulted before wars and other great enterprises were undertaken. But among these and other ancient peoples certain classes of diviners were prohibited by the government from exercising their calling, probably because they were supposed to be in league with tile gods of other and hostile nations. The gods of a people were in the beliefs of the time the protectors of their people and therefore the foes of the foes of their proteges. It is on this account that witchcraft has been so largely condemned and punished (see WITCHCRAFT ). Necromancy is uniformly forbidden in the Old Testament (see Leviticus 19:31; Deuteronomy 18:11; Isaiah 8:19; 19:3), probably on account of its connection with ancestor worship. But among other ancient peoples it was allowed and largely practiced. Note that the Hebrew words translated (Deuteronomy 18:11) "consulter with a familiar spirit" and "wizards" denote alike such persons as seek oracles from the spirits of the dead (see the present writer's Magic, Divination, and Demonology among the Hebrews, 85 ff). The early Fathers believed that in the divination of heathenism we have the work of Satan who wished to discredit the true religion by producing phenomena among pagan races very similar to the prophetical marvels of the chosen people. This of course rests on a view of the Old Testament prophet which makes him a "predicter" and little if anything more.

See PROPHECY.

5. The Bible and Divination: The attitude of the Bible toward divination is on the whole distinctly hostile and is fairly represented by Deuteronomy 18:10 f, where the prophet of Yahweh is contrasted with diviners of all kinds as the only authorized medium of supernatural revelation. Yet note the following:

(1) Balaam (Numbers 22:1-41 through Numbers 24:1-25) was a heathen diviner whose words of blessing and of cursing were believed to have magical force, and when his services are enlisted in the cause of Yahwism, so that, instead of cursing he blessed Israel, there is not a syllable of disapproval in the narrative.

(2) In Isaiah 3:2 diviners are ranked with judges, warriors and prophets as pillars of the state. They are associated with prophets and seers in Jeremiah 27:9; 29:8; Ezekiel 22:28 (compare Ezekiel 13:6-9; 12:24). It is true that the prophets and diviners mentioned in these passages use utter falsehoods, saying peace where there is none; all the same the men called prophets and diviners are classed together as similar functionaries.

Pure Yahwism in its very basal principle is and must ever have been antagonistic to divination of every kind, though inspirational divination has resemblances to prophetism and even affinities with it. Why then does the Bible appear to speak with two voices, generally prohibiting but at times countenancing various forms of divination? In the actual religion of the Old Testament we have a syncretism in which, though Yahwism forms the substructure, there are constituents from the religions of the native aborigines and the nations around. The underlying thought in all forms of divination is that by employing certain means men are able to obtain knowledge otherwise beyond their reach. The religion of Israel made Yahweh the source of that knowledge and the prophet the medium through which it came to men. We have an analogous example of syncretism resulting in the union of opposite elements in ancient Zarathustraism (Zoroastrianism) which, though in its central principle inconsistent with divination by omens, yet took on from the native Turanian cults of Persia certain forms of divination, especially that by lot (see Lenormant, La Divination, 22 ff). Nor should it be forgotten that the Bible is a library and not a book, and where so many writers, living at widely separated times, have been at work it is natural to look for diversity of teaching, though no one can deny that in fundamental matters Bible authors are wonderfully consistent.

6. Modes of Divination Mentioned in the Bible: For modes of divination in vogue among the ancient Babylonians, Egyptians, Greeks, Romans, etc., see the relevant works and dictionary articles. The species of divination spoken of in the Bible may be arranged under two heads: (1) those apparently sanctioned, and (2) those condemned in the Bible.

Those Approved and Those Condemned:

(1) Methods of Divination Tacitly or Expressly Sanctioned in the Bible.

(a) The following are instances of inspirational divination:

(i) The case of Balaam has already been cited. He was a Moabite and therefore a heathen soothsayer. His word of blessing or of curse is so potent that whether he blesses or curses his word secures its own realization. So far is his vocation from being censured that it is actually called into the service of Yahweh (see Numbers 22:1-41 through Numbers 24:1-25).

(ii) To dreams the Bible assigns an important place as a legitimate means of revealing the future. Such dreams are of two kinds:

(aa) Involuntary or such as come unsought. Even these are regarded as sent for guidance in human affairs. The bulk of the dreams spoken of in the Bible belong to this class: see Genesis 20:3, 1 (Abimelech); Genesis 28:2 f; Genesis 31:10-14 (Jacob); Genesis 37:5-9 (Joseph; see ASTRONOMY, sec. II, 6); 40:5-21 (Pharaoh's butler and baker); 41:1-35 (Pharaoh); Judges 7:9-14 (Gideon and an unnamed man); Daniel 1:17 (Daniel had understanding of dreams); Daniel 2:1-49 (Nebuchadnezzar's dream and its interpretation by Daniel); Matthew 1:20; 2:13 f,Matthew 19:1-30 f (Joseph, husband of Mary the virgin); Matthew 27:19; see also Jeremiah 23:25 ff, where the lawfulness of prophetic dreams is assumed (compare Jeremiah 23:32, where "lying dreams" imply genuine ones). In the document usually ascribed by modern critics to the Elohist (E), dreams bulk largely as the above examples serve to show. Among the Babylonians belief in the significance of dreams gave rise to a science (oneiromancy) so elaborate that only special interpreters called seers (singular, baru) were considered able to explain them (see Lenormant, op. cit., 143, for examples).

(bb) The other species of dreams consists of such as are induced by what is called "incubation," i.e. by sleeping in a sacred place where the god of the place is believed to reveal his secrets to the sleeper. Herodotus (iv.172) says that the Nasamonians, an Egyptian tribe, used to practice divination by sleeping in the graves of their ancestors. The dreams which then came to them were understood to be revelations of their deified ancestors. See Herod. i.181 for another instance of incubation in Nineveh. We have a reference to this custom in Isaiah 65:4 ("that sit among the graves"), where Yahweh enters into judgment with the Jews for their sin in yielding to this superstition. Solomon's dream (1 Kings 3:5-15) came to him at the high place of Gibeon.

Divine Names

Divine Names - See GOD, NAMES OF.

Divine Visitation

Divine Visitation - See PUNISHMENTS.

Divine; Diviner

Divine; Diviner - di-vin, di-vin'-er.

See AUGURY; ASTROLOGY; DIVINATION.

Division

Division - di-vizh'-un: Used in English Versions of the Bible in the following senses:

(1) A separate body of people (a) of the tribal divisions of Israel (Joshua 11:23; 12:7; 18:10); (b) of sections of a tribe, "the divisions of Reuben" (Judges 5:15-16 the King James Version; but the Revised Version (British and American) rightly substitutes "the watercourses of Reuben"; in Job 20:17 the same word is rendered "rivers"); (c) of the (late) organization of priests and Levites into classes or families who ministered in the temple in rotation; translated "courses" generally in the King James Version, and always in the Revised Version (British and American) (1 Chronicles 24:1; 1, 12, 19; Nehemiah 11:36; compare 2 Chronicles 35:5). Much prominence is given by the Chronicler to the 24 classes of priests, singers, and doorkeepers, who served in turns in the temple (compare Luke 1:5, 8).

(3) In the New Testament, dissension, disunion, schism (Luke 12:51; Romans 16:17; 1 Corinthians 3:3 the King James Version, omitted the Revised Version (British and American); 1 Corinthians 1:10; 11:18; Galatians 5:20).

D. Miall Edwards

Divorce

Divorce - see DIVORCE IN THE OLD TESTAMENT; DIVORCE IN THE NEW TESTAMENT

Divorce in the New Testament

Divorce in the New Testament - to apostasiou): The Scripture doctrine of divorce is very simple. It is contained in Matthew 19:3-12.

We are not called upon to treat of divorce in the Mosaic legislation (Deuteronomy 24:1-4). That was passed upon by Jesus in the above discussion and by Him ruled out of existence in His system of religion. After Jesus had spoken as above, the Mosaic permission of divorce became a dead letter. There could not be practice under it among His disciples. So such Old Testament divorce is now a mere matter of antiquarian curiosity.

It may be of interest in passing to note that the drift of the Mosaic legislation was restrictive of a freedom of divorce that had been practiced before its enactment. It put in legal proceedings to bar the personal will of one of the parties. It recognized marriage as a social institution which should not be disrupted without reference to the rights of society in it. In this restrictive character "the law is become our tutor to bring us unto Christ" (Galatians 3:24). But here, as in numerous other instances, Christ went behind the enactments to primitive original principles whose recognition would make the law of none effect, because no practice was to be permitted under it. Thus the Old Testament is disposed of.

Of course what Jesus said will dominate the New. In fact, Jesus is the only author in the New Testament who has treated of divorce. It has been thought that Paul had the subject in hand. But we shall find on examination, further along, that he did not. We need then look nowhere but to Matthew 19:1-30 for the Scripture doctrine of divorce.

True, we have other reports of what Jesus said (Mark 10:2-12; Luke 16:18). But in Matthew 19:1-30 we have the fullest report, containing everything that is reported elsewhere and one or two important observations that the other writers have not included. Luke has only one verse where Matthew has ten. Luke's verse is in no necessary connection with context. It seems to be a mere memorandum among others of the spiritual or ethical teachings of Christ. Luke however caught the gist of the whole teaching about divorce in recording the prohibition to put away one wife and marry another. The records in Matthew 19:1-30 and Mark 10:1-52 cover one and the same occasion. But there is nothing in Mark that is not in Matthew; and the latter contains nearly a third more of text than the former. There is nothing, however, essential in Matthew that is not in Mark, save the clause "except for fornication." That exception will be treated further along. We seem to be justified then in saying that the total doctrine of the Scripture pertaining to divorce is contained in Matthew 19:1-30.

Attention must be called to the fact that, in the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5:27-32), Jesus treated of divorce, and that in every essential particular it agrees with the elaboration in Matthew 19:1-30. Jesus there as plainly as in the argument with the Pharisees put Moses' permission of divorce under ban; as plainly there declared the putting away of one partner to marry another person to be adultery. This may also be noticed, that the exception to the absolute prohibition is in the text of the Sermon on the Mount.

We have then a summary of the New Testament doctrine of divorce stated by Christ Himself as follows: "Whosoever shall put away his wife, except for fornication, and shall marry another, committeth adultery" (Matthew 19:9). This puts Him in line with the ideal of the monogamic, indissoluble family which pervades the whole of the Old Testament.

1. The Family: It may be well here to treat of the exception which Christ made in His rule to the indissolubility of marriage. It is very widely maintained in the Christian church that there should be no divorce for any cause whatever. This position is in plain contradiction to Christ's teaching in Matthew 15:1-39 and Matthew 19:1-30. One of the grounds adduced for this denial of divorce in case a partner is guilty of adultery is that Luke and Mark do not record the exception. It is a difficult matter to invade the psychology of writers who lived nearly two thousand years ago and tell why they did not include something in their text which someone else did in his. Neither Luke nor Mark were personal disciples of the Lord. They wrote second hand. Matthew was a personal disciple of Christ and has twice recorded the exception. It will be a new position in regard to judgment on human evidence when we put the silence of absentees in rank above the twice expressed report of one in all probability present--one known to be a close personal attendant.

This may be said: Matthew's record stands in ancient manuscript authority, Greek and also the Versions. And on this point let it be noted that the testimony of the manuscripts was up before the English and American Revisers, and they have deliberately reaffirmed the text of 1611 and given us the exception in Christ's rule in each place (Matthew 5:32; 19:9). This makes the matter as nearly res adjudicata as can be done by human wisdom.

Let us consider the rationality of the exception. That feature has had scant attention from theologians and publicists, yet it will bear the closest scrutiny. In fact it is a key to much that is explanatory of the basic principle of the family. To begin with, the exception is not on its face an after-thought of some transcriber, but was called out by the very terms of the question of the Pharisees: "Is it lawful for a man to put away his wife for every cause?" This plainly called for a specification from Jesus of exceptions which he would allow to the rule against divorce. It is fortunate that the Pharisees asked the question in the form they did, for that put on Jesus the necessity of enumerating such exceptions as he would allow. He mentioned one, and but one in reply. That puts the matter of exceptions under the rule in logic: Expressio unius-exclusio alterius. All other pretenses for divorce were deliberately swept aside by Christ--a fact that should be remembered when other causes are sought to be foisted in alongside this one allowed by Christ. The question may come up, Whose insight is likely to be truest?

Why, then, will reason stand by this exception? Because adultery is per se destructive of monogamic family life. Whoever, married, is guilty of adultery has taken another person into family relation. Children may be born to that relation--are born to it. Not to allow divorce in such case is to force an innocent party in marriage to live in a polygamous state. There is the issue stated so plainly that "the wayfaring man need not err therein," and "he who runs may read," and "he who reads may run."

It is the hand of an unerring Master that has made fornication a ground for divorce from the bond of matrimony and limited divorce to that single cause. Whichever way we depart from strict practice under the Savior's direction we land in polygamy. The society that allows by its statutes divorce for any other cause than the one that breaks the monogamic bond, is simply acting in aid of polygamy, consecutive if not contemporaneous.

Advocates of the freedom of divorce speak of the above view as "the ecclesiastical." That is an attempt to use the argument ad invidiam. The church of Christ held and holds its views, not because ecclesiastics taught it, but because Christ taught it, and that in His teaching we have a statement out from the righteousness, wisdom, insight and rationality of the all-wise God.

2. Paul: Paul is the only other New Testament author besides Christ who has been supposed to treat of divorce. But a careful examination of Paul's writing will disclose the fact that he has nowhere discussed the question--for what cause or causes a man might put away his wife, or a woman her husband, with liberty of marriage to another person. If Paul has treated of divorce at all it is in 1 Corinthians 7:1-40. But even a careless reading of that chapter will disclose the fact that Paul is not discussing the question for what causes marriage might be disrupted, but the question of manners and morals in the relation. Paul has not modified Christ in any respect. It has been supposed that in 1 Corinthians 7:15 Paul has allowed divorce to a believing partner who has been deserted by one unbelieving, and so he has been sometimes understood as adding desertion to the exception Christ made as cause for divorce.

But Paul has not said in that verse or anywhere else that a Christian partner deserted by a heathen may be married to someone else. All he said is: "If the unbelieving departeth, let him depart: the brother or the sister is not under bondage (dedoulotai) in such cases: but God hath called us in peace." To say that a deserted partner "hath not been enslaved" is not to say that he or she may be remarried. What is meant is easily inferred from the spirit that dominates the whole chapter, and that is that everyone shall accept the situation in which God has called him just as he is. "Be quiet" is a direction that hovers over every situation. If you are married, so remain. If unmarried, so remain. If an unbelieving partner deserts, let him or her desert. So remain. "God hath called us in peace." Nothing can be more beautiful in the morals of the marriage relation than the direction given by Paul in this chapter for the conduct of all parties in marriage in all trials.

Many reasons might be given why Paul could not have given liberty of remarriage, besides the one that he did not in his text; but attention should be called to the fact that such an assumption of authority in divorce would soon have brought him into conflict with the Roman government. Paul's claim that he was a Roman citizen was of some value to himself. Would not some Roman citizen have claimed to scrutinize pretty closely Paul's right to issue a decree of divorce against him because he had "departed" from a wife who had become a Christian? There would be two sides to such divorces. Would not Paul, careful, shrewd, politic as he was, have known that, and have avoided an open rupture with a government that did not tolerate much interference with its laws? That neither Paul nor anyone else ever put such construction upon his language, is evidenced by the fact that there is no record in history of a single case where it was attempted for 400 years after Paul was in his grave, and the Roman Empire had for a century been Christian. Then we wait 400 years more before we find the suggestion repeated. That no use was ever made of such construction of Paul in the whole era of the adjustment of Christianity with heathenism is good evidence that it was never there to begin with. So we shall pass Paul as having in no respect modified the doctrine of divorce laid down by Christ in Matthew 19:1-30.

3. Remedies for Marriage Ills: In all civilized countries the machinery of legislation and law can always be open for removal or relief of troubles in marriage without proceeding to its annulment. If a father is cruel to his children, we do not abolish the parental relation, but punish the father for his cruelty. If he deserts his children, we need not assist him to rear other children whom he can desert in turn, but we can punish him for his desertion. What can be done by law in case of parent and child can be done in case of husband and wife. By putting in absolute divorce (frequently for guilty and innocent alike) we invite the very evils we seek to cure. We make it the interest of a dissatisfied party to create a situation that a court will regard as intolerable, and so he or she may go free.

Then by affording an easy way out of the troubles of married life we are inviting carelessness about entering marriage. We say by divorce statutes to a young woman: "If your husband deserts you, you may have another. If he is cruel, you may have another. If he fails to support you, you may have another. If he is drunken, you may have another. If he is incompatible or makes you unhappy, you may have another"--and yet others beyond these. When an easy road is thus made out of marriage, will there be proper caution about entering into marriage? By just as much as a crevice for relief of the miseries of married life is opened by divorce, by so much the flood gates are opened into those miseries. The more solemnly society is impressed that the door of marriage does not swing outward as well as inward the more of happiness and blessing will it find in the institution.

See FAMILY.

C. Caverno

Divorce in the Old Testament

Divorce in the Old Testament - di-vors':

1. Subordinate Position of Woman: Woman, among the Hebrews, as among most nations of antiquity, occupied a subordinate position. Though the Hebrew wife and mother was treated with more consideration than her sister in other lands, even in other Semitic countries, her position nevertheless was one of inferiority and subjection. The marriage relation from the standpoint of Hebrew legislation was looked upon very largely as a business affair, a mere question of property. A wife, nevertheless, was, indeed, in most homes in Israel, the husband's "most valued possession." And yet while this is true, the husband was unconditionally and unreservedly the head of the family in all domestic relations. His rights and prerogatives were manifest on every side. Nowhere is this more evident than in the matter of divorce. According to the laws of Moses a husband, under certain circumstances, might divorce his wife; on the other hand, if at all possible, it was certainly very difficult for a wife to put away her husband. Unfortunately a double standard of morality in matters pertaining to the sexes is, at least, as old as Moses (see Exodus 7:1-25 through Exodus 11:1-10).

2. Law of Divorce: Deuteronomy 24:1-4: The Old Testament law concerning divorce, apparently quite clear, is recorded most fully in Deuteronomy 24:1 ff. A perusal of the commentaries will, nevertheless, convince anyone that there are difficulties of interpretation. The careful reader will notice that the renderings of the King James Version and the Revised Version (British and American) differ materially. the King James Version reads in the second part of Deuteronomy 24:1: "then let him write a bill," etc., the Revised Version (British and American) has "that he shall write," etc., while the Hebrew original has neither "then" nor "that," but the simple conjunction "and." There is certainly no command in the words of Moses, but, on the other hand, a clear purpose to render the proceeding more difficult in the case of the husband. Moses' aim was "to regulate and thus to mitigate an evil which he could not extirpate." The evident purpose was, as far as possible, to favor the wife, and to protect her against an unceremonious expulsion from her home and children.

3. Marriage a Legal Contract: As already suggested, marriage among the Hebrews, as among most Orientals, was more a legal contract than the result of love or affection. It would be, however, a great mistake to assume that deep love was not often present, for at all times the domestic relations of the Hebrew married couple have compared most favorably with those of any other people, ancient or modern. In its last analysis it was, nevertheless, a business transaction. The husband or his family had, as a rule, to pay a certain dowry to the parents or guardians of the betrothed before the marriage was consummated. A wife thus acquired could easily be regarded as a piece of property, which, without great difficulty, could be disposed of in case the husband, for any reason, were disposed to rid himself of an uncongenial companion and willing to forfeit the mohar which he had paid for his wife. The advantage was always with the husband, and yet a wife was not utterly helpless, for she, too, though practically without legal rights, could make herself so intolerably burdensome and hateful in the home that almost any husband would gladly avail himself of his prerogatives and write her a bill of divorcement. Thus, though a wife could not divorce her husband, she could force him to divorce her.

4. Divorce Applicable Only to Wives: The following words of Professor Israel Abrahams, Cambridge, England, before "the Divorce Commission" (London, November 21, 1910), are to the point: "In all such cases where the wife was concerned as the moving party she could only demand that her husband should divorce her. The divorce was always from first to last, in Jewish law, the husband's act." The common term used in the Bible for divorce is shilluach 'ishshah, "the sending away of a wife" (Deuteronomy 22:19, 29). We never read of "the sending away of a husband." The feminine participle, gerushah, "the woman thrust out," is the term applied to a divorced woman. The masculine form is not found.

5. Process and Exceptions: The Mosaic law apparently, on the side of the husband, made it as difficult as possible for him to secure a divorce. No man could unceremoniously and capriciously dismiss his wife without the semblance of a trial. In case one became dissatisfied with his wife, (1) he had to write her a BILL OF DIVORCEMENT (which see) drawn up by some constituted legal authority and in due legal form. In the very nature of the case, such a tribunal would use moral suasion to induce an adjustment; and, failing in this, would see to it that the law in the case, whatever it might be, would be upheld. (2) Such a bill or decree must be placed in the hand of the divorced wife. (3) She must be forced to leave the premises of her former husband. Divorce was denied two classes of husbands: (1) The man who had falsely accused his wife of antenuptial infidelity (Deuteronomy 22:13 ff), and (2) a person who had seduced. a virgin (Deuteronomy 22:28 f). In addition, a heavy penalty had to be paid to the father of such damsels.

It is probable that a divorced wife who had not contracted a second marriage or had been guilty of adultery might be reunited to her husband. But in case she had married the second time she was forever barred from returning to her first husband, even if the second husband had divorced her or had died (Deuteronomy 24:3 f). Such a law would serve as an obstacle to hasty divorces.

Divorces from the earliest times were common among the Hebrews. All rabbis agree that a separation, though not desirable, was quite lawful. The only source of dispute among them was as to what constituted a valid reason or just cause.

6. Grounds of Divorce (Doubtful Meaning of Deuteronomy 24:1):

The language in Deuteronomy 24:1 ff has always been in dispute. The Hebrew words, `erwath dabhar, on which a correct interpretation depends, are not easy of solution, though many exegetes, influenced possibly by some preconceived notion, pass over them quite flippantly. The phrase troubled the Jewish rabbis of olden times, as it does Jewish and Christian commentators and translators in our day. the King James Version renders the two words, "some uncleanness," and in the margin, "matter of nakedness." The latter, though a literal translation of the Hebrew, is quite unintelligible. the Revised Version (British and American) and the American Standard Revised Version both have: "some unseemly thing." Professor Driver translates the same words "some indecency." The German the Revised Version (British and American) (Kautzsch) has "etwas Widerwartiges" ("something repulsive"). We know of no modern version which makes `erwath dabhar the equivalent of fornication or adultery. And, indeed, in the very nature of the case, we are forced to make the words apply to a minor fault or crime, for, by the Mosaic law, the penalty for adultery was death (Deuteronomy 22:20 ff). It is, however, a question whether the extreme penalty was ever enforced. It is well known that at, and some time before, the time of our Saviour, there were two schools among the Jewish rabbis, that of Shammai and that of Hillel. Shammai and his followers maintained that 'erwath dabhar signified nothing less than unchastity or adultery, and argued that only this crime justified a man in divorcing his wife. Hillel and his disciples went to the other extreme. They placed great stress upon the words, "if she find no favor in his eyes" immediately preceding `erwath dabhar (Deuteronomy 24:1), and contended that divorce should be granted for the flimsiest reason: such as the spoiling of a dish either by burning or careless seasoning. Some of the rabbis boldly taught that a man had a perfect right to dismiss his wife, if he found another woman whom he liked better, or who was more beautiful (Mishnah, GiTTin, 14 10). Here are some other specifications taken from the same book: "The following women may be divorced: She who violates the Law of Moses, e.g. causes her husband to eat food which has not been tithed. .... She who vows, but does not keep her vows. .... She who goes out on the street with her hair loose, or spins in the street, or converses (flirts) with any man, or is a noisy woman. What is a noisy woman? It is one who speaks in her own house so loud that the neighbors may hear her." It would be easy to extend the list, for the Mishna and rabbinic writings are full of such laws.

From what has been said, it is clear that adultery was not the only valid reason for divorce. Besides, the word adultery had a peculiar significance in Jewish law, which recognized polygamy and concubinage as legitimate. Thus a Hebrew might have two or more wives or concubines, and might have intercourse with a slave or bondwoman, even if married, without being guilty of the crime of adultery (Leviticus 19:20), for adultery, according to Jewish law, was possible only when a man dishonored the "free wife" of a Hebrew (Leviticus 20:10 ff).

Divorcement, Bill of:

This expression, found in Deuteronomy 24:1, 3; Isaiah 50:1; Jeremiah 3:8 is the translation of the Hebrew cepher kerithuth. The two words, literally rendered, signify a document or book of cutting off, i.e. a certificate of divorce given by a husband to a wife, so as to afford her the opportunity or privilege of marrying another man. The Hebrew term is rendered by the Septuagint biblion apostasion. This is also found in the New Testament (Mark 10:4). Matthew 5:31 has "writing of divorcement" in English Versions of the Bible, but Matthew 19:7 the King James Version has "writing," while the Revised Version (British and American) and the American Standard Revised Version have "bill." The certificate of divorce is called geT, plural giTTin, in the Talmud. There is an entire chapter devoted to the subjects in the Mishna It is not positively known when the custom of writing bills of divorcement commenced, but there are references to such documents in the earliest Hebrew legislation. The fact that Joseph had in mind the putting away of his espoused wife, Mary, without the formality of a bill or at least of a public procedure proves that a decree was not regarded as absolutely necessary (Matthew 1:19). The following was the usual form of a decree:

"On the____day of the week____in the month____in the year____from the beginning of the world, according to the common computation in the province of____I____the son of____by whatever name I may be known, of the town of____with entire consent of mind, and without any constraint, have divorced, dismissed and expelled thee____daughter of____by whatever name thou art called, of the town who hast been my wife hitherto; But now I have dismissed thee____the daughter of____by whatever name thou art called, of the town of____so as to be free at thy own disposal, to marry whomsoever thou pleasest, without hindrance from anyone, from this day for ever. Thou art therefore free for anyone (who would marry thee). Let this be thy bill of divorce from me, a writing of separation and expulsion, according to the law of Moses and Israel.

____, the son of____, witness

Spiritual Application.

The Hebrew prophets regarded Yahweh not only as the father and king of the chosen people, and thus entitled to perfect obedience and loyalty on their part, but they conceived of Him as a husband married to Israel. Isaiah, speaking to his nation, says: "For thy Maker is thy husband; Yahweh of hosts is his name" (54:5). Jeremiah too makes use of similar language in the following: "Return, O backsliding children, saith Yahweh; for I am a husband unto you" (3:14). It is perfectly natural that New Testament writers should have regarded Christ's relation to His church under the same figure. Paul in 2 Cor says: "I am jealous over you with a godly jealousy: for I espoused you to one husband, that I might present you as a pure virgin to Christ" (11:2); see also Matthew 9:15; John 3:29; Revelation 19:7. Any unfaithfulness or sin on the part of Israel was regarded as spiritual adultery, which necessarily broke off the spiritual ties, and divorced the nation from God (Isaiah 1:21; Ezekiel 16:22; Revelation 2:22).

Di-zahab

Di-zahab - di'-za-hab, diz'-a-hab di-za-habh; Septuagint Katachrusea, literally, "abounding in gold"): The name occurs in a list apparently intended to fix definitely the situation of the camp of Israel in the plains of Moab (Deuteronomy 1:1). No place in the region has been found with a name suggesting this; and there is no other clue to its identification. Some names in the list are like those of stations earlier in the wanderings. Thinking that one of these may be intended Burckhardt suggested Mina edh-Dhahab, a boat harbor between Ras Mohammad and `Aqaba. Cheyne gets over the difficulty by accepting a suggestion of Sayee that Di-zahab corresponds to Me-zahab (Genesis 36:39); this latter he then transforms into Mitzraim, and identifies it with the North Arabian Mucri (Encyclopedia Biblica, under the word). The changes, however, seem greater than can be justified.

W. Ewing

Doctor

Doctor - dok'-ter: In Luke 2:46 didaskalos) "doctor" is equivalent to "teacher," which latter is the translation of the Revised Version (British and American). So in Luke 5:17; Acts 5:34, the King James Version and the Revised Version (British and American) "doctors," "doctor," of the law (nomodidaskalos).

See EDUCATION; RABBI; SCRIBES.

Doctrine

Doctrine - dok'-trin: Latin doctrina, from doceo, "to teach," denotes both the act of teaching and that which is taught; now used exclusively in the latter sense.

1. Meaning of Terms: (1) In the Old Testament for (a) leqach "what is received," hence, "the matter taught" (Deuteronomy 32:2; Job 11:4; Proverbs 4:2; Isaiah 29:24, the American Standard Revised Version "instruction"); (b) she-mu`ah, "what is heard" (Isaiah 28:9, the Revised Version (British and American) "message," the Revised Version, margin "report"); (c) mucar, "discipline" (Jet 10:8 margin, "The stock is a doctrine (the Revised Version (British and American) "instruction") of vanities," i.e. "The discipline of unreal gods is wood (is like themselves, destitute of true moral force)" (BDB).

(2) In the New Testament for (i) didaskalia = (a) "the act of teaching" (1 Timothy 4:13, 16; 5:17; 2 Timothy 3:10, 16), all in the Revised Version (British and American) "teaching"; (b) "what is taught" (Matthew 15:9; 2 Timothy 4:3). In some passages the meaning is ambiguous as between (a) and (b). (ii) didache, always translated "teaching" in the Revised Version (British and American), except in Romans 16:17, where "doctrine" is retained in the text and "teaching" inserted in the margin = (a) the act of teaching (Mark 4:2; Acts 2:42, the King James Version "doctrine"); (b) what is taught (John 7:16-17; Revelation 2:14-15, 24, the King James Version "doctrine"). In some places the meaning is ambiguous as between (a) and (b) and in Matthew 7:28; Mark 1:22; Acts 13:12, the manner, rather than the act or matter of teaching is denoted, namely, with authority and power.

2. Christ's Teaching Informal: The meaning of these words in the New Testament varied as the church developed the content of its experience into a system of thought, and came to regard such a system as an integral part of saving faith (compare the development of the meaning of the term "faith"): (1) The doctrines of the Pharisees were a fairly compact and definite body of teaching, a fixed tradition handed down from one generation of teachers to another (Matthew 16:12, the King James Version "doctrine"; compare Matthew 15:9; Mark 7:7). (2) In contrast with the Pharisaic system, the teaching of Jesus was unconventional and occasional, discursive and unsystematic; it derived its power from His personality, character and works, more than from His words, so that His contemporaries were astonished at it and recognized it as a new teaching (Matthew 7:28; 22:33; Mark 1:22, 27; Luke 4:32). So we find it in the Synoptic Gospels, and the more systematic form given to it in the Johannine discourses is undoubtedly the work of the evangelist, who wrote rather to interpret Christ than to record His ipsissima verba (John 20:31).

3. Apostolic Doctrines: The earliest teaching of the apostles consisted essentially of three propositions: (a) that Jesus was the Christ (Acts 3:18); (b) that He was risen from the dead (Acts 1:22; 24, 32); and (c) that salvation was by faith in His name (Acts 2:38; 3:16). While proclaiming these truths, it was necessary to coordinate them with Hebrew faith, as based upon Old Testament revelation. The method of the earliest reconstruction may be gathered from the speeches of Peter and Stephen (Acts 2:14-36; Acts 5:29-32; Acts 7:2-53). A more thorough reconstruction of the coordination of the Christian facts, not only with Hebrew history, but with universal history, and with a view of the world as a whole, was undertaken by Paul. Both types of doctrine are found in his speeches in Acts, the former type in that delivered at Antioch (Acts 13:16-41), and the latter in the speeches delivered at Lystra (Acts 14:15-17) and at Athens (Acts 17:22-31). The ideas given in outline in these speeches are more fully developed into a doctrinal system, with its center removed from the resurrection to the death of Christ, in the epistles, especially in Galatians, Romans, Ephesians, Philippians and Colossians. But as yet it is the theological system of one teacher, and there is no sign of any attempt to impose it by authority on the church as a whole. As a matter of fact the Pauline system never was generally accepted by the church. Compare James and the Apostolic Fathers..

4. Beginnings of Dogma: In the Pastoral and General Epistles a new state of things appears. The repeated emphasis on "sound" or "healthy doctrine" (1 Timothy 1:10; 6:3; 2 Timothy 1:13; 4:3; Titus 1:9; 2:1), "good doctrine" (1 Timothy 4:6) implies that a body of teaching had now emerged which was generally accepted, and which should serve as a standard of orthodoxy. The faith has become a body of truth "once for all delivered unto the saints" (Jude 1:3). The content of this "sound doctrine" is nowhere formally given, but it is a probable inference that it corresponded very nearly to the Roman formula that became known as the Apostles' Creed.

See DOGMA.

T. Rees

Docus

Docus - do'-kus.

See DOK.

Dodai

Dodai - do'-di, do'-da-i (1 Chronicles 27:4).

See DODO.

Dodanim

Dodanim - do'-da-nim (dodhanim, "leaders"): In Genesis 10:4, the son of Javan, the son of Japheth. This would place the Dodanim among the Ioninns. The parallel passage 1 Chronicles 1:7, with the Septuagint and Samaritan Pentateuch, has, however, "Rodanim," which is probably the true reading. This identifies the people with the Rhodians (compare on Ezekiel 27:15 under DEDAN).

Dodavahu

Dodavahu - do-dav'-a-hu (dodhawahu, "loved of God"; the King James Version Dodavah): Father of Eliezer of Mareshah, a prophet in the days of Jehoshaphat (2 Chronicles 20:37).

Dodo; Dodai

Dodo; Dodai - do'-do, (dodho, dodhay, "beloved"):

(1) The grandfather of Tola of the tribe of Issachar, one of the judges (Judges 10:1).

(2) "The Ahohite," father of Eleazar, one of David's heroes, and (2 Samuel 23:9; 1 Chronicles 11:12) himself the commander of one of the divisions of the army (1 Chronicles 27:4).

(3) The Bethlehemite, father of Elhanan, one of David's mighty men (2 Samuel 23:24; 1 Chronicles 11:26).

Doe

Doe - do.

See DEER.

Doeg

Doeg - do'-eg (do'-egh "anxious," "cared for"): "The Edomite," a servant of Saul, who watched David's intercourse with the priest Ahimelech, then denounced the priest to the king, and later executed his command to slay the priests at Nob. The position he held is described as that of "the mightiest" of Samuel's herdsmen (1 Samuel 21:7 margin). Septuagint reads: "tending the mules." Rabbinical legends speak of him as the greatest scholar of his time. The traditional title of Psalms 52:1-9 associates the composition of that Psalms with the events that led to the slaying of the priests (1 Samuel 21:7; 9, 18, 22).

Nathan Isaacs

Dog

Dog - kelebh; (compare Arabic kelb, "dog"); kuon; and diminutive kunarion): References to the dog, both in the Old Testament and in the New Testament, are usually of a contemptuous character. A dog, and especially a dead dog, is used as a figure of insignificance. Goliath says to David (1 Samuel 17:43 ): "Am I a dog, that thou comest to me with staves?" David says to Saul (1 Samuel 24:14): "After whom dost thou pursue? after a dead dog, after a flea." Mephibosheth says to David (2 Samuel 9:8): "What is th servant, that thou shouldest look upon such a dead dog as I am?" The same figure is found in the words of Hazael to Elisha (2 Kings 8:13). The meaning, which is obscure in the King James Version, is brought out well in the Revised Version: "But what is thy servant, who is but a dog, that he should do this great thing?" The characteristically oriental interrogative form of these expressions should be noted.

Other passages express by inference the low esteem in which dogs are held. Nothing worse could happen to a person than that his body should be devoured by dogs (1 Kings 14:11; 16:4; 19, 23, etc.). Job 30:1 says of the youth who deride him that he disdained to set their fathers with the dogs of his flock. In Philippians 3:2 and Revelation 22:15, dogs are coupled with evil-workers, sorcerers, etc. In Matthew 7:6 we read: "Give not that which is holy unto the dogs, neither cast your pearls before the swine."

Job 30:1 (cited above) refers to the use of dogs to guard flocks; and the comparison of inefficient watchmen with dumb dogs (Isaiah 56:10) implies that at least some dogs are useful. In the apocryphal Book of Tob, Tobias' dog is his companion on his travels (Tobit 5:16; 11:4; on this see Expository Times,XI , 258;HDB ,IV , 989; Geiger, Civilization of E. Iranians, I, 85 ff).

There is further the reference to the greyhound (Proverbs 30:31 English Versions) as one of the four things which are "stately in their going." But the rendering, "greyhound," rests solely upon inference, and is contrary to the Septuagint and Vulgate, which have respectively alektor and gallus, i.e. "cock," the King James Version margin "horse." The Hebrew has zarzir mothnayim, which the King James Version marginrenders "girt in the loins." the Revised Version, margin has "warhorse," Hebrew "well girt (or, well knit) in the loins." In support of the meaning, "girt," for zarzir, there is the word zer, which, with zarzir, is assigned to the obsolete root zarar and the Arabic zirr, "button," from zarr, "to button, "to compress." Further, to render zarzir by "cock" logically requires a change in the text, for mothnayim, "loins," becomes superlative and inappropriate (see Encyclopedia Biblica, under the word "Cock"). On the other hand, the Arabic zarzur is a starling (compare Arabic zarzar, "to utter cries," said of birds; carcar, "to cry out"; carcar, "cockroach," or "cricket"). Also, according to Encyclopedia Biblica (s.v. "Cock"), "the Talmudic zarzir .... means some bird (a kind of raven)." If the text stands, there appears to be no better rendering than "girt in the loins," which might fairly be taken to refer to a war horse or to a greyhound. The Persian greyhound would in that case be understood, a hairy race, which, according to the Royal Natural History, is less fleet than the English breed and is used in chasing gazelles and in hunting the wild ass, and which according to Doughty (Arabia Deseria) is kept by the Bedouin. "These dogs are said to be sometimes girdled by their owners to prevent them from over-eating and becoming fat" (L. Fletcher, British Museum (Natural History)).

Domestic dogs have probably been derived from various species of wolves and jackals. In this connection, it is noteworthy that the dogs of certain regions greatly resemble the wolves of those regions. The pariah dogs of Syria and Palestine resemble the jackals, especially in color and in the tail, differing in their greater size and in the shape of muzzle and ears. It is fair to assume that they are much the same as existed in Bible times. They are in general meek and harmless creatures, and are valuable as scavengers, but disturb the night with their barking. Each quarter of the city has its own pack of dogs, which vigorously resents any invasion of its territory. A dog which for any reason finds itself in foreign territory gets home as quickly as possible, and is lucky if it does not have to run the gauntlet of a pack of vicious foes. The pariah dog is sometimes brought up to be a sheep dog, but the best shepherd dogs are great wolfish creatures, which are usually obtained from Kurdistan.

Alfred Ely Day

Dogma

Dogma - dog'-ma (dogma, from dokeo, "that which seems," "an opinion," particularly the opinion of a philosopher):

1. As Law and Ordinance: In the decadent period of Greek philosophy, the opinion, or ipse dixit, of the master of a philosophical school came to be quoted as authoritative truth; also, the opinion of a sovereign imposed as law upon his subjects: a decree or ordinance of the civil authority. The word never appears in English Versions of the Bible, although it is used 5 times in the Greek New Testament, but with the one exception of Acts 16:4, in a sense widely different from that which ecclesiastical usage has given to it from the Acts 2:11-47nd century downward. "Dogma" is used in the New Testament, (1) of Roman laws: "a decree (Greek dogma) from Caesar Augustus" (Luke 2:1); "the decrees of Caesar" (Acts 17:7) = the whole body of Roman law; (2) of ordinances of religious law: "the law of commandments contained in ordinances" (Ephesians 2:15); "the bond written in ordinances" (Colossians 2:14) = the Mosaic ordinances as expressing the moral law which condemned the sinner, and whose enmity Christ abolished by His death. It is a significant revelation of the spirit of Greek theology that all the Greek commentators understood by ordinances in these two places, the gospel as a body of dogmas which had removed the commandment or bond that was against us (see Lightfoot, Colossians, at the place); (3) of the decrees of the Council of Jerusalem (Acts 15:20), which Paul and his companions delivered to the Gentilechurches (Acts 16:4). Here we have one element that entered into the later ecclesiastical meaning of the word. These dogmas were decisions on religious matters, imposed by a more or less authoritative council of the church as a condition of admission to its membership.

2. As Formulated Teaching: There is however one important difference. These decrees relate to moral and ceremonial matters, but from the 2nd century downward, dogma means especially a theological doctrine. In Greek theology "doctrine" and "dogma" meant the same thing. Each had its origin in the opinion of some great teacher; each rested upon revelation and claimed its authority; each meant an exposition of a particular truth of the gospel, and of the whole Christian truth, which the church adopted as the only right exposition. Each word might be used for the teaching of a philosopher, or of a heretic, although for the latter, "heresy" became the regular term. On the one side stood the doctrines or dogmas of the majority or the "Catholic" church, and on the other side, those of the heretics. So long as the "Catholic" ideal of orthodoxy and uniformity of belief held the field, there was no room for the distinction now made between "doctrine," as a scientific and systematic expression of the truth of the Christian religion, and "dogma," as those truths "authoritatively ratified as expressing the belief of the church." This distinction could only arise when men began to think that various expressions of Christian truth could coexist in the church, and is therefore quite modern and even recent. Dogma in this sense denotes the ancient conception of theology as an authoritative system of orthodoxy, and doctrine, the modern conception, outside the dogmatic churches, where theology is regarded as a scientific exposition of truth.

LITERATURE.

Harnack, History of Dogma, I, chapter i; Drummond, Studies in Christian Doctrine, 1-7.

T. Rees

Dok

Dok - dok (Dok, Dagon): A small fortress, "little stronghold" near Jericho (1 Maccabees 16:15), built by Ptolemy, son of Abubus, where he entertained and murdered his father-in-law Simon Maccabeus and his two sons. Josephus (Ant., XIII, viii, 1; BJ, I, ii, 3) calls the place Dagon and places it above Jericho. The name persists in Ain Duk with its copious springs of excellent water about 4 miles Northwest of Jericho. Some ancient foundations in the neighborhood are possibly those of Ptolemy's fortress, but more probably of a Templars' station which is known to have stood there as late as the end of the 13th century. For its importance in earlier Jewish history, see Smith,HGHL , 250, 251.

J. Hutchinson

Doleful

Doleful - dol'-fool ('oach, "howling"): The "doleful creatures" referred to in Isaiah 13:21 are probably "jackals," although some have suggested "leopard," or "hyena." The older English Versions of the Bible gives "great owls." The word rendered "doleful lamentation" in Micah 2:4 (niheyah) is simply a form of the word ordinarily translated "wailing" (nehi). Compare the King James Version margin.

Dolphin

Dolphin - dol'-fin.

See BADGER.

Dominion

Dominion - do-min'-yun: In Ephesians 1:21; Colossians 1:16 the word so translated (kuriotes) appears to denote a rank or order of angels. The same word is probably to be so interpreted in Jude 1:8 (the King James Version and the Revised Version (British and American) "dominion"), and in 2 Peter 2:10 (the King James Version "government," the Revised Version (British and American) "dominion").

See ANGEL.

Doom

Doom - doom: Occurs only once in the King James Version (2 Esdras 7:43), "The day of doom shall be the end of this time" (the Revised Version (British and American) "the day of judgment"); but the Revised Version (British and American) gives it as the rendering of tsephirah, in Ezekiel 7:7, 10 (the King James Version "the morning," the Revised Version, margin "the turn" or "the crowning time"; but the meaning is not yet quite certain); and in 1 Corinthians 4:9 (epithanatios, "as men doomed to death," the King James Version "appointed (originally "approved") unto death"). Our word "doom" is connected with the word "deem," and signifies either the act of judging or (far more often) the sentence itself or the condition resulting therefrom (compare "Deemster" of Isle of Man and Jersey). Generally, but not always, an unfavorable judgment is implied. Compare Dryden, Coronation of CharlesII , i, 127:

"Two kingdoms wait your doom, and, as you choose,

This must receive a crown, or that must lose."

J. R. Van Pelt

Door

Door - dor: Most commonly the rendering of Hebrew pethach, "doorway," deleth, "door" proper (the two distinguished in Genesis 19:6), or of Greek thura, which represents both meanings. The door proper was usually of wood, frequently sheeted with metal, sometimes of one slab of stone, as shown in excavations in the Hauran. It turned on pivots (the "hinges" of Proverbs 26:14) working in sockets above and below, and was provided with a bolt (2 Samuel 13:17) or with lock and key (Judges 3:23). The doorway was enclosed by the stone threshold (1 Kings 14:17), the two doorposts on either side, and the lintel above (Exodus 12:7). Doors were frequently two-leaved, and folding ones are mentioned in connection with the temple (1 Kings 6:34). Where "door" is used in connectio with city gates (Nehemiah 3:1 ff) it refers to the door proper which swings on its hinges as distinguished from the whole structure. The custom of fastening to the doorposts small cases containing a parchment inscribed with the words of Deuteronomy 6:4-9; Deuteronomy 11:13-21 had its origin in the command there given.

Doorkeeper

Doorkeeper - dor'-kep-er (sho`er): The gates of an oriental city and of the temple courts so closely resembled the door of a house that the same Hebrew word was used for doorkeeper and gatekeeper. It is often translated by the less definite word "porter" (which see).

In the preexilic writings (2 Samuel 18:26; 2 Kings 7:10-11) reference is made to porters at the gates of the cities Mahanaim and Samaria. In these early writings there is also mention of a small number of "keepers of the threshold" of the temple, whose duties included the gathering of money from the people for temple purposes, and the care of the sacred vessels (2 Kings 12:9; 22:4; 23:4). They held an honorable position (2 Kings 25:18), and occupied chambers in the temple (Jeremiah 35:4). The same term is used to describe officers in the household of the king of Persia (Esther 2:21; 6:2).

Differing from these "keepers of the threshold" in some respects are the doorkeepers or porters mentioned in Chronicles, Ezra, and Nehemiah. These formed a numerous sacred order (1 Chronicles 9:22; 23:5) from the time of David. Their duties and the words describing them in two passages, "keepers of the thresholds" (1 Chronicles 9:19) and "porters of the thresholds" (2 Chronicles 23:4), connect them in some measure with the "keeper of the threshold" referred to above. They guarded the gates of the house of Yahweh (1 Chronicles 9:23), closing and opening them at the proper times (1 Chronicles 9:27) and preventing the unclean from entering the sacred enclosure (2 Chronicles 23:19); they had charge of the sacred vessels and of the free-will offerings (2 Chronicles 31:14), and dwelt in the chambers about the temple (1 Chronicles 9:27). They were Levites, and came in from the Levitical villages every seventh day for service in their turn (1 Chronicles 9:25). Their office was honorable, ranking with the singers, after the priests and Levites (Ezra 2:42; 1 Chronicles 15:18).

In Psalms 84:10, "I had rather be a doorkeeper in the house of my God," the word is not used in its technical sense. the Revised Version, margin gives "stand (the King James Version margin "sit") at the threshold," to an eastern mind a situation of deep humility (compare title of the Ps and 1 Chronicles 9:19).

In the New Testament the order of temple doorkeepers is not referred to. But a doorkeeper (thuroros) is mentioned in connection with a private house (Mark 13:34), with the high priest's house (John 18:16-17), and with sheep-folds (John 10:3), a maid serving as doorkeeper in some cases (Acts 12:13).

George Rice Hovey

Doorpost

Doorpost - dor'-post.

See HOUSE.

Dophkah

Dophkah - dof'-ka (dophqah, "drover"): A desert camp of the Israelites, the first after leaving the wilderness of Sin (Numbers 33:12-13).

See WANDERINGS OF ISRAEL.

Dor; Dora

Dor; Dora - dor, do'-ra (do'r, dor, "habitation," "circle"; Dor; Josephus, Dora; modern TanTurah): A town of the coast of Palestine, South of Carmel (Apion, II, 10; Vita, 8), about 8 miles North of Caesarea. It was occupied in the earliest times by the Canaanites and probably belonged to Phoenicia, tradition saying that it was a Sidonian colony. It furnished an abundance of the shell-fish so valuable for the manufacture of the Tyrian purple, and this would have led the Phoenicians to occupy the site. In the 12th century BC, the region was occupied by the northern people who raided the whole Syrian coast and Egypt. They were driven back by the Egyptians, but renewed the attack, and the weakness of Egypt in the middle of the century enabled them to settle in the coast region South of Carmel; a tribe of them occupied Dor, and others the territory to the limits of the desert of Sinai, and became the Philistine people so well known by their contests with the Hebrews. Naphoth-dor, "the heights of Dor," may be the slopes of Carmel inland from TanTurah. Dor fell within the territory assigned to Manasseh (Joshua 17:11; compare Ant, V, i, Joshua 22:1-34). It was the seat of a king who possessed other towns on the heights back of the coast. He was one of the allies of Jabin of Hazor in the conflict with Joshua (Joshua 11:2) and was conquered by him (Joshua 12:23), but Dor was not occupied by the Israelites (Joshua 17:11; Judges 1:27).

The inhabitants of Dor were at enmity with the Phoenician towns and it would seem that the Sidonians seized it to obtain its rich supplies of shell-fish, and this probably caused the war of retaliation waged by the Philistines, under the lead of Ashkelon, against Sidon in the middle of the 11th century. Sidon was besieged by land, and the inhabitants were compelled to flee to Tyre. Dor seems to have been occupied by Solomon since he placed one of his purveyors in the town (1 Kings 4:11), and Tiglath-pileser III reduced it and set a governor over it (Rawl., Phoenician., 84). Here Tryphon was besieged by Antiochus, but escaped to Apamea (1 Maccabees 15:11, 13, 15; Ant, XIII, vii, 2). It was made free by Pompey, and joined to the province of Syria (XIV, iv, 4). The youths of the place set up a statue of Tiberius in the Jewish synagogue, an outrage that was reported to Publius Petronius by Agrippa, and reparation was made (XIX, vi, 3). It does not seem to have been of much importance in later times, though the fortifications still remaining on the ruined site, from the period of the Middle Ages, show that it was then occupied. It is now only a miserable village nestled in the ruins.

H. Porter

Dorcas

Dorcas - dor'-kas (Dorkas, the Greek equivalent of Aramaic tabitha, "a gazelle"): The name was borne by a Christian woman of Joppa. She is called a disciple (mathetria: Acts 9:36, the only place in the New Testament where the feminine form is used). She seems to have had some means and also to have been a leader in the Christian community. Dorcas was beloved for the manner in which she used her position and means, for she "was full of good works, and almsdeeds which she did." Among her charities was the clothing of the poor with garments she herself made (Acts 9:39), and by following her example, numerous "Dorcas societies" in the Christian church perpetuate her memory. There is a local memorial in the "Tabitha School" in Jaffa devoted to the care and education of poor girls.

Her restoration to life by Peter is recorded. At the time of her death Peter was in Lydda where he had healed Aeneas. Being sent for, he went to Joppa, and, by the exercise of the supernatural powers granted to him, "he presented her alive" to the mourning community. In consequence of this miracle "many believed on the Lord" (Acts 9:42).

S. F. Hunter

Dorymenes

Dorymenes - do-rim'-e-nez (Dorumenes): Father of Ptolemy Macron (1 Maccabees 3:38; 2 Maccabees 4:45); probably the same man who fought against Antiochus the Great (Polyb. v.61).

Dositheus

Dositheus - do-sith'-e-us (Dositheos):

(1) A captain of Judas Maccabeus (2 Maccabees 12:19-25); along with Sosipater he captured Timotheus after the battle of Carnion, but granted him his life and freedom on the representation that "he had in his power the parents of many of them and the brethren of some," who, if they put him to death, should "be disregarded."

(2) A soldier in the army of Judas Maccabeus (2 Maccabees 12:35); he made a special attack upon Gorgias, governor of Idumaea, the opposing general, and would have taken the "accursed man" prisoner but for the interference of a Thracian horseman.

(3) A Jew, son of Drimylus (3 Maccabees 1:3) who rescued Ptolemy Philopator from a plot of Theodotus. He afterward proved an apostate from Judaism.

(4) A Levite priest who "in the 4th year of the reign of Ptolemy and Cleopatra" carried the translation of the Book of Esther to Alexandria (Additions to Esther 11:1).

J. Hutchison

Dotaea

Dotaea - do-te'-a (the King James Version, incorrectly, Judea; Dotaia): Another form of the name DOTHAN (which see).

Dote

Dote - dot: "To dote" means either "to be weakminded" or "to be foolishly fond." In the latter sense it is employed in Ezekiel 23:5 ff; in the former, in Jeremiah 50:36 the King James Version (the Revised Version (British and American) "shall become fools"); the King James Version Sirach 25:2 (the Revised Version (British and American) "lacking understanding"), and the King James Version 1 Timothy 6:4 (the Revised Version, margin "to be sick"; the King James Version margin"a fool").

Dothaim

Dothaim - do'-tha-im: Mentioned in Judith 4:6 and frequently in connection with the invasion of Holofernes. See next article.

Dothan

Dothan - do'-than (dothayin, dothan, "two wells," "double feast"; Dothaeim): A place to the North of Shechem whither Jacob's sons went for pasture for the flocks; where Joseph who followed them was sold to the Ishmaelites, after having been imprisoned in a "pit" (Genesis 37:17 ff). Here in later days the eyes of Elisha's servant were opened to see the mountain "full of horses and chariots of fire," guarding his master from the encircling Syrians (2 Kings 6:13 ff). This is certainly to be identified with Tell Dothan, which lies on the East of the ancient road leading from Gilead across Esdraelon to the seacoast, and thence to Egypt. It is about 5 miles to the Southwest of Jenin. There are some traces of old buildings, two cisterns--Dothayin or Dothayin = "two cisterns" or "pits"--and one copious spring. Excellent pasture is found in the surrounding plain, and on the adjoining slopes.

W. Ewing

Double

Double - dub'-'-l (shanah, "to repeat," as in counting; kaphal, "to fold over," or "double," as a cloth): A word used quite frequently in the Old Testament. Jacob ordered his sons to take double money in their hands, i.e. twice the necessary amount (Genesis 43:12, 15). If a thief be caught with a living animal he was to restore double (Exodus 22:4); if property be stolen out of the house of one to whom it is entrusted he was to restore double (Exodus 22:7, 9). The firstborn was to receive a double portion of the inheritance (Deuteronomy 21:17). Likewise also by a beautiful symbol Elisha asked for a double portion of Elijah's spirit to fall upon him (2 Kings 2:9). Degrees of punishment or sufferings were also expressed by the idea of a doubling (Isaiah 61:7; Jeremiah 16:18; 17:18; Zechariah 9:12). The use of the second Hebrew form in Job 11:6 and Job 41:13 seems quite confusing in its translation. the King James Version translates it simply "double," but the Revised Version (British and American) gives it its expanded and derived meaning, "manifold in understanding," and "who shall come within his jaws," respectively, "manifold" in the first instance meaning multiplied, and "jaws" doubtless meaning the double row of teeth. The classic phrases in the New Testament are those used by James to represent instability and a wavering disposition, dipsuchos, literally, "doubleminded" (James 1:8; 4:8).

Walter G. Clippinger

Doubt

Doubt - dout: This word, found only a score of times in the Bible, translates nevertheless about half as many different Hebrew and Greek originals with a corresponding variety of meanings.

In Genesis 37:33 "without doubt" is to be taken in the common sense of "certainly"; in Job 12:2 in the sarcastic sense of "indeed!" In Daniel 5:12, 16, it is used as a difficult problem or mystery to be explained, and these are the only cases of its employment in the Old Testament.

In the New Testament it is about equally used to translate diaporeo, and diakrino, and their cognates. The first means "to be without resource," "utterly at a loss," "nonplussed"; and the second, "to judge diversely." For the first, see John 13:22; Acts 2:12 the King James Version; Acts 5:24 the King James Version; Acts 10:17 the King James Version; Acts 25:20 the King James Version; and Galatians 4:20 the King James Version. For the second see Matthew 21:21; Mark 11:23; Acts 10:20; Romans 14:23. The last-named is deserving of particular attention. "He that doubteth is condemned (the King James Version "damned") if he eat," means that in a case of uncertainty as to one's Christian liberty, it were better to err on the side of restraint. In Luke 12:29 "to be of doubtful mind" (meteorizo, literally, "to suspend"; see Thayer, under the word), means "to be driven by gusts," or "to fluctuate in mid-air."

Here, as in Matthew 14:31, "doubt" does not indicate a lack of faith, but rather "a state of qualified faith": its weakness, but not its absence.

In John 10:24 "doubt" translates airo psuchen, which literally means "to lift up the soul" or "to keep one in suspense"; so the Revised Version (British and American).

Dough

Dough - do.

See BREAD.

Dove

Dove - duv (tor, yonah; peristera; Latin Zenaedura carolinensis): A bird of the family Columbidae. Doves and pigeons are so closely related as to be spoken and written of as synonymous, yet there is a distinction recognized from the beginning of time. It was especially marked in Palestine, because doves migrated, but pigeons remained in their chosen haunts all the year. Yet doves were the wild birds and were only confined singly or in pairs as caged pets, or in order to be available for sacrifice. Pigeons, without question, were the first domesticated birds, the record of their conquest by man extending if anything further back than ducks, geese and swans. These two were the best known and the most loved of all the myriads of birds of Palestine. Doves were given preference because they remained wild and were more elusive. The thing that escapes us is usually a little more attractive than the thing we have. Their loving natures had been noted, their sleek beautiful plumage, their plump bodies. They were the most precious of anything offered for sacrifice. Their use is always specified in preference to pigeons if only one bird was used; if both, the dove is frequently mentioned first. Because of their docility when caged, their use in sacrifice, and the religious superstition concerning them, they were allowed to nest unmolested and, according to species, flocked all over Palestine. The turtle-dove nested in gardens and vineyards, and was almost as tame as the pigeons. The palm turtle-dove took its name from its love of homing in palm trees, and sought these afield, and in cities, even building near the temple in Jerusalem. It also selected thorn and other trees. It has a small body, about ten inches in length, covered with bright chestnut-colored feathers, the neck dappled with dark, lustrous feathers. The rock dove swarmed over, through, and among the cliffs of mountains and the fissures of caves and ravines. The collared turtle-dove was the largest of the species. It remained permanently and homed in the forests of Tabor and Gilead, around the Dead Sea, and along the Jordan valley. This bird was darker than the others and took its name from a clearly outlined collar of dark feathers encircling the neck, and was especially sought for caged pets on account of its size and beauty.

In all, the dove is mentioned about fifty times in the Bible. Many of these references are concerning its use in sacrifice and need not all be mentioned. The others are quoted and explained from a scientific standpoint and in accordance with the characteristics and habits of the birds. The first reference to the dove occurs in Genesis 8:8-12, in the history of the flood; then follows its specified use in sacrifice; note of its migratory habits is made, and then in poetry, prophecy, comparison, simile and song, it appears over and over throughout the Bible.

In Genesis 8:8-12, we read, "And he sent forth a dove from him, to see if the waters were abated." Noah first sent out a raven, because it was a strong, aggressive bird and would return to its mate. But the raven only flew over the water and returned to perch on the ark. This was not satisfactory, so Noah in looking for a bird better suited to his purpose, bethought him of the most loving and tender bird he knew--the dove. It not only would return to the ark, but would enter and go to the cage of its mate, and if it found green food it would regurgitate a portion for her or its young, or if not nesting he could tell by its droppings if greenery had been eaten and so decide if the waters were going down. And this is precisely what happened. The dove came back, and the watching Noah saw it feed its mate little green olive leaves, for the dove never carries food in the beak, but swallows and then regurgitates it to mate and young. This first reference to birds was made on account of the loving, tender characteristics of the species; the next, because they were the most loved by the people, and therefore chosen as most suitable to offer as sacrifice (Genesis 15:9). In Leviticus 1:14 f, doves are mentioned as sacrifice: "And the priest shall bring it unto the altar, and wring off its head, and burn it on the altar; and the blood thereof shall be drained out on the side of the altar." In Leviticus 5:7 the proper preparation of the sacrifice is prescribed. For method of handling sacrifice see Leviticus 5:8-9, 10. In Leviticus 12:6 the law for a sacrifice for a mother is given, and Leviticus 12:8 of same chapter provides that if she be too poor to offer a lamb, doves or pigeons will suffice. In Leviticus 14:4-8 the reference for the sacrifice of a leper is merely to "birds," because it is understood that they are pigeons and doves, and it contains the specification that if the victim is too poor to afford so elaborate a sacrifice, a smaller one will suffice. The birds are named in Leviticus 14:22: "Two turtle-doves, or two young pigeons, such as he is able to get; and the one shall be a sin-offering, and the other a burnt-offering" (compare Leviticus 15:14, 29; Numbers 6:10). When David prayed for the destruction of the treacherous, he used the dove in comparison, and because he says he would "lodge in the wilderness" he indicates that he was thinking of the palm turtle.

"And I said, Oh that I had wings like a dove!

Then would I fly away, and be at rest" (Psalms 55:6).

In chanting a song of triumph, David used an exquisite thought.

"When ye lie among the sheepfolds,

It is as the wings of a dove covered with silver,

And her pinions with yellow gold" (Psalms 68:13).

He referred to the rock dove because the metallic luster on its neck would gleam like gold in sunshine, and the soft grayish-white feathers beneath the wings as he would see the bird above him in flight would appear silver-like. By this quotation David meant that in times of peace, when men slept contentedly at home among their folds, their life was as rich with love and as free in peace as the silver wing of the dove that had the gold feathers and was unmolested among the inaccessible caves and cliffs. In Psalms 74:19 the term "turtle-dove" is used to indicate people whom the Almighty is implored to protect: "Oh deliver not the soul of thy turtle-dove unto the wild beast: forget not the life of thy poor for ever."

Solomon uses the dove repeatedly in comparison or as a term of endearment. In Song of Solomon 1:15; 4:1; 5:12, he compares the eyes of his bride full, tender, beautiful, with those of a dove. In 2:12 he uses the voice of the dove as an indication of spring. In 2:14 he addresses the bride as a rock dove, In 5:2 is another term of endearment, this time used in the dream of the bride (compare 6:9). Isaiah 38:14 has reference to the wailing, mournful dove note from which the commonest species take the name "mourning dove." The reference in Isaiah 60:8 proves that the prophet was not so good an observer, or so correct in his natural history as David, who may have learned from the open. As a boy, David guarded the flocks of his father and watched the creatures around him. When exulting over the glory of the church in the numerous accessions of Gentiles, Isaiah cried, "Who are these that fly as a cloud, and as the doves to their windows?" This proves that he confounded pigeons and doves. Doves were wild, mostly migratory, and had no "windows." But the clay cotes of pigeons molded in squares so that one large cote sheltered many pairs in separate homes had the appearance of latticed windows and were used as a basis in estimating a man's wealth. This reference should be changed to read, "and as pigeons to their windows." In Jeremiah 8:7 the fact is pointed out that doves were migratory; and in Jeremiah 48:28 people are advised to go live in solitary places and be peaceable, loving and faithful, like the rock doves. See also Ezekiel 7:16: "But those of them that escape shall escape, and shall be on the mountains like doves of the valleys, all of them moaning, every one in his iniquity." This merely means that people should be driven to hide among the caves and valleys where the rock doves lived, and that the sound of their mourning would resemble the cry of the birds. It does not mean, however, that the doves were mourning, for when doves coo and moan and to our ears grow most pitiful in their cries, they are the happiest in the mating season. The veneration cherished for doves in these days is inborn, and no bird is so loved and protected as the dove--hence, it is unusually secure and happy and its mournful cry is the product of our imagination only. The dove is the happiest of birds. Hosea 7:11 and Hosea 11:11 each compares people with doves; the first, because the birds at times appear foolishly trusting; the second, because, while no bird is more confiding, none is more easily frightened. "And Ephraim is like a silly dove, without understanding: they call unto Egypt, they go to Assyria" (Hosea 7:11). "They shall come trembling as a bird out of Egypt, and as a dove out of the land of Assyria; and I will make them to dwell in their houses, saith Yahweh" (Hosea 11:11). The reference in Nahum 2:7 is to the voice of the birds.

New Testament references will be found in a description of the baptism of Jesus (Matthew 3:16). People are admonished to be "harmless as doves" (Matthew 10:16). "And Jesus entered into the temple of God, and cast out all them that sold and bought in the temple, and overthrew the tables of the money-changers, and the seats of them that sold the doves" (Matthew 21:12). This proves that these birds were a common article of commerce, probably the most used for caged pets, and those customarily employed for sacrifice.

Dove's Dung (chari yonim, Kethibh for dibhyonim): 2 Kings 6:25: "And there was a great famine in Samaria: and, behold, they besieged it, until an ass's head was sold for fourscore pieces of silver, and the fourth part of a kab of dove's dung for five pieces of silver." This seems so repulsive that some commentators have tried to prove the name applied to the edible root of a plant, but the history of sieges records other cases where matter quite as offensive was used to sustain life. The text is probably correct as it stands.

Gene Stratton-Porter

Dowry

Dowry - dou'-ri: In all Hebrew marriages, the dowry held an important place. The dowry sealed the betrothal. It took several forms. The bridegroom presented gifts to the bride. There was the mohar, "dowry" as distinguished from matttan, "gifts to the members of the family" (compare Genesis 24:22, 53; 34:12). The price paid to the father or brothers of the bride was probably a survival of the early custom of purchasing wives (Genesis 34:12; Exodus 22:17; 1 Samuel 18:25; compare Ruth 4:10; Hosea 3:2). There was frequently much negotiation and bargaining as to size of dowry (Genesis 34:12). The dowry would generally be according to the wealth and standing of the bride (compare 1 Samuel 18:23). It might consist of money, jewelry or other valuable effects; sometimes, of service rendered, as in the case of Jacob (Genesis 29:18); deeds of valor might be accepted in place of dowry (Joshua 15:16; 1 Samuel 18:25; Judges 1:12). Occasionally a bride received a dowry from her father; sometimes in the shape of land (Judges 1:15), and of cities (1 Kings 9:16). In later Jewish history a written marriage contract definitely arranged for the nature and size of the dowry.

Edward Bagby Pollard