Gaal (gay′uhl; Heb., possibly “beetle”), the son of Ebed who lived in Shechem and usurped leadership from Abimelech (Judg. 9:26–33). This usurpation caused Abimelech to retaliate in force, destroying the city (9:34–49) before further expanding his conquests (9:50–57). Gaal was apparently a Canaanite and may have been a native of Shechem, although the action above is said to occur on his “return” to the city. Both he and Abimelech offer competing credentials for royal political leadership. Within the full narrative of Judges, the account of Gaal and Abimelech is intended to demonstrate the futility of life under a king: both Gaal and Abimelech lead the Israelites to disaster.
R.S.B.
Gaash (gay′ash), a mountain in the territory of Ephraim. Joshua is said to have been buried at Timnath-heres, “north of Mount Gaash” (Josh. 24:30; Judg. 2:9). The “torrents of Gaash” are also identified as the home of Hiddai, one of the group of David’s elite troops known as “the Thirty” (2 Sam. 23:30). Elsewhere, the “wadis of Gaash” are given as the home of Hurai, another of David’s warriors (1 Chron. 11:32), but the name Hurai could simply be a variant for Hiddai. No certain location is known for Mount Gaash. Speculation locates it some twenty miles southwest of Shechem. The torrents and wadis are probably runoff features of the mountain, water rushing through gullies in heavy rainstorms.
R.S.B.
Gabbatha (gab′uh-thuh), a term that appears only once in the NT, in John 19:13 as the Hebrew (actually Aramaic) equivalent of the Greek term lithostr–oton, “the pavement” where the hearing of Jesus before Pontius Pilate was held. Attempts to locate the Gabbatha have been frustrating. Two sites that still vie for the attention of tourists have been largely discounted by scholars. First, the first-century Jewish historian Josephus refers to a paved yard adjacent to Herod’s palace where court was held (Jewish War 2.14.8). Today, this would be part of the citadel adjacent to Jaffa Gate. This would seem a likely spot for the location of Jesus’s trial, but to date no paved court has been discovered to corroborate the information in Josephus. Second, a possible location for the Gabbatha that was once considered very promising was the area that would have constituted the courtyard of the fortress Antonia, a garrison Herod constructed on the northwest corner of the Temple Mount. Today, this site is found in the basement of the Convent of the Sisters of Zion on the Via Dolorosa. Some 2500 square yards of pavement have been excavated there. This pavement consists of large flagstones averaging 4 feet by 3.5 feet by 2 feet thick with incised treads to prevent animals from slipping. One of the stones displays a Roman gaming board, suggestive of the sort of activity (“casting lots”) the soldiers responsible for Jesus’s execution are mentioned as doing (Matt. 27:35). This pavement did seem like a promising candidate for the Gabbatha, but it has now been dated to the time of Hadrian in the second century CE. A third possibility has arisen only recently: the foundation of a podium measuring 2200 square feet has been discovered in the Armenian quarter of Jerusalem. See also Antonia, Tower of.
F.S.F.
Gabriel (gay′bree-uhl), an archangel. In the Hebrew Bible, Gabriel appears only in Dan. 8:15–26; 9:21–27, and in the NT only in Luke 1:11–20, 26–38. In these passages, Gabriel appears as a messenger (“angel”) from God and an interpreter for the people to whom he is sent. In Daniel, he interprets dreams and visions for the prophet, revealing mysteries about the last days. In Luke’s Gospel, he appears first to the priest Zechariah to tell him that he and his wife, Elizabeth, will give birth to a son (John the Baptist). Then he appears to the virgin Mary to announce the birth of Jesus. Gabriel is not explicitly called an “archangel” in the Bible (where that term is used only in 1 Thess. 4:16; Jude 9). The concept of archangels is developed in certain deuterocanonical and pseudepigraphical writings, where angels are organized into categories with specific duties and status before God. The most frequently named archangels are Michael (Dan. 10:13; Jude 9) and Gabriel; others include Raphael (1 Enoch 20:3; 40:2, 8–9) and Jeremiel (4 Esd. 3:6; called Remiel in 1 Enoch 20:8 and Ramiel in 2 Bar. 55:3). In 1 Enoch 40, Gabriel is considered one of these top four archangels, perhaps second only to Michael. In that writing, Gabriel’s duties include intercession on behalf of God’s people (1 Enoch 9:1; 40:6) as well as being the instrument for destruction of the wicked (1 Enoch 9:9–10). Tradition has associated Gabriel with the archangel whose trumpet blast would announce the return of Christ, though this is not actually stated in the Bible. (cf. 1 Thess. 4:16; Matt. 24:31). See also angel; Michael.
J.M.E.
Gad (Heb., “luck”).
1 The Canaanite god of fortune (Isa. 65:11).
2 The son of Jacob and Zilpah (Gen. 30:9–11) and the eponymous ancestor of the Israelite tribe of that name (see 3).
3 The tribe of Gad, which occupied territory between the Jabbok and Arnon rivers. At times, this territory seems to have overlapped with that allotted to Reuben. The Jabbok served as the boundary between Gad and the half-tribe of Manasseh. In the Blessing of Jacob (Gen. 49:19), by means of an alliterative play on the name “Gad,” the poet alludes to military tactics of the tribe. In the Blessing of Moses (Deut. 33:20–21) Gad is described as a lioness who tears both arm and head and is praised for having performed the righteous ordinances of the LORD. In the Song of Deborah (Judg. 5:17), Gad, under the designation Gilead (cf. Judg. 12:7), is listed among those tribes that failed to participate in the war against Sisera and is chided for having remained across the Jordan. Mesha, king of Moab, ca. 830 BCE, conquered Ataroth, which “the men of Gad inhabited from of old.” Some time afterward, the territory of Gad was overrun by Hazael of Damascus (2 Kings 10:32–33). The region may have been restored to Israel by Jeroboam II (2 Kings 14:25), but it was lost again to the Assyrian conqueror Tiglath-pileser, who deported its population (1 Chron. 5:26). See also Mesha; tribes.
4 A prophet-seer of David (2 Sam. 24:11).
S.G.
Gadara (gad′uh-ruh), Gadarenes (gad′uh-reenz). Some biblical manuscripts mention the “country of the Gadarenes” as the site of a dramatic exorcism performed by Jesus (Matt. 8:28–34; Mark 5:1–10; Luke 8:26–39). The account is remarkable in that it involves a large number of demons being cast into a herd of pigs, who rush into the water to drown. There is considerable confusion in the manuscript tradition, however, with regard to where this occurred: some ancient authorities read “Gadarenes,” some read “Gerasenes,” and some read “Gergesenes,” all of which were actual (though distinct) locations in the Decapolis. The NRSV accepts “Gerasenes” as the preferred reading in Mark and Luke, but accepts “Gadarenes” in Matthew. The country of the Gadarenes would be the area around the city of Gadara (modern Umm Qeis). Gadara was one of the cities of the Decapolis that Jesus is reported to have visited (Matt. 4:23–25; Mark 7:31). It lies about six miles southeast of the Sea of Galilee. The city appears to have been thoroughly hellenized, with only a small Jewish population. In one inscription from the Hellenistic period, Gadara refers to itself proudly as a “cultivator of the arts.” A number of Cynic philosophers, orators, and poets are associated with the city, including the Greek poet Meleager of Gadara (first century BCE), who mentions the Jewish sabbath in one of his love poems: “If your love is a ‘sabbath-keeper,’ no great wonder. Not even love burns on cold sabbaths.” See also Gerasa, Gerasenes.
P.P./M.A.P.
Gaius (gay′uhs).
1 A person in Corinth baptized by Paul (1 Cor. 1:14); he likely was partial to Paul’s position in the church disputes in Corinth. He may be the same Gaius identified as “host to me and to the whole church” in Rom. 16:23.
2 A traveling companion, with Aristarchus, of Paul mentioned in Acts 19:29. Coming from Macedonia, they were caught up in a riot provoked by Paul’s missionary work in Ephesus. See also Aristarchus.
3 A traveling companion of Paul in Acts 20:4, identified as being from Derbe (in Asia Minor).
4 A recipient of 3 John (v. 1). His leadership is favored over that of a certain Diotrephes (vv. 9–10). See also Diotrephes.
A.J.M.
Galatia (guh-lay′shuh), a geographic term used for both a territory in north-central Asia Minor and (after the first century BCE) a Roman province that included that territory plus portions of other ethnic regions to the south. The region or territory traditionally called Galatia was named for the Gauls, who migrated there in the third century BCE. Their central city was Ancyra (modern Ankara), but after a period of independence, they became a client state of Rome in 64 BCE. After the “Galatian” king Amyntas died in 25 BCE, the Romans created a province that included Galatia and territories south almost to the Mediterranean Sea. They called this province “Galatia.” Because “Galatia” can refer to either the specific territory or the larger province, references in the NT are often ambiguous. 1 Pet. 1:1 and 2 Tim. 4:10 (if one prefers the reading “Galatia” to the variant “Gaul”) surely refer to the province, but there remains doubt concerning the other four references (Acts 16:6; 18:23; 1 Cor. 16:1; Gal. 1:2), all of which relate to Paul’s ministry. Some think they refer to the province, in which case Paul is believed to have traveled through the southern part of this province and to have written his letter “to the Galatians” to persons in that part of the province (i.e., to people who were not ethnically Galatians, but who were residents of the province of Galatia). In biblical studies, this view is called the “south Galatian theory.” Supporters of this view point out that Acts records no mission to north-central Asia Minor, but does record visits by Paul to Antioch, Iconium, Lystra, and Derbe, cities in the southern part of the province, outside the ethnic Galatian territory. An alternative view, the “north Galatian theory,” holds that the specific references to Galatia are to the ethnic territory in the northern part of the Roman province, the only part of the province in which the people who were normally called “Galatians” lived. Those who hold to this view maintain that Paul would not have used the term “Galatians” when writing to people who were not ethnically Galatians but merely lived in an area that had been incorporated into a province the Romans called “Galatia.” Resolution of this argument affects the dating of Paul’s Letter to the Galatians and has implications for the question of whether that letter was written before or after the Jerusalem Council described in Acts 15. See also Galatians, Letter of Paul to the.
D.R.M.
Galatians (guh-lay′shuhnz), Letter of Paul to the, the ninth book in the NT and one of thirteen letters attributed to Paul. Galatians is typically regarded as Paul’s most intense and combative letter, written in anger to believers who are considering options he thinks are contrary to the gospel.
Contents: After a customary salutation (1:1–4), Paul immediately declares his astonishment that the Galatians are deserting God and embracing a false message that perverts the gospel of Christ (1:6–9). He then turns defensive, responding to charges that he is a people pleaser (1:10). He recounts segments of his autobiography to counter allegations that he picked up the gospel message secondhand and that he does not proclaim the gospel in a manner approved by other apostles (1:11–2:10). Continuing in the autobiographical mode, he relates an incident at Antioch that set him at odds with Peter (called Cephas—his Aramaic name) and other respected church leaders (2:11–14). Reporting that incident serves as a segue to discussion of matters at hand, for it brings into sharp focus a question that the Galatians themselves need to consider: whether one is made right with God by doing works of the law or by trusting in Jesus Christ (2:15–21). Seizing the offensive, Paul tells the Galatians they are fools for allowing anyone to convince them the crucified Christ is insufficient for them. With a number of arguments—many drawn from scripture—he reiterates his point that trusting in Christ is incompatible with relying on works of the law as a means to receiving God’s Spirit or being declared righteous by God (3:1–18). He considers the true purpose of the law (3:19–4:11) and then turns conciliatory, appealing to the Galatians as his children in the faith and calling them to turn back from a course that will lead them into bondage (4:12–5:1). He warns them against accepting circumcision as a qualification for belonging to God and vents his anger against those who urge them to do so (5:2–12). Finally, Paul launches into a soaring treatise on the meaning of freedom, emphasizing its paradoxical fulfillment in loving service rather than in self-indulgence. He identifies the outcome and evidence of true freedom with the fruit that the Holy Spirit bears in people whose lives have been transformed by God’s grace (5:13–25). He then concludes the letter with a quick series of exhortations (5:26–6:10) and a summary paragraph written in his own hand, exalting the cross of Jesus (6:11–18).
Historical Setting: The Letter to the Galatians was written by Paul to a number of churches in a Roman province located in modern-day Turkey. The dating of the letter depends on more precise suppositions about where these Galatians were located: the people who called themselves “Galatians” were a group who lived in the northern part of the province, which Paul does not appear to have visited until at least the early 50s (cf. Acts 16:6; 18:23); if, however, the term “Galatians” was used less precisely to mean “residents of Galatia,” then the people addressed could be inhabitants of the southern part of the province visited by Paul in the mid to late 40s. The attraction of this latter view (called the “south Galatian theory”) for some scholars is that it allows the Letter to the Galatians to have been written early (indeed, to be the earliest of all Paul’s letters), and this helps to resolve historical discrepancies that otherwise arise (e.g., if Paul is writing the letter early—before the Jerusalem Council mentioned in Acts 15—then Gal. 2:1–10 can be taken as referring to meetings and other events not recounted in Acts rather than to events that are recounted in Acts in ways that contradict Paul’s report). Most scholars nevertheless hold to the first option mentioned above, the “north Galatian theory.” Then the letter is usually dated to the mid-50s, around the same time that Paul wrote Romans.
| GALATIAN THEORIES: SEQUENCE OF EVENTS | |
| “North Galatian Theory” | “South Galatian Theory” |
| Paul evangelizes cities in south Galatia (Acts 13:14–15; 14:1) | Paul evangelizes cities in south Galatia (Acts 13:14–15; 14:1) |
| Jerusalem Council (Gal. 2:1–10; Acts 15) | Paul meets with church leaders in Jerusalem (Gal. 2:1–10) |
| Paul evangelizes Galatian tribes in north Galatia (Acts 16:6, 18:5) | Paul writes the letter of Galatians to churches in south Galatia |
| Paul writes the letter of Galatians to churches in north Galatia | Jerusalem Council (Acts 15) |
| The “north Galatian theory” recognizes that the people usually known as “the Galatians” lived in the northern part of the province visited by Paul after the Jerusalem Council. | The “south Galatian theory” resolves what would be inconsistencies between Gal. 2:1–10 and Acts 15 if these were viewed as describing the same event. |
| From Mark Allan Powell, Introducing the New Testament (courtesy, Baker Academic) | |
In any case, the impetus for this letter is that the Gentile Christians in Galatia have been persuaded by certain Jewish Christians that they ought to be circumcised, keep the Jewish law, and, in effect, become Jews (albeit Jews committed to Jesus Christ). It is possible that these teachers had told the Galatians that the salvation brought by Jesus the Jewish Messiah was only available to Jewish people, or it is possible that they simply proclaimed circumcision and Torah observance as the appropriate “next step” for Gentile Christians who wanted to experience the fullness of faith. Either way, they have also belittled Paul, claiming that his law-free gospel was acquired secondhand (since Paul had not known the earthly Jesus) and did not meet with the approval of disciples and family members of Jesus who had a closer link to the Lord.
Paul writes to the Galatians to settle two related matters. First, he responds to the personal charges made against him by claiming that his understanding of the gospel does have the endorsement of James, Peter, John, and others (2:1–10) and that he was an eyewitness to the risen Jesus and received his gospel directly from Jesus Christ. Second, he rebukes the Galatians for listening to teachers who proclaim a false gospel, insisting that any reliance on the law as a means to obtaining a right (or better) relationship with God is incompatible with the gospel of grace and faith in Christ.
Major Themes: The letter reveals a good deal about Paul’s own biography, providing his account of his transformation from persecutor of Christians to proclaimer of the gospel (1:13–24). He also gives an account of an incident at Antioch in which he rebuked Peter for hypocrisy after the latter apparently changed his position on the question of whether Jewish and Gentile Christians should eat the community meal at one table or at separate tables (2:11–14). Apart from the biographical material, however, the primary theological theme of Galatians is the relationship of Christ and the law. Paul makes at least four points in defense of his claim that Gentile believers do not need to keep the Jewish law. First, he argues that justification is by faith, not works (2:16–17). Second, he maintains that God’s favor is universal in scope, and that Jews and Gentiles alike are now recipients of the grace of God manifested through Christ (3:28). Third, Paul claims that the “fullness of time” has now come in a way that marks a radical shift in God’s plan (4:4–5). The law belongs to a bygone era “before faith came” (3:23; cf. 3:25); for people of faith to live under the law would be inappropriate, analogous to adults continuing to live under the authority of a servant who had charge of them when they were children (4:1–7). Finally, Paul maintains that God gives the Holy Spirit to believers (3:2) and that this obviates the need for the law; the Spirit produces in believers a righteousness that the law could only describe but not effect (5:22–23). See also circumcision; faith; flesh and spirit; Galatia; Gentile; Holy Spirit; justification; kingdom of God; law; Paul.
OUTLINE OF CONTENTS
Galatians
I. Epistolary prescript (1:1–5)
II. Introduction (exordium; 1:6–11)
III. Statement of facts (narratio; 1:12–2:14)
A. Thesis (1:12)
B. First part: from Paul’s birth to mission in Asia Minor (1:13–24)
C. Second part: Paul’s second visit in Jerusalem (the Jerusalem Council; 2:1–10)
D. Third part: conflict at Antioch (2:11–14)
IV. Proposition (propositio; 2:15–21)
V. Proofs (probatio; 3:1–4:31)
A. First argument: the Galatians’ experience of the Spirit (3:1–5)
B. Second argument: God’s promise to Abraham (3:6–14)
C. Third argument: common human practice of law (3:15–18)
D. Digression: Jewish Torah (3:19–25)
E. Fourth argument: Christian tradition (3:26–4:11)
F. Fifth argument: friendship (4:12–20)
G. Sixth argument: allegory of Sarah and Hagar (4:21–31)
VI. Exhortation (exhortatio; 5:1–6:10)
A. Warning against acceptance of Jewish Torah (5:1–12)
B. Warning against corruption of flesh (5:13–24)
C. Recommendations for the Christian life (series of sententiae; 5:25–6:10)
VII. Epistolary postscript (6:11–18)
H.D.B.
Bibliography
Betz, Hans Dieter. Galatians: A Commentary on Paul’s Letter to the Churches in Galatia. Fortress, 1979.
Dunn, James D. G. The Theology of Paul’s Letter to the Galatians. Cambridge University Press, 1993.
Longenecker, Richard N. Galatians. Word, 1990.
Lührmann, Dieter. Galatians. Augsburg, 1992.
Martyn, J. Louis. Galatians. Doubleday, 1997.
Powell, Mark Allan. Introducing the New Testament: A Historical, Literary, and Theological Survey. Baker Academic, 2009. Pp. 307–21.
M.A.P.
galbanum (gal′buh-nuhm), a gum resin derived from several plants (such as Ferula galbaniflua). It is an ingredient in incense (Exod. 30:34) for use in worship. Yellow or greenish brown, it has a prominent aroma and, though regularly called a “sweet spice,” it has a bitter taste. In Sir. 24:15 galbanum appears on a list of spices that symbolize wisdom.
Galilean (gal′uh-lee′uhn), inhabitant of Galilee (Matt. 26:69; Acts 1:11; 2:7; Mark 14:70; Luke 13:1, 22:59; 23:6; John 4:45; 7:52). The term appears as an epithet for the insurrectionist Judas (Acts 5:37). The regional accent of Galilean speech apparently enabled others to identify origin by it (Matt. 26:73).
Galilee (gal′uh-lee; Heb. Galil), the region of the Levant that is situated between the Litani River in modern Lebanon and the Jezreel Valley in modern Israel. The designation “Galilee” first occurs as a proper name in Joshua (20:7; 21:32) and in Chronicles (1 Chron. 6:76) in reference to the site of Qadesh of Naphtali. It occurs with the definite article in 1 Kings 9:11, “in the land of Galilee.” From Isa. 9:1 we learn it was known as a land surrounded by foreigners. The proper name occurs regularly in the writings of the first-century historian Josephus and the NT (Gk. Galilaia).
This tiny region, approximately forty-five miles long north to south, is first mentioned by Pharaoh Thutmose III in 1468 BCE when he captured twenty-three Canaanite cities there. From the time of the Israelite settlement (late thirteenth–early twelfth century BCE) Galilee is associated with the tribes of Naphtali, Asher, Issachar, and Zebulun; the tribe of Dan eventually moved there. The reorganization into administrative districts under King David saw a consolidation of Israelite presence there. King Solomon, however, returned some twenty Galilean cities to Hiram, king of Tyre, in payment for building materials (1 Kings 9:10–11).
During the period of the divided monarchy (ca. 922–587/6 BCE) Galilee was invaded by Pharaoh Shishak during the time of Rehoboam. In ca. 885 during the reign of Israel’s King Baasha, Ben-hadad of Damascus captured Ijon, Dan, Able-beth-maacah, and “all the land of Naphtali” (1 Kings 15:18–20). The confrontation of Ahab, king of Israel, with Shahnaneser III of Assyria at Qarqar in 853 BCE ultimately led to the confrontation at Mount Carmel in 841. Tiglath-pileser III, also of Assyria, however, took much of Galilee in 732 BCE when he captured thirteen of its cities (2 Kings 15:29), depopulated much of the area, and united it to Assyria as a province. From then on Galilee as a region became known as the Assyrian province of Megiddo. Galilee’s history remains obscure until the Greek conquest by Alexander the Great in 332 BCE.
Jewish settlement in Galilee followed the Maccabean revolt in 164 BCE. Galilee was annexed by Judah Aristobolus I in 104 BCE. His brother and successor, Alexander Jannaeus, further extended the borders of Galilee during his reign. With the Roman conquest in 63 BCE, Pompey recaptured many Galilean cities and incorporated them into a new Roman administration. Under Herod the Great (40–4 BCE), Galilee, together with Judea and Perea, formed a large portion of a new province. Upon Herod’s death in 4 BCE, Galilee and Perea were made part of the tetrarchy of Herod Antipas, his son.
Galilee constitutes the area in which Jesus conducted the major part of his ministry. His youth and early ministry took place in Nazareth in Lower Galilee; much of his public ministry was located at the northwestern end of the Sea of Galilee, at Capernaum, which was known as Jesus’s own city (Matt. 9:1).
The first-century historian Josephus (Life 45.235) maintains that there were 204 villages in Galilee. Archaeology has shown that that figure is not improbable. In Lower Galilee the major centers in the first centuries CE were Tiberias and Sepphoris. In Upper Galilee, called Tetracomia (“Four Villages”) by Josephus, Gush Halav (Gischala) and Meiron were certainly among the largest villages. The population in both areas of Galilee was Jewish, but it was not until after the two devastating wars with Rome in 66–73 and 132–135 CE that the population accelerated. It was in the aftermath of those debacles that Jews from Judea relocated themselves there en masse.
E.M.M.
Galilee, Sea of, a freshwater lake in the district of Galilee, given various names throughout history: “Sea of Chinnereth” (or “Chinneroth”), from the Hebrew word for a harplike instrument (Num. 34:11; Josh. 12:3; 13:27); “Sea of Tiberias” (John 6:1; 21:1); “Lake of Gennesaret” (Luke 5:1); and “waters of Gennesaret” (1 Macc. 11:67). Elsewhere, it is referred to simply as “the lake” (Luke 5:2; 8:22–33) or “the sea” (John 6:16–25). It appears as the “Sea of Galilee” in Matt. 4:18; 15:29; Mark 1:16; 7:31.
Along with the Jordan River and the Dead Sea, this body of water is an integral part of the Syro-African rift, a geological fault that extends from Syria in the north to the northeastern part of Africa in the south. The lake is approximately 700 feet below sea level and has a maximum depth of 150 feet. The Jordan River, carrying the melted snows of Mount Hermon, enters the lake from the north, flows through its thirteen-mile length, and continues its course after leaving the lake along the southwestern shoreline. The water surface of the lake varies according to the season and the amount of rainfall. At its widest part, the lake measures about eight miles, and its circumference is about thirty-two miles.
Due to the height of the hills (1200 to 1500 feet) surrounding the below sea-level lake, abrupt temperature shifts occur, causing sudden and violent storms, as the NT accounts indicate (Matt. 8:23–27; Mark 4:35–41; Luke 8:22–25; Matt. 14:22–33; Mark 6:45–52; John 6:16–21). The northern end of the lake has little protection and remains subject to strong winds. Nevertheless, the natural features of climate, fertile soil, and abundance of water attracted inhabitants from prehistoric times to the present day to settle along the shores of the lake.
An offshoot of the international highway known as the Via Maris followed a portion of the western coast of the lake, helping the area to develop as one of the larger population centers in the first century CE. Fishing, agriculture, and fruit growing added to the attraction of the area. Some forty different species of fish inhabit the waters, and salted fish were exported widely throughout the Roman Empire. A Roman-era fishing boat was discovered in 1986. Some of the towns and areas near the Sea of Galilee that are mentioned in the Gospels are Bethsaida, Capernaum, Chorazin, Gadara, Gennesaret, Magdala, and Tiberias. Numerous hot mineral springs near Tiberias, Gadara, and Tabgha, combined with the tropical climate around the lake, made the area a natural health spa. See also Bethsaida; Capernaum; Chorazin; Gadara, Gadarenes; Galilee; Magdala; Tiberias.
M.K.M.
gall. When “gall” is used to translate Hebrew merorah, the reference is to a bodily organ—the gall bladder or, possibly, the liver (Job 20:25)—and the bile that it produces (Job 16:13). The NRSV also translates a different word (Heb. rosh) as “gall” in Lam. 3:19, though it renders that same word as “poison” in Ps. 69:21. This latter word (rosh) refers to some unknown herb (possibly, though not certainly, hemlock); in Lam. 3:19, it is paired with wormwood in a metaphorical description of the bitterness of life. The LXX uses Greek chol–e in both Lam. 3:19 and Ps. 69:21, and that is also the Greek word that the NRSV translates “gall” in Matt. 27:34 and Acts 8:23. In the Matthew reference, Jesus is given wine mixed with gall to drink on the cross. In Acts, the term is again used metaphorically to describe the bitter or poisonous character of Simon Magus. The term “gall” (chol–e) is also used several times in Tobit, where it refers to an inner organ of a fish believed to have medicinal properties (6:5–9; 11:4, 8, 11).
M.A.P.
Gallio (gal′ee-oh), the son of the Roman rhetorician Seneca, brother of Seneca the philosopher, and holder of several important civil positions in the Roman Empire. His full name was Lucius Junius Gallio Annaeus. According to Acts 18:12–17, Paul was brought before Gallio’s judgment seat in Corinth (discovered in recent times in the old city) when Gallio was proconsul in Achaia. After a perfunctory hearing, Gallio perceived that the dispute between Paul and his Jewish accusers was over an internal religious matter, and he refused to continue with the case, even when the Jews proceeded to beat Sosthenes, a synagogue official sympathetic to Paul (Acts 18:17; cf. 1 Cor. 1:1) in front of the tribunal. There are no further references to Gallio in the NT. Roman sources, however, indicate that, after spending time in Achaia and Egypt, he returned to Rome to take an official position. After his brother Seneca’s death in a conspiracy against Nero in the early 60s, Gallio fell into disgrace and ultimately committed suicide. The mention of Gallio in Acts is important to biblical studies, because it provides a key piece of evidence for establishing the chronology of Paul’s activities. An inscription discovered at Delphi mentions Gallio as proconsul of Achaia at the time of the twenty-sixth accolade (an honor given to Roman officials) of the emperor Claudius. It is not clear whether this was 52/53 or 51/52 CE, but most scholars prefer the earlier date. Thus, according to Acts 18:12–17, the inscription, and Paul’s own writings (1 Cor. 3:5–15), it would appear that Paul was in Corinth ca. 51/52 CE and that this was when he founded the church there. Most Pauline biographies start with this piece of information as a relatively firm date and then work forward and backward to determine dates for the rest of Paul’s career. See also chronology, New Testament; Corinth; Paul; tribunal.
A.J.M.
gallows, a device for execution by hanging. Most gallows comprised a platform from which a vertical support ascended to anchor a horizontal arm from which the strangling rope descended. Biblical law made no provision for such a form of execution, and gallows are mentioned only in the book of Esther, where they are employed by the Persians. In that account, Bigthan and Teresh, who had plotted to assassinate the Persian king, were hanged once their threat was found to be true (2:23). A gallows “fifty cubits high” was also built for the execution of Mordecai at the instigation of Haman (5:14). Thanks to Esther, however, the conspiracy against Mordecai was averted, and Haman and his sons were hung on the gallows instead (7:9–10; cf. 8:7; 9:13, 25). See also hanging.
Gamaliel (guh-may′lee-uhl; Heb., “recompense of God”).
1 The son of Pedahzur, a prince of Manasseh on the march through the wilderness (Num. 1:10; 2:20; 7:54, 59; 10:23).
2 A Pharisee in the Jewish council, honored by all the people, who, according to Acts 5:34–39, counseled tolerance of the apostles proclaiming Jesus’s resurrection and messiahship. He reasoned that, if the movement was not of God, it would die on its own, and if it was of God, the Jewish authorities should not oppose it. He is probably the same person referred to in Acts 22:3 as a teacher of the law at whose feet Paul claims to have been instructed in Jerusalem. In rabbinic literature, this Gamaliel is identified as Gamaliel I or the Elder. He was prominent in the mid-first century CE, but very little reliable information about him is available. The list of princes or patriarchs of Judaism in Pirqe ’Abot (part of the Mishnah) lists him after Hillel. He is not to be confused with another Jewish leader known as Gamaliel II, the leader of the rabbinic assembly that gathered after the destruction of the temple in 70 CE.
A.J.S.
games. Categories of games in biblical times include mental exercises, sporting events, and board games. The riddle proposed by Samson (Judg. 14:12–14) is a mental exercise. Riddles were widely known in the ancient Near East, but (unlike the tricky riddle posed by Samson) were supposed to deal with common experience or knowledge.
One reference to a sporting event in the Bible, described in 2 Sam. 2:12–17, set twelve of Joab’s men against twelve of Abner’s men. The contest, which was probably intended to be wrestling, had, however, a fatal outcome. By Hellenistic times, major sporting festivals such as the Olympian games were held in various cities. In 2 Macc. 4:18 reference is made to the “quadrennial games” held at Tyre. NT letters shows the influence of these Greek games through the employment of sporting metaphors (1 Cor. 9:24–27). Specifically, Paul speaks of running a race in several passages (1 Cor. 9:24; Gal. 2:2; 5:7; Phil. 3:14), and he refers to boxing in 1 Cor. 9:26. The Pastoral Letters use the image of fighting a good fight (1 Tim. 1:18; 2 Tim. 4:7) with connotations that seem more athletic than military.
Board games, though not mentioned specifically in the Bible, have been found in a number of archaeological excavations. In the NT, the soldiers cast lots for Jesus’s garments, probably gambling with dice (Matt. 27:35). Inlaid game boards were known from Ur as early as the twenty-sixth century BCE. Likewise, game boards and boxes have been uncovered from Egypt dating to the third and second millennia BCE. One Egyptian set is fully preserved. Of the ten ivory playing pieces five were carved with dogs’ heads and five with jackals’ heads. These pieces were apparently moved around a playing board with numerous holes for the pieces. Three astragali (animal knuckle bones) served as the dice to determine moves. Game boards have also been found in the Near East. An ivory board from Megiddo is largely circular with fifty-eight holes for pieces to move along. A limestone game board from Tell Beit Mirsim has fifteen ruled squares and ten playing pieces of blue faience, five cone-shaped pieces and five tetrahedrons. It also has a small die in the shape of a truncated pyramid, with numbers on the four sides. Unfortunately, no evidence remains to indicate how these games were played. See also riddle.
J.F.D.
garden, a plot of cultivated land, often enclosed by walls made of stones, mud-brick, or hedges. Entrance was normally through a gate, which could be locked (Song of Sol. 4:12; 2 Kings 25:4). Located near ample supplies of water, gardens were lush and desirable pieces of property used for both decorative and utilitarian purposes (Gen. 13:10; Num. 24:6; Jer. 31:12). Vegetables, spices, fruit trees, and flowers were grown in them (1 Kings 21:2; Jer. 29:5; Song of Sol. 4:12–16; Luke 13:19). Gardens were also used as meeting places for social occasions and for meditation and prayer (Esther 1:5; John 18:1). Occasionally, idolatrous religious practices were carried on in gardens (Isa. 65:3; 66:17). Ancestral tombs were often located in gardens. Thus, many Judean kings were buried in garden tombs (2 Kings 21:18, 26), and the body of Jesus was laid to rest in a garden tomb belonging to Joseph of Arimathea (John 19:41–42). The care of gardens might require the employ of a gardener (John 20:15).
The word “garden” is also used metaphorically and symbolically in the Bible. Thus, in the Song of Solomon, the word refers to the young woman or bride whom the lover comes to court (4:12; 5:1; 6:2). Elsewhere, the word refers to the “garden of God” or “garden of the LORD,” also known as “Eden,” where God walked among the trees in the cool of the day and from which the primordial human beings were banished (Gen. 2:15; 3:1, 2, 3, 8, 10, 23, 24; Ezek. 28:13; 31:8–9). In this latter sense it is also used as a simile to describe the eschatological restoration of the land of Israel (Isa. 51:3; 58:11; Ezek. 36:35). See also Eden; paradise.
W.E.L.
garment. See dress.
gate. See walls.
Gate, Beautiful. See Nicanor.
Gath, one of the Philistine Pentapolis cities located on the coastal plain in the southern Levant (Josh. 13:3). Like Ashdod, it was one of the remaining homes of the Anakim (giants; see Josh. 11:22; 2 Sam. 21:22). The city is mentioned twice in conjunction with the stories about the ark of the covenant (1 Sam. 4–6; 2 Sam. 6). The Philistine inhabitants of Ashdod sent the ark to Gath (1 Sam. 5:8; 6:17; 7:14). Gath was also the home of Goliath the Philistine (1 Sam. 17:4, 23). David befriended Achish, the king of Gath, during his time as an outlaw (1 Sam. 27:2–11). However, Gath continued as a center of opposition to the Hebrews, and it provided warriors who opposed the Hebrews (2 Sam. 15:18; 21:20). During the reign of Joash (ca. 802–786 BCE) Hazael, king of Damascus/Syria, took the city (2 Kings 12:17). According to 2 Chron. 26:6, the city was captured by David and then recaptured by Uzziah (ca. 783–742 BCE). There is no mention, however, of those conquests in the Deuteronomistic History (Joshua–2 Kings). Ancient Near Eastern sources indicate that Sargon II of Assyria destroyed Gath ca. 712 BCE.
S.B.R.
Gath-rimmon (gath-rim′uhn; Heb., “the wine press of Rimmon”), a city originally assigned to Dan, but later given to the Levites (Josh. 19:45; 21:24). In a parallel account it is listed as being given to the Levites from the tribe of Ephraim (1 Chron. 6:69), but that account omits a verse preserved in Joshua (21:23) that specifies the city belonged to Dan. A second Gath-rimmon given to the Levites from the half-tribe of Manasseh is also recorded (Josh. 21:25), but in the parallel account (1 Chron. 6:70) that city is called Bileam. Most scholars think there was only one Gath-rimmon and that scribal errors led to the multiple and conflicting references in these accounts. The city is thought to have been located northeast of Joppa, although the exact site is unknown. Perhaps the fact that this area is near the borders of Dan, Ephraim, and Manasseh contributed to the confusion in the accounts.
D.R.B.
Gaza (gay′zuh), a settlement about three miles from the Mediterranean coast, marking the southern border of Canaan. It was captured by Pharaoh Thutmose III (ca. 1469 BCE) and is mentioned in the Tell el-Amarna tablets and Taanach tablets as an Egyptian administrative center. It was later conquered by Israelites from the tribe of Judah (Judg. 1:18) and was included in the allotment given to that tribe (Josh. 15:47). Gaza eventually became part of the Philistine Pentapolis, the southernmost city in that league of five cities (Josh. 13:3; 1 Sam. 6:17; Jer. 25:20); it remained an independent Philistine stronghold ca. 1200–600 BCE (though it did fall briefly to the Assyrians in the eighth century). As quintessential Philistine territory, Gaza figured prominently in the Samson narratives. It was here that Samson, while visiting a prostitute, eluded capture by the Philistines and, seizing the Gaza city gates, carried them to Hebron (Judg. 16:1–3). Later, after he was betrayed by Delilah, Samson was taken as a prisoner to Gaza, where he was tortured and confined (16:21–25). Eventually, however, he regained his strength and pulled down the pillars of the temple of Dagon in Gaza (16:28–30).
King Hezekiah of Judah waged war against the Philistines “as far as Gaza” in the eighth century BCE (2 Kings 18:8), and the city was later conquered by Sennacherib of Assyria (734 BCE). Still later, Pharaoh Neco II occupied Gaza briefly in 609 BCE, and Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon conquered the city in 604 BCE, an event referred to in Jer. 47:1–2. According to the Greek historian Herodotus (2.159), Gaza became a royal fortress under Persian control of the area and was then called Kadytis. It was also the only city in its area to oppose Alexander the Great (332 BCE). Later on, it became an outpost of the Ptolemies, who were the ruling power in Egypt during the Hellenistic period, until its capture in 198 BCE by Antiochus III, the Seleucid king in control of Syria. The Seleucid city was subsequently attacked by Jonathan the Hasmonean (145 BCE; cf. 1 Macc. 11:61–62). During the Hasmonean civil war, Gaza was taken by Alexander Jannaeus in 96 BCE. The Roman Pompey restored the city, and Galbinius, also a Roman official, rebuilt it (ca. 57 BCE). King Herod the Great held Gaza for a short time, but after his death it came under the authority of the Roman proconsul of Syria. It flourished as a Roman city and remained a center for the Jewish community and the emerging Christian community throughout the Roman era (63 BCE–324 CE) and continuing into the Byzantine period (324–1453 CE).
Modern Tell Harube has been identified as ancient Gaza. Excavations there have revealed a mosaic pavement, and a synagogue from the sixth century CE. There appears to have been continuous occupation from the Late Bronze era until the Byzantine period (ca. 1500 BCE–632 CE).
S.B.R.
gazelle. Three species of gazelles lived in the Near East during the biblical period: the Dorcas gazelle (Gazella dorcas) in the deserts, the mountain gazelle (Gazella gazella) in the hillier areas, and the goitred gazelle (Gazella subgutturosa) east of the Jordan. They were symbols of love and beauty for the Hebrews (Song of Sol. 2:9, 17). They were also a major game animal, regularly supplied at Solomon’s table (1 Kings 4:23), though they were difficult to catch because of their swiftness (2 Sam. 2:18; 1 Chron. 12:8).
Geba (gee′buh), a town to the northwest of the Dead Sea given to the Levites from the tribe of Benjamin (Josh. 21:17). It guarded the Michmash pass and was the scene of Israelite battles with the Philistines (1 Sam. 13:3). It is sometimes confused with Gibeah and Gibeon in the Hebrew text, thus, “from Geba to Gezer” in 1 Sam. 5:25 should probably read, “from Gibeon to Gezer” (cf. 1 Chron. 14:16), and the reference to Geba in Judg. 20:33 should probably be to Gibeah (cf. Judg. 20:20, 34). Geba was later fortified by Asa (1 Kings 15:22) and was repopulated in the postexilic period, after the mid-sixth century BCE (Neh. 11:31). See also Gibeah; Gibeon; Michmash; Philistines.
Gebal (gee′buhl; Heb., “mountain”).
1 A Canaanite and Phoenician port city about twenty miles north of Beirut, known to the Greeks as Byblos and today called Jebail. Mentioned in Josh. 13:5 as part of the land that still remained to be conquered, it was famous for its skilled laborers. These would include stonemasons and carpenters who helped construct Solomon’s temple (1 Kings 5:18) as well as shipwrights (Ezek. 27:9), who used cedar, spruce, and cypress from the high mountains immediately east of the city.
Archaeological excavations at Gebal reveal a long and fascinating history. First settled in the Pre-Pottery Neolithic period as early as ca. 8000 BCE, it was already a major site during the Chalcolithic period (ca. 3500–3100 BCE). In the Bronze Age (ca. 3000–1200 BCE) Gebal traded as far afield as Anatolia, Mesopotamia, and the Sudan, not only in lumber, but also in such goods as wine, leather, and oil. Egypt, which had little wood of its own, sought to control Gebal, but between ca. 1800 and 1500 BCE Gebal was fortified as a city of the Hyksos. Egypt regained control after 1500, but never attained its earlier level of authority. For example, an account of how an Egyptian official, Wen-Amon, was rudely received in ca. 1000 BCE vividly reveals Gebal’s complete freedom of action at that time (corresponding to the beginnings of the Israelite monarchy). Specific archaeological finds include the sarcophagus of King Ahiram (tenth century BCE), which bears the earliest known Phoenician alphabetic inscription. In fact, almost all early Phoenician inscriptions that have been discovered thus far come from Gebal.
2 A tribal area south of the Dead Sea mentioned in Ps. 83:7 in connection with Moab and Edom; some modern scholars equate it with 1 above.
D.B.
Geber (gee′buhr; Heb., “vigorous”), the son of Uri; he was Solomon’s officer in charge of procuring provisions in Gilead (1 Kings 4:19).
Gedaliah (ged′uh-li′uh).
1 The son of Ahikam son of Shaphan, who was appointed by King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon to be governor of Judah after Jerusalem fell to the Babylonians in 587/6 BCE (1 Kings 25:22). Gedaliah was a member of a prominent Jerusalem family; his father and grandfather had served in Josiah’s court (2 Kings 22:3, 14). He too may have been a royal official, if he is identical with “Gedaliah, the royal steward,” whose name appears on a stamp seal discovered at Lachish. Though viewed with suspicion as a Babylonian collaborator by his contemporaries, Gedaliah succeeded in restoring order to the countryside with the support of former army officers and the prophet Jeremiah. His tenure at Mizpah, the provincial capital, was cut short by a conspiracy led by Ishmael, son of Nataniah, of the royal line. Gedaliah and his entourage were slaughtered, and the conspirators escaped across the Jordan to Ammon (Jer. 40–41). A national day of fasting and mourning was inaugurated among the exiles to mark his murder (Zech. 7:5). See also Nebuzaradan.
2 The grandfather of the prophet Zephaniah (cf. Zeph. 1:1).
M.C.
Gederah (gi-dee′ruh; Heb., “a wall”), a city in the lowlands of Judah noted for its royal potters (Josh. 15:36; 1 Chron. 4:23). It was also the home of Jozabad, one of David’s warriors (1 Chron. 12:4), and of Baal-hanan, an agricultural official under David (1 Chron. 27:28). The site is unknown.
Gedor (gee′dor; Heb., possibly “stone pile”).
1 The name of a town inherited by Judah (Josh. 15:58), possibly Khirbet Jedur southwest of Bethlehem and northwest of Hebron.
2 A son of the Judahite Penuel (1 Chron. 4:4) who may have been the founder of the town inherited by Judah.
3 A son of the Judahite Jered (1 Chron. 4:18).
4 The name of the entrance to some rich grazing land (1 Chron. 4:39); possibly the intended reference here is to “Gerar.”
5 A son of the Benjaminite Jeiel and Maacah (1 Chron. 8:31; 9:37).
6 The residence of Jehoram (1 Chron. 12:7).
Gehazi (gi-hay′zi; Heb., “valley of vision”), the servant or younger associate of Elisha the prophet. In the story of the wealthy Shunammite woman (2 Kings 4:8–37), Gehazi is portrayed as Elisha’s faithful messenger and perhaps overzealous protector (4:27). Some time later Gehazi is in conversation with the king of Israel, when this same woman appears seeking recovery of her property after a sojourn in Philistia (2 Kings 8:1–6). In the story of Naaman (2 Kings 5), however, Gehazi is portrayed as greedy and deceitful; he is cursed by Elisha and contracts leprosy.
D.L.C.
Gemariah (gem′uh-ri′uh).
1 The son of Shaphan, of an influential Jerusalem family of scribes in the early sixth century BCE. The scroll of Jeremiah’s collected prophecies was first read in Gemariah’s chamber in the temple precinct (Jer. 36:10). Later, Gemariah appears among the prophet’s supporters at the court of Jehoiakim.
2 The son of Hilkiah, who carried Jeremiah’s letter to the exiles in Babylonia (Jer. 29:3).
gematria (gay-mah′tree-uh), the practice of assigning a numerical value to proper names or to related words and expressions. This was easily done in the ancient world because, in both Hebrew and Greek, letters of the alphabet were also used as numerals. It became commonplace for people to add up the numerical value of the letters that were used to spell any person’s name and to regard the sum of those numbers as “the number of (that) person’s name” (cf. Rev. 13:17–18). For example, if gematria were practiced with the modern-day English alphabet, an A would be equal to 1, a B would be equal to 2, and so forth. After the tenth letter, the eleventh (K) would be equal to 20, the twelfth (L) would be equal to 30, and so on until, with the twenty-first letter (U), multiples of 100 would be used. The proper name “Mark” would end up consisting of four letters with these numerical values: M = 40; A = 1; R = 90; K = 20. The sum of these numbers (40 + 1 + 90 + 20) would be 151, so in modern-day gematria, it could be said that the number of Mark’s name is 151. Today, this would seem like a code, but the whole process would have been less mysterious in the biblical world, when everyone already knew the numerical value of each individual letter. In any case, gematria became very popular in certain times and places. In the Greco-Roman world, during NT times, it often became the basis for jokes and riddles; for these to have functioned as they did at a popular level, most people would have to have known the numbers of their own names, as well as the numbers to be associated with other prominent people. Most Jews would have known that the letters in the name “David” (in Hebrew) added to 14 and most Christians would have known that the letters in the name “Jesus” (in Greek) added to 888. Likewise, the first readers of the book of Revelation probably knew that the letters in the name “Caesar Nero” (in Hebrew) added to either 666 or 616, depending on how it was spelled. Accordingly, Rev. 13:18 reveals the number of the beast to be 666 in some manuscripts and 616 in others.
M.A.P.
| GEMATRIA | |||||
| The practice of gematria consists of assigning a numerical value to a word or phrase by adding together the values of the individual letters. This works in Hebrew and Greek, where the letters of the alphabet can also serve as numerals. In Greek, the marks signifying 6 and 90 were not used as letters in New Testament times. | |||||
| Hebrew Letters | |||||
 = 1 |
 = 5 |
 = 9 |
 = 40 |
 = 80 |
 = 300 |
 = 2 |
 = 6 |
 = 10 |
 = 50 |
 = 90 |
 = 400 |
 = 3 |
 = 7 |
 = 20 |
 = 60 |
 = 100 |
|
 = 4 |
 = 8 |
 = 30 |
 = 70 |
 = 200 |
|
| Greek Letters | |||||
 = 1 |
 = 6 |
 = 20 |
 = 70 |
 = 300 |
 = 800 |
 = 2 |
 = 7 |
 = 30 |
 = 80 |
 = 400 |
|
 = 3 |
 = 8 |
 = 40 |
 = 90 |
 = 500 |
|
 = 4 |
 = 9 |
 = 50 |
 = 100 |
 = 600 |
|
 = 5 |
 = 10 |
 = 60 |
 = 200 |
 = 700 |
|
| In the Roman world, gematria became a basis for riddles, jokes, and games: | |||||
| • Graffiti on a wall in Pompeii reads, “I love her whose number is 545.” | |||||
• As a political joke, Suetonius (Nero 39) indicates that the name “Nero” ( ) and the phrase “killed his own mother”  have the same numerical value (1,005) when written in Greek. This was pertinent because the emperor was rumored to have murdered his mother. |
|||||
| In Christianity and Judaism, gematria could provide a basis for religious symbolism: | |||||
• Rabbis noted that “Eliezer’  , the name of Abraham’s favored servant (Gen. 15:2), has a numerical value of 318, which is the total number of servants mentioned in Gen. 14:14. Thus, Eliezer was equal to all the rest of the servants combined. |
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• The Hebrew letters in the name “David”  add up to 14, so that number could be accorded messianic significance: the messiah was to be the Son of David. This is probably why Matthew’s Gospel emphasizes that the genealogy of Jesus can be divided into three sets of 14 generations (Matt. 1:17). |
|||||
• The Greek letters in the name “Jesus”  add up to 888, which some early Christians found significant: 8 surpasses 7 (the number for perfection) and heralds a “new creation” beyond what God did in the first 7 days (Gen. 1:1–2:3). |
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| Many scholars think that gematria holds the clue to resolving the puzzle of 666, the number attributed to the beast in Rev. 13:18: | |||||
• A popular spelling for the name of the emperor Nero adds up to 666 when written in Hebrew ( = Caesar Neron). An alternate spelling ( = Caesar Nero) adds up to 616, a variant reading for the number of the beast found in some manuscripts of Revelation. |
|||||
| • A designation for the emperor Domitian that sometimes appeared on Greek coins also adds up to 666: A. Kai. Domet. Seb. Ge. (an abbreviation for Autokrat–or Kaisar Dometianos Sebastos Germanikos = Emperor Caesar Domitian Augustus Germanicus). | |||||
| Over time, most Jewish and Christian groups abandoned the practice of gematria, perhaps because certain groups used numerology in connection with magic and the occult. The practice still features prominently in kabbalah and other mystical traditions. | |||||
genealogy. The Hebrew Bible contains contains about two dozen genealogical lists. The first is at Gen. 4:17–22 (from Cain through seven generations). Other prominent lists are the generations from Adam to Noah (Gen. 5:1–32), the descendants of Noah (10:1–32), the generations from Shem to Abraham (11:10–26), the descendants of Jacob (46:8–27) and Levi (Exod. 6:16–25), and the list of persons and families of the postexilic community who continue the line from preexilic times (Ezra 2:2b–61). The most extensive genealogy is in 1 Chron. 1:1–9:44 (Adam to the descendants of Saul). These genealogies vary with regard to historical value and purpose. The aim of constructing genealogies was not necessarily to be comprehensive, but to establish descent and thereby to define identity. Accordingly, certain generations and individuals could be omitted. For example, Exod. 6:16–20 appears to identify Moses as the great-grandson of Levi, which is hardly possible in a strict sense, since the time span is over four hundred years (cf. Exod. 12:40). The impetus for genealogies arose after the Deuteronomic reform (seventh century BCE), which stressed purity of the community (Deut. 7:1–4; 23:1–8). This was intensified in the postexilic era when there was some pressure to document ethnic purity (Ezra 2:59–63; 10:9–44; Neh. 13:23–28). Moreover, genealogies were constructed for the Aaronic priesthood (restricted to descendants of Levi; Exod. 28:1–29:44). Furthermore, since royal succession in the southern kingdom was determined by Davidic descent, a royal genealogical record had to be kept. It was expected in some circles that a Messiah would arise from among the descendants of David (Isa. 11:1–5; cf. 2 Sam. 7:16; Ps. 89:3–4), but the persistence and prevalence of that expectation is cast into some doubt by the fact that the Hebrew Bible offers no genealogies for Davidic descendants after Zerubbabel.
The NT genealogies of Jesus in Matt. 1:1–17 and Luke 3:23–38 seek to establish above all his Davidic descent (Matt. 1:1, 6, 17; Luke 3:31). Matthew also demonstrates Jesus’s descent from Abraham (1:1–2, 17), while Luke traces his descent all the way back to “Adam, the son of God” (3:38). Both genealogies, therefore, cover the span from Abraham to Jesus, but they differ in detail. Matthew computes three groups of fourteen generations each for this span (1:17), although only forty-one (not forty-two) names actually appear (inclusive of Abraham and Jesus), while Luke lists fifty-seven names for the same period. The names are mostly the same from Abraham to David in both (Luke 3:33 adds Arni and Admin), but thereafter only three names appear in common (Shealtiel, Zerubbabel, and Joseph). The significance of the number “fourteen” for Matthew’s genealogy is probably tied to an interest in gematria, according to which the number fourteen was associated with David and thus acquired messianic connotations. Matthew’s genealogy is also significant in that it includes four women (Tamar, Rahab, Ruth, and “the wife of Uriah” [Bathsheba]” cf. Matt. 1:3, 5, 6). The mention of women in a genealogy was highly irregular, and Matthew’s reason for naming these four women is not certain; it may be because all four were considered to be Gentiles, or because all four (like Mary, the virgin mother of Jesus) were considered to have had irregular sexual unions that nevertheless proved important for God’s plan. See also David; king; messiah; priests.
A.J.H./M.A.P.
General Letters/Epistles. See Catholic Letters/Epistles.
generation (Heb. dor), the period of time between the birth of parents and the birth of their children, or all of the people alive during such a time period. The Bible uses the term “generation” only loosely as a measure of time, so such references do not allow for precise chronological calculations. Although a generation sometimes covers up to a hundred years (Gen. 15:13, 16; Exod. 12:40), most biblical writers seem to consider thirty to forty years to be a normal generation (Deut. 2:14; Job 42:16; Ps. 95:10). Usually “generation” simply refers to the people who are alive at any given time (Gen. 6:9; Pss. 14:5; 24:6; 49:19; 24:6; 112:2; Jer. 2:3). Jesus uses the term this way in the NT when he speaks of judgment to come upon “this generation” (Matt. 12:41–45; cf. 23:36) or when he says, “An evil adulterous generation seeks a sign” (Matt. 12:39; 16:4; cf. 17:17). In Matt. 24:34, after delineating what will happen in the end times before the coming of the Son of Man, Jesus says, “This generation will not pass away until all these things take place” (cf. Mark 13:30; Luke 21:32).
R.R.W.
Genesis (jen′uh-sis), book of, the first of the Five Books of Moses (the Torah) of the Tanakh (Jewish Bible); it is the first book of the Pentateuch of the Christian OT. The Hebrew name of the book is bereshit, meaning “in the beginning,” which is the first Hebrew phrase of the book. The English name Genesis comes from the Greek word genesis in the LXX, which translates the Hebrew word toledot, meaning “generations.” The book consists of two parts, a narrative of the creation of the world and early world events called the primeval story (chaps. 1–11) and a narrative of Israel’s forebears Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob called the ancestral story (chaps. 12–50).
Contents: The primeval story begins with an account of creation painted in broad strokes. It accounts for the emergence of entire realms of material reality in short paragraphs full of formulaic repetitions; light, sky, earth, sun, moon, stars, birds, fish, animals, and humans all come into being within six days (Gen. 1). A second rendering of creation follows, which revolves entirely around the first human male, whose creation is followed by the creation of animals and a woman to meet his needs (Gen. 2). The next incident describes how the human–divine relationship becomes broken when Adam and Eve, the first couple, transgress the bounds of allowed behavior by eating the forbidden fruit (Gen. 3). Expulsion from the garden of Eden is shortly followed by the first murder, when Cain kills his brother, Abel (Gen. 4). The text notes how seminal cultural inventions, including the emergence of the city, arts, animal husbandry, and metallurgy, track alongside a growing trend in human violence. These developments prompt a destructive flood in the time of Noah that allows the world the opportunity to start afresh (Gen. 6–9). But human character has not changed, and humans are still driven to make a name for themselves apart from the deity. This effort is frustrated by God at Babel, and God focuses attention on one man, Abram (later renamed Abraham), and his offspring, who become the object of divine blessing (Gen. 11).
The ancestral story is constructed of three narrative cycles that are collections of material revolving around Abraham, Jacob, and Joseph, respectively, with genealogical interludes devoted to Ishmael and Esau. In the Abraham cycle Abraham is guided by God to journey to Canaan and settle there, with the promise of divine blessing and offspring (Gen. 12). Arriving at his destination, Abraham and his wife, Sarah, find the land to be rife with disappointment and danger, from famine to threats to personal safety, to infertility. Eventually Abraham and Sarah have a son, Isaac, but the bestowing deity demands him back, as told in the wrenching episode called the Akedah, or binding of Isaac (Gen. 22). Surviving these challenges, Isaac marries Rebekah, and they have twin sons, Esau and Jacob (Gen. 25). The Jacob cycle is dominated by Jacob’s relentless efforts to win blessing and prosperity, acquiring them by dubious and devious methods. He steals the firstborn’s rights from Esau (Gen. 25) as well as the paternal blessing (Gen. 27) and then acquires considerable wealth from his uncle Laban (Gen. 29–31). Last, he wrestles a blessing from God at the Jabbok River and receives the name Israel (Gen. 32). Jacob has twelve sons by his four wives (Leah, Zilpah, Rachel, and Bilhah), and they begin the twelve tribes that later constitute Israel. The final cycle is focused on Joseph, son of Jacob, and takes the form of a short story. Driven by jealousy, Joseph’s brothers sell him into slavery in Egypt (Gen. 37). While there he rises to a position of power as head of food resources (Gen. 39). When his brothers come to buy food due to a famine in Canaan, he takes revenge on them by imprisoning Simeon and threatening Benjamin (Gen. 40–44). He finally reveals his true identity, to their great shame and relief, and the entire extended family moves to Goshen in Egypt so that he can provide for them (Gen. 45–50). This positions the sons of Israel in Egypt, from which they will later escape, as told in the book of Exodus.
Structure: The book of Genesis has an overall structure that is defined by the occurrence of ten topic sentences that use the word toledot (Heb., “generations”), e.g., Gen. 2:4: “These are the generations of the heavens and the earth when they were created.” A toledot topic sentence introduces a new section that grabs hold of the central figure of the preceding section and describes what it has generated. For example, the creation of the heavens and the earth is told in Gen. 1:1–2:3; then comes the heavens and earth toledot topic sentence in 2:4, which introduces the narrative of what the heavens and earth become, as told in the Adam and Eve episodes. A similar pattern recurs in the remaining nine toledot sections. On the basis of content and structure, these ten toledot sections can be clustered into two groups of five each: the primeval story and the ancestral story.
Background: Genesis combines a variety of materials including genealogies, narrative episodes, and reports such as the creation narratives. Although some of the episodes are prehistorical and could not have been based on eyewitness reporting, many others are vivid and history-like rather than fantastical. Historians and archaeologists have sought evidence to reconstruct a viable context for the events of the primeval and ancestral stories. Late nineteenth-century and early twentieth-century finds in Mesopotamia, Egypt, and Turkey seemed to support the historicity of some of the figures in these stories (see Kitchen); other approaches, however, seem to support a monarchic or postexilic context for the written accounts, rendering the authenticity of the Genesis narratives suspect (see Van Seters, Finkelstein).
Although the book of Genesis does not identify its author, the Torah, including Genesis, was traditionally assumed to contain the writings of Moses. Close attention to details in the text reveals that Genesis was not written by one person, and it is not a book of history in the modern sense of the genre. It is more a chronologically structured book of cultural and family memories. The book was constructed out of a variety of preexisting oral and written material, and it developed in stages over hundreds of years, from the era of the Israelite monarchy to the postexilic period. The consensus of modern scholarship posits multiple authors and a long and involved process of composition. The prevailing Documentary Hypothesis identifies four main source texts for the Pentateuch: the Yahwist, Elohist, Priestly, and Deuteronomic documents. Elements of the Yahwist (J), Elohist (E), and Priestly (P) sources have been identified in Genesis.
According to most reconstructions of the compositional history of Genesis, the Yahwist narrative was an epic containing the episodes that formed the backbone of Genesis: the garden of Eden, Cain and Abel, the flood, the Tower of Babel, Abraham and Sarah (Gen. 12–13), etc. YHWH (“the LORD”) is the deity of these texts and is portrayed as very humanlike. Elohist texts include the covenant with Abraham (Gen. 15), the sacrifice of Isaac (Gen. 22), and portions of the Joseph cycle; they were combined with the Yahwist narrative to form the JE “old epic.” A Priestly group added narrative episodes and genealogies in the fifth century BCE to complete Genesis; these P additions include the first creation account (1:1–2:3), a version of the flood (interwoven with the J version in Gen. 6–9), and an account of the covenant of circumcision (Gen. 17). This P material refers to the deity as God (Elohim) or God Almighty (El Shaddai).
Themes: Genesis posits that the world came into existence by divine word and action. The creation of humans in the image and likeness of God (1:27) and out of the dust of the ground (2:7) accounts for their unique place within God’s world. Genesis also accounts for the origin of the nation of Israel (especially in the accounts of Abraham and Jacob) and grants possession of Canaan to the ancestors of Israel. The core assertion of Genesis is that Israel’s deity was responsible for the acts that brought everything into being: the creation of a world, the creation of all living things including humankind, the flood, which demonstrated the vulnerability of creation, and the creation of a divinely chosen people who would become God’s special nation. Related themes of blessing and covenant follow from creation and express the potential of the created world.
The words “bless” and “blessing” occur eighty-six times in Genesis. Blessing someone is a speech act that designates someone or something as an object of divine favor leading to its prosperity. It is an act of recognition and affirmation and entails the promise of a good future. Genesis mainly works out this notion in narratives with spoken promises and by the use of genealogies. Promises are so frequent in Genesis (12:2–3; 13:14–17; 18:17–19; 22:15–18; 24:7; 26:3b–5; 28:14; 32:13) and are so similar in vocabulary that Westermann posits a promise source, in addition to the JEP sources, that contributed to the book. The primeval story is largely a demonstration that blessing flows from being created in the image of God, but blessing is jeopardized when humans attempt to be like the deity by deciding for themselves what is good and evil (3:4, 22), by having intercourse with the gods (6:1–4), or by building a tower to access heaven (11:1–9).
The genealogies of Genesis, in addition to contributing to the chronological structure and flow of the book, give concrete evidence that the creation blessing to “be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth and subdue it” (1:28) had become a reality. The genealogies also progressively narrow the trajectory of biblical history, so that by the end of the book Israel, represented by the twelve sons of Jacob, has taken center stage. The three ancestral cycles relate how Abraham and his offspring come to experience blessing. The Abraham cycle works out the struggle for blessing primarily in relation to offspring. First, there is Sarah’s struggle to have any children at all (Gen. 15), which prompts Abraham and Sarah to use Hagar as a surrogate (Gen. 16). After the birth of Ishmael, Sarah has a child by Abraham, but God demands that Abraham sacrifice this son, Isaac (Gen. 22), delivering the child only at the last moment. The Jacob cycle is presented as a battle for blessing, one that Jacob wins at every juncture. He secures the family birthright (Gen. 25) and blessing (Gen. 27) from Esau, wives and livestock from Laban (Gen. 29–31), and blessing from God at the river (Gen. 32). The Joseph cycle is not focused on blessing to the same extent as the Jacob cycle, but it does work out how Joseph becomes the facilitator of blessing in a time of great famine, and thereby becomes a blessing to the nations, as promised to Abram (12:3).
The Priestly source, P, employs a sequence of three covenants to track the development of the deity’s relationship with the world. The first two of these are found in Genesis and the third in Exodus. Each covenant is associated with a stage in the sequential revelation of the identity of the biblical deity, as acknowledged in Exod. 6:2–3. The first is the covenant of God (Elohim) with all creatures after the flood, which is marked by the sign of the rainbow (Gen. 9). The second is the covenant of God Almighty (El Shaddai) beginning with Abraham, which is marked by the sign of circumcision (Gen. 17). The third is the covenant of YHWH (“the LORD”) with all Israel as described in the book of Exodus, which is marked by the sign of the sabbath.
Influences: Genesis, more than any other book of the Hebrew Bible, was influenced by the ancient conceptual and literary contexts of Mesopotamia, Canaan, and Egypt in which it arose. For example, the sea monsters of creation (1:21), the image of God (1:26–27), the garden of God (Gen. 2–3), the cherubim (3:24), and the “sons of God” (6:1–4) all draw from Mesopotamian cosmology. Significant portions of Genesis bear more than passing similarity to ancient literary works that have survived. The Enuma Elish, a Babylonian creation story, relates how the material world was created from primeval water, with parallels to Gen. 1. Humans were denied immortality (Gen. 3) in Adapa and the Gilgamesh epic. In the flood text of Gilgamesh the hero builds an ark, sends birds to find dry land, and offers a sacrifice after landing.
Going in the other direction of influence, Genesis has had a significant impact on art, literature, music, politics, and science in the Western world. The central figures of Genesis and the stories about them, such as Adam and Eve, Noah, Abraham and Sarah, Isaac, Jacob, and Joseph, have been the subject of countless works. To cite just a few examples of the profound influence of Genesis, note the ceiling frescos of Michelangelo in the Sistine Chapel, Caravaggio and Rembrandt’s depictions of the sacrifice of Isaac, Milton’s “Paradise Lost,” and the current discussion of creationism and evolution in political and educational contexts. See also ancestor; Pentateuch, sources of the.
Bibliography
Alter, Robert. Genesis: Translation and Commentary. Norton, 1996.
Bandstra, Barry L. Reading the Old Testament: Introduction to the Hebrew Bible. 4th ed. Wadsworth, 2009.
Campbell, Anthony F., and Mark A. O’Brien. The Sources of the Pentateuch: Texts, Introductions, Annotations. Augsburg Fortress, 1993.
Finkelstein, Israel, and Neil A. Silberman. The Bible Unearthed: Archaeology’s New Vision of Ancient Israel and the Origin of Its Sacred Texts. Free Press, 2001.
Kitchen, Kenneth A. On the Reliability of the Old Testament. Eerdmans, 2003.
Sarna, Nahum M. Genesis (Bereshit): The Traditional Hebrew Text with New JPS Translation. Jewish Publication Society, 1989.
Van Seters, John. Prologue to History: The Yahwist as Historian in Genesis. Westminster John Knox, 1992.
Westermann, Claus. The Promises to the Fathers: Studies on the Patriarchal Narratives. Fortress, 1980.
B.B.
Gennesaret (gi-nes′uh-ret). See Galilee, Sea of.
Gentile (from Lat. gens, “nation”), a non-Jew. The distinction has its roots in the biblical account of seven nations (Heb. goyim) not driven completely from the land (Josh. 24:11). According to several traditions, the Israelites were enjoined to maintain separation from the people of these nations in matters of religion, marriage, and politics (Exod. 23:28–33; Deut. 7:1–5; Josh. 23:4–13). Historically speaking, the amount of interchange between the Israelites and the peoples of the land seems to have been considerable, and it was only in postexilic times that individuals were referred to as goyim or Gentiles; even then, however, the primary reference seemed to be to nations. Theologically, Israel understood God as creator of all peoples of the earth. The Isaianic tradition, in particular, spoke of Israel as “a light to the nations” (42:6; cf. 60:3) and indicated that, in the latter days, the nations would flow to Jerusalem to learn Torah (2:2–4) or to participate in the coming reign of God (45:22–24; 51:4–5). Still, in order for Israel to fulfill its role as a “light to the nations,” it was necessary for Israel to remain distinct from those nations, not to be shut off from them, but not to assimilate completely with them either. In the wake of the exile, a renewed emphasis on preserving culture and tradition led many to favor stricter separation of Jews and non-Jews (particularly with regard to marriage and religious observations). Thus, Ezra and Nehemiah commanded Jews in Jerusalem to divorce their non-Jewish wives (Ezra 9–10; Neh. 10:30; 13:23–31). The books of Ruth, Esther, and Jonah, however, give evidence to a countertradition that presented Gentiles more favorably.
Hellenistic Jewish literature from the Second Temple period (e.g., deuterocanonical and pseudepigraphical writings) gives evidence of different attitudes about Israel and the nations (or Jews and Gentiles). A reference in 2 Macc. 14:38 refers wistfully to “former times, when there was no mingling with the Gentiles.” Sir. 11:34 warns against receiving a stranger (probably, a non-Jew) into one’s household, lest one’s way of life become alienated. Thus, mixed marriages continued to be a concern (Tob. 4:12–13; T. Levi 9:10; 14:6), and Jews were urged to remain distinctive through diet (Tob. 1:10–12; cf. Dan. 1:8–15), the practice of circumcision (1 Macc. 1:11–15), and, above all, avoidance of the idolatry characteristic of Gentile society (1 Macc. 3:48). The alternative is depicted starkly in 1 Macc. 1:11–15, which reports that “certain renegades came out from Israel and misled many, saying, ‘Let us go and make a covenant with the Gentiles around us, for since we separated from them many disasters have come upon us.’. . . So they built a gymnasium in Jerusalem, according to Gentile custom, and removed the marks of circumcision, and abandoned the holy covenant.” By NT times, there was resentment among most Jews toward those Gentiles who ruled over them (the Romans), but in general most Jews seem to have been oriented toward peaceful coexistence with Gentiles—and, indeed, toward cooperation and friendship with them at levels that did not compromise their own faith or traditions. Thus, there was a “court of the Gentiles” in the temple at Jerusalem, and many Gentiles became “God-fearers” and worshiped in the Jewish synagogues. These “God-fearers” appear to have been “half converts”: Gentiles who accepted much Jewish theology and morality, but who did not undergo circumcision or keep the food laws required of full converts. A number of God-fearers are referred to in the NT, where they are often presented as receptive to the gospel of Christ (cf. Acts 10:22; 13:16, 26; 17:4, 17).
In the NT itself, the term “Gentile” (Gk. ethnos) is used with a range of meanings. The basic meaning seems to be “non-Jew,” as is apparent from the instances in which Jews and Gentiles (or Jews and Greeks) are referred to in a sense that seems to connote “all humanity” (Acts 14:1, 5; 19:10, 17; 1 Cor. 1:22–24). In other instances, however, the word ethnos seems to mean “nation”—and it is usually translated that way in the NRSV (e.g., when Rom. 4:18 calls Abraham the father of many ethnoi, he is obviously the father of “nations,” not “Gentiles”). But in certain passages. the meaning is ambiguous. In Matt. 28:19, does Jesus commission his followers to make disciples of all nations (as in the NRSV) or of all Gentiles? Another meaning of “Gentile” is found most prominently in the teachings of Jesus, where the term does not seem to indicate an ethnic identification so much as a “pagan” or a person who does not believe in or worship God (cf. Matt. 5:47; 6:7, 32; 18:17; 20:25; cf. Eph. 4:17; 1 Thess. 4:5). Even more striking, perhaps, is a peculiar usage of the term in 1 Peter, a letter written to non-Jewish Christians (evident from 1:14, 18; 2:10; 4:3–4). In this letter, believers in Christ are identified spiritually as the new chosen people of God, heirs to all the promises of Israel (2:9), so the term “Gentile” is used to mean “non-Christians” (2:12; 4:3).
The development of Christianity, which began as a Jewish movement, was profoundly affected by the success of the Gentile mission undertaken by the apostle Paul and others. The Jerusalem Council ca. 49 CE determined that Gentile converts to Christianity did not have to become Jewish proselytes (Acts 15:1–35), thus opening membership in the church to those who might otherwise have remained “half converts” similar to the “God-fearers” in the synagogues. Paul fought efforts to make distinctions between Jew and Gentile in the Christian community (Rom. 3:29–30; Gal. 2:11–21; 3:26–29). He was opposed by Christians who insisted that Gentile converts become Jewish proselytes (he refers to people who hold this view as the “circumcision faction” in Gal. 2:12 and as “those who mutilate the flesh” in Phil. 3:2). His rationale for regarding Jews and Gentiles as “one in Christ Jesus” (Gal. 3:28) was closely associated with his doctrine of justification by grace through faith, an understanding that because of the death and resurrection of Christ, Jews and Gentiles alike could be put right with God through faith, apart from works of the law (Rom. 1:16–17; 3:28; 5:1; Gal. 2:15–17; 3:24–26).
As a result of the controversy over the role of Gentiles in the church, it is difficult to determine the attitude of Jesus himself, since both sides seem to have affected the preservation of the Jesus tradition. There is material in the Gospels that suggests Jesus understood the activity of the Messiah as directed primarily toward the Jewish people with, perhaps, some ultimate inclusion of the Gentiles only at the last (Matt. 10:5–6; 15:24). On the other hand, a number of sayings attributed to Jesus seem to suggest divine favor for Gentiles even at the expense of some in Israel (Matt. 8:10–12; 21:28–32, 43; Mark 11:15–17; Luke 4:23–27). See also God-fearers; proselyte.
D.W.S./M.A.P.
Gentiles, court of the. See temple, the.
Gera (gee′ruh).
1 A son of Benjamin (Gen. 46:21).
2 A son of Bela and grandson of Benjamin (1 Chron. 8:3).
3 A second son of Bela and grandson of Benjamin (1 Chron. 8:5).
4 A Benjaminite, the father of Ehud (Judg. 3:15).
5 A Benjaminite, a son of Ehud (1 Chron. 8:7).
It is difficult to separate these names (1–5) and assign them to specific persons. They may all represent the same person whose ancestry has become confused in the records; or the name may represent an ancient family group within the tribe of Benjamin whose exact genealogy was not known.
6 A member of Saul’s family and father of Shimei, the man who pronounced a curse on David (2 Sam. 16:5; 19:16).
D.R.B.
gerah (gee′ruh), a measure of weight equal to 1/20 of a shekel (Exod. 30:13; Lev. 27:25; Num. 3:47; 18:16; Ezek. 45:12). Recovered samples to date indicate an average weight of 0.565 grams. See also weights and measures.
Gerar (gee′rahr), a town in the Negev. Abraham visited the town and entered into some type of agreement with the Philistine king of Gerar, Abimelech (Gen. 20:1–2). However, the bulk of episodes involving Gerar are in the Isaac stories: Isaac and Rebekah settle at Gerar (Gen. 26:2) but, like his father before him, Isaac tells Abimelech that his wife is his sister, because he fears someone will kill him to obtain her. The ruse is exposed when Abimelech looks out a window and sees Isaac fondling Rebekah (26:8). Isaac is guaranteed Abimelech’s protection and he subsequently sows seed in the land and becomes rich, with so many flocks and herds and such a great household that the Philistines envy him. Isaac then moves to the valley of Gerar, where he digs wells that become a source of contention with herders in the area (26:17–21). The only other references to Gerar in the Bible are in 2 Chron. 14:9–14, which presents a story of Asa’s defeat of Zerah, an invading Ethiopian (905–874 BCE). Despite several proposals, the location of Gerar remains undetermined.
S.B.R.
Gerasa (gair′uh-suh), Gerasenes (gair′uh-seenz). Some biblical manuscripts mention the “country of the Gerasenes” as the site of a dramatic exorcism performed by Jesus (Matt. 8:28–34; Mark 5:1–10; Luke 8:26–39). If this is the correct reading, then the exorcism would have occurred in the area around the city of Gerasa (modern Jerash), one of the three greatest cities of Roman Arabia. There is, however, considerable confusion in the manuscript tradition: some manuscripts read “Gadarenes” or “Gergesenes” rather than “Gerasenes.” The NRSV accepts “country of the Gadarenes” as the best reading in Matt. 8:28, but it uses “Gerasenes” in Mark 5:1 and Luke 8:26, 37. Thus, in the NRSV the same exorcism (which involves a large number of demons being cast into a herd of pigs, who run into the sea and drown) is set in two sites, depending on which Gospel is consulted. The location for Mark and Luke, however, is near Gerasa, thirty-three miles southeast of the Sea of Galilee in the mountains of Gilead. This city was administered by an appointee of the legate of Syria and officially known as “Antioch on the Chrysorrhoas.” Excavations have revealed extensive remains of public buildings from the first and second centuries CE. The city wall, gates, and towers, several main streets, and the forum as well as remains of the hippodrome, theaters, triumphal arch, and temples of Zeus and Artemis have been found. A coin from the reign of Commodus attests that the city was founded by Alexander the Great. Josephus reports that the Jews living in Gerasa were spared by the Gentile population when the city was attacked by Jewish rebels during the Jewish revolt (Jewish War 2.480).
P.P./M.A.P.
Gergesenes (guhr′guh-seenz). See Gadara, Gadarenes; Gerasa, Gerasenes.
Gerizim (gair′uh-zim), Mount, the mountain (summit 2800 feet above sea level) opposite Mount Ebal in the central Samaritan highlands. Shechem lies in the pass between Mount Ebal and Mount Gerizim, at the intersection of main north–south and east–west roads. Deut. 11:29; 27:12; and Josh. 8:33 portray a ceremony in which the people gathered at Shechem and heard blessings shouted from Mount Gerizim and curses shouted from Mount Ebal. These blessings and curses conveyed the consequences of covenantal loyalty or disloyalty. Elsewhere, in Judg. 9:7, Jotham tells his parable of the Trees at Mount Gerizim, perhaps from the seventeenth- or sixteenth-century BCE sanctuary that has been found on the knoll called Tananir, a quarter mile southeast of Shechem. Judg. 9:37 mentions Tabbur-erez, the “navel” of the land, suggesting that Mount Gerizim was for some the mythic meeting place of heaven and earth. For Samaritans, Mount Gerizim was the site of the Samaritan temple, the place to worship God (John 4:20). Josephus, the first-century CE Jewish historian, reports that this temple was built in the fourth century BCE. During the Hasmonean period, John Hyrcanus reportedly destroyed the Samaritan temple at Mount Gerizim, but Herod the Great later rebuilt it. See also Ebal; Samaritans; Shechem.
E.F.C.
Gershom (guhr′shuhm).
1 The eldest son born to Moses and Zipporah in Midian (e.g., Exod. 2:22). His name is popularly explained within the narrative as meaning “sojourner there” (supposedly from Heb. ger sham), but this may be a later guess based on a phonetic pun. Gershom was the father of Jonathan, who served as priest to the Danites (Judg. 18:30).
2 A son of Levi, whose descendants were called “Gershomites” (1 Chron. 16:6, 62, 71), but this may be a scribal error for “Gershon,” the name that appears to be used for the same person elsewhere. See also Gershon.
3 A descendant of Phinehas (Ezra 8:2).
K.G.O.
Gershon (guhr′shuhn), the first son of Levi, followed by Kohath and Merari (e.g., Gen. 46:11). The name appears as Gershom several times in 1 Chron. 6 (cf. 15:7), but this appears to be a scribal error. Num. 4 and Josh. 21 list Gershon’s descendants between Kohath’s and Merari’s, while 1 Chron. 15:5–7 and 2 Chron. 29:12 put them third. Num. 7:7–9 allocates two wagons to Gershon’s sons and four to Merari’s (for carrying sections of the tabernacle), but none to the sons of Kohath (for the smaller tabernacle furnishings). Gershon’s two sons were named Shimei and either Libni (Exod. 6:17; Num. 3:18) or Ladan (1 Chron. 23:7; 26:21). See also Gershom.
K.G.O.
Geshem (gesh′uhm), an opponent of Nehemiah who ridiculed the plan to rebuild Jerusalem’s walls and subsequently plotted against him (Neh. 2:19; 6:1–9). Identified as “an Arab,” he is apparently the same person identified in nonbiblical sources as the king of Kedar, an Arabian province just south of Judah. That position may explain his motivation to interfere in Judah’s domestic affairs.
Geshur (gesh′uhr).
1 A small ancient kingdom whose territory formed part of southern Golan, east of the Sea of Galilee (Josh. 12:5; 13:11, 13). It was one of the areas that Israel was unable to occupy during the period of conquest and settlement (late thirteenth to early twelfth centuries BCE). Thus, Geshur remained an independent Aramean kingdom into the time of David. Seeking to establish political relationships with this kingdom, David married Maacah, the daughter of Geshur’s king, Talmai (2 Sam. 3:3). She bore him Absalom, who, many years later, fled to his grandfather’s territory after killing Amnon, who had raped his sister (and Maacah’s daughter), Tamar (2 Sam. 13:37–38).
2 A region in the south of Canaan, mentioned in Josh. 13:2 as yet to be won by the Israelites, and in 1 Sam. 27:8–11 as conquered by David while he was with the Philistines.
Y.G.
gestures, postures, and facial expressions. The Bible often refers to physical postures, gestures, or facial expressions as indicative of cultural customs and of the ways through which people consciously or unconsciously express their attitudes or emotions.
Prayer: Bowing or bending over is the posture for worship prescribed for one who presents the first fruits of the harvest in Deut. 26:10 and for one who approaches any of the gates of the temple in Ezek. 46, but bowing is also associated with idolatrous worship in Lev. 26:1 and Ezek. 8:16. Other references to bowing as a posture for worship include 2 Kings 18:22; Pss. 5:8; 22:28; 86:9; 132:7; 138:2; and Isa. 66:23. Other postures of worship mentioned in the Bible include stooping (1 Kings 8:54; 19:18; 2 Chron. 29:29; Ezra 9:5; Ps. 22:30; Isa. 45:23), falling on the face (Gen. 24:26, 48; Exod. 4:31; 12:27; 34:8; 2 Chron. 29:30; Neh. 8:6; Ezek. 44:4; Matt. 26:39; Mark 14:35; Rev. 1:17), throwing oneself down (Deut. 9:18, 25; Ezra 10:1), and bowing the head (Isa. 58:5; Mic. 6:6). Kneeling, to be distinguished from stooping, is mentioned as a posture for prayer in 2 Chron. 6:13; Ps. 95:6; Dan. 6:11; and Luke 22:41. Standing is attested as a posture for prayer to God in Neh. 9:2; Ps. 106:30; Jer. 18:20; Matt. 6:5; and Mark 11:25 and as a posture for idolatrous worship in Dan. 2:3. King David is portrayed as praying to God in a seated position in 2 Sam. 7:18, and a psalmist prays while lying in bed (Ps. 63:5–6). The prayer gesture most frequently mentioned in the Bible is “spreading the palms” (Exod. 9:29, 33; 1 Kings 8:22, 38, 54; 2 Chron. 6:12, 13, 29; Ezra 9:5; Job 11:13; Ps. 44:21; Isa. 1:15; Jer. 4:31). Apparently this gesture was employed with prayers of petition to suggest that God fill the hands of the petitioner with the requested benefit. This gesture is probably to be distinguished from “lifting up the hands” toward the holy place or sanctuary, possibly as a salute to God in the heavenly temple (Pss. 28:2; 63:4; 134:2; 141:2; 1 Tim. 2:8).
Judicial Proceedings: Because one lifted one’s hand, thereby pointing to God’s heavenly throne, when taking an oath (Deut. 32:40), swearing came to be referred to as simply “lifting the hand” (see Gen. 14:22; Exod. 6:8; Ezek. 20:5, 6, 15, 23, 28, 42). That the judge was seated while hearing cases is reflected in Exod. 18:13, which also says that the litigants stood during the legal proceeding (see also Judg. 4:4; Ruth 4:2; Ps. 9:8; John 19:13).
Reading and Teaching Scripture: Although no specific posture is prescribed for the reading of Torah in Deut. 31:10–13, Neh. 8–9 states that, when Ezra read from the Torah, both he and the congregation were standing. Luke 4:17–20 informs us that Jesus stood to read from the book of Isaiah in the synagogue at Nazareth, but that he afterward sat down to teach. According to Matt. 5:1, Jesus was seated while preaching the Sermon on the Mount (but cf. Luke 6:17). Matt. 26:55 refers to Jesus’s sitting while teaching in the temple. He is perhaps seated in a chair in Luke 10:39, but in any case that verse says that Mary sat at his feet to listen to his word.
Obeisance or Supplication: Throughout the Bible, people bow down (Gen. 23:7, 12; 33:3, 6, 7; 37:10; 2 Sam. 9:6; 14:22; Isa. 49:23), stoop (Esther 3:2, 5), or fall down (Gen. 50:18; Esther 6:13) before sovereigns or social superiors in order to acknowledge the difference in rank. Against that background, two postures are repeatedly mentioned in the Gospels when people come to Jesus to request healing: kneeling and prostration (i.e., lying down in front of him with one’s face to the ground). According to Matt. 8:2 and Mark 1:40 a person with leprosy kneels in supplication before Jesus; in Luke 5:12, this person prostrates himself. According to Matt. 15:25 the Canaanite woman kneels when asking Jesus to exorcise the demon from her daughter; in Mark 7:25, she prostrates herself. Entreating Jesus for healing in a kneeling posture is attested also in Matt. 17:14 and 20:20, while prostration is mentioned in Mark 5:22; and Luke 8:28, 41.
Greeting and Farewell: Lev. 19:32 prescribes that when younger persons encounter their elders, the former should stand. In 1 Kings 2:19 King Solomon stands up to greet his mother. Job reports that before disaster befell him, he was so highly esteemed in the community that even the elderly stood up when encountering him (Job 29:8). Another posture for greeting high-status persons is bowing or bending over (Gen. 19:1; 43:28; 1 Sam. 25:41; 2 Kings 2:15). Kissing is also associated with greeting close relatives or friends (Gen. 29:11, 13; 33:4; 45:15; 48:10; Exod. 4:27) and with taking leave of loved ones (Gen. 31:28; 32:1; 50:1; 1 Sam. 20:41; 2 Sam. 19:40; Ruth 1:9, 14; cf. Acts 20:37). An ironic kiss of betrayal, attested in 2 Sam. 20:9 and Matt. 26:49, is treasonous precisely because the gesture is supposed to convey trust, affection, or at least hospitality (cf. Luke 7:45). In the NT, the “holy kiss” or “kiss of love” becomes a greeting exchanged between Christians, possibly as a liturgical act in their worship services (see Rom. 16:16; 1 Cor. 16:20; 2 Cor. 13: 12; 1 Thess. 5:26; 1 Pet. 5:14). The erotic kiss between lovers, incidentally, is mentioned in the Bible only in Prov. 7:13 and Song of Sol. 1:2; 8:1.
Facial Expressions: Sadness is expressed primarily by a downcast appearance of the face or countenance (Gen. 4:5–6; 40:7; Neh. 2:2; Eccles. 7:3; Mark 10:22). Sometimes, a person is known to be sad simply because the countenance has changed (Job 14:20; Eccles. 8:1; Dan. 5:6, 9, 10; 7:28). Dim (i.e., darkened) eyes (Lam. 5:17) and weeping (Gen. 27:38; 42:24; 50:17; Ezra 3:12; Ps. 126:6) also show sadness. Happiness is associated with bright or shining eyes (1 Sam. 14:27, 29; Pss. 13:4; 19:9; Prov. 29:13; Ezek. 9:8), with one’s face being lit up (Job 29:24; Isa. 60:1), or with one’s head (Pss. 3:3; 110:7) or face (Num. 6:26; Deut. 28:50) being lifted up. Anger is often indicated by a reddening of the face. This is applied to persons (Gen. 39:19; Judg. 9:30; 14:19; 1 Sam. 11:6) and also to God (Exod. 4:14; Num. 11:10; 12:9; 25:3; 32:10, 13; Deut. 29:26; 2 Sam. 6:7). Fuming in anger is referred to in 2 Sam. 22:9; Ps. 74:1; and Isa. 65:5. See also dancing; mourning rites; prayer.
Bibliography
Gruber, Mayer I. Aspects of Nonverbal Communication in the Ancient Near East. 2 vols. Biblical Institute Press, 1980.
M.I.G.
Gethsemane (geth-sem′uh-nee; Heb., “oil press”), the site where Jesus prayed in lonely anguish just before his public betrayal and subsequent arrest (Matt. 26:36, Mark 14:32). Its precise location is not known. Matthew and Mark refer to a “place” called Gethsemane and imply it was near the Mount of Olives. See also Jerusalem; Olives, Mount of.
Gezer (gee′zuhr; Arabic Tell el-Jazari; Assyrian Gazru), an ancient city located eighteen miles northwest of Jerusalem and five miles south-southeast of Ramleh. It is first mentioned in the Bible in Josh. 10:33 and 12:12, where, while aiding Japhia king of Lachish, its king Horam is vanquished by Joshua’s forces “on the day the sun stood still.” Gezer subsequently became part of Ephraim’s allotment and was given over to the Levites (Josh. 21:21; 1 Chron. 6:67). However, Canaanites remained in the city as servants (Josh. 16:3–10; Judg. 1:29). The city was later captured by the pharaoh of Egypt and given to Solomon as a dowry for his daughter (1 Kings 9:15–17). Solomon in turn rebuilt it as one of his principal store-cities along with Hazor and Megiddo.
Archaeological Excavations: The mound at Gezer covers 33 acres and is one of the largest Bronze and Iron Age archaeological sites in the ancient Near East. It is located strategically on the edge of the western foothills overlooking the north-central Shephelah. It guards the crossroads where the trunk road up the Valley of Aijalon to Jerusalem branches off from the Via Maris. The site was identified with biblical Gezer by C. Claremont-Ganneau in 1873, when he discovered the first of a series of inscriptions on bedrock in the hills to the southwest of the mound, which read in Hebrew “boundary of Gezer.”
Settlement at Gezer began ca. 3500 BCE in the Chalcolithic period, and the occupation continued as a modest village throughout most of the Early Bronze Age until ca. 2400 BCE. Then, following a prolonged gap, occupation resumed after 2000 BCE in the Middle Bronze Age. Through the ensuing centuries the city grew, ultimately becoming one of the most massively fortified sites in the area. Its defenses included a towering three-entryway gate and a wall system linking intermittent towers fronted by a sloping rampart faced with chalk plaster. The largest tower, overlooking the southwest flank of the gateway, was more than 100 feet long and over 50 feet wide. In the north central part of the city was an outdoor alignment of ten large stelae. This may have been a Canaanite high place of the type recalled in 2 Kings 18:4 and Jer. 32:35. The Middle Bronze city was finally destroyed in the late sixteenth or early fifteenth century BCE by one of the resurgent Eighteenth Dynasty Egyptian pharaohs, either Amenophis I (ca. 1510 BCE) or Thutmose III (ca. 1482 BCE). Thutmose’s claim to a victory at the site is recorded on the walls of the temple complex at Karnak.
In the Late Bronze Age between 1550 and 1200 BCE, Gezer remained largely under Egyptian domination. Evidence shows that by the late fifteenth century BCE, trade with Egypt and throughout the eastern Mediterranean flourished. The excavators maintain that a new outer city wall enclosing an area considerably larger than the Middle Bronze limits was built in the fourteenth century BCE. Also dating to this period were ten letters to the pharaohs of Egypt from three successive kings of Gezer. These were found in the archives at el-Amarna in Egypt. However, harassed by internecine conflicts in the region, Gezer declined toward the end of the thirteenth century BCE, and it seems to have been partially destroyed in 1208 BCE by Pharaoh Merneptah, whose victory stele mentions both Israel and Gezer.
In the twelth and eleventh centuries BCE, Gezer remained a Canaanite outpost. Its king Horam may have perished in the battle of Lachish (Josh 10:31), but full control was not taken by the incoming Israelites. The presence of Philistines, possibly Egyptian mercenaries, is attested by Philistine-style bichrome pottery, a granary, and several patrician houses. Several local destructions helped define these Philistine phases, and a more general destruction was presumably the result of an Egyptian punitive raid ca. 950 BCE, after which the city was ceded to King Solomon as dowry in his marriage to Pharaoh’s daughter. Remains from the late tenth century BCE dramatically confirm the biblical note in 1 Kings 9:15-17, which reports these events and records Solomon’s subsequent fortification of the site along with Jerusalem, Hazor, and Megiddo. Excavations revealed a classic four-entryway city gate with an associated casemate (i.e., double) wall identical to gate and wall systems found at Megiddo and Hazor.
During the period of the Hebrew monarchy into the eight century BCE, Gezer remained an Israelite site. But in 734 BCE it was destroyed by invading Assyrians. This is attested by both archaeological remains and a relief at Nimrud from the reign of Tiglath-pileser III (biblical Pul, ca. 745–727 BCE), which depicts the siege and refers to the city by name (i.e., Gazru). The site recovered under Assyrian hegemony, as the presence of several Neo-Assyrian cuneiform inscriptions indicate, but it was destroyed again a century and a half later by the Babylonians ca. 587 BCE.
The Persian period in the fifth and fourth centuries BCE is represented only by scant remains, but the site became a prominent settlement again in the Hellenistic era. According to 1 Macc. 9:52, the city was fortified by Bacchides, the general of the Syrian army during the Maccabean wars of the second century BCE. This is attested archaeologically by evidence of the renovation and reuse of the erstwhile Solomonic gate and by the addition of towers with sloping bastions along the outer city wall. After 143 BCE Gezer (i.e., Gazara), became the residence of Simon Maccabeus (1 Macc. 13:43, 48), and trash heaps found down the north slope confirm the text’s claim that the city was purged of Gentile remains at that time. Subsequent occupation is represented primarily by domestic houses along with some repairs of the city gate and walls. Coin evidence dated to the reign of Antiochus VII (138–129 BCE) suggests that Jewish settlement was disrupted around 134 BCE, when Antiochus invaded the area, but coins from the reign of Alexander Jannaeus (103–76 BCE) may attest to some recovery at the close of the century. In any case, occupation on the mound ceases by the mid-first century BCE. By this time or in the following century its lands had apparently become the private holding of a certain Alkios.
Bibliography
Dever, William G., et al. Gezer I. Preliminary Report of the 1964–66 Seasons. Hebrew Union College, 1974.
———. Gezer IV. The 1969–71 Seasons in Field VI, the Acropolis. Hebrew Union College, 1985.
Seger, J. D. Gezer V. The Field I Caves 1969–1971. Hebrew Union College, 1989.
J.D.S.
Ghor (gor), the. See Jordan River.
ghost. Widespread belief in disembodied “shades” is attested in both biblical writings and their cultural contexts. These shades (Heb. repha’im) were regarded as spirits of persons who had died and were sometimes represented as inhabiting Sheol (Job 26:5; Ps. 88:10; Prov. 2:18; 9:18; 21:16; Isa. 14:9; 26:19). Although the Israelites acknowledged the tenuous existence of such spirits, they believed that they should be left alone. Deut. 18:10–11 teaches: “No one shall be found among you who . . . consults ghosts or spirits, or who seeks oracles from the dead” (cf. Isa. 8:19). King Saul completely disobeys this injunction when he hires a medium to summon the ghost or shade of the prophet Samuel to speak to him (1 Sam. 28:12–14). Elsewhere, Isaiah refers to a voice of moaning and lamentation being “like the voice of a ghost” (29:2–4). In the Gospels, Jesus’s disciples think that he might be a ghost (Gk. phantasma) when they see him walk on water (Matt. 14:26; Mark 6:49) and when they behold him risen (Luke 24:37). In the latter instance, Jesus indicates that he cannot be a ghost because “a ghost does not have flesh and bones as you see that I have” (Luke 24:29). See also death; divination; magic; Sheol.
giants, a race of people rumored to have lived in Gath, from whom were descended four Philistine warriors killed by David’s troops (2 Sam. 21:16–22; 1 Chron. 20:4–8). According to 2 Samuel, the four warriors descended from giants were: (1) Ishbi-benob, killed by Abishai son of Zeruaiah (he is not mentioned in 1 Chron. 20); (2) Saph (called Sibbai in 1 Chron. 20), killed by Sibbecai the Hushathite; (3) Goliath the Gittite, killed by Elhanan son of Jaare-oregim (in 1 Chron. 20:5 Elhanan is said to have killed Lahmi the brother of Goliath, probably because Goliath is said to have been killed by David, when he was a shepherd boy, in a variant tradition; cf. 1 Sam. 17:20–51); and (4) an unnamed warrior with six fingers on each hand and six toes on each foot, killed by Jonathan, the son of David’s brother Shimei (Shimea in 1 Chron.).
The Hebrew word often rendered “giants” in these texts is repha’im. The precise meaning of that word is uncertain; it has been suggested that it means “the hale ones” and was used in Canaanite mythology to describe a group of gods, and sometimes humans, related to El, the high god of Canaanite mythology. It is probably in this context that the word is sometimes translated “shades” in the NRSV, referring to the spirits of those who have died, lingering perhaps in Sheol (Job 26:5; Ps. 88:10; Prov. 2:18; 9:18; 21:16; Isa. 14:9; 26:19). It has also been suggested that, based on this mythology, an elite group of warriors may have called themselves the repha’im, in which case the term would refer to a Canaanite or Philistine military guild composed of men with sufficient wealth to provide chariots and other weapons of war for themselves; there is some evidence that such a group of repha’im met together for feasting. Thus, the four warriors encountered by David’s troops may have been descended from people who had belonged to that guild. Those warriors, however, are specifically noted for their size and strength: Ishbi-benob wielded a spear that weighed “three hundred shekels of bronze,” Goliath (or Lahmi) had a spear the size of a weaver’s beam, and the warrior with twenty-four digits was “a man of great size.” Other passages also speak of the Rephaim (Gen. 14:5; 15:20; Deut. 2:11, 20; 3:11, 13; Josh. 12:4; 13:12; 15:8; 17:15; 18:16). In these instances, the term is taken by the NRSV to be an ethnic or tribal designation for Transjordanian inhabitants of Canaan about whom almost nothing is known. Great size, however, is sometimes an attribute: Og of Bashan, the last of the Rephaim, had a bed that was 9 cubits long and 4 cubits wide (Deut. 3:11). The Rephaim were called the Emim by the Moabites (Deut. 2:10–11) and the Zamzummim by the Amonites (Deut. 2:20–21). A Valley of Rephaim is also mentioned (2 Sam. 5:18, 22; 23:13; 1 Chron. 11:14; 14:9; Isa. 17:5).
Another Hebrew word, nephilim, has often been translated “giants” in English Bibles, though the NRSV simply transliterates it in its only two occurrences (Gen. 6:4; Num. 13:33). In Gen. 6:4 the Nephilim are the offspring of the sons of God and the daughters of humans, part of a formidable race of people that is said to have existed on the earth before the flood. Num. 13:33 says that the Anakites come from the Nephilim of old and that these inhabitants of Canaan were so huge that the Israelite spies felt like grasshoppers in comparison. The Anakites are elsewhere called the Anakim, and they are often noted for being especially tall (Deut. 1:28; 2:10, 11, 21; 9:2; cf. Josh. 11:21–22; 14:12–15). In Deut. 2:11, the Emim (Rephaim?) are said to have been as tall as the Anakim. A strong tradition seems to have been passed on within Israel that there had once been giants on the earth—a race of people, probably to be associated with the Nephilim, whose very existence was associated with disobedience and revolt against God (cf. Sir. 16:7; Bar. 3:26; 3 Macc. 2:4).
R.J.C./M.A.P.
Gibbethon (gib′uh-thon; Heb., “mound” or “height”), a city originally assigned to Dan and later given to the Levites (Josh. 19:44; 21:23), although by the time of King Asa of Judah (ca. 900 BCE) it was in Philistine hands (1 Kings 15:27). It was the site of the assassination of Nadab, king of Israel (northern kingdom) by his general Baasha during an attempt to take the city from the Philistines (1 Kings 15:27). It was also the site twenty-four years later of a revolt against Zimri by his general Omni during another siege of the city (1 Kings 16:15). It is identified with modern Tel el-Malat, about four miles northeast of Joppa, although the location is not certain.
D.R.B.
Gibeah (gib′ee-uh; Heb., “hill”), a site in Benjamin, five miles north of Jerusalem. In biblical tradition, Gibeah is where an Ephraimite received inhospitable treatment, including the rape and murder of his concubine; this led to a war between Israel and Benjamin (Judg. 19–20). Later, Gibeah was the home of Saul and center for his career as king (1 Sam. 10:26). It was here that Saul was first associated with a band of prophets (1 Sam. 10:1–10), an event related to his selection as king. From here, Saul engineered a liberation of Jabesh-gilead from the Ammonites (1 Sam. 11:1–11) as well as a contest of strength with the Philistines (1 Sam. 14). He also later sought help from Gibeah in his search for David though, ironically, some of David’s associates were from Gibeah (2 Sam. 23:29). Another reference is also possible: 2 Sam. 6:3 says that David discovered the ark at the house of Abinadab, which was either “in Gibeah” or “on the hill” (NRSV prefers the latter).
Ancient Gibeah has been identified with the modern site of Tell el Ful. Excavations there reveal a succession of occupations that, at least in part, correspond with the Bible’s account of Saul’s career. The earliest relevant level, destroyed by fire in the twelfth century BCE, provides context for a more extensive and fortified construction from the Early Iron Age. The most important building from this level is an eleventh-century structure, a fortress with a casemate wall and corner tower; this could perhaps be the palace of King Saul. Successive constructions suggest that some violent destruction of the fortress/palace occurred, and subsequent rebuilding reflected more modest effort or quality.
G.W.C.
Gibeon (gib′ee-uhn), a town, five and a half miles northwest of Jerusalem. Other towns associated with Gibeon include Chephirah, Beeroth, and Kiriath-jearim (Josh. 9:17). Gibeon has been identified with modern el-Jib, and archaeological excavations have been conducted there.
Gibeon first enters the biblical tradition in narratives relating the Israelite conquest of Canaan. The Gibeonites, who are also described as Hivites (Josh. 9:7) or Amorites (2 Sam. 21:2), tricked the Israelites into making a treaty not to harm them. This treaty was upheld, but the Gibeonites were reduced to becoming hewers of wood and drawers of water (Josh. 9:3–27). In an ensuing battle near Gibeon (Josh. 10:1–14), the Israelites defeated a coalition of Canaanite kings led by Adoni-zedek of Jerusalem. Most scholars would date this period of Israel’s history to the thirteenth century BCE, but no evidence for a settlement at el-Jib during that period has been found.
During the tenth century BCE, a famine in the time of King David is associated with bloodguilt incurred by King Saul, who reportedly broke the ancestral treaty and tried to annihilate the Gibeonites. Thus, David allowed the Gibeonites to gain revenge for such mistreatment by impaling seven of Saul’s sons on a mountain (2 Sam. 21:1–15), possibly at the high place at Gibeon mentioned later in 1 Kings 3:4. Also during this time of David, young warriors led by Joab and Abner fought on the edge of a pool at Gibeon (2 Sam. 2:12–17). That pool was still a landmark in the area almost five hundred years later, for it is mentioned in Jer. 41:12 (from the early sixth century BCE). Archaeologists at el-Jib have found this pool. It consisted of a circular shaft cut into bedrock at a point immediately inside the city wall. It was approximately 36 feet in diameter and 36 feet deep. A stairway was cut along the edge of the shaft, spiraling down to the bottom. Thereafter, the stairway continued to descend in the form of a tunnel, to a room whose floor is 1.5 feet below the water level. The purpose of such shafts was to provide access to the water table from inside the city during times of siege.
Gibeon is also mentioned in 1 Kings 3:4–15, where Solomon at the beginning of his reign traveled to the “principal high place” at Gibeon to sacrifice there (this high place is perhaps to be associated with the “large stone that is in Gibeon” mentioned in 2 Sam. 20:8). While there, Solomon had a dream in which God offered to give him anything he asked; he asked for “an understanding mind” with which to govern the people, a request God was pleased to grant. Nothing more is said of Gibeon in the Bible, but during the eighth–sixth centuries BCE there was a winery there, as is attested by inscribed and stamped handles of wine jars and clusters of rock-cut pits that functioned as wine cellars.
T.L.M.
Giddel (gid′uhl).
1 The ancestor of a family of temple servants (Ezra 2:47; Neh. 7:49).
2 The name of an ancestor of a family of Solomon’s servants (Ezra 2:56; Neh. 7:58).
Gideon (gid′ee-uhn; from the Heb. root meaning “to cut off”), the son of Joash the Abiezrite of the town of Ophrah in the tribal area of Manasseh. He is called Jerubbaal in Judg. 6:32. At a time of dire circumstances and impoverishment (6:2, 6, 11), Gideon is called by an angel to deliver Israel from the hand of Midian (6:11–23). His hesitancy (6:15–21) is reminiscent of the call to Moses (Exod. 3–4), and he requests a sign that proves God will be with him: meat placed on a rock is consumed by fire. At this point, he recognizes that he has seen an angel of the Lord face-to-face (Judg. 6:22); he builds an altar to the Lord and follows the angel’s instructions to take down an altar of Baal (6:24–32). Before proceeding further, however, Gideon requires two more signs that he is the one to deliver Israel, as God has said: first, a fleece placed on the ground overnight is to be damp with dew, though the ground is dry; then the fleece is to be dry, while on the ground there is dew. After these signs have been granted to him, Gideon prepares for battle.
Gideon’s battle against the Midianites occupies the main body of the story (6:34–8:21). He gathers men from the tribes of Manasseh, Asher, Zebulun, and Naphtali (6:36–40). In order to emphasize that the victory will be won through the might of God (and not by the people’s own might), Gideon follows God’s instructions to pare his army down from thirty-three thousand (7:3) to a much smaller force of only three hundred (7:2–8). That night Gideon and a servant gather information (by way of dream interpretation, 7:8–15) at the Midianite camp at Endor between the hill of Moreh and Mount Tabor (7:1; Ps. 83:11). That same night, using psychological warfare, surprise, and darkness, Gideon and his band attack the Midianites with maximum effect, causing them to flee toward the Jordan Valley (7:16–22). Soldiers from the tribes of Naphtali, Ephraim, Asher, and Manasseh (possibly the thousands sent back when the attack force was pared down in size) ambush the Midianites at the Jordan fords, and two Midianite princes, Oreb and Zeeb, are killed (7:23–25; Ps. 83:12–13). After calming the Ephraimites who complain about not being included in this phase of the conflict (8:1–3), Gideon and his three hundred pursue the kings of Midian, Zebah, and Zalmunna beyond the Jordan. On the way, he requests food for his men from Succoth and Penuel, but is rebuffed (8:4–9). At Karkor, once again using stealth and surprise, Gideon falls upon the remnants of the Midianites (8:10, fifteen thousand out of a hundred and twenty thousand) and captures the two kings (8:10–13). After exacting punishment upon Succoth and Penuel (8:14–17), Gideon, acting as the blood-avenger for his brothers’ deaths, kills Zebah and Zalmunna (8:15–21). This victory would come to be viewed as heroic, as attested by references elsewhere in the Bible (Isa. 9:3; 10:26; Ps. 83:10–12; cf. 1 Sam. 12:11; Heb. 11:12).
Gideon’s humility (cf. 6:15) and religious piety are evinced by his refusal to accept hereditary rulership over Israel. He says, “I will not rule over you, and my son will not rule over you; the LORD will rule over you” (8:23). Thus, he becomes a spokesperson for the antimonarchic perspective that governs the entire book of Judges and most of the Deuteronomistic History (Joshua–2 Kings). Despite Gideon’s rejection of kingship, however, his son Abimelech tried to take the kingship for himself after Gideon had died (Judg. 9).
One aspect of Gideon’s piety is criticized in the biblical tradition. He is said to have fashioned an ephod out of golden earrings that his soldiers had taken as booty and to have placed it in Ophrah, his town (8:24–27; cf. Exod. 32:2–3). The author or editor of Judges comments that “all Israel prostituted themselves” before this ephod, such that it “became a snare to Gideon and to his family” (8:27). Gideon is said to have had many wives and seventy sons (in addition to Abimelech, born to a concubine in Shechem; Judg. 8:29–32). See also Abimelech; Jotham; Judges, book of; Midian, Midianites.
J.U./M.A.P.
Gideoni (gid′ee-oh′ni), the Benjaminite father of Abidan. His son was appointed to assist Moses in the wilderness as head of the Benjaminite family group (Num. 1:11; 2:22; 7:60, 65; 10:24).
gifts of the Spirit. See spiritual gifts.
Gihon (gi′hon; Heb., “a bursting forth”).
1 The second of the four rivers flowing “out of Eden to water the garden”; it is the one said to flow around the whole land of Cush (Gen. 2:10, 13). Gihon was once equated with the Nile on the assumption that Cush meant Abyssinia (modern Ethiopia), but it is now thought to refer to an unidentifiable irrigation channel in southern Iraq, “Cush” being the land of the Kassites.
2 A pulsating spring in Jerusalem, south of the temple area on the west side of the Kidron Valley. Because of the steepness of the slope, the spring was outside the town walls at the summit, and although water was normally obtained by carrying jars down to it, perhaps using donkeys, in times of siege the jars could apparently be lowered down a vertical shaft. According to 2 Sam. 5:8, it was by means of this shaft that David was able to gain entrance to Jerusalem when he conquered the city. This shaft has been discovered and is now called “Warren’s Shaft” after the person who excavated it. Another, less deep, shaft also exists and was perhaps used at an earlier date when the water table may have been higher. Gihon is Jerusalem’s only immediate source of water, and it could support a population of about twenty-five hundred. The Gihon fountain was evidently a sacred place, and for this reason Solomon (and probably also later rulers) was anointed king there (1 Kings 1:32–40). That anointing was accomplished to thwart Adonijah, who had offered a sacrifice at En-rogel, a spring somewhat farther down the valley (1 Kings 1:9–10). Later in the monarchy the supply of water from Gihon seems to have been supplemented by water brought from a greater distance along a conduit, perhaps to the “upper pool,” where Isaiah met and rebuked King Ahaz (cf. Isa. 7:3).
Hezekiah, who succeeded Ahaz, was confronted by the danger of Assyrian invasion and therefore sought, not only to prevent the invaders from obtaining water in the vicinity of Jerusalem (2 Chron. 32:4), but to ensure the security of the city’s own supply. This he did by digging a tunnel 1,750 feet long from Gihon to the Pool of Solomon, which at that time was probably an underground cistern. The tunnel was carved from both ends simultaneously, and it followed a curiously winding course, perhaps to permit cutting a vertical shaft from inside the city to reach the water in a crisis.
D.B.
Gilboa (gil-boh′uh), modern Jebel Fuqu‘ah, a hill opposite the Hill of Moreh. Together Gilboa and Moreh guarded the eastern pass from the Plain of Esdraelon into the Valley of Jezreel, the main access from the coastal plain to the Jordan Valley. Gilboa rises to a height of 1,696 feet above sea level, but plunges abruptly 2,000 feet below on the east to the Jordan. Its more gradual western slopes are probably where Saul fought his last battle with the Philistines; his three sons were killed and Saul took his own life after he was seriously wounded (1 Sam. 31). When told of this, David lamented the deaths of Saul and of his son Jonathan (David’s close friend) and pronounced a curse on Gilboa: “Let there be no dew or rain upon you, nor bounteous fields” (2 Sam. 1:22). See also Jezreel; Moreh.
N.L.L.
Gilead (gil′ee-uhd; Heb., “rugged”), a region in the Transjordan (modern-day Jordan) from the Arnon to the Yarmuk rivers, located between Bashan and Moab. Its name describes it well, for Gilead is indeed rugged, mountainous territory, and in antiquity it was densely forested (see Jer. 22:6). The major trade route in the Transjordan, the King’s Highway, passed through Gilead on its way from the Gulf of Aqabah to Damascus, and inhabitants of this region thus controlled an important thoroughfare.
Southern Gilead (from the Arnon to the Jabbok) was under the control of Sihon, the king of the Amorites in the Mosaic period (thirteenth century BCE). This area would be assigned to the Israelite tribes of Reuben and Gad in the division of the land, but Israel did not gain or maintain control of the territory, and it would later correspond approximately to the kingdoms of the Moabites and the Ammonites, with their capital at Rabbath-ammon (modern Amman). Southern Gilead was especially well suited for herding (Num. 32:1; Song of Sol. 6:5). Northern Gilead (from the Jabbok to the Yarmuk) was assigned to Manasseh, and remained under Israelite control until the Assyrian conquest (722/1 BCE), although both the Ammonites to the south and the Arameans to the north occupied it at times (see Judg. 10:8; 1 Kings 22:3; Amos 1:3).
During the Persian period (ca. 538–333 BCE) Gilead became its own province, and in the Roman period Gilead was subdivided into Perea and the Decapolis. Major cities in Gilead include Heshbon and Rabbath-ammon (later Philadelphia) in the south, and Pella, Gerasa, Gadara, Abila, Jabesh-gilead, and Ramoth-gilead in the north. The exact composition of the proverbial “balm of Gilead” (Jer. 8:22; cf. Gen. 37:25) has not been established, but it is presumed to have been some sort of salve made from the sap of mountain trees. See also Decapolis; Perea.
M.D.C.
Gilgal (gil′gal; Heb., “circle,” probably of stones).
1 A town located between Jericho and the Jordan. This Gilgal served as the Israelites’ first encampment after crossing the Jordan (Josh. 3–4), and it became Joshua’s base of operations. It is probably to be identified with modern Khirbet el-Mafjir, about one and a quarter miles from ancient Jericho, or possibly Khirbet en-Nitleh, about two miles southeast of Jericho. In the tribal period and the early monarchy (thirteenth–eleventh centuries BCE) this city became an important political, religious, and military center, especially for the tribe of Benjamin. It was one of the places visited by Samuel on his yearly circuit (1 Sam. 7:16). A number of the early traditions about Saul are also set here. Gilgal was a rallying point in Saul’s campaigns against the Philistines (1 Sam. 13:4–7); it was here that he was affirmed by the people as king (1 Sam. 11:14–15); and it was also here that the kingship was taken from him for presuming on Samuel’s priestly prerogatives (1 Sam. 13:8–15). This Gilgal was denounced by the eighth-century prophets as the site of a national sanctuary with a corrupt sacrificial cult (Hos. 4:15; 9:15; 12:11; Amos 4:4; 5:5; Mic. 6:5).
2 Another town that figures in the narratives of Elijah and Elisha (2 Kings 2:1–4; 4:38), probably the present village of Khirbet ‘Alyata, about seven miles north of Bethel.
3 Possibly, a third town near Dor mentioned in a list of conquered Canaanite kings in Josh. 12:23 (NRSV reads “Galilee,” following the LXX, but the Hebrew text reads “Gilgal”); if this is a reference to a town, it is probably to be identified with the modern village of Jiljulieh, about five miles north of Antipatris.
F.S.F.
girdle. See apron; dress.
Girgashites (guhr′guh-shits), one of the peoples whom God displaced from the land of Canaan for the Israelites at the time of Joshua (Gen. 15:21; Josh. 3:10; cf. Gen. 10:16). According to the genealogy in Gen. 10:16 these nations are the offspring of Canaan. The name could be related to the Gergesenes mentioned in certain NT manuscripts at Matt. 8:28; Mark 5:1; and Luke 8:26.
Gittite (git′it), someone who lives in or is from Gath, one of the five major cities of the Philistines located in the coastal plain of southwestern Judah. The giant Goliath and his brother Lahmi were Gittites (2 Sam. 21:19; 1 Chron. 20:5), as were Obed-edom, whose house was the temporary resting place of the ark of the covenant (2 Sam. 6:10–11; 1 Chron. 13:13), and Ittai, the refugee who joined David and became one of his military commanders (2 Sam. 15:19–22; 18:2). See also Gath; Philistines.
Gittith (git′ith), a Hebrew word that appears in the superscriptions to Pss. 8; 81; and 84. Because its meaning is uncertain, it is often left untranslated (“according to the Gittith”). Some translators have sought to explain the term via the Hebrew gath, “(wine) press” or through some reference to the Philistine city of Gath. Whatever its precise meaning, the phrase is usually assumed to refer to a musical mode, possibly the name of a well-known song to whose tune the psalm could be sung, or possibly to some variety of musical instrument deemed appropriate for accompaniment when the psalm was sung.
J.L.K.
glass. See mirrors.
glory, a human or divine atttribute indicating significance, importance, or presence. The most important Hebrew word for “glory,” kabod, means “weight” or “importance.” Thus, to have glory is to be weighty or important to oneself or others. In this sense, glory may be applied to humans, showing their significance in the world (Job 19:9; Prov. 16:31; 20:29; Isa. 8:7), but more often “glory” is applied to God. The glory of God is sometimes said to appear to people, indicating that God’s worth and significance has become particularly manifest (Num. 16:19, 42; Ps. 102:16; Ezek. 10:4). In some such instances, God’s “glory” seems to serve as a virtual synonym for God’s presence or being: at Mount Sinai, God’s glory appears as a cloud and as fire (Exod. 16:10; 24:16–17). God’s glory is likewise associated with the tabernacle and with the temple (Exod. 40:34; Num. 20:6; Pss. 24:7–10; 78:60–61). God’s glory frequently appears in Ezekiel’s visions (10:4; 28:22; 43:2–5) and, in Isaiah, is particularly connected to God’s future eschatological appearance (4:5; 60:1–2). Most biblical references to glory, however, occur within contexts of worship: the appropriate human response to God is to ascribe glory to God (Pss. 22:23; 29:2; 86:9; Isa. 66:5).
The NT idea of glory (Gk. doxa) continues in the same vein. Occasionally, glory is applied to humans (Luke 12:27; John 7:18), but it is usually applied to God; God’s glory is seen (Luke 2:9; John 11:40; Acts 7:55; Rev. 15:8), and people are to give glory to God (Acts 12:23; 1 Cor. 10:31). However, the NT is distinctive in applying glory (in the sense of divine glory, normally an attribute of God alone) to the risen Christ (1 Cor. 2:8; Heb. 2:7, 9; 1 Pet. 1:11; Rev. 5:12–13). The Gospel of John develops this notion even further, attributing glory to Christ during his human existence on earth (1:14). God’s glory appears in Jesus (13:31; 17:5) and is revealed through his miracles (2:11; 11:4). It is also closely associated with his death, which is now called his hour of glorification (12:23; 17:1). Finally, both the Gospel of John and Paul speak of the eschatological glory of God, not only as something to be beheld, but as something in which believers may participate (John 17:22; Rom. 5:2).
J.D.
glossolalia (glos′uh-lay′lee-uh). See tongues, speaking in.
gnat, a nonspecific term referring to small insects such as gnats, lice, mosquitoes, or sand flies. It probably includes all such blood-sucking, two-winged insects. In Exod. 8:16–18 gnats are the third plague upon the Egyptians. In Matt. 23:24, Jesus accuses certain scribes and Pharisees of straining out a gnat and swallowing a camel, i.e., scrutinizing details of the law while neglecting the weightier matters of justice, mercy, and faith.
Gnosticism (nos′tuh-siz-uhm), a generic term for a variety of religious movements that flourished during the second to fourth centuries CE. Although the theology, ritual practice, and ethics of these groups differed, all purported to offer salvation from the oppressive bonds of material existence through gn–osis, or “knowledge.” Such knowledge consisted of privileged, esoteric understanding of the relationship between one’s true spiritual self and the transcendent source of all being. Typically, this knowledge could only be conveyed to humans by a revealer figure. What is known about Gnosticism must be gathered from two sources: reports in the writings of early church leaders—Irenaeus, Hippolytus, Tertullian, Origen, and Epiphanius—who were opponents of Christian gnostic teaching, condemning it as a heresy; and a number of ancient works produced by gnostics themselves—Codex Askew, Codex Bruce, the Berlin Gnostic Codex and, especially, works contained in the library found at Nag Hammadi. Both sources of information are problematic. The antignostic Christian writings often provide a fairly clear description of ideas and practices, but since these writings are highly polemical, these descriptions may not be ones that gnostics themselves would have used. The gnostic materials themselves, however, are often highly esoteric, intended for readers who knew much that is not contained in the writings themselves.
All the various expressions of gnostic thought appear to have evinced a radically dualistic attitude that identified “spirit” as fundamentally good and “matter” as fundamentally “evil.” Thus, the physical world in general and individual human bodies in particular were understood to be material prisons in which divine souls or spirits had been trapped. The most prevalent form of Gnosticism known to us held that the world was created by an evil god called the Demiurge. Human beings are basically eternal spirits that were captured by the Demiurge and confined in bodies of flesh and in a world of matter. Gnostic Christians believed that Christ had come as a spiritual redeemer (disguised as a human being) to enable the enlightened to be liberated from their material existence and to realize their true identities as spiritual beings. The implications of such a belief system for life in this world varied dramatically. Many (probably most) gnostics held that such liberation from the flesh involved renunciation of bodily pleasures and material concerns; they encouraged virginity, celibacy, fasting, strict diets, and other aspects of an acetic and austere lifestyle that would enable them to become more spiritual. Other gnostics appear to have drawn the opposite conclusion (or so certain Christian authors hold); they engaged freely in all manner of wanton excesses on the grounds that, since the spirit is all that matters, what one does with the flesh is irrelevant.
In any case, although Gnosticism is clearly related to the development of early Christianity, its significance for interpretation of the NT remains highly controversial. There was a period around the middle of the twentieth century when many NT writings (especially the Gospel and Letters of John) were interpreted as a response to Gnosticism. Some passages were even read as potentially supportive of Gnosticism. By the end of the twentieth century, however, it was generally recognized that such interpretations were anachronistic: at the time of these writings (first century CE), Gnosticism did not exist as any developed system that NT authors would have been supporting or denouncing. Nevertheless, historical scholars do not think that Gnosticism would have simply emerged fully formed in the middle of the second century without a considerable period of predevelopment; the ideas and tendencies that would later define Gnosticism must have been present earlier. Thus, it has become common for NT scholars to speak of an almost invisible and largely unidentified “proto-Gnosticism” as part of the milieu in which NT writings were produced. The apostle Paul writes about the distinction between “what is of the flesh” and “what is of the spirit” (Rom. 8:4–13; Gal. 5:16–26; 6:8). The Gospel of John and the Johannine Letters emphasize that Jesus was not just a spiritual being, but a man with a body of actual flesh (John 1:14; 1 John 4:2). Such passages seem to indicate that Gnosticism was “on the horizon”; people were already thinking about the kinds of things that Gnosticism would seek to address, sometimes in ways that were compatible with the NT documents and sometimes in ways that were radically distinct from those writings. See also Thomas, Gospel of; Nag Hammadi.
Bibliography
Pearson, Birger A. Ancient Gnosticism: Traditions and Literature. Fortress, 2007.
King, Karen L. What Is Gnosticism? Harvard University Press, 2003.
Makschies, Christoph. Gnosis: An Introduction. Clark, 2003.
Perkins, Pheme. Gnosticism and the New Testament. Augsburg Fortress, 1993.
Powell, Mark Allan. Introducing the New Testament: A Historical, Literary, and Theological Survey. Baker Academic, 2009. Pp. 39–41.
Roukema, Reimer. Gnosis and Faith in Early Christianity: An Introduction to Gnosticism. Trinity Press International, 1999.
H.W.A./M.A.P.
goad, an implement used to control oxen (1 Sam. 13:21). Shamgar, one of Israel’s early judges, is reputed to have used an ox goad as a weapon (Judg. 3:31). Metaphorically, the sayings of the wise could be called “goads,” because they could stimulate thought in others (Eccles. 12:11). Paul is accused of “kicking against the goads” when he persecutes believers in Christ, implying perhaps that he is resisting the obvious leading or direction of God (Acts 26:14).
goat. The goat (Capra hircus) is one of the most versatile of domestic livestock animals and has always been of special importance in the Near East, to whose arid climate it is excellently adapted. Goats are hardy beasts that can live off shrubs and the scanty vegetation of the desert, thereby utilizing areas that are useless for agriculture. Goat bones attributed to domesticated animals are the most frequently found faunal remains on the Early Neolithic sites of the southern Levant, as at Jericho, Beidha, and Ain Ghazal. They testify that humans started herding goats in this area about nine thousand years ago. At first, goats were kept mainly for their meat, but by the Chalcolithic period (ca. 4000 BCE) they were also used for milk and products made from the hair and skin.
Numerous references are made in the Bible to the various uses of the goat. Lev. 7:23 and Deut. 14:4 mention its meat, while Deut. 32:14 and Prov. 27:27 report that it provided milk. Gen. 21:14 and Josh. 9:4 refer to goatskin bottles. Goats’ hair was apparently processed into fabric (1 Sam. 19:13), and the roof of the tabernacle was made of goats’ hair (Exod. 26:7; 36:14–15). The goat was also of importance as a sacrificial animal. Male animals were preferred (Lev. 1:10; 22:19), but sometimes female goats were demanded (Lev. 4:28; 5:6). In another ritual related to atonement, the priest would symbolically place the sins of the people upon a goat (the so-called scapegoat), which would be driven into the wilderness, taking the sins and impurities away (Lev. 16:7–10). Daniel beheld a vision of a goat and a ram, which portended the conquest of the Persian Empire by the Macedonians under Alexander the Great (Dan. 8). Jesus refers to goats in an eschatological discourse in which he says that, when the Son of Man comes for the final judgment, he will separate the nations of the world as a shepherd separates sheep from goats (Matt. 25:32–33).
I.U.K.
God, god. In English Bibles, the word “God” (capitalized) is used to refer to the deity worshiped by Jews and Christians, and the word “god” (lowercase), to any deity worshiped by other peoples. In the Hebrew Bible, the word “God” usually translates the Hebrew word el or its plural form, ’elohim. The latter form is a plural of majesty (magnitude) and a sign of honor paid to the deity; when applied to the God of Israel, it carries no implication of multiple deities. This is clear from the fact that Elohim (when it refers to the God of Israel) takes a singular verb and is modified by singular adjectives, even though it is technically a plural noun.
The authors of the Bible do not concern themselves with abstract questions of definition (i.e., concerning the existence or nature of God), but rather portray God with images and, above all, through narratives in which God is the subject of action or speech rather than an object of thought. Thus, in the Hebrew Bible, God is presented as the Creator and Sustainer of the world, who enters into covenantal relationship with a chosen people, Israel, and who guides the history of that people toward a redemptive goal. God gives commandments and holds people responsible for obedience to them; the nation as a whole, and sometimes individuals, suffer negative consequences of disobedience to God’s commands. God also desires and demands worship and God’s jealousy and anger can be aroused when Israel worships other gods. God provides the people of Israel with means of atoning for iniquities, of purifying themselves, and of either retaining or restoring the covenant relationship.
In the NT, the word “God” translates the Greek word theos, also a general term for deity and the word used in the LXX to translate el and ’elohim. The characteristics of God in the NT are generally consistent with those ascribed to God in the Hebrew Bible, for even Gentile Christians believed that they were worshiping the God of Israel. The essential difference is that, for most NT authors, the primary locus of God’s self-revelation no longer lies in the history of a people, but rather in the person of Jesus Christ (e.g., Matt. 1:23; John 14:9; 20:28–29). Jesus is even called “God” or regarded as equivalent to God in a number of texts (John 1:1, 18; 20:28; Rom. 9:5; Titus 2:13; Heb. 1:8–9; 2 Pet. 1:1; 1 John 5:20). See also Abba; El; El Shaddai; Holy Spirit; incarnation; Jesus Christ; names of God in the Hebrew Bible; names of God in the New Testament.
T.R.W.L.
God, kingdom of. See kingdom of God.
God-fearers, Gentiles who, during the Second Temple period, embraced Jewish theology, worship, and morality, but who did not follow purity laws, which they regarded as specific for ethnic Jews. According to the dominant theory, they attended synagogues, but were normally not circumcised (which would have constituted a full conversion and made them “Jews”). Eventually, these God-fearers became prime candidates for conversion to Christianity (cf. Acts 10:22; 13:16, 26; 17:4, 17). No direct evidence exists for such an institutional class of “God-fearers,” however, apart from a third-century CE inscription from Asia Minor. Some interpreters think that the references in Acts to Gentiles who were God-fearers are simply meant to imply that those Gentiles had an appropriate respect for the Jews and for the Jewish God. See also Cornelius; Gentile; proselyte.
M.A.P.
godlessness, a mode of thinking or being that excludes God from life and ignores or perhaps deliberately violates God’s laws and commandments. The godlessness of a person is often associated with such characteristics as worthlessness, ruthlessness, wickedness, pride, impiety, and the like. Basically, godless or ungodly persons are those who live, act, and think as though God can be ignored or spurned. For illustrations of godlessness, see Deut. 8:11–20; Job 8:13; Ps. 119:51; Rom. 1:18–32; 4:5; 5:6; 1 Tim. 1:9; 4:7; 6:20; 2 Tim. 2:16; 2 Pet. 2:5–6; Jude 4, 15. See also foolishness, folly.
J.M.E.
godliness, godly, a life or attribute that is pleasing to God. Almost all references to “godliness” in the Bible occur in the Pastoral Letters and in 2 Peter (1 Tim. 2:2; 4:7–8; 6:3, 5–6, 11; 2 Tim. 3:5; Titus 1:1; 2 Pet. 1:3, 6, 7; 3:11). The term translates a Greek word (eusebeia; also used in Acts 3:12, NRSV: “piety”) that was commonly used in the Roman world to describe respect for the Greek and Roman gods and for the orders of society. This may explain why it is not more common in the LXX or in the NT; biblical writers generally prefer such words as “righteousness,” “faith,” “steadfastness,” or “holiness” to describe a faith and life pleasing to God. As an adjective, the related term “godly” (Gk. euseb–os), however, is used in the LXX (where it translates Hebrew khasid): “There is no longer anyone who is godly” (Ps. 12:1); the mighty ones boast of mischief done against “the godly” (Ps. 52:1); God desires “godly offspring” (Mal. 2:15); see also Ps. 4:3 (NRSV: “the faithful”). The expression is employed frequently in Sirach (16:13; 23:12; 27:11, 29; 28:22; 33:14; 37:12; 39:27; 43:33; 44:10, 23). In the NT, “godly” modifies behavior and attitudes: “godly sincerity” (2 Cor. 1:12); “godly grief” (2 Cor. 7:9–11); godly lives (2 Tim. 3:12; Titus 2:12). Reference to “the godly” is found only in 2 Pet. 2:9. See also religion, religious; worship in the New Testament.
J.F.J.
Gog, a king who, in Ezek. 38–39, is described as an apocalyptic figure who marches from the north (38:6, 15; 39:2) and ravages Israel before being destroyed by God (38:19–22; 39:3–5). This mythical or eschatological ruler is probably based on the historical figure of Gyges, a seventh-century BCE king of Lydia. In describing his activities, Ezekiel is thought to draw upon Jeremiah’s writings about an “enemy from the north” (1:14; 4:6; 6:1, 22; 10:22; 13:20) as well as on Isaiah’s motif of the destruction of Israel’s foes on the mountains of Israel (14:24–25; 17:12–14; 31:8–9). Gog reappears in the NT, paired with Magog (Rev. 20:18–20); in Ezek. 38:2 Magog is probably not a ruler, but a phrase from the Akkadian language (mat Gog) meaning “land of Gog.”
J.S.K.
Golan (goh′luhn; Heb., possibly “circuit”).
1 Part of the plateau of Bashan between Mount Hermon and the Wadi el-Yarmuk east of the Jordan River. It was called Gaulanitis by the historian Josephus. See also Bashan.
2 A city of refuge in Manasseh assigned to the levitical family of Gershon (Deut. 4:43; Josh. 20:8; 21:27; 1 Chron. 6:71). This city was located in the Golan region indicated by 1.
gold, the precious metal named more frequently than any other in the Bible (385 times). It was imported from Uphaz (Jer. 10:9), Raamah (Ezek. 27:22), Sheba (1 Kings 10:2), Havilah (Gen. 2:11), and Ophir (1 Chron. 29:4; 2 Chron. 8:18), all sites that have not yet been located. Occasionally gold was acquired as booty (Exod. 12:35; Judg. 8:26), but more often it was obtained through commercial enterprises (1 Kings 10:14–24).
People of ancient sites outside Canaan knew of gold and learned to work it beautifully. At Ebla in Syria (modern Tell Mardikh; ca. 3200 BCE) excavators found objects of gold, such as a ceremonial hammer, and wooden frames overlaid with gold. Also at Ebla commercial texts report a caste or guild of smiths including goldsmiths. Precious metals measured in bars with specific weights given in minas (a mina equaled 47 grams) were held in an Eblaite storehouse. One text showed the tribute paid by the kingdom of Mari to include 134.26 minas of gold. At Ur in Sumer (ca. 2500 BCE), excavations uncovered fluted vases, bowls of pure gold, intricately fashioned ornaments, and 9 yards of gold ribbon in a headdress. Much later (ca. 1350 BCE), the golden treasure of Egypt’s Tutankhamen would testify to the prominence and significance of gold in the very area where the Hebrews were perhaps serving as slaves.
The Bible employs thirteen different words for gold that describe the metal in a variety of forms and usages. Most prominently, perhaps, gold was used for jewelry, including necklaces (Song of Sol. 1:11), rings (James 2:2), and other unspecified items (Exod. 3:22). Gold also played a part in public worship. When the Israelites turned idolatrous, they worshiped a golden calf fashioned by Aaron (Exod. 32:2–4; cf. Deut. 29:17; 1 Kings 12:28; Isa. 2:20; Rev. 9:20), but later gold was employed in both the tabernacle and the temple. The ark of the covenant was covered with gold (Exod. 25:11). Most of the furniture of the tabernacle was gold-plated, and the high priest’s clothing, crown, ephod, and breastplate were either adorned with gold or fashioned from pure gold (Exod. 39:2–30). In Solomon’s temple the entire inner sanctuary was overlaid with gold, as were the cherubim, carved palm trees, and flowers (1 Kings 6:14–31). Likewise, the book of Revelation indicates, in heaven, the elders wear golden crowns (4:4) and the new Jerusalem will be constructed of pure gold (21:18).
Gold can be used as a standard of importance (Isa. 60:17; Hos. 2:8; 1 Pet. 1:18), referred to as a symbol of spiritual wealth (Rev. 3:18), or contrasted with what is of greater, lasting value. Gold is said to be less worthy than wisdom (Job 28:15, 17; Prov. 3:14; 8:10; 16:16), faith (1 Pet. 1:7), or knowledge (Pss. 19:10; 119:72; Prov. 20:15). One should not put one’s trust in gold (Job 31:24), for it can become a stumbling block (Ezek. 7:19), and ultimately it will be of no value at all (Isa. 46:6; Ps. 135:15; 1 Tim. 6:9). Nevertheless, the Bible recognizes its value: the magi bring gold to the infant Jesus (Matt. 2:11).
R.A.C.
Golden Rule, a modern term used for a saying of Jesus regarded as being of inestimable and universal importance: “In everything do to others as you would have them do to you” (Matt. 7:12; cf. Luke 6:31). Jesus maintains, furthermore, that “this is the law and the prophets.” Within the context of Matthew’s Gospel, the latter comment would not mean that the “Golden Rule” replaces Torah and prophets for Jesus’s followers (who are to keep every detail of the law; cf. Matt. 5:17–19), but that it underscores the value of Torah and prophets by summarizing their intent and providing a convenient guide to their application. The Golden Rule basically restates Lev. 19:18 (“Love your neighbor as yourself”) in a way that makes explicit the already implied directive for behavior and conduct. Similar statements are found elsewhere in Jewish literature, e.g., Tob. 4:15 (“Do to no one what you would not want done to you”) and Sir. 31:15 (“Judge your neighbor’s feelings by your own”).
Golgotha (gol′guh-thuh; Aramaic, “Place of the Skull”; cf. Matt. 27:33; Mark 15:22; Luke 23:33; John 19:17), the site of Jesus’s crucifixion. In Christian tradition, it is also known as Calvary, after the Latin translation for Golgotha used in the Vulgate (calvaria). The place may owe its name to a distinctive physical appearance (a hill that, at that time, resembled a skull), or it may have been called this simply because of its habitual use as a site for executions. Apart from the name very little is known about Golgotha/Calvary. John 19:20 indicates that it was located outside Jerusalem’s city walls, which would concur with Jewish and Roman execution customs. A reference to passersby (Matt. 27:39) suggests it was near a thoroughfare, while the fact that the cross was visible from afar (Matt. 27:55) could indicate an elevated location. Nevertheless its precise location remains in dispute. Since the fourth century the site now marked by the Church of the Holy Sepulchre has been revered as the location of Golgotha/Calvary. Objections that this church is inside the presumed location of the ancient city walls, and thus incompatible with the Gospel account, have been challenged by recent archaeological excavations defining more clearly the location of the walls. A rival hypothesis, first espoused in the nineteenth century, locates Golgotha/Calvary on a vaguely skull-shaped rise northeast of the Damascus Gate (called “Gordon’s Calvary,” named after the original proponent of this theory). See also cross; crucifixion; Jerusalem.
Goliath (guh-li′uhth), a Philistine champion from Gath. According to 1 Sam. 17, he was killed by David in single combat in the Valley of Elah. In that narrative, the might of the seasoned Philistine warrior is contrasted with the vulnerability of the Israelite shepherd boy, who fells his heavily armed opponent with a sling stone. The story is recalled in Sir. 47:4. According to 2 Sam. 21:19, however, Goliath was killed by Elhanan, one of David’s warriors. Apparently noting the discrepancy, the Chronicler indicates that Elhanan’s victim was Lahmi, the brother of Goliath (1 Chron. 20:5). Some interpreters have suggested another explanation: perhaps the name of the Philistine slain by David was not given in the original, oldest tradition, so the name of Elhanan’s victim was substituted for that anonymous adversary of the better-known David. In any case, according to an old textual tradition of 1 Sam. 17:4 (preserved at Qumran, in Josephus, and some LXX versions), Goliath was a giant “four cubits and a span” (6 feet, 9 inches) in height. A different figure is found in the Hebrew text, where Goliath’s height is recorded as “six cubits and a span” (9 feet, 9 inches). See also David.
P.K.M.
Gomer (goh′muhr).
1 A son of Japheth (Gen. 10:2) and the ancestor of a people from southern Russia called Gimirrai by the Assyrians and Cimmerians.
2 A promiscuous woman who became the wife of Hosea and bore him three children. Although she has traditionally been identified as a prostitute, the Hebrew text never names her as such (NRSV: “a wife of whoredom” in 1:2 is thus misleading). The command of God was for Hosea to marry a woman who would be unfaithful to him in order to dramatize the relationship of God to unfaithful Israel (1:2), whose infidelity was evident through rampant worship of Baal (2:8; cf. 2:16–17). The prophet then gave symbolic names to the children that Gomer bore to him: Jezreel (“God sows”), Lo-ruhamah (“not pitied”), and Lo-ammi (“not my people”). Gomer was the daughter of Diblaim, but nothing else is known of her.
Gomorrah (guh-mor′uh). See Sodom.
Good Samaritan, parable of the, a story told by Jesus about a Samaritan who demonstrates love for neighbor by helping a Jewish man who has been wounded by thieves (Luke 10:29–37). A “good Samaritan” would have been a contradiction in terms for most Jews of Jesus’s day, because of centuries-long mutual hostility between Jews and Samaritans. Jesus, as a Jewish teacher, tells the parable to an expert in Jewish law to illustrate what is meant by the commandment of Torah, “Love your neighbor as yourself” (cf. Lev. 19:18). In the parable, the unlikely “good Samaritan,” who does what the law commends, is contrasted with Jewish leaders (a priest and a Levite), who do not. The point of the parable was clearly not to exalt Samaritans at the expense of Jews, but to indicate that Torah expresses God’s will even when those who keep it are not those for whom it was intended. Further, the concept of “neighbor” is given a broad interpretation by Jesus, as is evident elsewhere by his claim that love of neighbor implies love for enemies as well (cf. Matt. 5:43–44; Luke 6:27, 35). See also Samaritans.
M.A.P.
gopher wood, the term used in the KJV and RSV for the material that Noah was instructed to use in building the ark (Gen. 6:14). The NRSV and NIV have “cypress wood.” The meaning of the Hebrew (nopher) is uncertain.
Goshen (goh′shuhn).
1 The fertile region in the eastern Nile Delta of Egypt (modern Wadi Tumi-lat), where the family of Jacob was allowed to settle (Gen. 47:28–29, 34). Also known as “the land of Rameses” (47:11), this territory was well suited for grazing (47:3–6). Goshen (evidently not called by that name except in the Bible) was apparently something of a hinterland to the Egyptians, perhaps because of its distance from the network of Nile irrigation canals (cf. 46:34). The Hebrews were still dwelling in the region at the time of the plagues (Exod. 8:22; 9:26). From this territory Moses led the Israelites out of Egypt (Exod. 4–13). See also Egypt; exodus, the; patriarchs.
2 A geographic region between the southern hill country of Judah and the Negev, mentioned only in Josh. 10:41; 11:16. Its precise delineations are unknown. It is possibly related to 3.
3 A city in the southern hill country of Judah, in the same district as Debir (modern Khirbet Rabud), Anab, Socoh, and Eshtamoh (Josh. 15: 41). Its identification is unknown. Proposals include such modern locations as Tell Beit Mirsim, Dhahariya, and, more recently, Tell el-Kheleifeh, all sites near the southeast edge of the Judean hill country.
D.A.D.
gospel (Gk. euangelion, “good news”). The noun “gospel” (often but not always rendered as “good news” in the NRSV) is used only in the NT, but background for understanding the concept is found in the LXX, where the verb euangelizein (“to bring good news”) is used in Isa. 40:9; 41:27; 52:7; 61:1–2 (on the last passage especially, cf. Luke 4:18–19; 7:22). In all of these passages, a messenger is said to announce the good news of Israel’s redemption from exile. The NT understanding of gospel also reflects Hellenistic usage of the term, evident in the language of Roman decrees. The Roman proconsul Paulus Fabius Maximus honored Caesar Augustus by declaring the day of Caesar’s birth to be “good news” (euangelion) for the whole world. Against this background, the word “gospel” came to have at least four different connotations in the NT and the early Christian church.
First, gospel was used to describe the content of Jesus’s preaching: “Jesus came into Galilee, proclaiming the good news of God” (Mark 1:14). Here the use of “gospel” is similar to the one in Isaiah: Jesus is announcing what God is about to do, and this message of impending salvation is called “gospel” or “good news.” Thus, the term could be employed almost as a synonym for “what Jesus said about God.”
Second, gospel was used to describe the content of early Christian preaching, which focused on the death and resurrection of Christ, and on the benefits that faith in Christ has for believers. Paul speaks of “my gospel” (Rom. 2:16; 16:25) and “our gospel” (2 Cor. 4:3), indicating who it is who proclaims this good news (Paul himself) and for whom it is good news (Paul and his readers). He also uses the term “gospel” without any other modifier (Rom. 10:16; 11:28; 1 Cor. 4:15; 9:14, 18). In all of these cases (“my gospel,” “our gospel,” or simply “gospel”) the readers are assumed to understand the content of the gospel, i.e., the message Paul and the readers considered to be “good news.” At other times, however, Paul speaks of the “gospel of God” (Rom. 1:1; 15:16; cf. 2 Cor. 11:7), the “gospel (or good news) of Christ” (Rom. 15:19; 1 Cor. 9:12; 2 Cor. 2:12; 9:13; 10:14; Phil. 1:27; 1 Thess. 3:2), or the “gospel concerning [God’s] Son” (Rom. 1:9). The first of these expressions (“gospel of God”) seems only to indicate that the gospel Paul preaches has its origin in God; but the latter two phrases (“gospel of Christ” or “gospel concerning [God’s] Son”) seem to indicate what the content of Paul’s gospel message was: just as Jesus preached good news about God’s kingdom (“the good news of the kingdom,” cf. Matt. 4:23; 9:35), so Paul preached good news about Christ, the Son of God (the “gospel of Christ” or the “gospel concerning [God’s] Son”). In Rom. 1:1–6 and 1 Cor. 15:1–8, Paul describes this gospel further: it comes from God; it was promised through the prophets; its content is Jesus, a descendant of David according to the flesh, designated Son of God in power by the resurrection. Thus, for Paul, the “gospel” was no longer a message proclaimed by Jesus about God, but a message proclaimed by Christians about Jesus (or at least about what God had done in or through Jesus). At a content level, the gospel was now less about the “coming of God’s kingdom” and more about the death and resurrection of Christ. The significance of this gospel for Paul can hardly be overstated. It was disclosed to Paul by God (Gal. 1:16) and so was no human affair (Gal. 1:11–12). It contained or conveyed the power of God for salvation to all who believed (Rom. 1:16). Paul also affirms that there is no other gospel (Gal. 1:7), and he strives constantly to prevent anyone from turning his audience toward false versions of the gospel (2 Cor. 11:4; Gal. 1:6). The true gospel demands obedience (Rom. 10:16), and Paul does everything for its sake (1 Cor. 9:23), even surrendering his legitimate rights so that the gospel can be preached free of charge (1 Cor. 9:18).
Third, as a combination of the above, gospel came to refer to preaching that summarized the ministry of Jesus in a way that included both what Jesus had said was the good news about God and what Christians had said was the good news about Jesus. A summary of such “gospel preaching” is found in Acts 10:34–43. Likewise, Mark 14:9 indicates that preaching the gospel in the early church included telling anecdotes about the life and ministry of Jesus. In Mark 8:35 and 10:29, the word “gospel” (NRSV: “good news”) seems to refer to the ministry of Jesus as a whole—and perhaps even to the ongoing ministry of his followers on his behalf. Again, there is a subtle shift in focus and content. When the apostle Paul says that he preached the “gospel of God” (Rom. 1:1–5), he does not mean that he repeated what Jesus had said about God or that he told people stories about Jesus—parables he had taught, miracles he had performed, other anecdotes about his life on earth. Still, in NT books written after the time of Paul (including Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, and Acts) the gospel has come to be understood as a message that includes such matters. Indeed, the book that is now called the Gospel of Mark describes its entire contents as “the good news (gospel) of Jesus Christ, the Son of God.”
Fourth, gospel came to be used for books that offer in written form what had previously been proclaimed orally. This was a natural outgrowth of the use of the term as just described: a comprehensive message that includes what Jesus himself considered to be the gospel of God, what people like Paul considered to be the gospel about Christ (especially his death and resurrection), and numerous anecdotes and stories about Jesus as the Messiah and Son of God active on earth.
Bibliography
Powell, Mark Allan. Fortress Introduction to the Gospels. Fortress, 1998.
Stuhlmacher, Peter, ed. The Gospel and the Gospels. Eerdmans, 1991.
M.A.P.
THE FIRST FOUR BOOKS of the NT are called the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, respectively, and, by extension, other books that were probably written in emulation of these writings are sometimes called “Gospels” as well. The term derives from the Greek word euangelion, which means “good news.” This term was applied first to preaching about God’s redemptive activity (cf. Isa. 61:1–2), then to Jesus’s preaching about the kingdom of God (Mark 1:14–15), then to the message that early Christians proclaimed about what God had done in and through Jesus (Rom. 1:9), and finally to the whole story of Jesus: his life, ministry, death, and resurrection (cf. Mark 1:1).
Genre: Because the “Gospel” was not a known literary genre at the time the first four books of the NT were written, the actual literary genre of those books has been a matter of intense debate. Some scholars have maintained that the authors of those books—or one of the authors (probably Mark)—created an entirely new genre of literature that the world had not seen before. Others, without denying that these books are not exactly like anything that preceded them, have focused on identifying analogues in both Jewish literature (apocalypse, biography of righteous individuals, biography of prophets) and Greco-Roman literature (popular biography, laudatory biography, aretalogy, tragedy).
Although there is no consensus on this matter, most recent scholars have concluded that the Gospels can be placed loosely into the genre of ancient biography. Books belonging to that genre were especially popular in the Roman world, and many of them have survived to the present day. The Greek historian Plutarch (45–125 CE) wrote more than fifty biographies of prominent Greeks and Romans. Suetonius and Tacitus recounted the lives of the Roman emperors. There were biographies of generals and military heroes and also of philosophers and religious leaders. Thus, it is sometimes said (with a hint of anachronism) that a Roman library would probably have put the NT Gospels on the same shelf as Lives of Eminent Philosophers by Diogenes Laertius and Life of Apollonius of Tyana by Philostratus. This understanding of the Gospels, however, is qualified by at least five additional considerations:
1. The NT Gospels are compilations. Although the Gospels as finished products may be identified as ancient biographies, they include other genres of literature within their pages: genealogies, hymns, parables, miracle stories, speeches, pronouncement stories, etc.
2. They were influenced by Jewish literature. All four of the Gospels are written in Greek, the language of the Greco-Roman world, but they are written by persons well versed in the scriptures of Israel. Those scriptures contain semibiographical narratives of people like Abraham, Moses, and Elijah. Even though the Gospels were written for the Greco-Roman world, their authors knew these Jewish stories and were influenced by them.
3. They are ancient biographies, not modern ones. The Gospels make no pretense of offering objective or balanced perspectives on Jesus’s life. They do not reveal their sources or offer any way for readers to check the reliability of what they report. Their treatment is far from comprehensive: they offer little insight into Jesus’s personality or motivation; they provide almost no information about his early life; they do not even bother to describe his physical appearance. They also lack the sort of data—references to names, dates, and places—that would be standard for any modern biography. The Gospel of Mark reports that Jesus healed a man in a synagogue (3:1–6), but it does not give the man’s name or say when this happened or what happened next. (Was the healing permanent? Did the man become a follower of Jesus? Did he continue to attend the synagogue?) Though these lapses may seem strange to modern readers, such questions were not usually expected to be addressed in biographies of the ancient world. The point of ancient biographies was to relate accounts that portrayed the essential character of the person who was the subject of the work. Indeed, the purpose of the biography was to define that person’s character in a manner that would invite emulation. The anecdotal style of ancient biographies, furthermore, allowed events to be related without much concern for chronology. Events were not necessarily reported in the order in which they happened; rather, they were recounted in a sequence likely to have a particular rhetorical effect on the book’s readers. This characteristic may explain why the NT Gospels often relate events in different sequences (e.g., the account of Jesus overturning tables in the Jerusalem temple is found near the beginning of John’s Gospel, but comes near the end of the Gospel of Mark).
4. They employ a fictive (“fictionlike”) style of narrative. In many ways, the literary style of the NT Gospels is closer to that of modern fiction than it is to modern historical reporting. The Gospel authors knew the art of storytelling, and they employ such literary devices as irony, symbolism, and foreshadowing. They solicit readers’ empathy so that, as their stories unfold, the reader feels drawn into the drama. The genre of ancient biography allows for such analysis, because biographies in the ancient world tended to treat history as a story and to relate events with a flair that modern readers associate with fiction.
5. They are overtly evangelistic. Most biographies of the ancient world were evangelistic in a broad sense. They did not simply pass on information about interesting individuals; they reported on extraordinary lives with an obvious hope that readers would be inspired by what was presented and motivated to change their values or behaviors accordingly. The NT Gospels exhibit this tendency to an extreme. Their authors tell the story of Jesus in a way that may inspire people to accept his teaching or practice his way of life. Beyond that, the claim of these books is that what has happened in and through Jesus altered the very nature of human existence. These authors are telling a story of ultimate significance, recounting things they claim will affect the lives of all people, whether they believe in Jesus or not.
| CHARACTERISTICS OF ANCIENT BIOGRAPHIES |
| • No pretense of detached objectivity |
| • No concern for establishing facts (e.g., by citing evidence or sources) |
| • Not much attention to historical data (names, dates, places) |
| • Little attention to chronology of events or development of the person’s thought |
| • No psychological interest in the subject’s inner motivations |
| • Anecdotal style of narration |
| • Emphasis on the subject’s character and defining traits |
| • Consistent focus on the subject’s philosophy of life |
| • Strong interest in the subject’s death as consistent with the subject’s philosophy of life |
| • Presentation of the subject as a model worthy of emulation |
| • Depiction of subject as superior to competitors or rivals |
| • Overall concern with the subject’s legacy, evident in followers who carry on the tradition |
| From Mark Allan Powell, Introducing the New Testament (courtesy, Baker Academic) |
Types of Material in the Gospels: As indicated, the NT Gospels must be understood as compilations of various types of material. Some of these are specific to particular Gospels: hymns are found only in Luke and John; genealogies only in Matthew and Luke. Other types of material, however, are found in most or all of the Gospels.
Parables: More than forty parables of Jesus are included in the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, and Luke. No parables are found in John, but even there one finds instances of figurative speech not too far removed from the parable genre (4:35–37; 8:35; 10:1–5; 12:24; 16:21). See also parables.
Miracle stories: All four Gospels contain multiple accounts of Jesus working miracles. The preferred term for miracles in the Synoptic Gospels (Matthew, Mark, Luke) is the Greek word dynamis, which means “power” or “deeds of power” (e.g., Matt. 11:20–23; Mark 6:2, 5). In John’s Gospel, the miracles are often called semeia, or “signs” (e.g., 2:11; 12:37), because they point beyond themselves to the truth about God that Jesus has come to reveal. See also miracles.
Pronouncement Stories: All four of the NT Gospels contain numerous examples of what scholars call “pronouncement stories,” anecdotes that preserve the memory of something Jesus said. In such a story, everything leads up to a climactic and provocative pronouncement—the saying, which usually comes at the end, is the whole point of the anecdote (just as a punch line is the whole point of a joke). Thus, a story about Jesus’s opponents trying to trap him serves to set up his memorable saying, “Give to the emperor the things that are the emperor’s, and to God the things that are God’s” (Matt. 22:15–22; Mark 12:13–17; Luke 20:20–26). See also pronouncement stories.
Individual Sayings: The Gospels also contain numerous sayings of Jesus that lack narrative context. Sometimes these sayings are strung together to make what appear to be speeches of Jesus given on some particular occasion. Sometimes they are linked together by no more than what appear to be “catchword” connections (e.g., Mark 9:49 follows 9:47–48 only because of the word “fire,” and then 9:50a and 9:50b each follow 9:49 only because of the word “salt”).
Passion and Resurrection Narratives: All four Gospels conclude with an extended account of Jesus’s arrest, trial, crucifixion, burial, and resurrection. In each Gospel, this portion of the story is treated with more intense detail than any other portion, and the pace of the narrative slows to the point that readers receive an almost hour-by-hour account of what is happening. Scholars have noted similarities between these accounts and the death scenes of other famous men in ancient Greco-Roman biographies. These accounts also show an especially strong degree of interaction with the scriptures of Israel; they appear to be written by people who have already thought deeply about the meaning of Jesus’s death and resurrection and reflected on those events in light of passages from the Psalms, the Prophets, and other portions of scripture. Thus, the death and resurrection of Jesus is not just one more episode in a series of remarkable occurrences; for each of the four Gospels, it is treated as the climax of the story, the goal toward which everything has been moving all along. Indeed, each of the Gospels prepares its readers for this capstone event by having Jesus predict exactly what will occur (e.g., Mark 8:31–32; 9:31; 10:33–34) and/or offering allusions that readers are expected to understand in a manner that characters in the story do not (see Mark 2:20; John 2:19–22; 3:14; 8:28; 12:32–34). Furthermore, each Gospel tells the story of Jesus’s death and resurrection in a distinctive way that pulls together certain threads and fulfills important themes of that particular work. In Matthew’s Gospel, Jesus dies as the Messiah of Israel, fulfilling prophecies that indicated he would be the one to save his people from their sin (cf. 1:21). In Mark, he gives his life as a ransom for many, demonstrating the sacrificial way of self-denial that is to mark all of his followers (cf. 8:34–35; 10:43–45). In Luke, he dies as a noble martyr, a victim of injustice, who will overcome death in a way that promises an end to oppression (cf. 4:18). In John, he dies triumphantly, as one who is glorified and exalted in an ultimate expression of God’s love (cf. 12:23; 15:13). In these and other ways, each of the passion and resurrection stories serves as the narrative and theological climax of the Gospel in which it appears.
| SAYINGS OF JESUS IN THE GOSPELS: SOME EXAMPLES |
| Wisdom Sayings provide insight into how life really works: |
| “Where your treasure is, there your heart will be also” (Luke 12:34). |
| “If a kingdom is divided against itself, that kingdom cannot stand” (Mark 3:24). |
| Prophetic Sayings proclaim the activity or judgment of God: |
| “The kingdom of God has come near; repent and believe” (Mark 1:15). |
| Eschatological Sayings reflect the view that the future is of primary importance: |
| “The Son of Man is to come with his angels in the glory of his Father, and then he will repay everyone for what has been done” (Matt. 16:27). |
| Legal Sayings interpret Torah or the will of God: |
| “In everything do to others, as you would have them do to you, for this is the law and the prophets” (Matt. 7:12). |
| “I” Sayings are autobiographical: |
| “I came not to call the righteous but sinners” (Mark 2:17). |
| “I came that they may have life and have it abundantly” (John 10:10). |
| From Mark Allan Powell, Introducing the New Testament (courtesy, Baker Academic) |
Composition and Sources: The author of Luke’s Gospel says that he has done some research and that his intent is to provide an orderly account of what has been handed on “from the beginning” (1:1–4). As this comment implies, the Gospel authors did not have to start from scratch. They were able to rely upon “oral sources” (nuggets of material that had been told from memory), and they probably also had written sources (materials that people had put into writing a generation before the Gospels themselves were produced). A potentially complicating factor with regard to composition of the Gospels concerns the question of whether the evangelists operated independently of each other. Did each of the Gospel authors produce his biography of Jesus without any clue that others were doing (or had done) the same thing? Or did they consult each other? More to the point, did the ones who wrote last have copies of the Gospel or Gospels that were written first? Three of the four Gospels—Matthew, Mark, and Luke—are called the “Synoptic Gospels” because they appear to be related to each other in a way that the fourth one, John, is not. The word “synoptic” literally means “seeing together,” and it came to be applied to the first three Gospels, because their contents could be set in parallel columns that allowed them to be read and interpreted side by side. The amount of overlapping material is remarkable, as are the similarities in structure, style, perspective, and overall tone. The question of exactly how these three Gospels should be related to each other is called the “Synoptic Problem.” Various solutions to this problem have been proposed. The dominant hypothesis holds that Mark wrote his Gospel first, that Matthew and Luke each used Mark’s Gospel as a source, that Matthew and Luke also used a now lost collection of sayings attributed to Jesus (called the “Q source”), and that Matthew and Luke operated independently of each other. Every aspect of this proposal can be and has been challenged. See also Synoptic Problem.
With regard to the Gospel of John, the principal question becomes whether the author of this Gospel knew of or had access to Matthew, Mark, or Luke. Scholars are somewhat evenly divided over this issue. In addition, a number of other possible sources for John’s Gospel have been proposed, including a now lost “Signs Gospel” that included numbered miracle stories (cf. references to “the first of his signs” in 2:11 and “the second sign” in 4:54) and concluded with what is now 20:30–31. See also John, Gospel According to.
In addition to the four NT Gospels, other early Christian writings are sometimes called gospels, mainly because they are assumed to have been written in emulation of these documents. Of the numerous apocryphal gospels produced in the first few centuries CE, the Gospel of Thomas has been of most interest to NT scholars, because some think that it might have been written in the first century and so provide a variant tradition for sayings of Jesus that can be compared and contrasted with what is found in the NT Gospels. Despite its name, the Gospel of Thomas does not belong to the same literary genre as the NT Gospels, for it contains only sayings attributed to Jesus, not narratives concerning him. The Gospel of Peter has also attracted some attention in biblical studies, because a handful of scholars believe it may have drawn upon an early account of Jesus’s resurrection that also served as a source for some of the NT Gospels. Other apocryphal gospels are studied for what they reveal concerning the diversity and development of Christianity in the second, third, and fourth centuries, but have no direct impact on NT studies. See also gospel; John, Gospel According to; Luke, Gospel According to; Mark, Gospel According to; Matthew, Gospel According to.
Bibliography
Aune, E. David. The New Testament in Its Literary Environment. Westminster, 1987.
Powell, Mark Allan. Fortress Introduction to the Gospels. Fortress, 1998.
———. Introducing the New Testament: A Historical, Literary, and Theological Survey. Baker Academic, 2009.
Stuhlmacher, Peter, ed. The Gospel and the Gospels. Eerdmans, 1991.
M.A.P.
gourd, a hard-rinded inedible fruit of the genus Lagenaria (large) or of the species Cucurbita pepo (small), used both as utensils (dippers, cups, storage vessels) and for ornamentation. In Jon. 4:4–10 the KJV has “gourd” where the NRSV has “bush” due to uncertain identification. Gourd motifs decorated the temple interior (1 Kings 6:18) and the bronze sea in the temple (1 Kings 7:24; 2 Chron. 4:3). A “wild gourd” referred to in 2 Kings 4:39 had poisonous fruit—just what that gourd might have been remains unknown.
government, the administration of society by those in power. The form of government in the Bible varies: village assemblies, heads of familial and tribal associations, intertribal judges, theocratic kings, and emperors with their representatives (prefect or procurator or subordinate king) or local councils (e.g., the Sanhedrin). The purpose and dangers of government receive attention throughout the Hebrew Bible, particularly with regard to the monarchy. God is the ultimate ruler, and the responsibility of the king is to execute justice, particularly for the weak (1 Kings 10:9; Prov. 31:8–9; Ezek. 34:1–6, 23); this is true even for foreign governments (Dan. 4:27). Ps. 72:1–4 contains a prayer for God to enable and empower the earthly ruler, and Ps. 101 conveys a pledge on the part of such a ruler to show integrity and justice. Government needs limits; rule is a function, not a status or class (Deut. 17:14–20). The people are not mere subjects but are also participants, even in the covenantal aspects of kingship (2 Kings 11:17; 23:1–3). In the NT, different attitudes toward the government can be discerned. First, the government may be understood as divinely established to encourage and maintain what is beneficial and to discourage what is harmful and disruptive; according to this view, believers should honor and obey governing authorities as instituted by God (Rom. 13:1–7; Titus 3:1–2; 1 Pet. 2:13–17). Second, governing authorities may be viewed as lackeys of the devil (Luke 4:6) in control of a world that is intrinsically opposed to Jesus and hostile to his followers; according to this view, believers should seek to withdraw from society, avoid any compromise with worldly powers, and strive to implement what is godly in direct opposition to what the demonic instruments of injustice will seek to produce (John 15:18–19; 1 John 2:15–17; and the book of Revelation, esp. chaps. 13, 17–18). Finally, a mediating position is evident in the teaching of Jesus, who counsels acceptance of the powers that be, while also critiquing them and insisting on a transcendent commitment to God alone (Mark 10:42–44; 12:13–17; cf. Acts 5:29). See also council, the; king; law; prefect.
Bibliography
Pilgrim, Walter J. Uneasy Neighbors: Church and State in the New Testament. Fortress, 1999.
S.C.M./M.A.P.
governor, a ruler of a city, territory, or province. In the Bible, governors are not elected officials, nor are they supreme rulers. They are appointed by a king or emperor; while exercising considerable local authority, they only rule at the pleasure of the one who appointed them. In Genesis, Pharaoh appoints Joseph governor of all Egypt (42:6; 45:26). At the time of Ahab, a number of district governors are mentioned who have military responsibilities (1 Kings 20:14–19). During the Babylonian and Persian periods, governors were appointed by emperors. Dan. 3:2 mentions satraps, prefects, governors, counselors, treasurers, justices, and magistrates under King Nebuchadnezzar (if this list implies a hierarchy, governors would seem to occupy a mid-level position of power). After the exile, Tattenai is appointed governor of the Persian province “Beyond the River,” which from a Persian perspective would include Judah (Ezra 5:6). Zerubbabel and Nehemiah are listed as local governors appointed by the Persian ruler (Hag. 1:1; Neh. 5:14). In the NT, Quirinius is named as the governor of Syria at the time of Jesus’s birth (Luke 2:2), and Pontius Pilate is referred to as the governor of Judea at the time of Jesus’s ministry (Luke 3:1) and crucifixion (Matt. 27:2). More precise terminology usually identifies Pilate as a Roman prefect. Felix (Acts 23:24) and Porcius Festus (Acts 24:27; cf. 26:30) are also called governors. Jesus told his disciples that they would be dragged before governors and kings because of him (Matt. 10:18; Mark 13:9; Luke 21:12). First Peter teaches that Christians should “accept the authority of every human institution, whether of the emperor as supreme, or of governors as sent by (God) to punish those who do wrong and to praise those who do right” (2:13–14).
M.A.P.
Gozan (goh′zan; Akkadian Guzana), a city (modern Tell Halaf) on the Habor (Heb. Khabur) River; the city and its surrounding region became part of the Assyrian Empire in the ninth century BCE (alluded to in 2 Kings 19:12; see Isa. 37:12). Gozan was one of the places to which the Israelites were deported after the capture of Samaria (2 Kings 17:6; 18:11; 1 Chron. 5:26); texts from Tell Halaf mention some of the exiles’ descendants. See also Habor.
grace, as a theological concept, the unmerited favor of God, closely associated with mercy and forgiveness. The noun “grace” (Heb. khen; Gk. charis) is used only 3 times in the Hebrew Bible (Ps. 45:2; Jer. 31:2; Zech. 4:7), but occurs 115 times in the NT. These statistics, however, can be misleading, for the concept of God’s unmerited favor is expressed throughout the Bible. God’s choice of Israel to be God’s people was not based on prior accomplishments or qualifications (Gen. 12:1–3; cf. Wis. 3:9; 4:15, where “grace and mercy” are connected with election). God loved Israel in spite of puny numbers (Deut. 7:6–9) and rescued the community from the wilderness, encircling them with care (Deut. 32:10). God kept covenant with Israel even when the covenant was violated by the people (Jer. 31:31–34; Ezek. 16:8) and brought the captives home from Babylon (Isa. 49:14–18). Furthermore, the Hebrew verb khanan, “to be gracious,” is frequently used with God as the subject, and the adjective khannun, “gracious,” is often applied to God. Thus, God declares, “I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will show mercy on whom I will show mercy” (Exod. 33:19). The seemingly arbitrary nature of that declaration becomes cause for celebration as biblical writers discover that God is frequently, typically, and perhaps intrinsically “gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love” (Exod. 34:6). The psalmists show confidence in asking God to be gracious in hearing prayers (4:1), healing sickness (6:2; 41:4), rescuing the oppressed (9:13), forgiving sin (41:4), etc. Still, grace is not something that can be taken for granted, especially when one has aroused God’s wrath (2 Sam. 12:22).
In the NT, the focus of God’s grace shifts decisively to the person of Jesus Christ. Divine grace rests on the infant Jesus (Luke 2:40), who subsequently grows in grace (2:52; NRSV: “favor”) and speaks gracious words (4:22). Paul regards his apostleship as a gift of grace. Above all, however, Paul associates God’s grace with God’s unmerited favor shown to sinners through Jesus Christ and expressed supremely though Christ’s death and resurrection. Jews and Gentiles alike gain entrance to the messianic community through the “gift” (Rom. 3:24) or “free gift” (Rom. 5:15) of grace (Gal. 2:17–21; Rom. 4:16). People have been justified or put right with God by grace, which is received through faith—and even that comes as a free gift of God (Eph. 2:8). Still, Paul cautions against using grace as a license to sin, lest believers “accept the grace of God in vain” (2 Cor. 6:1). Paul also uses the word “grace” (combined with “peace”) as a salutation in the opening of his letters (e.g., Rom. 1:7; 1 Cor. 1:3). See also covenant; forgiveness; love; mercy; promise.
C.J.R./M.A.P.
gracious, the quality of showing favor and mercy. The term is usually applied to a person of superior position and power who is kindly disposed toward a person of inferior position and power. Thus, Potiphar dealt graciously with Joseph (Gen. 39:4), Ruth found favor in the eyes of Boaz (Ruth 2:10), and Esther was treated graciously by King Ahasuerus (Esther 2:17; 5:2). In the Bible, it is above all God who is gracious toward human beings, as stated in an ancient liturgical affirmation that calls God “gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love” (Exod. 34:6; cf. Pss. 86:15; 103:8; 145:8). See also grace; mercy.
W.E.L.
graft. See olive.
grain, a general term used throughout the Bible to indicate the seed of cultivated cereal grasses such as wheat, barley, millet, and sorghum. The term the NRSV regularly translates as “grain” is translated “corn” in the KJV and NEB. Ground into flour, grain was the major component of breads and other cooked foods. An ancient poem designates the promised land a place of “grain and new wine” (Deut. 33:28). The phrase “grain, wine, and oil” occurs repeatedly (Deut. 28:51; 2 Chron. 32:28; Neh. 5:11; 10:39; 13:5, 12; Joel 2:19), denoting the range of native agricultural produce: cereal farming, viticulture, and olive cultivation. The development of cereal agriculture antedated the settlement of Israel’s tribes (beginning in the thirteenth century BCE). Israel inherited from Canaan the techniques of farming and a cycle of agricultural festivals: Unleavened Bread (Passover); Weeks (Pentecost); and Ingathering (Tabernacles). See also barley; millet; Passover; Pentecost; spelt; Tabernacles, Festival of; Unleavened Bread, Festival of; wheat.
R.M.G.
granary, a storage facility for threshed and winnowed grains such as wheat and barley. The facility ranged in size and format from an entire building of rooms or compartments, to plastered or unplastered pits or silos, to individual jars or containers. The presence of large granary structures in the ancient Near East implies a surplus production of wheat to guard against famine years as well as some type of organized system for redistribution of the grain (see Jer. 50:26; Joel 1:17; Matt. 3:12; Luke 3:17).
grape. See vine.
grasshopper. See locust.
grave. See architecture; burial.
graven images. See idol.
greave, armor protecting the lower leg. The ones Goliath wore were made of bronze (1 Sam. 17:6).
Greece (grees), a country that lies at the terminus of the central mountain structure of southern Europe. Between 750 and 500 BCE Greeks, pressed for land, founded numerous colonies in the Aegean, along the Black Sea, in Cyrenaica, Sicily, and southern Italy as well as Asia Minor. By 500 BCE the city-state Sparta had united most of the Peloponnesus. Meanwhile, the Athenians united most of the Greeks in the Aegean area as well as those along the coast of Asia Minor. Athens’s defeat by Sparta ended this league, though attempts would be made to form new leagues around prominent cities. In the north, Greece had remained divided into weak tribal monarchies until Philip II of Macedon consolidated power in the region. Philip defeated Athens and a weak coalition of cities at Chaeronea in 338 BCE. The Romans gained control of Greece in 146 BCE.
In the Hebrew Bible, Greece is mentioned only in two of the later books (Dan. 8:21; 10:20; 11:2; Zech. 9:13). It figures much more prominently in the NT, though not by name. During the NT period, the area now known as Greece was divided into two Roman provinces, Achaia (in the south) and Macedonia (in the north). Corinth and Athens were in Achaia; Philippi and Thessalonica were in Macedonia. Thus, Paul wrote letters to three churches in Greece (Corinth, Philippi, Thessalonica), and he visited other cities there as well (see Acts 16:9–18:18; 2 Cor. 2:12). When Paul is said to arrive in Greece in Acts 20:2, he is actually arriving in Macedonia (cf. Acts 20:1, 3).
P.P.
| THE GREEK ALPHABET | ||||
| Greek Capital | Form Small | Name | Transliteration | Approximate Pronunciation |
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α | alpha | a | drama |
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β | beta | b | bike |
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γ | gamma | g | good |
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δ | delta | d | dog |
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ε | epsilon | e | ego |
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ζ | zeta | z | Zeus |
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η | eta | ē | they |
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θ | theta | th | thin |
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ι | iota | i | it |
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κ | kappa | k | kite |
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λ | lambda | l | logic |
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μ | mu | m | mother |
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ν | nu | n | not |
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ξ | xsi | xs | axiom |
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o | omicron | o | hot |
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π | pi | p | poet |
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ρ | rho | r | road |
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σ | sigma | s | side |
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τ | tau | t | topic |
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υ | upsilon | u,y | tu (French) Tür (German) |
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ϕ | phi | ph | phone |
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χ | chi | ch | chasm |
 |
ψ | psi | ps | apse |
 |
ω | omega | ō | ode |
1 As a substantive adjective, the word “Greek” sometimes refers to the Greek language (Acts 9:36; 21:37; Rev. 9:11). The inscription attached to Jesus’s cross was written in Hebrew, Latin, and Greek (John 19:20). See also Greek language.
2 As a substantive adjective referring to people, the term “Greek” or “Greeks” would literally refer to people from the land of Greece. It might mean this in certain passages, such as John 12:20. In the great majority of cases, however, the NT uses “Greek/Greeks” as a synonym for “Gentile/Gentiles,” i.e., for persons who are not Jewish. Titus is “a Greek” because he is not a Jew (Gal. 2:3). When Paul says in Rom. 3:9 that “Jews and Greeks” are under the power of sin, he means that all people are under the power of sin, Jews and non-Jews alike.
M.A.P.
Greek language. All the books of the NT were written in Greek, or more precisely in a dialect called Koine (“common”) Greek or Hellenistic Greek. Koine Greek was a “common” dialect in two senses of the word. First, it became the most commonly used language of late antiquity, serving as the lingua franca of the Mediterranean world for over a millennium (fourth century BCE–sixth century CE). Second, it represented the language of the “common people”; it was a simplified, colloquial version of the language spoken (and sometimes written) by the less educated classes. A major boon to the study of Koine Greek has been the discovery during the past century of tens of thousands of papyrus documents, mainly in Egypt, in addition to inscriptions and ostraca unearthed by archaeological excavations. Scholars now possess a wide spectrum of written materials from late antiquity, thus permitting a comparative analysis of NT Greek with secular Koine Greek documents of the time. As a result, most scholars now view NT Greek as closely related to the Koine vernacular of the first century CE, though NT Greek does differ somewhat due to the influence of Hebrew and Aramaic patterns on the NT authors (called “Semitisms”) and also to the new connotations of Greek words generated by the process of community formation in early Christianity. Moreover, NT Greek varies from book to book as a result of each author’s educational level and familiarity with Koine Greek.
L.C.M.
grinding stone, a stone, known as a quern, with a flat or slightly concave surface used for grinding grain into meal by hand. Most samples are basalt or limestone in the Near East, and the grain was pulverized by being crushed with a handheld stone repeatedly kneaded over the grain against the quern surface. Such an activity is probably presumed in Jesus’s saying in Matt. 24:41.
groves, clusters of trees such as might be found in an orchard or oasis. Palm groves (Num. 24:6) and olive groves (Deut. 6:11; Judg. 15:5) are specifically mentioned. Jth. 3:8 mentions sacred groves destroyed by Holofernes. In 2 Esdras it is said that neither thick groves nor the clefts of rocks will prove to be effective hiding places from the wrath of God (16:28). See also oak; trees; wood.
grudge, a feeling of anger, prohibited by Lev. 19:18. Likewise, God does not maintain anger forever (Jer. 3:5, 12; Ps. 103:9). In Gen. 50:15, Joseph’s brothers wonder whether he might bear a grudge against them for selling him into slavery in Egypt. Mark 6:19 says that Herodias bore a grudge against John the Baptist. Ungrudging behavior is encouraged in Deut. 15:10 and 1 Pet. 4:9.
guard, bodyguard, a person or persons assigned to the protection of a individual, place, or thing. Cherubim guard the entrance to the garden of Eden to prevent human access to the tree of life (Gen. 3:24). Various royal figures are depicted as having guards (Gen. 37:36; Dan. 2:14; 2 Kings 25:8–21). David had an elite troop of Cherethites and Pelethites who served as his bodyguard under the leadership of Benaiah, the son of Jehoiada (2 Sam. 23:22–3; cf. 8:18). As “foreigners” these soldiers would have had personal loyalty to their employer and would have been less influenced by competing internal political factions. The temple area in Jerusalem also required guards (1 Kings 14:27–28; 2 Kings 11:19). Prison guards are mentioned in Gen. 40:3–4; Acts 5:23; 12:6. During the Roman occupation of Judea, the temple area had at least two sets of guards. One set of Roman soldiers was stationed in the fortress of Antonia (see Acts 21:30–34), and the priestly officials had levitical “security officers” as well. Roman guards watched the tomb of Jesus (Matt. 27:65–28:4) and supervised the house arrest of the apostle Paul (Acts 28:16).
J.A.D.
guest, one invited to a feast (1 Kings 1:41; Matt. 22:10–11; Mark 6:22–26) or to lodge overnight (Luke 19:7). In the ancient Mediterranean world, people were often expected to lodge travelers and strangers and to ensure the safety and welfare of their guests, even at extreme inconvenience to themselves or to their family (Judg. 19:15–24; 2 Sam. 12:4; cf. Luke 11:5–6; Heb. 13:2). Some houses were equipped with guest rooms (Luke 22:11; Philem. 22). The practice of such hospitality implied a social bond and could lead to aspersions being cast on either party: Jesus is criticized for going to be the guest of a sinner (Luke 19:7), and a Thessalonian named Jason is attacked for entertaining Paul and Silas as guests in his home (Acts 17:7).
guest chamber. See house.
guilt. For the biblical writers, guilt is not primarily an inward feeling of remorse or a bad conscience, but rather a situation that has arisen because of sin committed against God or one’s neighbor; a clear presupposition is that human beings are responsible and accountable for their actions, thoughts, and attitudes. The latter notion of responsibility is so great that people can be guilty without even being aware that they have done anything wrong (e.g., Lev. 5:17–19). Guilt, furthermore, can be collective as well as individual. Ps. 51 testifies to a situation in which an individual has sinned and brought guilt upon himself, but what one person does can also cause guilt to come upon an entire group of people (cf. the story of Achan in Josh. 7). In the Bible, guilt brings serious consequences, including separation from God and one’s neighbors. Guilt is depicted as a burden or weight that can crush a person (e.g., Ps. 38:4, 6), as a disease that can destroy a person from within (e.g., Ps. 32:3–4), or as a debt that must be paid (e.g., Lev. 5:1–6:7; Num. 5:5–8). When speaking of guilt, NT writers use the Greek word enochos, which usually means “deserving of punishment” (e.g., Matt. 26:66; 1 Cor. 11:27; James 2:10). According to Paul, all human beings are guilty before God (e.g., Rom. 1:18–3:20).
Throughout the Bible, guilt can only be removed or set aside because of God’s grace, which allows for forgiveness. In Israel, this grace was manifest in a system of sacrifices and rituals designed to cleanse and purify people. Such rituals were not designed primarily to relieve the conscience of the guilty party, but rather to remove the “status” of guilt and so to restore the broken relationship caused by that status. The system was designed, then, to effect reconciliation between the guilty and offended parties. In the NT, Paul makes frequent use of this idea, interpreting the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ as a once-for-all act that effects reconciliation between God and sinful humanity (e.g., Rom. 5:6–11; 2 Cor. 5:16–21; cf. Col. 1:19–20). Although the NT never says that God’s action in Christ removes guilt, it does say that it makes available the forgiveness of sins (Matt. 26:28; Luke 24:47; Acts 5:31; 10:43; 13:38; 26:18; Col. 1:14). Likewise, Paul says that people are justified or put right with God through faith in Jesus Christ (Rom. 3:28; 5:1; Gal. 2:16; 3:24). See also atonement; evil; justification; reconciliation; sanctification; sacrifice; sin.
J.M.E.
guilt offering. See sacrifice.
Guni (gyoo′ni).
1 A son of Naphtali who settled with Jacob’s family in Egypt (Gen. 46:24) and became the head of the Gunite group (Num. 26:48).
2 A descendant of Gad (1 Chron. 5:15).