probably only different pronunciations of the same oriental term, הצרעה,
_hatsiraah_, as this fly is called by Moses and Joshua. The vindictive
power that presided over this dreadful scourge was worshipped at Ekron,
in Palestine, through fear, the reigning motive of Pagan superstition,
under the title of _Baal-zebub_, “master or lord of the hornet,” whence
_Beelzebub_, in the New Testament, “the prince of demons,” Matt. xii,
24. Isaiah, denouncing a wo against Abyssinia, describes it as “the land
of the winged cymbal,” (_tsaltsal canaphim_,) Isaiah xviii, 1; by the
same analogy that _tsaltsal_ signifies “a locust,” Deut. xxviii, 42; _a
streperâ voce sic dictam_. [So called from its streperous sound.] Bruce,
in his Travels in Abyssinia, has given an accurate description of this
tremendous fly, which in Arabic is called _zimb_, and by the Abyssinians
_tsaltsal-ya_, “the cymbal of the Lord,” from its sonorous buzzing. And
in his Appendix he has given a drawing of it, magnified, for
distinctness’ sake, something above twice the natural size: after which
he observes, “He has no sting, though he seems to me to be rather of the
bee kind; but his motion is more rapid and sudden than that of the bee,
(_volitans_,) and resembles that of the gad-fly in England. There is
something particular in the sound or buzzing of this insect; it is a
jarring noise, together with a humming, (_acerba sonans_,) which induces
me to believe it proceeds, in part at least, from a vibration made with
the three hairs at his snout.” Bruce does not cite or refer to Virgil’s
description, though his account furnishes the most critical and exact
explanation of it. Such undesigned coincidences are most satisfactory
and convincing; they show that the poet and the naturalist both copied
from nature. And the terror impressed by this insect on all the cattle,
_quo tota exterrita sylvis diffugiunt_, [affrighted at which the entire
herds flee to the thickets,] according to Virgil, is thus illustrated by
Bruce: “As soon as this plague appears, and their buzzing is heard, all
the cattle forsake their food, and run wildly about the plain till they
die, worn out with fatigue, fright, and hunger. No remedy remains but to
leave the black earth, where they breed, and hasten down to the sands of
Atbara; and there they remain while the periodical rains last, this
cruel enemy (_asper_) never daring to pursue them farther. The camel,
emphatically called by the Arabs the ship of the desert, though his size
is immense as is his strength, and his body covered with a thick skin,
defended with strong hair, still is not able to sustain the violent
punctures the fly makes with his pointed proboscis. He must lose no time
in removing to the sands of Atbara; for when once attacked by this fly,
his body, head, and legs, break out into large bosses, which swell,
break, and putrefy, to the certain destruction of the creature. I have
found some of these tubercles upon almost every elephant and rhinoceros
that I have seen, and attribute them to this cause. All the inhabitants
of the sea coast are obliged to put themselves in motion, and remove to
the next sand, in the beginning of the rainy season, to prevent all
their stock of cattle from being destroyed. Nor is there any
alternative, or means of avoiding this, though a hostile band was in the
way, capable of spoiling them of half their substance, as was actually
the case when we were at Sennaar. Of such consequence is the weakest
instrument in the hand of Providence.” See FLIES and BEELZEBUB.
HORSE, סוס. Horses were very rare among the Hebrews in the early ages.
The patriarchs had none; and after the departure of the Israelites from
Egypt, God expressly forbade their ruler to procure them: “He shall not
multiply horses to himself, nor cause the people to return to Egypt, to
the end that he should multiply horses: forasmuch as the Lord hath said,
Ye shall henceforth return no more that way,” Deut. xvii, 16. As horses
appear to have been generally furnished by Egypt, God prohibits these,
1. Lest there should be such commerce with Egypt as might lead to
idolatry. 2. Lest the people might depend on a well appointed cavalry,
as a means of security, and so cease from trusting in the promised aid
and protection of Jehovah. 3. That they might not be tempted to extend
their dominion by means of cavalry, and so get scattered among the
surrounding idolatrous nations, and thus cease in process of time, to be
that distinct and separate people which God intended they should be, and
without which the prophecies relative to the Messiah could not be known
to have their due and full accomplishment. In the time of the Judges we
find horses and war chariots among the Canaanites, but still the
Israelites had none; and hence they were generally too timid to venture
down into the plains, confining their conquests to the mountainous parts
of the country. In the reign of Saul, it would appear, that horse
breeding had not yet been introduced into Arabia; for, in a war with
some of the Arabian nations, the Israelites got plunder in camels,
sheep, and asses, but no horses. David’s enemies brought against him a
strong force of cavalry into the field; and in the book of Psalms the
horse commonly appears only on the side of the enemies of the people of
God; and so entirely unaccustomed to the management of this animal had
the Israelites still continued, that, after a battle, in which they took
a considerable body of cavalry prisoners, 2 Sam. viii, 4, David caused
most of the horses to be cut down, because he did not know what use to
make of them. Solomon was the first who established a cavalry force.
Under these circumstances, it is not wonderful that the Mosaic law
should take no notice of an animal which we hold in such high
estimation. To Moses, educated as he was in Egypt, and, with his people,
at last chased out by Pharaoh’s cavalry, the use of the horse for war
and for travelling was well known; but as it was his object to establish
a nation of husbandmen, and not of soldiers for the conquest of foreign
lands, and as Palestine, from its situation, required not the defence of
cavalry, he might very well decline introducing among his people the yet
unusual art of horse breeding. Solomon, having married a daughter of
Pharaoh, procured a breed of horses from Egypt; and so greatly did he
multiply them, that he had four hundred stables, forty thousand stalls,
and twelve thousand horsemen, 1 Kings iv, 26; 2 Chron. ix, 25. It seems
that the Egyptian horses were in high repute, and were much used in war.
When the Israelites were disposed to place too implicit confidence in
the assistance of cavalry, the prophet remonstrated in these terms: “The
Egyptians are men, and not God; and their horses are flesh, not spirit,”
Isaiah xxxi, 3.
HORSE-LEECH, עלוקה, from a root which signifies _to adhere_, _stick
close_, or _hang fast_, Prov. xxx, 15. A sort of worm that lives in
water, of a black or brown colour, which fattens upon the flesh, and
does not quit it till it is entirely full of blood. Solomon says, “The
horse-leech hath two daughters, Give, give.” This is so apt an emblem of
an insatiable rapacity and avarice, that it has been generally used by
different writers to express it. Thus Plautus makes one say, speaking of
the determination to get money, “I will turn myself into a horse-leech,
and suck out their blood;” and Cicero, in one of his letters to Atticus,
calls the common people of Rome horse-leeches of the treasury. Solomon,
having mentioned those that devoured the property of the poor as the
worst of all the generations which he had specified, proceeds to state
the insatiable cupidity with which they prosecuted their schemes of
rapine and plunder. As the horse-leech had two daughters, cruelty and
thirst of blood, which cannot be satisfied, so the oppressor of the poor
has two dispositions, rapacity and avarice, which never say they have
enough, but continually demand additional gratifications.
HOSANNA, “Save, I beseech thee,” or, “Give salvation,” a well known form
of blessing, Matthew xxi, 9, 15; Mark xi, 9, 10; John xii, 13.
HOSEA, son of Beeri, the first of the minor prophets. He is generally
considered as a native and inhabitant of the kingdom of Israel, and is
supposed to have begun to prophesy about B. C. 800. He exercised his
office sixty years; but it is not known at what periods his different
prophecies now remaining were delivered. Most of them are directed
against the people of Israel, whom he reproves and threatens for their
idolatry and wickedness, and exhorts to repentance, with the greatest
earnestness, as the only means of averting the evils impending over
their country. The principal predictions contained in this book, are the
captivity and dispersion of the kingdom of Israel; the deliverance of
Judah from Sennacherib; the present state of the Jews; their future
restoration, and union with the Gentiles in the kingdom of the Messiah;
the call of our Saviour out of Egypt, and his resurrection on the third
day. The style of Hosea is peculiarly obscure; it is sententious,
concise, and abrupt; the transitions of persons are sudden; and the
connexive and adversative particles are frequently omitted. The
prophecies are in one continued series, without any distinction as to
the times when they were delivered, or the different subjects to which
they relate. They are not so clear and detailed, as the predictions of
those prophets who lived in succeeding ages. When, however, we have
surmounted these difficulties, we shall see abundant reason to admire
the force and energy with which this prophet writes, and the boldness of
the figures and similitudes which he uses.
2. HOSEA, or HOSHEA, son of Elah, was the last king of Israel. Having
conspired against Pekah, son of Remaliah, king of Israel, he killed him,
A. M. 3265; B. C. 739. However, the elders of the land seem to have
taken the government into their hands; for Hoshea was not in possession
of the kingdom till nine years after, 2 Kings xv, 30; xvii, 1. Hoshea
did evil in the sight of the Lord, but not equal to the kings of Israel
who preceded him; that is, say the Jewish doctors, he did not restrain
his subjects from going to Jerusalem to worship, if they would; whereas
the kings of Israel, his predecessors, had forbidden it, and had placed
guards on the road to prevent it. Salmaneser, king of Assyria, being
informed that Hoshea meditated a revolt, and had concerted measures with
So, king of Egypt, to shake off the Assyrian yoke, marched against him,
and besieged Samaria. After a siege of three years, in the ninth year of
Hoshea’s reign, the city was taken, and was reduced to a heap of ruins,
A. M. 3282. The king of Assyria removed the Israelites of the ten tribes
to countries beyond the Euphrates, and thus terminated the kingdom of
the ten tribes.
HOSPITALITY. Instances of ancient hospitality occur frequently in the
Old Testament. So in the case of Abraham, Gen. xviii, where he invites
the angels who appeared in the form of men to rest and refreshment, “And
he stood by them under the tree, and they did eat.” “Nothing is more
common in India,” says Mr. Ward, “than to see travellers and guests
eating under the shade of trees. Even feasts are never held in houses.
The house of a Hindoo serves for the purposes of sleeping and cooking,
and of shutting up the women; but is never considered as a sitting or a
dining room.” “On my return to the boat,” says Belzony, “I found the aga
and all his retinue seated on a mat, under a cluster of palm trees,
close to the water. The sun was then setting, and the shades of the
western mountains had reached across the Nile, and covered the town. It
is at this time the people recreate themselves in various scattered
groups, drinking coffee, smoking their pipes, and talking of camels,
horses, asses, dhourra, caravans, or boats.” “The aga having prepared a
dinner for me,” says Mr. Light, “invited several of the natives to sit
down. Water was brought in a skin by an attendant, to wash our hands.
Two fowls roasted were served up on wheaten cakes, in a wooden bowl,
covered with a small mat, and a number of the same cakes in another: in
the centre of these were liquid butter, and preserved dates. These were
divided, broken up, and mixed together by some of the party, while
others pulled the fowls to pieces: which done, the party began to eat as
fast as they could: getting up, one after the other, as soon as their
hunger was satisfied.” “Hospitality to travellers,” says Mr. Forbes,
“prevails throughout Guzerat: a person of any consideration passing
through the province is presented, at the entrance of a village, with
fruit, milk, butter, fire wood, and earthen pots for cookery; the women
and children offer him wreaths of flowers. Small bowers are constructed
on convenient spots, at a distance from a well or lake, where a person
is maintained by the nearest villages, to take care of the water jars,
and supply all travellers gratis. There are particular villages, where
the inhabitants compel all travellers to accept of one day’s provisions:
whether they be many or few, rich or poor, European or native, they must
not refuse the offered bounty.”
“So when angelic forms to Syria sent
Sat in the cedar shade, by Abraham’s tent,
A spacious bowl th’ admiring patriarch fills
With dulcet water from the scanty rills;
Sweet fruits and kernels gathers from his hoard,
With milk and butter piles the plenteous board;
While on the heated hearth his consort bakes
Fine flour well kneaded in unleavened cakes,
The guests ethereal quaff the lucid flood,
Smile on their hosts, and taste terrestrial food;
And while from seraph lips sweet converse springs,
They lave their feet, and close their silver wings.”
DARWIN.
HOURS. See DAY.
HOUSES. The following description of oriental houses will serve to
illustrate several passages of Scripture. From the gate of the porch,
one is conducted into a quadrangular court, which, being exposed to the
weather, is paved with stone, in order to carry off the water in the
rainy season. The principal design of this quadrangle, is to give light
to the house, and admit the fresh air into the apartments; it is also
the place where the master of the house entertains his company, who are
seldom or never honoured with admission into the inner apartments. This
open space bears a striking resemblance to the _impluvium_, or _cava
ædium_, of the Romans, which was also an uncovered area, from whence the
chambers were lighted. For the accommodation of the guests, the pavement
is covered with mats or carpets; and as it is secured against all
interruption from the street, is well adapted to public entertainments.
It is called, says Dr. Shaw, the middle of the house, and literally
answers to τὸ μέσον of the evangelist, into which the man afflicted with
the palsy was let down through the ceiling, with his couch, before
Jesus, Luke v, 19. Hence, he conjectures that our Lord was at this time
instructing the people in the court of one of these houses; and it is by
no means improbable, that the quadrangle was to him and his Apostles a
favourite situation, while they were engaged in disclosing the mysteries
of redemption. To defend the company from the scorching sun-beams, or
“windy storm and tempest,” a veil was expanded upon ropes from one side
of the parapet wall to the other, which might be unfolded or folded at
pleasure. The court is for the most part surrounded with a cloister,
over which, when the house has a number of stories, a gallery is erected
of the same dimensions with the cloister, having a balustrade, or else a
piece of carved or latticed work, going round about, to prevent people
from falling from it into the court. The doors of the enclosure round
the house are made very small; but the doors of the houses very large,
for the purpose of admitting a copious stream of fresh air into their
apartments. The windows which look into the street are very high and
narrow, and defended by lattice work; as they are only intended to allow
the cloistered inmate a peep of what is passing without, while he
remains concealed behind the casement. This kind of window the ancient
Hebrews called _arubah_, which is the same term that they used to
express those small openings through which pigeons passed into the
cavities of the rocks, or into those buildings which were raised for
their reception. Thus the prophet asks: “Who are these that fly as a
cloud, and as the doves, אל-ארבתיהם, to their small or narrow windows.”
The word is derived from a root which signifies to lie in wait for the
prey; and is very expressive of the concealed manner in which a person
examines through that kind of window an external object. Irwin describes
the windows in Upper Egypt as having the same form and dimensions; and
says expressly, that one of the windows of the house in which they
lodged, and through which they looked into the street, more resembled a
pigeon hole than any thing else. But the sacred writers mention another
kind of window, which was large and airy; it was called חלון, and was
large enough to admit a person of mature age being cast out of it; a
punishment which that profligate woman Jezebel suffered by the command
of Jehu, the authorized extirminator of her family. These large windows
admit the light and the breeze into spacious apartments of the same
length with the court, but which seldom or never communicate with one
another. In the houses of the fashionable and the gay, the lower part of
the walls is adorned with rich hangings of velvet or damask, tinged with
the liveliest colours, suspended on hooks, or taken down at pleasure. A
correct idea of their richness and splendour may be formed from the
description, which the inspired writer has given of the hangings in the
royal garden at Shushan, the ancient capital of Persia: “Where were
white, green, and blue hangings, fastened with cords of fine linen and
purple, to silver rings and pillars of marble,” Esther i, 6. The upper
part of the walls is adorned with the most ingenious wreathings and
devices, in stucco and fret-work. The ceiling is generally of wainscot,
painted with great art, or else thrown into a variety of pannels with
gilded mouldings. In the days of Jeremiah the prophet, when the
profusion and luxury of all ranks in Judea were at their height, their
chambers were ceiled with fragrant and costly wood, and painted with the
richest colours. Of this extravagance the indignant seer loudly
complains: “Wo unto him that saith, I will build me a wide house and
large chambers, and cutteth him out windows: and it is ceiled with
cedar, and painted with vermilion,” Jer. xxii, 14. The floors of these
splendid apartments were laid with painted tiles, or slabs of the most
beautiful marble. A pavement of this kind is mentioned in the book of
Esther; at the sumptuous entertainment which Ahasuerus made for the
princes and nobles of his vast empire, “the beds,” or couches, upon
which they reclined, “were of gold and silver, upon a pavement of red
and blue, and white and black marble.” Plaster of terrace is often vised
for the same purpose; and the floor is always covered with carpets,
which are for the most part of the richest materials. Upon these
carpets, a range of narrow beds, or mattresses, is often placed along
the sides of the wall, with velvet or damask bolsters, for the greater
ease and convenience of the company. To these luxurious indulgences the
prophets occasionally seem to allude: Ezekiel was commanded to pronounce
a “wo to the women that sew pillows to all armholes,” Ezek. xiii, 18;
and Amos denounces the judgments of his God against them “that lie upon
beds of ivory, and stretch themselves upon their couches, and eat the
lambs out of the flock, and the calves out of the midst of the stall,”
Amos vi, 4. At one end of each chamber is a little gallery, raised three
or four feet above the floor, with a balustrade in front, to which they
go up by a few steps. Here they place their beds; a situation frequently
alluded to in the Holy Scriptures. Thus Jacob addressed his undutiful
son, in his last benediction: “Thou wentest up to thy father’s bed,--he
went up to my couch,” Gen. xlix, 4. The allusion is again involved in
the declaration of Elijah to the king of Samaria: “Now, therefore, thus
saith the Lord, Thou shalt not come down from that bed on which thou art
gone up, but shalt surely die,” 2 Kings i, 4, 16. And the Psalmist sware
unto the Lord, and vowed unto the mighty God of Jacob, “Surely I will
not come into the tabernacle of my house, nor go up into my bed, until I
find out a place for the Lord,” Psalm cxxxii, 3. This arrangement may
likewise illustrate the circumstance of Hezekiah’s “turning his face to
the wall, when he prayed,” that the greatness of his sorrow, and the
fervour of his devotion, might, as much as possible, be concealed from
his attendants, 2 Kings xx.
The roof is always flat, and often composed of branches of wood laid
across rude beams; and, to defend it from the injuries of the weather,
to which it is peculiarly exposed in the rainy season, it is covered
with a strong plaster of terrace. It is surrounded by a wall
breast-high, which forms the partition with the contiguous houses, and
prevents one from falling into the street on the one side, or into the
court on the other. This answers to the battlements which Moses
commanded the people of Israel to make for the roof of their houses, for
the same reason. “When thou buildest a new house, then thou shalt make a
battlement, מעקה, for thy roof, that thou bring not blood upon thine
house, if any man fall from thence,” Deut. xxii, 8. Instead of the
parapet wall, some terraces are guarded, like the galleries, with
balustrades only, or latticed work. Of the same kind, probably, was the
lattice or net, as the term שבכה seems to import, through which Ahaziah,
the king of Samaria, fell down into the court, 2 Kings i, 2. This
incident proves the necessity of the law which was graciously dictated
from Sinai, and furnishes a beautiful example of God’s paternal care and
goodness; for the terrace was a place where many offices of the family
were performed, and business of no little importance was occasionally
transacted. Rahab concealed the spies on the roof, with the stalks of
flax which she had laid in order to dry, Joshua ii, 6; the king of
Israel, according to the custom of his country, rose from his bed, and
walked upon the roof of his house, to enjoy the refreshing breezes of
the evening, 2 Sam. xi, 2; upon the top of the house the prophet
conversed with Saul, about the gracious designs of God, respecting him
and his family, 1 Sam. ix, 25; to the same place Peter retired to offer
up his devotions, Acts x, 9; and in the feast of tabernacles, under the
government of Nehemiah, booths were erected, as well upon the terraces
of their houses, as in their courts, and in the streets of the city,
Neh. viii, 16. In Judea, the inhabitants sleep upon the tops of their
houses during the heats of summer, in arbours made of the branches of
trees, or in tents of rushes. When Dr. Pococke was at Tiberias, in
Galilee, he was entertained by the sheik’s steward, and with his company
supped upon the top of the house for coolness, according to their
custom, and lodged there likewise, in a sort of closet of about eight
feet square, formed of wicker-work, plastered round toward the bottom,
but without any door, each person having his cell. In like manner, the
Persians take refuge during the day in subterraneous chambers, and pass
the night on the flat roofs of their houses.
The expression, “to dig through houses,” occurs, Job xxiv, 16.
“Thieves,” says Mr. Ward, “in Bengal very frequently dig through the mud
walls, and under the clay floors of houses, and, entering unperceived,
plunder them while the inhabitants are asleep.” Our Lord’s parable of
the foolish man who built his house on the sand derives illustration
from the following passages in Ward’s “View,” and Belzoni’s “Travels:”
“The fishermen in Bengal build their huts in the dry season on the beds
of sand, from which the river has retired. When the rains set in, which
they often do very suddenly, accompanied by violent north-west winds,
the water pours down in torrents from the mountains. In one night
multitudes of these huts are frequently swept away, and the place where
they stood is the next morning undiscoverable.” “It so happened, that we
were to witness one of the greatest calamities that have occurred in
Egypt in the recollection of any one living. The Nile rose this season
three feet and a half above the highest mark left by the former
inundation, with uncommon rapidity, and carried off several villages,
and some hundreds of their inhabitants. I never saw any picture that
could give a more correct idea of a deluge than the valley of the Nile
in this season. The Arabs had expected an extraordinary inundation this
year, in consequence of the scarcity of water the preceding season; but
they did not apprehend it would rise to such a height. They generally
erect fences of earth and reeds around their villages, to keep the water
from their houses; but the force of this inundation baffled all their
efforts. Their cottages, being built of earth, could not stand one
instant against the current; and no sooner did the water reach them,
than it levelled them with the ground. The rapid stream carried off all
that was before it; men, women, children, cattle, corn, every thing was
washed away in an instant, and left the place where the village stood
without any thing to indicate that there had ever been a house on the
spot.”
House is taken for family: “The Lord plagued Pharaoh and his house,”
Gen. xii, 17. “What is my house, that thou hast brought me hitherto?” 2
Sam. vii, 18. So Joseph was of the house of David, Luke i, 27; ii, 4;
but more especially he was of his royal lineage, or family; and, as we
conceive, in the direct line or eldest branch of the family; so that he
was next of kin to the throne, if the government had still continued in
possession of the descendants of David. House is taken for kindred: it
is a Christian’s duty to provide first for those of his own house, 1
Tim. v, 8, his family, his relatives.