Pen (Hastings' Dictionary)

See WRITING. PENCIL occurs only once in the Bible, Is 44% (RV).

The first four clauses of this verse, which describes the making of an idol, read in MT er WIND) ARN niyspes wey: Tys wy 72 7p} ΟὟ ; the PENDANT LXX has ἐκλεξάμενος τέκτων ξύλον ἔστησεν αὐτὸ ἐν μέτρῳ, καὶ ἐν κόλλῃ ἐρύθμισεν αὐτό, which, as Cheyne points out, implies a reading ny2 wan Ἢ van ἽΠΞ ywrxn’ nyxpo3); RV ‘The carpenter stretcheth out a line (AV ‘his rule’), he marketh it out with a pencil (AV ‘line’), he shapeth (AV ‘fitteth’) it with planes, and he marketh it out with the com- passes’ (AV ‘compass’).

In the first clause RV ‘line,’ ¢.e. measuring line, is decidedly to be pre- ferred to AV ‘rule’ as the tr. of ἢ (cf. 2 K 21%, Is 2817 344, Jer 3159, Zec 1", and see art. LINE). The meaning of the word τὴν in the second clause is quite uncertain. It is a dx. λεγ., and quite possibly a corrupt reading. hens (SBOT, ‘Isaiah,’ p. 137) thinks the final 7 is doubtful, and he suggests Gompecing the Aram. root ».

0=J/ineavit) that we should read oy (with the meaning ‘ stylus’), although he notes that this word in Lv 19° means 8 cutting in the flesh. Griitz boldly reads 815. P. Haupt, in an editorial note in SBOT, ad loc., thinks that »nne3 ‘ with the compass’ (he prefers the sing.) should be read after 13, and taken as an explanatory gloss of the latter. If sered= ‘compass,’ he suggests a connexion with the Assyr. sirdu, ‘yoke.

’ e Babylonian use of compasses is described by him in a note in ‘ Ezekiel’ (SBO7), Ρ. 100f. Other explanations come nearer the RV pencil,’ e.g. ‘red chalk’ (Kimchi, Vitr. ; cf. RVm ‘red ochre’), Reissstift (Siegfried-Stade, Dillmann- Kittel, and V. hee (Nowack, LeArb. der Heb. Arch. i. 246). J. A. SELBIE. PENDANT occurs twice in the Bible, but both times RV only. The first instance is Jg 8%, where the word (Heb.

nip}, LXX B στραγγαλίδες, AV ‘collars’) is used of one of the ornaments worn by the Midianites who were conquered and spoiled Gideon ; the other is Is 3 (Heb. nipy;, LXX κάθεμα, AV ‘chains’) in a list of articles of female attire. In both passages the reference appears to be to oar ἄτομα (so Cheyne, ‘Isaiah,’ in BB), the Heb. nétiphéth being, perhaps, equivalent to Arab. natafat, a small clear pear!

resembling a drop of water, or a bead of gold or silver of a spheri or elongated form, fastened to the lobe of the ear. See Moore, Judges, ad loc. J. A. SELBIE. PENIEL (5x35 only in Gn 32”, LXX Εἴδος θεοῦ), elsewhere PENUEL (5x32). — This name appears on three occasions only, in connexion Soy fe with Jacob, Gideon, and Jeroboam. he word means ‘face of God,’ and is traced in Gn 32” to the fact that Jacob had there seen God ‘face to face.

’ Perhaps a different derivation is alluded to in 33 (Wellh. ΤᾺ, xxi. 435). It has been sug- ted (see Merrill, Last of the Jordan, p. 392) that fhe name may have been originally Εἶτα to some rojecting rock in whose contour a face was seen. We may compareStrabo’s (xvi. 2. 15f.) Θεοῦ πρόσωπον. The place was east of the Jordan, and somewhere on the line of the Jabbok.

It was a city whose chief feature was a strong tower or castle (Jg 857), which at a much later period was rebuilt by Jero- boam (1 Καὶ 12%). These facts show that Penuel had considerable strategic importance. It was a at tribe from the eastern desert that invaded alestine and were driven back to their homes by Gideon (Jg6ff.) These invaders always entered the lowlands, that is, the plain of Esdraelon, and there was a main road from the Jordan Valley eastward by which they came and returned.

On this road the castle of Penuel was designed to be a protection. Succoth, now Tell Deir' Alla, was on this road, and Penuel was in the hills not far beyond it. Such desert people never go over mountains when there is a good valley route open to them. In the valley of the Jabbok, 4 miles from Suc- eoth, two sharp hills, called Tulul edh-Dhahab, autzsch’s .4 77), Réthel PENTECOST 739 and covered with ancient ruins, rise to a height of 250 ft.

‘Whether approached from the west or the east, or looked down upon from the mountains above them, they form very striking objects. . On one side of the eastern hill a strong wall of massive stones runs from the summit to the foot. . The platform of the “tower” or castle was supported by a wall, the remains of which are 15 or 20 ft. high, which extends to a distance of over 100 ft. ese substantial structures, considering the size of the stones employed, must have been built at great expense.

Phe stones are unhewn blocks, and appear to date from a remote period’ (Merrill, Last of the Jordan, pp. 390-392). That these desert invaders did not climb over mountains, that they followed a valley route, that the easy and main route to the t was through the valley of the Jabbok, and that at a certain point on this road these ruin-crowned hills exist at no great distance from Succoth,—all this seems to indi- cate them as the most probable site for Penuel. S. MERRILL.