CHIMHAM

modern KaXwOdha near Baghdad — but neither of these conjectures has much probability.

CHEHHAM.— Probably the son (ct. 1 K 2') of Bar-zillal the Gileadite, who returned with David from beyond Jordan to Jerusalem after the death of Absalom (2 S 19'i'-)- See, further, Gehuth-chimham.

CHIMNEY.— See House, § 7.

OHINNERETH.— A city (Dt 3", Jos ll^ [in latter spelt Chinneroth] IQ^s) which gave its name to the Sea of Chlnnereth (Nu 34", Jos 123 1327), the OT designation of the Sea of Galilee. i?he site of the town is uncertain, but it follows Rakkath (probably Tiberias), and may have been in the plain of Gennesaret (cf. 1 K 15^°).

CHIOS, — An island in the .fflgean Sea opposite the Ionian peninsula in Asia Minor. In the 5th cent. B.C. the inhabitants were the richest of all the Greeks. The city was distinguished in literature also, and claimed to be the birth-place of Homer. Up to the time of Vespasian it was, under the Roman Empire, a free State. The chief city was also named Chios. St. Paul passed it on his last voyage in the iEgeau Sea (Ac 20'^).

A. SOUTER.

CHISLEV (AV Chisleu, Neh V, Zee 7'). —See Time.

CHISLON ('strength').- Father of Elidad, Ben-jamin's representative for dividing the land (Nu 34^" P).

CHISLOTH -TABOR, Jos 1912.— See Chesulloth.

CHITHLISH (Jos IS", AV Kithlish),— A town in the Shephelah of Judah. The site is unknown.

CHITTIM (1 Mac V- 8*) for Kittim (wh. see).

CHITTN. — Am S^ (see Rephan, Siccuth). As shown by the appositional phrase 'your god-star,' this name refers to the Assyr. Kaiwanu, the planet Saturn ( = Ninib, war-god), whose temple, Bit Ninib, in the province of Jerusalem is mentioned by the Egyptian governors of this city as early as b.c. 14S0. The transla-tion of the word as an appellative (' pedestal') by some is due to the vocalization of the Massoretes, who are supposed to have considered it a common noun. How-ever, it is far more probable that they, conscious of its reference, substituted for the original vowels those of the word shiqguts ('abomination') — an epithet often applied to strange gods. N. Kgeniq.

CHLOE (mentioned only in 1 Co 1").— St. Paul had been informed of the dissensions at Corinth prob. by some of her Christian slaves. Chloe herself may have been either a Christian or a heathen, and may have lived either at Corinth or at Ephesus. In favour of the latter is St. Paul's usual tact, which would not suggest the invidious mention of his informants' names, if they were members of the Corinthian Church.

CHOBA (Jth 4<; Chobai 15<- ', noticed with Damascus). — Perhaps the land of Hobah (wh. see).

CHOIR (Neh 12^ RVm).— See Pkaise.

CHOLA. — An unknown locality mentioned in Jth IS*.

CHOLER is used in Sir 312» 373" in the sense of a disease, 'perhaps cholera, diarrhoea' — Oxf. Eng. Diet (RV 'colic'); and in Dn 8' 11" in the sense of bitter anger. Both meanings are old, and belonged indeed to the Lat. cholera as early as the 3rd and 4th centuries.

CHORAZIN. — A place referred to only in the de-nunciation by Christ (Mt ll^i, Lk 10''). It is with probability identified with Kerazeh, north of Tell Hum, where are remains of pillars, walls, etc., of basalt.

R. A. S. Macalister.

GHORBE (AV Corbe), 1 Es Si2=Zaccai, Ezr 2«, Neh 7".

CHOSAM/EUS (1 Es 9'^).- It is not improbable that the Gr. reading is due to a copyist's error, especially seeing that the three proper names that follow Simeon in the text of Ezr 10" are omitted in 1 Esdras.

CHRIST. — See Jesus Cheist, and Messiah.

CHRISTIAN. — This name, from very early times the

CHRISTIAN

distinctive title of the followers of Jesus Christ, occurs only thrice in NT (Ac 11«« 262s, 1 p 4i»).

1. Time and place of origin. — Our only information on this point comes from Ac 11". It was in Antioch, and in connexion with the mission of Barnabas and Saul to that city, that the name arose. It has some-times been suggested that the infrequent use of ' Chris-tian' in the NT points to a considerably later origin, and that the author of Acts had no better reason for assigning it to so early a date than the fact that the founding of the first Gentile church appeared to him to be an appropriate occasion for its coming into use. But apart from St. Luke's well-established claim, as the historian of Christ and early Christianity, to have ' traced the course of all things accurately from the first,' his own non-employment of the word as a general designa-tion for the disciples of Christ suggests that he had no reason other than a genuine historical one for referring to the origin of the name at all.

2. Authors of the name. — (1) It is exceedingly un-likely that it was originally adopted by the Christiana themselves. As the NT shows, they were in the habit of using other designations — 'the disciples' (Ac ll^a and passim), 'the brethren' Ac Q^", Ro 16" and con-stantly), 'the elect' (Ro 8», Col 3"), 'the saints' . (Ac 91s, Ro 12"), 'believers' (Ac 5», 1 Ti 412), 'the Way ' (Ac 92 19') . But in NT times we never find them calling themselves Christians. In Ac 262» it is king Agrippa who employs the name. And though in

1 P 41s it comes from the pen of an Apostle, the context shows that he is using it as a term of accusation on the lips of the Church's enemies.

(2) It cannot have been applied to the followers of Jesus by the Jews. The Jews believed in 'the Christ,' i.e. 'the Anointed One,' the Messiah; and they ardently looked for Him to come. But it was their passionate contention that Jesus of Nazareth was not the Christ. To call His followers Christians was the last thing they would have thought of doing. They referred to them contemptuously as 'this sect' (Ac 28^2, cf. 245- "), and when contempt passed into hatred they called them 'Nazarenes' (Ac 24=, cf. Jn 1«). It is true that Agrippa, a Jewish king, makes use of the name; but this was nearly 20 years after, and when, in that Roman world with which he lived in close relations, it had become the recognized designation of the new faith.

(3) Almost certainly the name owed its origin to the non-Christian Gentiles of Antioch. As these Anti-ochenes saw Barnabas and Saul standing day by day in the market-place or at the corners of the streets, and proclaiming that the Christ had come and that Jesus was the Christ, they caught up the word without under-standing it, and bestowed the name of 'Christians' on these preachers and their followers. Probably it was given, not as a mere nickname, but as a term of convenience. Yet doubtless it carried with it a sugges-tion of contempt, and so may be compared to such titles as 'Puritan' and 'Methodist' originally applied by those who stood outside of the spiritual movements which the names were meant to characterize.

3. The spread of the name. — Originating in this casual way, the name took deep root in the soil of human speech, and the three passages oftheNTin which it occurs show tiow widely it had spread within the course of a single generation. In Ac 262s we find it on the Ups of a Jewish ruler, speaking in Csesarea before an audience of Roman oificials and within 20 years after it was first used in Antioch. A few years later St. Peter writes to 'the elect who are sojourners of the Dis-persion in Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynla' (1 P 1'); and, without suggesting that 'Christian' was a name which the Church had yet adopted as its own, he assumes that it was perfectly familiar to the 'elect' themselves over a vast region of the Dispersion; and further implies that by this time, the time probably of Nero's persecution (a.d. 64),

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