DEAFNESS

Jos 155 etc.), the 'sea of the Arabah' (Dt 3" 4"), the 'east or eastern sea' (Ezk 47", Jl 2"). In Arabic it is known as Bahr Lut, ' the sea ot Lot,' a name which, however, is more probably due to the direct influence of the history as reiated in the Koran than to a survival of local tradition. Somewhere near the sea were Sodom and Gomorrah, but whether north or south of it is not settled; the one certain fact about their sites is that the popular belief that they are covered by the waters of the Lake is quite inadmissible.

The Dead Sea owes its origin to a fault or fracture produced in the surface of the region by the earth-movements whereby the land was here raised above the sea-level. This fault took place towards the end of the Eocene period ; it extends along the whole Jordan valley from the Gulf of Akabah to Hermon; and it may be taken as fairly certain that the general appearance of the Lake has not radically altered during the whole time that the human race has existed in the world.

Round the border of the Lake are numerous small springs, some bursting actually under its waters, others forming lagoons of comparatively brackish water (as at ' Ain Feshkhak on the western side). In these lagoons various specimens of small fish are to be found ; but in the main body of the water itself life of any kind is impossible.

Recent observations tend to show that the surface of the Lake is slowly rising. An island that was a conspicuous feature at the N. end disappeared under the surface in 1892, and has never been seen since.

R. A. S. Macalisteb.

DEAFNESS.— See Medicine.

DEAL. — A deal is a part or share. It is still in use in the phrase 'a great deal' or 'a good deal.' In AV occurs 'tenth deal' (RV 'tenth part'), the Heb. 'issdrdn being a measure used in meal-offerings. See Weights

AND MEAS0BES, n.

DEATH.— I. IntheOT.— 1. The B.eh. terra maweth and our corresponding word- 'death' alike spring from primitive roots belonging to the very beginnings of speech. One of man's first needs was a word to denote that stark fact of experience — the final cessation of life to which he and the whole animated creation, and the very trees and plants, were all subject. It is, of course, in this ordinary sense of the term as denoting a physical fact that the expressions 'death' and 'die' are mostly used in the Scriptures.

2. The Scriptures have nothing directly to say as to the place of death in the economy of nature. St. Paul's words in Ro 5™- as to the connexion between sin and death must be explained in harmony with this fact ; and, for that matter, in harmony also with his own words in Ro 6^, where death, the ' wages of sin,' cannot be simply physical death. The Creation narratives are silent on this point, yet in Gn 2" man is expected to know what it is to die. We are not to look for exact information on matters such as this from writings of this kind. If the belief enshrined in the story of the Fall in Gn 3 regarded death in the ordinary sense as the penalty of Adam and Eve's transgression, they at any rate did not die 'in the day' of their transgression; v.« suggests that even then, could he but also eat of 'the tree of life,' man might escape mortality. All we can say is that In the dawn of human history man appears as one already familiar with the correlative mysteries of life and death.

3. From the contemplation of the act of dying it is an easy step to the thought of death as a state or condition. This is a distinct stage towards beUeving in existence of some kind beyond the grave. And to the vast mass of mankind to say 'he is dead' has never meant 'he is non-existent.'

4. Divergent beliefs as to what the state of death is show themselves in the OT. — (a) In numerous instances death is represented as a condition of considerable activity and consciousness. The dead are regarded as ' knowing

DEATH

ones,' able toimpart information and counsel to the living. Note, the term translated ' wizards' in EV in Lv 19*' 2D«, Is 8" 19' really denotes departed spirits who are sought unto or inquired ot 'on behalf of the Uving.' A vivid instance of this belief is furnished in the story of the Witch of En-dor (1 S 28). So also in Is 149- i», where we have a graphic description of the commotion caused in Sheol by the arrival of the king of Babylon, a de-scription with wliich we may compare the dream of 'false Clarence' in Shakespeare's Rich. III., 1. 4. The reference to the dead under the term 'gods' (.eWhim), as in 1 S 28i3, is noticeable. Whether in all this we have a relic of ancient Semitic ancestor-worship (as e.g. Charles maintains in his Jowett Lectures on Eschatology) or no, it seems to represent very primitive beliefs which survived in one form and another, even after the stern Jahwistic prohibition of necromancy was promulgated. They may also have affected the treatment of the dead, just as even yet there are usages in existence amongst us in regard to behaviour towards the dead which are probably traceable to very primitive pre-Christian ideas and beUefs.

(6) Jahwism might well forbid resort to necro-mancers with their weird appeals to the dead for guidance and information, for in its view the state of death was one of unconsciousness, forgetfvXness, and silence (see Ps 88'2 94" 116" etc.). The present world is emphati-cally 'the land of the living' (Ps 271= 116' etc.). Those that are in Sheol have no communion with Jahweh ; see the Song of Hezekiah in Is 38, and elsewhere. Sheol appears inviting to a soul in distress because it is a realm of unconscious rest (Job 3'™- ) ; and there is nothing to be known or to be done there (Ec 9'°). It is true that here and there glimpses of a different prospect for the individual soul show themselves (e.g. Job IQ'^- and probably Ps 16""); but the foregoing was evidently the prevalent view in a period when the individual was altogether subservient to the nation, and the religious concerns of the latter were rigorously limited to the present life.

(c) Other ideas of death as not terminating man's existence and interests were, however, reached in later prophetic teaching, mainly through the thought of the worth of the individual, the significance of his conscious union with God, and of the covenant relations established by God with His people (Jer 31; cf. Ezk 18). 'Thou wilt not leave us in the dust.'

6. Death as standing in penal relation to man's sin and unrighteousness is frequently insisted on. That this is something more than natural death is clear from such an antithesis as we have in Dt SO'*' " {'life and good: death and evil'), and this set in strict relation to conduct. Cf . the burden of Ezk 18, ' the soul that sinneth it shall die,' with the correlative promise of fife: similarly Pr 15'°. All this points to some experience in the man himself and to conditions outlasting the present Ufe. On the other hand, the thought of dying 'the death of the righteous' (Nu 23'°) as a desirable thing looks in the same direction. And why has the righteous ' hope in his death ' (Pr 14'^) ?

6. As minor matters, OT poetical uses of references to death may be merely pointed out. ' Chambers ot death,' Pr 7"; 'gates,' Ps 9" ( = state); 'bitterness of death,' 1 S 1582, Ec 72s ; 'terrors,' Ps 55«; 'sorrows,' Ps 1163 ( = man's natural dread); 'shadow of death,' Job, Ps., the Prophets, passim (=any experience of horror and gloom, as well as with reference to death itself); 'the sleep of death,' Ps 13' (to be distinguished from later Christian usage); 'snares of death,' Prov. passim, etc. ( = things leading to destruction) ; the phrase ' to death,' as 'vexed unto death,' Jg 13'; 'sick,' 2 K 20' (=to an extreme degree).

II. In the Apochtpha. — The value of the Apocrypha in connexion with the study of Scriptural teaching and usage here is not to be overlooked. Notice e.g. Wisdom chs. 1-5, with its treatment of the attitude of the ungodly towards death (' Let us eat and drink, for to-morrow we

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