PENIEL

PENIEL.— See Penuel.

PENINNAH.— The second wife of Elkanah (1 S 1").

PENKNIFE.— Mentioned only in Jer 36^3. Orientals use a reed pen in writing, and always carry a knife for the purpose of mending it.

PENNY.— See Money, §§ 6, 7.

PENSION.— Only AV of 1 Es 4m (AVm 'portions of land,' RV 'lands'). This archaism is first found in the Geneva version, and is used in the original sense of 'payment' (Lat. pensio).

PENTATEUCH.— See Hexateuch.

PENTEOOST.FEASTOF.-l.IntheOT.— The offer-ing of a barley-sheaf during the Feast of Unleavened Bread opened the reaping season, which lasted officially for 49 days, a week of weeks. On the 50th day took place the Feast of Pentecost, also called the Feast of Weeks (Ex 3422, Dt 16i»), the Feastof Harvest (Ex 23"), and the Day of First-fruits (Nu 28»). It thus took place at the end of the reaping season, when all the wheat and barley had been cut and gathered, and marked especially the termination of the wheat harvest (wheat being the last of the cereals to ripen in Palestine) . The festival was held at the central sanctuary (Dt 16"), whither the people were expected to repair for the celebration; it cannot, therefore, have existed before the settlement in Canaan.

The proper method by which to compute the date of Pentecost was a matter of controversy. In Lv 23" the terminus a quo is given as the day after the Sabbath during the Feast of Unleavened Bread. In Christ's time the Jews understood this to mean 16th Nisan, treating the first day of Unleavened Bread as a Sabbath, since it was a day of holy convocation. On this com-putation Pentecost would fall on 6th Sivan (June). But some theorists maintained that the Sabbath referred to was the ordinary Sabbath during the days of Un-leavened Bread, whenever it chanced to fall. The objection to this view was that if 14th or 21st Nisan was a Sabbath, the sheaf-waving would occur outside the Unleavened Bread festival, of which it certainly appears to form a part. Anyhow, whatever be the correct interpretation of the disputed passage in Lev., the Jews usually celebrated the sheaf-waving on 16th Nisan and Pentecost on 6th Sivan.

The feast was probably originally a nature-festival, fixed in later times at a specified date. It always retained its agricultural character in Biblical ages, but some later Rabbinical writers treated it also as a com-memoration of the delivery of the Law on Sinai — an event which was supposed to have taken place SO days after the Exodus (Ex 19'), though this idea is not found in Philo or Josephus; and the tact that the reading of the Law in the Sabbatical year took place at the Feast of Tabernacles and not at Pentecost, points to the late origin of this tradition.

The festival lasted for one day (though the later Jews allowed two days for it, because in the Dispersion it was difficult to determine accurately the Palestinian month); it was a day of holy convocation, and no servile work might be done. Two leavened loaves of wheaten flour were waved before the Lord; two yearling Iambs were also waved as a peace-offering; seven lambs, one bullock, and two rams were offered as a burnt- offering, and one kid of the goats as a sin-offering (Lv 23"-a). In Nu 28" the burnt-offerings are given as two bullocks, one ram, and seven lambs. These, perhaps, were supplementary to the offerings prescribed in Lv 23, where possibly only the sacrifices connected with the loaves are specified. Lv 23^2 also prescribes freewill offerings for the poor and the stranger, whilst Dt 16'ii- " ordains a freewill offering for the sanctuary, and states that the festal joy is to be shared by all classes. It is probable that this latter offering is referred to in Dt 262-", and the form of confession and thanks-giving there dictated was so used at this period.

698

PEOPLE

2. In the Christian Church Pentecost was the occasion on which the outpouring of the Holy Spirit occurred (Ac 2). The presence of multitudes at Jerusalem shows the generality of the observance which the Jews paid to this feast. It became one of the Church's great festivals, as the anniversary of the spiritual first-fruits procured through Jesus Christ's sacrifice. By the close of the 2nd cent, it was established as an occasion of Christian rejoicing. No fasting or kneeling in prayer was allowed during its duration, and it was especially used as a season for baptisms. Under the old dis-pensation Pentecost had been distinctly connected with the Feast of Unleavened Bread. So in Christian times its dependence on the Passover sacrifice of Christ, which led to the gift of the Holy Ghost, is unmistakable.

A. W. F. Blunt.

PENUEL (once, Gn 32»», Peniel).— A place E. of Jordan, and near the Jabbok, at which Jacob wrestled with the angel (Gn 32"ff), and said (v.«") to be called Peniel (or Penuel), i.e. 'Face of God,' because Jacob said, ' I have seen God face to face, and yet my life is preserved.' (The mention of the 'face of God" in SS'" makes it possible that another explanation of the origin of the name is there alluded to.) There was, however, in Phoenicia, a little S. of Tripolis, a headland called Theou prosSpon, 'God's face'; and it is thought by some scholars that 'Penuel' really derived its name from some projecting rock in whose contour a face was seen. Penuel is mentioned also in the history of Gideon, as a place with a strong tower or castle which Gideon destroyed (Jg 8*- '■ "); it may be inferred from this passage that Penuel was a little E. of Succoth (v.»), and also on a higher elevation (' went up,' V.8). Many years later, Penuel was fortified by Jeroboam (1 K 12^); so that it must have been a place of some strategic importance. The site is not more certain than that of Succoth; see under Succoth some account of the data upon which its settlement depends, and a suggestion for it. Merrill identifies Penuel with TiUvl edh-Dhahab ('the hills of gold,' so called from the yellow metalliferous sandstone of which they are composed), two conical hills, about 250 ft. high, round which the Jabbok winds, about 6 miles E. of Deir ' Alia (which Merrill identifies with Succoth), up the valley, with ancient ruins on the top; and Conder identifies it with Jebel Osha, a mountain 3597 ft. high, with a fine view, 8 miles S. of the Jabbok. But to each of these identifications there are grave objections: as regards Merrill's site, it is expressly declared by other travellers that the banks of the Jabbok for many miles above TulQl edh-Dhahab are on both sides so lofty and precipitous as to afford no way for either the Midianites or Gideon to pass along them (see ExpT. xiii. [1902] 457 ff., or more briefly the writer's Genesis, p. 300 ff.). S. R. Deiveb.

PEOPLE.— This is the translation used in AV for a large number of Hebrew and Greek terms. In some cases ambiguity occurs, as the pi. ' peoples ' is not used in AV except in Rev 10" 17". Thus 'people' is used sometimes of the people of Israel, and often of heathen nations. RV uses 'peoples' freely, and this makes the meaning much clearer in such passages as Ps 67S Is 55* 602 etc. (see art. NATroNS, also preface to RV).

A special phrase ' the people of the land ' occurs fre-quently in the OT, especially in Jeremiah, Ezekiel, 2 K., and 2 Ch. In most of these cases it means the general body of the people, the common people as opposed to the courtiers or the ruling class. In Gn 23'- «. la, Nu 14» the term is applied to non-Israelites. In the Books of Ezra and Nehemiah the 'people of the land' are the half-heathen, half-Jewish population with whom the less scrupulous Jews intermarried, but who were avoided by the stricter party represented by Ezra and Nehemiah (Ezr lO'- ", Neh 30'»- "; cf. 9'- Neh 9''). The same phrase was used by the Rabbis to describe the