Smith's Bible Dictionary.pdf - Online Christian Library

Smith's Bible Dictionary
latter being followed by the notice of the Philistines and by the Caphtorim. (Genesis 10:13,14; 1
Chronicles 1:12) Pathros is mentioned in the prophecies of Isaiah, (Isaiah 11:11) Jeremiah (Jeremiah
44:1,15) and Ezekiel. (Ezekiel 29:14; 30:13-18) It was probably part or all of upper Egypt, and we
may trace its name in the Pathyrite name, in which Thebes was situated.
Pathrusim
people of Pathros. [Pathros]
Patmos
(Revelation 1:9) a rugged and bare island in the AEgean Sea, 20 miles south of Samos and 24
west of Asia Minor. It was the scene of the banishment of St. John in the reign of Domitian, A.D.
95. Patmos is divided into two nearly equal parts, a northern and a southern, by a very narrow
isthmus where, on the east side are the harbor and the town. On the hill to the south, crowning a
commanding height, is the celebrated monastery which bears the name of “John the Divine.”
Halfway up the descent is the cave or grotto where tradition says that St. John received the
Revelation.
Patriarch
(father of a tribe), the name given to the head of a family or tribe in Old Testament times. In
common usage the title of patriarch is assigned especially to those whose lives are recorded in
Scripture previous to the time of Moses, as Adam, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. (“In the early history
of the Hebrews we find the ancestor or father of a family retaining authority over his children and
his children’s children so long as he lived, whatever new connections they might form when the
father died the branch families did not break off and form new communities, but usually united
under another common head. The eldest son was generally invested with this dignity. His authority
was paternal. He was honored as central point of connection and as the representative of the whole
kindred. Thus each great family had its patriarch or head, and each tribe its prince, selected from
the several heads of the families which it embraced.”—McClintock and Strong.) (“After the
destruction of Jerusalem, patriarch was the title of the chief religious rulers of the Jews in Asia and
in early Christian times it became the designation of the bishops of Rome, Constantinople,
Alexandria, Antioch and Jerusalem.”—American Cyclopedia .)
Patrobas
(paternal),a Christian at Rome to whom St. Paul sends his salutation. (Romans 16:14) Like
many other names mentioned in Roma 16 this was borne by at least one member of the emperor’s
household. Suet. Galba. 20; Martial, Ep. ii. 32, 3. (A.D. 55.)
Pau
(bleating) (but in (1 Chronicles 1:50) Pai), the capital of Hadar king of Edom. (Genesis 36:39)
Its position is unknown.
Paul
(small, little). Nearly all the original materials for the life St. Paul are contained in the Acts of
the Apostles and in the Pauline epistles. Paul was born in Tarsus, a city of Cilicia. (It is not
improbable that he was born between A.D. and A.D. 5.) Up to the time of his going forth as an
avowed preacher of Christ to the Gentiles, the apostle was known by the name of Saul. This was
the Jewish name which he received from his Jewish parents. But though a Hebrew of the Hebrews,
he was born in a Gentile city. Of his parents we know nothing, except that his father was of the
tribe of Benjamin, (Philemon 3:5) and a Pharisee, (Acts 23:6) that Paul had acquired by some means
the Roman franchise (“I was free born,”) (Acts 22:23) and that he was settled in Tarsus. At Tarsus
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William Smith