See GOD, NAMES OF.

See GOD, NAMES OF.

i-as’-i-mus.

See ALCIMUS.

i-ak’-u-bus (’Iakoubos 1 Esdras 9:48): "Akkub" in Ne 8:7.

i-ad’-i-nus (Iadeinos; 1 Esdras 9:48, the King James Version Adinus): Same as Jamin of Ne 8:7.

ib’-har (yibhchar, "He (God) chooses"; in Codex Sinaiticus, Codex Vaticanus, Ebear, in Chronicles, Codex Vaticanus, Baar; Codex Alexandrinus, Iebaar): One of David’s sons, born at Jerusalem; son of a wife and not of a concubine (1Ch 3:6; 2Sa 5:15); otherwise unknown. His name in all three lists follows Solomon’s.’ In the Peshitta, "Juchabar."

i’-bis. In Isa 34:11, yanshoph, which is rendered "owl," apparently indicates the sacred ibis (Ibis religiosa). The Septuagint gives eibis and Vulgate (Jerome’s Latin Bible, 390-405 A.D.) ibis; the Revised Version, margin "bittern."

See OWL.

ib’-le-am (yibhle‘am); A town in the territory of Issachar which was assigned to Manasseh (Jos 17:11). This tribe, however, failed to expel the inhabitants, so the Canaanites continued to dwell in that land (Jud 1:27). It was on the route by which Ahaziah fled from Jehu. He was overtaken and mortally wounded "at the ascent of Gur, which is by Ibleam" (2Ki 9:27). The name appears as Bileam in 1Ch 6:70; and it probably corresponds to Belmen of Jth. It is now represented by the ruin of Bel‘ameh on the West of the valley through which the road to the south runs, about half a mile from Jenin. In 2Ki 15:10, where it is said that Zechariah the son of Jeroboam was slain by Shallum "before the people," this last phrase, which is awkward in the Hebrew, should be amended to read "in Bileam." Possibly "Gath-rimmon" in Jos 21:25 is a clerical error for "Ibleam."

W. Ewing

ib-ne’-ya (yibhneyah, "Yah buildeth up"): A Benjamite, son of Jeroham (1Ch 9:8).

ib-ni’-ja (yibniyah or yibhneyah, "Yah buildeth up"): A Benjamite, father of Reuel (1Ch 9:8).

ib’-ri (ibhri, "a Hebrew"): A Merarite Levitt, son of Jaaziah (1Ch 24:27).

ib’-sam (yibhsam, "fragrant," the King James Version Jibsam): Descendant of Issachar, family of Tolah (1Ch 7:2).

ib’-zan (ibhtsan): The 10th judge of Israel. His city is given as Bethlehem (whether of Judah or Zebulun is not stated). He judged Israel 7 years, and when he died he was buried in his native place. The only personal details given about him in the Biblical narrative are that he had 30 sons and a like number of daughters. He sent all of his sons "abroad" for wives and brought husbands from "abroad" for all his daughters. The exact meaning of ha-chuts, "abroad," is mere matter of speculation, but the great social importance of the man and, possibly, alliances among tribes, are suggested in the brief narrative (Jud 12:8-10). Jewish tradition identifies Ibzan with Boaz of Bethlehem-Judah (Talmud, Babha’, Bathra’, 91a).

Ella Davis Isaacs

is (qerach): Ice is almost unknown in Palestine and Syria except on the highest mountains. At moderate heights of less than 4,000 ft. a little ice may form during the night in winter, but the warm rays of the sun melt it the next day. A great quantity of snow is packed away in caves in the mountains during the winter, and is thus preserved for use in the summer months. The word is found in the Bible in three places where it describes God’s power. "Out of whose womb came the ice? And the .... frost" (Job 38:29); "By the breath of God ice is given" (Job 37:10); "He casteth forth his ice like morsels" (Ps 147:17).

Figurative: Untrue friends are compared to streams "which are black by reason of the ice" (Job 6:16).

Alfred H. Joy

ik’-a-bod, i’-ka-bod (i-kha-bhodh, "inglorious"; Codex Vaticanus, ouai barchaboth; Codex Alexandrinus, ouai chaboth, Atimos): Son of Phinehas, Eli’s son, slain at the battle of Aphek when the ark was taken. Ichabod was born after his father’s death. His mother gave him this name on her death-bed to indicate that the "glory (had) departed from Israel" (1Sa 4:19 ). He was thus important as a symbol, though little is recorded of him as an individual. His nephew Ahijah was one of those who tarried with Saul and the six hundred at Gibeah just before Jonathan’s brave attack upon the Philistines (1Sa 14:2 f).

Henry Wallace

i-ko’-ni-um (Ikonion, also Eikonion, on inscriptions): Iconium was visited by Paul on his first and on his second missionary journey (Ac 13:51 ff; 16:2 ), and

if the "South Galatian theory" be correct, probably also on his third journey. His sufferings there are referred to in 2Ti 3:11.

1. Topographical Position:

The topographical position of Iconium is clearly indicated in Acts, and the evidence of Ac has been confirmed by recent research. Was Iconium in Phrygia or in Lycaonia, and in what sense can it be said to have belonged to one ethnical division or the other? The majority of our ancient authorities (e.g. Cicero, Strabo, Pliny), writing from the point of view of Roman provincial administration, give Iconium to Lycaonia, of which geography makes it the natural capital. But Xenophon, who marched with Cyrus’ expedition through Phrygia into Lycaonia, calls Iconium the last city of Phrygia. The writer of Ac 14:6 makes the same statement when he represents Paul and Barnabas as fleeing from Iconium to the cities of Lycaonia—implying that the border of Phrygia and Lycaonia passed between Iconium and Lystra, 18 miles to the South. Other ancient authorities who knew the local conditions well speak of Iconium as Phrygian until far into the Roman imperial period. At the neighboring city of Lystra (Ac 14:11), the natives used the "speech of Lycaonia." Two inscriptions in the Phrygian language found at Iconium in 1910 prove that the Phrygian language was in use there for 2 centuries after Paul’s visits, and afford confirmation of the interesting topographical detail in Ac (see Jour. Hell. Stud., 1911, 189).

2. In Apostolic Period:

In the apostolic period, Iconium was one of the chief cities in the southern part of the Roman province Galatia, and it probably belonged to the "Phrygian region" mentioned in Ac 16:6. The emperor Claudius conferred on it the title Claudiconium, which appears on coins of the city and on inscriptions, and was formerly taken as a proof that Claudius raised the city to the rank of a Roman colonia. It was Hadrian who raised the city to colonial rank; this is proved by its new title, Colonia Aelia Hadriana Iconiensium, and by a recently discovered inscription, which belongs to the reign of Hadrian, and which mentions the first duumvir who was appointed in the new colonia. Iconium was still a Hellenic city, but with a strong pro-Roman bias (as proved by its title "Claudian") when Paul visited it.

3. Later History:

About 295 AD, an enlarged province, Pisidia, was formed, with Antioch as capital, and Iconium as a "sort of secondary metropolis." The Byzantine arrangement, familiar to us in the Notitiae Episcopatuum, under which Iconium was the capital of a province Lycaonia, dates from about 372 AD. Iconium, the modern Konia, has always been the main trading center of the Lycaonian Plain. Trade attracted Jews to the ancient Phrygio-Hellenic city (Ac 14:1), as it attracts Greeks and Armenians to the modern Turkish town.

4. Thekla:

Paul’s experiences at Iconium form part of theme of the semi-historical legend of Thekla, on which see Professor Ramsay’s Church in the Roman Empire, 380 ff.

LITERATURE.

Ramsay Historical Commentary on Paul’s Epistle to the Galatians, 214 ff; Cities of Paul, 317 ff. To the literature referred to in the notes to the latter book (pp. 448 ff) add Ath. Mitth., 1905, 324 ff; Revue de Philologie, 1912, 48 ff; Journal Hellenic Studies, 1911, 188 ff.

W. M. Calder

id’-a-la, i-da’-la (yidh’alah): A town in the territory of Zebulun, named with Shimron and Beth-lehem (Jos 19:15). The Talmud identifies it with Churyeh (Talm Jerusalem on Megh., I, 1). This, Conder thinks, may be represented by the modern Khirbet el-Chuwara to the South of Beit Lachm.

id’-bash (yidhbash, "honeysweet"(?)): A man of Judah, one of the sons of the father of Etam (1Ch 4:3; Septuagint "sons of Etam").

id’-o:

(1) (’iddo (?[~’adhadh, "to be strong"), "hap," "happy" (?), Ezr 8:17): The "chief at the place Casiphia," who provided Ezra with Levites and Nethinim, the head of the Levitical body or school, said to be one of the Nethinim or temple slaves, but perhaps an "and" has slipped out, and it should read: "his brethren and the Nethinim." 1 Esdras 8:45,46 has "Loddeus (the King James Version "Saddeus"), the captain who was in the place of the treasury," keceph meaning silver. Septuagint has "in the place of the silver (en argurio tou topou) .... to his brethren and to the treasurers."

(2) (yiddo, "beloved," or "loving," 1Ch 27:21): Son of Zechariah, and captain of the half-tribe of Manasseh in Gilead, under David.

(3) (yiddo, "beloved," or "loving," Ezr 10:43): One of those who had taken foreign wives. Another reading is Jaddai, the King James Version "Jadau." In 1 Esdras 9:35 "Edos" (the King James Version "Edes").

(4) (‘iddo’," timely," 1Ki 4:14): Father of Abinadab, Solomon’s commissary in Mahanaim in Gilead.

(5) (yiddo, "beloved," or "loving," 1Ch 6:21): A Gershomite Levite, son of Joah, called Adaiah in verse 41; ancestor of Asaph.

(6) (ye‘do (Kethibh ye‘di), or ‘iddo, "decked," "adorned"): Seer (chozeh) and prophet (nabhi), the Chronicler’s "source" for the reign of Solomon (2Ch 9:29): "The visions of Iddo the seer concerning Jeroboam the son of Nebat"; and for the reign of Rehoboam (2Ch 12:15): "The histories of Iddo (‘iddo) the seer, after the manner of (or, "in reckoning") genealogies"; and for the reign of Abijah (2Ch 13:22): "The commentary (midhrash) of the prophet Iddo" (‘iddo). He may have been the prophet who denounced Jeroboam (1Ki 13), who is called by Josephus and Jerome Jadon, or Jaddo. Jerome makes Iddo and Oded the same.

(7) (‘iddo, "timely," Zec 1:1): Grandfather (father, according to Ezra) of the prophet, Zechariah. See also Zec 1:7; Ezr 5:1; 6:14 (‘iddo’). In 1 Esdras 6:1, "Addo."

(8) (‘iddo’," decked," "adorned," Ne 12:4,16): A priest who went up with Zerubbabel (12:4); one of the priestly clans which went up (12:16); perhaps same as (7).

Philip Wendell Crannell

i’-d’-l, i’-d’-l-nes: Both words, adjective and noun, render different Hebrew words (from ‘atsel, "to be lazy," raphah, "to relax," and shaqaT, "to be quiet"). According to the Yahwistic narrative Pharaoh’s retort to the complaints of the Israelites was a charge of indolence (Ex 5:8,17). It was a favorite thought of Hebrew wisdom—practical philosophy of life—that indolence inevitably led to poverty and want (Pr 19:15; Ec 10:18). The "virtuous woman" was one who would not eat the "bread of idleness" (Pr 31:27). In Eze 16:49 for the King James Version "abundance of idleness," the Revised Version (British and American) has "prosperous ease." In the New Testament "idle" generally renders the Greek word argos, literally, "inactive," "useless" (Mt 20:3,6). In Lu 24:11 "idle talk" corresponds to one Greek word which means "empty gossip" or "nonsensical talk."

T. Lewis

i-dol’-a-tri (teraphim, "household idols," "idolatry"; eidololatreia): There is ever in the human mind a craving for visible forms to express religious conceptions, and this tendency does not disappear with the acceptance, or even with the constant recognition, of pure spiritual truths (see IMAGES). Idolatry originally meant the worship of idols, or the worship of false gods by means of idols, but came to mean among the Old Testament Hebrews any worship of false gods, whether by images or otherwise, and finally the worship of Yahweh through visible symbols (Ho 8:5,6; 10:5); and ultimately in the New Testament idolatry came to mean, not only the giving to any creature or human creation the honor or devotion which belonged to God alone, but the giving to any human desire a precedence over God’s will (1Co 10:14; Ga 5:20; Col 3:5; 1Pe 4:3). The neighboring gods of Phoenicia, Canaan, Moab—Baal, Melkart, Astarte, Chemosh, Moloch, etc.—were particularly attractive to Jerusalem, while the old Semitic calf-worship seriously affected the state religion of the Northern Kingdom (see GOLDEN CALF). As early as the Assyrian and Babylonian periods (8th and 7th centuries BC), various deities from the Tigris and Euphrates had intruded themselves—the worship of Tammuz becoming a little later the most popular and seductive of all (Eze 8:14)—while the worship of the sun, moon, stars and signs of the Zodiac became so intensely fascinating that these were introduced even into the temple itself (2Ki 17:16; 21:3-7; 23:4,12; Jer 19:13; Eze 8:16; Am 5:26).

The special enticements to idolatry as offered by these various cults were found in their deification of natural forces and their appeal to primitive human desires, especially the sexual; also through associations produced by intermarriage and through the appeal to patriotism, when the help of some cruel deity was sought in time of war. Baal and Astarte worship, which was especially attractive, was closely associated with fornication and drunkenness (Am 2:7,8; compare 1Ki 14:23 f), and also appealed greatly to magic and soothsaying (e.g. Isa 2:6; 3:2; 8:19).

Sacrifices to the idols were offered by fire (Ho 4:13); libations were poured out (Isa 57:6; Jer 7:18); the first-fruits of the earth and tithes were presented (Ho 2:8); tables of food were set before them (Isa 65:11); the worshippers kissed the idols or threw them kisses (1Ki 19:18; Ho 13:2; Job 31:27); stretched out their hands in adoration (Isa 44:20); knelt or prostrated themselves before them and sometimes danced about the altar, gashing themselves with knives (1Ki 18:26,28; for a fuller summary see EB).

See also GOLDEN CALF; GODS; IMAGES; TERAPHIM.

LITERATURE.

Wm. Wake, A Discourse concerning the Nature of Idolatry, 1688; W.R. Smith, Lectures on the Religion of the Semites; E.B. Tylor, Primitive Culture; J.G. Frazer, Golden Bough (3 vols); L.R. Farnell, Evolution of Religion, 1905; Baudissin, Studien zur semitischen Religionsgeschichte; Beathgen, Der Gott Israels u. die Gotter der Heiden, 1888.

Camden M. Cobern

id’-u-el (Idouelos): 1 Esdras 8:43, English versions, margin "ARIEL" (which see).

id-u-me’-a, id-u-me’-anz.

See EDOM.

yed-i’-as, i-ed-i’-as, the King James Version Eddias (Ieddias): One who agreed to put away his foreign wife (1 Esdras 9:26); called also "Jezeias."

i-e’-zer, i-e’-zer-its (’i‘ezer, Nu 26:30): Contracted from ABIEZER (Jos 17:2, etc.) (which see).

i’-gal (yigh’al, "he (God) redeems"; Septuagint variously Igal, Gaal, Ieol):

(1) One of the twelve spies sent by Moses from the wilderness of Paran; son of Joseph, tribe of Issachar (Nu 13:7).

(2) One of David’s heroes, son of Nathan of Zobah (2Sa 23:36). In 1Ch 11:38 he is "Joe (yo’el), the brother of Nathan."

(3) Son of Shemaiah of the royal house of David, descendant of Zerubbabel (1Ch 3:22, the King James Version "Igeal").

ig-da-li’-a (yighdalyahu, "Yah is great"): Ancestor of certain persons who had a "chamber" in the temple in Jeremiah’s time (Jer 35:4).

i’-ge-al, i’-je-al (yigh’al, "he (i.e. God) redeems"): A remote descendant of David (1Ch 3:22, the Revised Version (British and American) "Igal").

ig’-no-rans (sheghaghah; agnoia): "Ignorance" is the translation of sheghaghah, "wandering," "going astray" (Le 4:2, etc., "if a soul sin through ignorance," the Revised Version (British and American) "unwittingly," margin "through error"; Le 5:15; Nu 15:24 ff; compare 35:11; Jos 20:3 ff; Ec 5:6; 10:5, "an error"). In the Law sheghaghah means "innocent error," such as had to be taken with consideration in judgment (see passages referred to). "Ignorance" is also expressed by the negative lo’ with yadha‘, "to know" (Isa 56:10; 63:16; Ps 73:22); also by bi-bheli da‘ath, literally, "in want of knowledge" (De 19:4; compare De 4:12; Jos 20:5, translated "unawares," "unwittingly").

Paul in Ro 1:18,32 attributes the pre-Christian ignorance of God to "the ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who hinder the truth in unrighteousness" (but the margin has, with the King James Version, "hold the truth, compare 1Co 7:30, Gr"); many, however (Alford, De Wette, Meyer and others), translation "hold back the truth." A willful ignorance is also referred to in Eph 4:17 f; 2Pe 3:5. But there is also a less blameworthy ignorance. Paul at Athens spoke of "times of ignorance" which God had "overlooked" (Ac 17:30); Paul says of himself that he "obtained mercy, because (he) did it (against Christ) ignorantly in unbelief" (1Ti 1:13); Peter said to the Jews (Ac 3:17) that they and their rulers rejected Christ "in ignorance" (compare 1Co 2:8); and Jesus Himself prayed for those who crucified Him: "Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do"; (Lu 23:34); in Heb 5:2 the necessary qualification of a high priest is that he "can bear gently with the ignorant and erring"—those who sin in ignorance or go astray (compare 9:7, "blood, which he offereth for himself, and for the errors of the people," margin "(Greek: ignorances"). Growing light, however, brings with it increasing responsibility, and the "ignorance" that may be "overlooked" at one stage of the history of men and nations may be blameworthy and even criminal at another.

W. L. Walker

i’-im (‘iyim): Same as IYIM (which see).

i-je-ab’-a-rim.

See IYE-ABARIM.

i’-jon (‘iyon; Septuagint in Kings has Ain, or Nain; in Chronicles Ion; Aion): A town in the territory of Naphtali, first mentioned in connection with the invasion of Ben-hadad, in the reign of Baasha. It was captured along with Da and Abel-beth-maacah (1Ki 15:20; 2Ch 16:4). It shared with these cities a similar fate at the hands of Tiglath-pileser in the reign of Pekah (2Ki 15:29). The name survives in that of Merj A‘yun, "meadow of springs," a rich, oval-shaped plain to the Northwest of Tell el Qady, where the LiTany turns sharply westward to the sea. The ancient city may be represented by Tell Dibbin, an important site to the North of the plain.

W. Ewing

ik’-esh (‘iqqesh, "crooked"): A Tekoite, father of Ira, one of David’s "thirty" (2Sa 23:26; 1Ch 11:28; 27:9).

i’-la-i, i’-li (‘ilay): A mighty man of David (1Ch 11:29); called Zalmon in 2Sa 23:28.

i-li’-a-dun, il’-i-ad-un (Eliadoun, 1 Esdras 5:58; the King James Version Eleadun): Possibly corresponding to Henadad in Ezr 3:9.

il, il-fa’-verd.

See EVIL-FAVOREDNESS.

i-lu-mi-na’-shun: Heb 10:32 the King James Version, only, "the former days, in which, after ye were illuminated (the Revised Version (British and American) "enlightened"), ye endured a great fight of afflictions." The verb is photizo, rendered in 6:4 by "enlightened" and in both passages (and not elsewhere in the New Testament) being used to describe complete conversion. The verb, indeed, is used in such a technical way that Syriac versions render by "baptized," and it is not perhaps impossible that the author of He had baptism definitely in mind. (In the early church baptism is frequently described as "illumination," e.g. Justin, Apol., i.61.) But this probably would go too far; the most that can be said is that he means the state of mind of a full Christian and not that of a catechumen (compare also Baruch 4:2 the King James Version; Sirach 25:11).

Burton Scott Easton

i-lus’-tri-us (thaumastos): A title of rank and merit attached to the name of Bartacus, the father of Apame (1 Esdras 4:29, the King James Version "the admirable). Instead of "the illustrious" we should possibly read "colonel" (Ant., XI, iii, 5; EB, under the word).

See BARTACUS; APAME.

i-lir’-i-kum (Illurikon): A province of the Roman Empire, lying East and Northeast of the Adriatic Sea. In his Epistle to the Romans Paul emphasizes the extent of his missionary activities in the assertion that "from Jerusalem, and round about even unto Illyricum, I have fully preached the gospel of Christ" (15:19). An examination of this statement involves three questions: What is the force of the preposition "even unto" (mechri)? What meaning is borne by the word Illyricum? and, At what period of his missionary career did Paul reach the limit here spoken of?

1. Force of "even unto":

In Greek, as in English, the preposition "unto" may either be exclusive or inclusive. In other words, Paul may mean that he has preached throughout Macedonia as far as the Illyrian frontier, or his words may involve a journey within Illyricum itself, extending perhaps to Dyrrhachium (mod. Durazzo) on the Adriatic seaboard, which, though belonging politically to Macedonia, lay in "Greek, Illyria." But since no word is said in the Ac of any extension of Paul’s travels beyond the confines of Macedonia, and since the phrase, "I have fully preached," precludes a reference to a hurried or cursory tour in Illyricum, we should probably take the word "unto" in its exclusive sense, and understand that Paul claims to have evangelized Macedonia as far as the frontier of Illyricum.

2. Meaning of "Illyricum":

What, then, does the word "Illyricum" denote? It is sometimes used, like the Greek terms Illyris and Illyria, to signify a vast area lying between the Danube on the North and Macedonia and Thrace on the South, extending from the Adriatic and the Alps to the Black Sea, and inhabited by a number of warlike and semi-civilized tribes known to the Greeks under the general title of Illyrians (Appian, Illyr. 1; Suetonius, Tiberius, 16); it thus comprised the provinces of Illyricum (in the narrower sense), Pannonia and Moesia, which for certain financial and military purposes formed a single administrative area, together with a strip of coast land between Dalmatia and Epirus and, at a later date, Dacia. Appian (Illyr. 6) even extends the term to include Raetia and Noricum, but in this he appears to be in error. But Illyricum has also a narrower and more precise meaning, denoting a single Roman province, which varied in extent with the advance of the Roman conquest but was finally organized in 10 AD by the emperor Augustus. At first it bore the name superior provincia Illyricum or simply Illyricum; later it came to be known as Dalmatia (Tac. Annals, iv.5; Josephus, BJ, II, xvi; Dio Cassius, xlix.36, etc.). In accordance with Paul’s habitual usage of such terms, together with the fact that he employs a Greek form which is a transliteration of the Latin Illyricum but does not occur in any other extant Greek writer, and the fact that he is here writing to the church at Rome, we may conclude that in Ro 15:19 Illyricum bears its more restricted meaning.

3. Relation to Rome:

The Romans waged two Illyrian wars: in 229-228 BC and in 219 BC, but no province was formed until 167, when, after the fall of the Macedonian power, Illyria received its provincial constitution (Livy, xlv.26). At this time it extended from the Drilo (modern Drin) to Dalmatia, which was gradually subjugated by Roman arms. In 59 BC Julius Caesar received as his province Illyricum and Gaul, and later Octavian and his generals, Asinius Pollio and Statilius Taurus, waged war there with such success that in 27 BC, at the partition of the provinces between Augustus and the Senate, Illyricum was regarded as wholly pacified and was assigned to the latter. Renewed disturbances led, however, to its transference to the emperor in 11 BC. Two years later the province was extended to the Danube, but in 9 AD, at the close of the 2nd Pannonian War, it was divided into two separate provinces, Pannonia and Illyricum (Dalmatia). The latter remained an imperial province, administered by a consular legatus Augusti pro praetore residing at Salonae (modern Spalato), and two legions were stationed there, at Delminium and at Burnum. One of these was removed by Nero, the other by Vespasian, and thenceforward the province was garrisoned only by auxiliary troops. It fell into three judicial circuits (conventus), that of Scardona comprising Liburnia, the northern portion of the province, while those of Salonae and Narona made up the district of Dalmatia in the narrower sense. The land was rugged and mountainous, and civilization progressed but slowly; the Romans, however, organized 5 Roman colonies within the province and a considerable number of municipia.

4. Paul’s Relation to Illyricum:

The extension of Paul’s preaching to the Illyrian frontier must be assigned to his 3rd missionary journey, i.e. to his 2nd visit to Macedonia. His movements during the 1st visit (Ac 16:12-17:15) are too fully recorded to admit of our attributing it to that period, but the account in Ac 20:2 of his second tour is not only very brief, but the words, "when he had gone through those parts," suggest an extensive tour through the province, occupying, according to Ramsay, the summer and autumn of 56 AD.

See also DALMATIA.

LITERATURE.

A. M. Poinsignon, Quid praecipue apud Romanos adusque Diocletiani tempora Illyricum fuerit (Paris, 1846); Zippe, Die romische Herrschaft in Illyrien bis auf Augustus (Leipzig, 1877); H. Cons, La province romaine de Dalmatie (Paris, 1882); T. Mommsen, CIL, III, pp. 279 ff; T. Mommsen et J. Marquardt, Manuel des antiquites romaines (Fr. T), IX, 171 ff.

M. N. Tod

im’-aj (tselem; eikon): Its usage falls under 3 main heads.

(1) "Image" as object of idolatrous worship (translations about a dozen words, including maccekhah, "molten image" (De 9:12, etc.); matstsebhah, in the King James Version translated "image" or "pillar," in the Revised Version (British and American) always "pillar" (Ex 23:24, etc.); pecel, "graven image" (Ex 20:4, etc.); tselem, "image" (2Ki 11:18, etc.); eikon, "image" (e.g. Re 14:9));

(2) of man as made in the image of God; (3) of Christ as the image of God. Here we are concerned with the last two usages. For "image" in connection with idolatrous practices, see IDOLATRY; IMAGES; PILLAR; TERAPHIM, etc.

I. Man as Made in the Divine Image.

1. In the Old Testament:

To define man’s fundamental relation to God, the priestly writer in Ge uses two words: "image" (tselem) and "likeness" (demuth); once employing both together (Ge 1:26; compare Ge 5:3), but elsewhere one without the other, "image" only in Ge 1:27; 9:6, and "likeness" only in 5:1. The priestly writer alone in the Old Testament uses this expression to describe the nature of man, though the general meaning of the passage Ge 1:26 f is echoed in Ps 8:5-8, and the term itself reappears in Apocrypha (Sirach 17:3; The Wisdom of Solomon 2:23) and in the New Testament (see below).

The idea is important in relation to the Biblical doctrine of man, and has figured prominently in theological discussion. The following are some of the questions that arise:

(1) Is there any distinction to be understood between "image" and "likeness"? Most of the Fathers, and some later theologians, attempt to distinguish between them.

(a) Some have referred "image" to man’s bodily form, and "likeness" to his spiritual nature (Justin Martyr, Irenaeus).

(b) Others, especially the Alexandrian Fathers, understood by the "image" the mental and moral endowments native to man, and by the "likeness" the Divine perfections which man can only gradually acquire by free development and moral conflict (Clement of Alexandria and Origen), or which is conferred on man as a gift of grace.

(c) This became the basis of the later Roman Catholic distinction between the natural gifts of rationality and freedom (= the image), and the supernatural endowments of grace which God bestowed on man after He had created him (the likeness = donum superadditum). The former remained after the Fall, though in an enfeebled state; the latter was lost through sin, but restored by Christ. The early Protestants rejected this distinction, maintaining that supernatural righteousness was part of the true nature and idea of man, i.e. was included in the "image," and not merely externally superadded. Whatever truth these distinctions may or may not contain theologically, they cannot be exegetically inferred from Ge 1:26, where (as is now generally admitted) no real difference is intended.

We have here simply a "duplication of synonyms" (Driver) for the sake of emphasis. The two terms are elsewhere used interchangeably.

(2) What, then, is to be understood by the Divine image? Various answers have been given.

(a) Some of the Fathers (influenced by Philo) supposed that the "image" here = the Logos (called "the image of the invisible God" in Col 1:15), on the pattern of whom man was created. But to read the Logos doctrine into the creation narrative is to ignore the historic order of doctrinal development. (b) That it connotes physical resemblance to God (see (1), (a) above; so in the main Skinner, ICC, in the place cited.). It may be admitted that there is a secondary reference to the Divine dignity of the human body; but this does not touch the essence of the matter, inasmuch as God is not represented as having physical form.

(c) That it consists of dominion over the creatures (Socinian view; so also Gregory of Nyssa, Chrysostom, etc.). This would involve an unwarranted narrowing of the idea. It is true that such "dominion" is closely associated with the image in Ge 1:26 (compare Ps 8:6-8). But the "image of God" must denote primarily man’s relation to his Creator, rather than his relation to the creation. Man’s lordship over Nature is not identical with the image, but is an effect of it.

(d) It is best to take the term as referring to the whole dignity of man, in virtue of his fundamental affinity to God. It implies the possession by man of a free, self-conscious, rational and moral personality, like unto that of God—a nature capable of distinguishing right and wrong, of choosing the right and rejecting the wrong, and of ascending to the heights of spiritual attainment and communion with God. This involves a separation of man from the beast, and his supremacy as the culmination of the creative process.

(3) Does the term imply man’s original perfection, lost through sin? The old Protestant divines maintained that the first man, before the Fall, possessed original righteousness, not only in germ but in developed form, and that this Divine image was destroyed by the Fall. Exegetically considered, this is certainly not taught by the priestly writer, who makes no mention of the Fall, assumes that the image was transmitted from father to son (compare Ge 5:1 with 5:3), and naively speaks of post-diluvian men as created in the image of God (Ge 9:6; compare 1Co 11:7; Jas 3:9). Theologically considered, the idea of the perfect holiness of primitive man is based on an abstract conception of God’s work in creation, which precludes the idea of development, ignores the progressive method of the Divine government and the essential place of effort and growth in human character. It is more in harmony with modern conceptions

(a) to regard man as originally endowed with the power of right choice, rather than with a complete character given from the first; and

(b) to think of the Divine image (though seriously defaced) as continuing even in the sinful state, as man’s inalienable capacity for goodness and his true destination. If the Divine image in man is a self-conscious, rational and ethical personality, it cannot be a merely accidental or transitory attribute, but is an essential constituent of his being.

2. In the New Testament:

Two features may be distinguished in the New Testament doctrine of the Divine image in man:

(1) man’s first creation in Adam,

(2) his second or new creation in Christ.

As to (1), the doctrine of the Old Testament is assumed in the New Testament. Paul makes a special application of it to the question of the relation of husband and wife, which is a relation of subordination on the part of the wife, based on the fact that man alone was created immediately after the Divine image (1Co 11:7). Thus Paul, for the special purpose of his argument, confines the meaning of the image to man’s lordly authority, though to infer that he regards this as exhausting its significance would be quite unwarranted. Man’s affinity to God is implied, though the term "image" is not used, in Paul’s sermon to the Athenians (Ac 17:28 f, man the "offspring" of God). See also Jas 3:9 (it is wrong to curse men, for they are "made after the likeness of God").

(2) More characteristic of the New Testament is the doctrine of the new creation.

(a) The redeemed man is said to be in the image of God (the Father). He is "renewed unto knowledge after the image of him that created him" (Col 3:10), i.e. of God the Creator, not here of Christ or the Logos (as some) (compare Eph 4:24, "after God"). Though there is here an evident reference to Ge 1:26 f, this does not imply that the new creation in Christ is identical with the original creation, but only that the two are analogous. To Paul, the spiritual man in Christ is on a higher level than the natural ("psychical") man as found in Adam (compare especially 1Co 15:44-49), in whom the Divine image consisted (as we have seen) in potential goodness, rather than in full perfection. Redemption is infinitely more than the restoration of man’s primitive state.

(b) The Christian is further said to be gradually transformed into the image of the Son of God. This progressive metamorphosis involves not only moral and spiritual likeness to Christ, but also ultimately the Christian’s future glory, including the glorified body, the "passing through a gradual assimilation of mind and character to an ultimate assimilation of His doxa, the absorption of the splendor of His presence" (Sanday and Headlam, Romans, 218; see Ro 8:29; 1Co 15:49; 2Co 3:18; and compare Php 3:21; 1 Joh 3:2).

II. Christ the Image of God.

In 3 important passages in English Versions of the Bible, the term "image" defines the relation of Christ to God the Father; twice in Paul: "the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God" (2Co 4:4); "who is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation" (Col 1:15); and once in He: "who being the effulgence of his glory, and the very image of his substance" (Col 1:3). These statements, taken in their contexts, register the highest reach of the Christology of the Epistles.

1. The Terms:

In the two Pauline passages, the word used is eikon, which was generally the Septuagint rendering of tselem (Vulgate: imago); it is derived from eiko, eoika, "to be like," "resemble," and means that which resembles an object and represents it, as a copy represents the original. In Heb 1:3 the word used is charakter, which is found here only in the New Testament, and is translated in Vulgate (Jerome’s Latin Bible, 390-405 A.D.) figura, the King James Version "express image," the Revised Version (British and American) "very image," the Revised Version, margin "impress." It is derived from charasso, "to engrave," and has passed through the following meanings:

(1) an engraving instrument (active sense);

(2) the engraved stamp or mark on the instrument (passive sense);

(3) the impress made by the instrument on wax or other object;

(4) hence, generally, the exact image or expression of any person or thing as corresponding to the original, the distinguishing feature, or traits by which a person or thing is known (hence, English words "character," "characteristic"). The word conveys practically the same meaning as eikon; but Westcott distinguishes them by saying that the latter "gives a complete representation, under conditions of earth, of that which it figures," while charakter "conveys representative traits only" (Westcott on Heb 1:3).

2. Meaning as Applied to Christ:

The idea here expressed is closely akin to that of the Logos doctrine in Joh (1:1-18). Like the Logos, the Image in Paul and in He is the Son of God, and is the agent of creation as well as the medium of revelation. "What a word (logos) is to the ear, namely a revelation of what is within, an image is to the eye; and thus in the expression there is only a translation, as it were, of the same fact from one sense to another" (Dorner, System of Ch. D., English translation, III, 178). As Image, Christ is the visible representation and manifestation of the invisible God, the objective expression of the Divine nature, the face of God turned as it were toward the world, the exact likeness of the Father in all things except being the Father. Thus we receive "the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ" (2Co 4:6). He is the facsimile of God.

3. To What State Does It Refer?:

Is Christ described as the Image of God in His preincarnate, His incarnate, or else His exalted state? It is best to say that different passages refer to different states, but that if we take the whole trend of New Testament teaching, Christ is seen to be essentially, and in every state, the Image of God.

(a) In Heb 1:3 the reference seems to be to the eternal, preincarnate Son, who is inherently and essentially the expression of the Divine substance. So Paul declares that He subsisted originally in the form of God (en morphe theou huparchon, Php 2:6).

(b) In Joh 1:18; 12:45; 14:9, though the term image is not used, we have the idea of the historical Jesus as a perfect revelation of the character and glory of God.

(c) In the two Pauline passages (2Co 4:4; Col 1:15), the reference is probably to the glorified, exalted Christ; not to His pre-existent Divine nature, nor to His temporal manifestation, but to His "whole Person, in the divine-human state of His present heavenly existence" (Meyer). These passages in their cumulative impressions convey the idea that the Image is an inalienable property of His personality, not to be limited to any stage of His existence.

4. Theological Implications:

Does this involve identity of essence of Father and Son, as in the Homoousion formula of the Nicene Creed? Not necessarily, for man also bears the image of God, even in his sinful state (see I above), a fact which the Arians sought to turn to their advantage. Yet in the light of the context, we must affirm of Christ an absolutely unique kinship with God. In the Col passage, not only are vast cosmic and redemptive functions assigned to Him, but there is said to dwell in Him "all the fullness of the Godhead bodily" (1:19; 2:9). In He not only is the Son the final revelation of God to men, the upholder of the universe, and the very image of the Divine nature, but also the effulgence (apaugasma) of God’s glory, and therefore of one nature with Him as the ray is of one essence with the sun (1:1-3). The superiority of the Son is thus not merely one of function but of nature. On the other hand, the figure of the "image" certainly guards against any Sabellian identification of Father and Son, as if they were but modes of the one Person; for we cannot identify the pattern with its copy, nor speak of anyone as an image of himself. And, finally, we must not overlook the affinity of the Logos with man; both are the image of God, though the former in a unique sense. The Logos is at once the prototype of humanity within the Godhead, and the immanent Divine principle within humanity.

5. Relation to Pre-Christian Thought:

Both in Paul and in He we have an echo of the Jewish doctrine of Wisdom, and of Philo’s doctrine of the Logos. In the Alexandrine Book of Wisdom, written probably under Stoic influence, Divine Wisdom is pictorially represented as "an effulgence (apaugasma) from everlasting light, and an unspotted mirror of the working of God, and an image (eikon) of His goodness" (7 26). Philo repeatedly calls the Logos or Divine world-principle the image (eikon, charakter) of God, and also describes it as an effulgence of God. But this use of current Alexandrian terminology and the superficial resemblance of ideas are no proof of conscious borrowing on the part of the apostles. There is this fundamental distinction, that Philo’s Logos is not a self-conscious personality, still less a historical individual, but an allegorical hypostatizing of an abstract idea; whereas in Paul and He, as in John, the Divine archetype is actually realized in a historical person, Jesus Christ, the Son and Revealer of God.

D. Miall Edwards

See GOD, IMAGE OF.

im’-aj-ri (maskith, "carved figure"): Only in Eze 8:12, "every man in his chambers of imagery," i.e. dark chambers on whose walls were pictures in relief representing all kinds of reptiles and vermin, worshipped by elders of Israel. Some maintain that the cult was of foreign origin, either Egyptian (Bertholet, Commentary on Ezekiel), or Babylonian (Redpath, Westminster Commentary on Ezekiel); others that it was the revival of ancient superstitions of a totemistic kind which had survived in obscure circles in Israel (W.R. Smith, Lectures on the Religion of the Semites, revised edition, 357). The word here rendered "imagery" is elsewhere in the King James Version translated "image" (of stone) (Le 26:1, the Revised Version (British and American) "figured stone"), "pictures" (Nu 33:52, the Revised Version (British and American) "figured stones"; Pr 25:11, the Revised Version (British and American) "network"); twice it means imagination, conceit, i.e. a mental picture (Ps 73:20; Pr 18:11). "Imagery" occurs once in Apocrypha (Sirach 38:27 the King James Version, eis homoiosai zographian, the Revised Version (British and American) "to preserve likeness in his portraiture").

D. Miall Edwards

im’-aj-iz (tselem; eikon):

1. Definition

2. Origin

3. Historical Beginnings and Early Developments

4. Bible References and Palestinian Customs

5. Most Important Technical Terms

(1) Matstsebhah ("pillar")

(2) ‘Asherah ("grove")

(3) Chamman ("sun-image")

6. Obscure Bible References

(1) Golden Calf

Jeroboam’s Calves

(2) Brazen Serpent

(3) Teraphim

(4) Image of Jealousy

(5) Chambers of Imagery

(6) ‘Ephod

LITERATURE

1. Definition:

Images, as used here, are visible representations of supposedly supernatural or divine beings or powers. They may be

(1) themselves objects of worship,

(2) pictures, embodiments or dwelling-places (temple, ark, pillar, priests) of deities worshipped,

(3) empowered instruments (amulets, charms, etc.) of object or objects worshipped,

(4) pictures or symbols of deities reverenced though not worshipped.

These images may be shapeless blocks, or symmetrically carved figures, or objects of Nature, such as animals, sun, moon, stars, etc. These visible objects may sometimes be considered, especially by the uninstructed, as deities, while by others in the small community they are thought of as instruments or symbolizations of deity. Even when they are thought of as deities, this does not exclude a sense and apprehension of a spiritual godhead, since visible corporeal beings may have invisible souls and spiritual attributes, and even the stars may be thought of as "seats of celestial spirits." An idol is usually considered as either the deity itself or his permanent tenement; a fetish is an object which has been given a magical or divine power, either because of its having been the temporary home of the deity, or because it has been formed or handled or otherwise spiritually influenced by such deity. The idol is generally communal, the fetish private; the idol is protective, the fetish is usually not for the common good. (See Jevons, Idea of Cod in Early Religions, 1910.) Relics and symbolic figures do not become "images" in the objectionable sense until reverence changes to worship. Until comparatively recent times, the Hebrews seem to have offered no religious objection to "artistic" images, as is proved not only from the description of Solomon’s temple, but also from the discoveries of the highly decorated temple of Yahweh at Syene dating from the 6th century BC, and from ruins of synagogues dating from the pre-Christian and early Christian periods (PEF, January, 1908; The Expositor, December, 1907; Expository Times, January and February, 1908). The Second Commandment was not an attack upon artists and sculptors but upon idolaters. Decoration by means of graven figures was not in ancient times condemned, though, as Josephus shows, by the time of the Seleucids all plastic art was regarded with suspicion. The brazen serpent was probably destroyed in Hezekiah’s time because it had ceased to be an ancient artistic relic and had become an object of worship (see below). So the destruction of the ark and altar and temple, which for so long a time had been the means of holy worship, became at last a prophetic hope (Isa 6:7; Jer 3:6; Am 5:25; Ho 6:6; compare Zec 14:20). While the temple is not naturally thought of as an "image," it was as truly so as any Bethel. An idol was the temple in miniature—a dwelling-place of the god. When an image became the object of worship or a means by which a false god was worshipped, it became antagonistic to the First and Second Commandments respectively.

2. Origin:

The learned author of the article on "Image Worship" in the Encyclopedia Biblica (11th edition) disposes too easily of this question when he suggests that image-worship is "a continuance by adults of their childish games with dolls. .... Idolatrous cults repose largely on make-believe."

Compare the similar statement made from a very different standpoint by the author of Great Is Diana of the Ephesians, or the Original of Idolatry (1695): "All Superstitions are to the People but like several sports to children, which varying in their several seasons yield them pretty entertainment," etc.

No universal institution or custom is founded wholly on superstition. If it does not answer to some real human need, and "if its foundations are not laid broad and deep in the nature of things, it must perish" (J.G. Fraser, Psyche’s Task, 1909, 103; compare Salomon Reinach, Revue des etudes grecques, 1906, 324). Image-worship is too widespread and too natural to humanity, as is proved in modern centuries as well as in the cruder earlier times, to have its basis and source in any mere external and accidental circumstances. All modern research tends to corroborate our belief that this is psychological rather than ecclesiastical in its origin. It is not imposed externally; it comes from within, and naturally accompanies the organic unfoldment of the human animal in his struggle toward self-expression. This is now generally acknowledged to be true of religious feeling and instinct (see especially Rudolf Eueken, Christianity and the New Idealism, 1909, chapter i; I. King, The Development of Religion, 1910); it ought to be counted equally true of religious expression. Neither can the origin of image-worship or even of magical rites be fully explained, as Fraser thinks, by the ordinary laws of association. These associations only become significant because the devoted worshipper already has a body of beliefs and generalizations which make him attentive to the associations which seem to him religiously or magically important. (Jastrow, Aspects of Rel. Belief and Practice in Babylonia and Assyria; compare James H. Leuba, Psychological Origin and Nature of Religion, 1909; Study of Religions, 1911). So animism must be regarded as a philosophy rather than as an original religious faith, since it is based on an "explanation of phenomena rather than an attitude of mind toward the cause of these phenomena" (EB, 11th edition, article "Animism," and compare Hoffding, Philosophy of Religion, 1906, 138). In whatever ways the various image-worshipping cults arose historically—whether from a primitive demonology or from the apotheosis of natural objects, or from symbolism, or a false connection of cause with effect—in any case it had some human need behind it and human nature beneath it. The presence of the image testifies to faith in the supernatural being represented by the image and to a desire to keep the object of worship near. Prayer is easier when the worshipper can see his god or some sacred thing the god has honored (compare M. L’abbe E. Van Drival, De l’origine et des sources de l’idolatrie, Paris, 1860).

3. Historical Beginnings and Early Development:

The first man was not born with a totem-pole in his fist, nor did the earliest historic men possess images. They lacked temples and altars and ephods and idols, as they lacked the fire-stick and potter’s wheel. Religion, which showed itself so strong in the next stage of human life, must have had very firm beginnings in the prehistoric period; but what were its external expressions we do not yet certainly know, except in the methods of burying and caring for the dead. It seems probable that primitive historic man saw in everything that moved an active soul, and that he saw in every extraordinary thing in earth or heaven the expression of a supernatural power. Yet reflective thinking began earlier than Tylor and all the older scientific anthropologists supposed. Those earlier investigators were without extended chronological data, and although ingenuity was exercised in systematizing the beliefs and customs of modern savages, it was necessarily impossible always to determine in this way which were the most primitive cults. Excavations in Babylonia, Egypt and elsewhere have enabled us for the first time to trace with some chronological certainty the religious expressions of earliest historic man. That primitive man was so stupid that he could not tell the difference between men and things, and that therefore totemism or fetishism or a low form of animism was necessarily the first expression of religious thought is a theory which can no longer be held very buoyantly in the face of the new and striking knowledge, material and religious, which is now seen to be incorporated in some of the most ancient myths of mankind. (See e.g. Winekler, Die jungsten Kampfe wider den Panbabylonismus, 1907; Jeremias, The Old Testament in the Light of the Ancient East, 2 volumes, 1911.) The pan-Bab theory, which makes so much use of these texts, is not certain, but the facts upon which theory depends are clear. It is a suggestive fact that among the earliest known deities or symbols of deities mentioned in the most ancient inscriptions are to be found the sun, moon, stars and other great forces of Nature. Out of these conceptions and the mystery of life—which seems to have affected early mankind even more powerfully than ourselves—sprang the earliest known religious language, the myth, which antedated by eons our oldest written texts, since some of these myths appear fully formed in the oldest texts. Rough figures of these solar and stellar deities are found from very early times in Babylonia. So in the earliest Egyptian texts the sun appears as divine and the moon as "the bull among the stars," and rough figures of the gods were carved in human or animal form, or these are represented pictorially by diadems or horns or ostrich feathers, as far back as the IInd Dynasty, while even earlier than this stakes and pillars and heaps of stones are sacred. (See further, HDB, 5th vol, 176 ff; Erman, A Handbook of Egyptian Rel.; Steindorf, Rel. of the Ancient Egyptians, 1905.) These rude and unshaped objects do not testify, as was once supposed, to a lower form of religious development than when sculptured images are found. The shapeless fetish, which not long ago was generally accepted as the earliest form of image, really represents a more advanced stage and higher form of religious expression than the worship of a beautifully or horribly carved image. It has been generally conceded since the days of Robertson Smith that it takes at least as much imagination and reflection to see an expression of deity in imageless matter as in the carved forms. Rude objects untouched by human hand, even in the most highly developed worships, have been most prized. The earliest images were probably natural objects which, because of their peculiar shapes or functions, were thought of either as divine or as made sacred by the touch of deity. Multiplied copies of these objects would naturally be made when worshippers increased or migrations occurred. While images may have been used in the most early cults, yet the highest development of image-worship has occurred among the most civilized peoples. Both deities and idols are less numerous in the early than in the later days of a religion. This is true in India, Assyria, Babylonia, and Egypt, as all experts now agree. Idols are not found among uncivilized peoples, such as the Bushmen, Fuegians, Eskimos, etc. (See e.g. Allen Menzies, History of Rel., 1895.) Images of the gods presuppose a power of discrimination that could only be the result of reflection. The earliest idols known among the Semites were rude stone pillars or unshapen blocks. These, as the fetish, were probably adored, not for themselves, but for the spirit that was supposed to be in them or to have touched them. Deities and idols are multiplied easily, not only by philological, geographical and social causes, but through intertribal and international associations. One thing absolutely proved by recent excavations has been the extent to which the representations of local deities have been modified by the symbolic art of surrounding nations. Babylonia, for example, was influenced by the Syro-Hittite religious art at least as much as by that of Egypt (William Hayes Ward, Cylinders and Other Ancient Oriental Seals, 1909; Clay, Amurru, 1910). Even in adjacent localities the same deity varied greatly in its pictorial representation. See PALESTINE EXPLORATION, and Revue biblique, XIV, 315-48. With the possible exception of one reign in Egypt, during which Ikhnaton refused to allow any deities to be worshipped except the sun discovered and himself, idolatry outside of the Hebrew kingdom was never made a crime against the state until the days of Constantine. Theodosius (392 AD) not only placed sacrifices and divination among the capital crimes, but placed a penalty upon anyone who entered a heathen temple.

4. Bible References and Palestinian Customs:

The dignity of the image in common thought in Bible times may be seen from the fact that man is said to have been made in God’s image (tselem; compare 1Sa 6:5; Nu 33:52), and Christ is said to be "the image of the invisible God" (eikon; compare Col 1:15 with Ro 1:23). The heathen thought of the sun and stars and idols as being images of the gods, but the Hebrews, though Yahweh’s temple was imageless, thought of normal humanity as in some true sense possessing a sacred resemblance to Deity, though early Christians taught that only Christ was the Father s "image" in unique and absolute perfection. See IMAGE. The ordinary words for "image" by a slight change came to mean vermin, carrion, false gods, no gods, carcasses, dung, etc. Heathen gods were undoubtedly accounted real beings by the early Hebrews, and the images of these enemies of Yahweh were doubtless looked upon as possessing an evil associated (?) power. In the earlier Old Testament era, images, idols, and false gods are synonymous; but as early as the 8th century BC Hebrew prophets begin to reach the lofty conception that heathen gods are non-existent, or at least practically so, when compared with the ever-living Yahweh, while the idols are "worthless things" or "non-entities" (Isa 2:8,18,20; 10:10,11; 19:1; 31:7; compare Jer 14:14; Eze 30:13; note the satiric term ‘elilim, as contrasted with the powerful ‘elohim). The many ordinary terms used by the Hebrews for an idol or image mean "copy," simulacrum, "likeness," "representation." These are often, however, so compounded as technically to express a particular form, as "graven" or "carved" image (e.g. Ex 20:4; 2Ch 33:7) of wood or stone, i.e. one cut into shape by a tool; "molten image" (e.g. Ex 32:4; Le 19:4), i.e. one cast out of melted metal (standing image) (Le 26:1 the King James Version, and see below), etc. However, a few of the Old Testament terms and modes of worship are unusual, or have a more difficult technical meaning, or have been given a new interest by new discoveries, and such deserve a more extended notice.

5. Most Important Technical Terms:

(1) Matstsebhah ("pillar"):

(2) ‘Asherah ("grove"):

‘asherah: Perhaps a goddess (see ASHERAH), but as ordinarily used in the Old Testament, a sacred tree or stump of a tree planted in the earth (De 16:21) or a pole made of wood and set up near the altar (Jud 6:26; 1Ki 16:33; Isa 17:8).

It has been supposed that these were primarily symbols of a goddess Asherah or Ashtoreth (Kuenen, Baethgen), and they were certainly in primitive thought connected with the tree cult and the sacred groves so universally honored by the Semites (see especially W.R. Smith, Religion of the Semites, 169, 437; Stade, Geschichte, 160 ff; Fraser, Golden Bough, II, 56-117; John O’Neill, Night of the Gods, II, 57); but the tree of life is closely connected in texts and pictures with the human organ of generation, and there can be no doubt that there is a phallic meaning connected with this sacred stake or pole, as with the matstsebhoth described above. See references in HDB under "Asherah," and compare Transactions of the Victoria Institute, XXXIX, 234; Winckler, Keilinschriftliches Textbuch zum AT. As these wooden posts from earliest times represented the ideas of fertility and were connected with the mystery of life, they naturally became the signs and symbols in many lands of the local gods and goddesses of fertility.

Astarte was by far the most popular deity of ancient Palestine. See ASHTORETH. The figures of Astarte from the 12th to the 9th century BC, as found at Gezer, have large hips, disclosing an exaggerated idea of fecundity. In close connection with the Astarte sanctuaries in Palestine were found numberless bodies of little children, none over a week old, undoubtedly representing the sacrifice of the firstborn by these Canaanites (R.A.S. Macalister, Excavation of Gezer, 3 vols). These Asherim were erected at the most sacred Hebrew sanctuaries, at Samaria (2Ki 13:6), Bethel (2Ki 23:15), and even in the Temple of Jerusalem (2Ki 23:6). The crowning act of King Josiah’s reformation was to break down these images (2Ki 23:14). As the astrological symbol of Baal was the sun, Astarte is often thought of as the moon-goddess, but her symbol was really Venus. She was, however, sometimes called "Queen of Heaven" (Jer 7:18; 44:17,19; but see Zeitschrift fur alttestamentliche Wissenschaft, VI, 123-30).

(3) Chamman ("sun-image"):

chamman, the King James Version "images," "idols"; the Revised Version (British and American) "sun-images" (Le 26:30; 2Ch 14:5; 34:4,7; Isa 17:8; 27:9; Eze 6:4,6): This worship may originally have come from Babylonia, but the reverence of the sun under the name Baal-hamman had long been common in Palestine before Joshua and the Israelites entered the country. These sun-images were probably obelisks or pillars connected with the worship of some local Baal. The chariot and horses of the sun, mentioned (2Ki 23:11) as having an honored place at the western entrance of the Jerusalem Temple, represented not a local but a foreign cult. In Babylonian temples, sacrifices were made to the sun-chariot, which seems to have had a special significance in time of war (Pinches, HDB, IV, 629; see also CHARIOTS OF THE SUN).

6. Obscure Bible References:

(1) Golden Calf and Jeroboam’s Calves:

See GOLDEN CALF.

(2) Brazen Serpent:

Brazen Serpent (Nu 21:4-9; 2Ki 4).—The serpent, because of its strange, lightning-like power of poisonous attack, its power to shed its skin, and to paralyze its prey, has been the most universally revered of all creatures. Living serpents were kept in Babylonian temples. So the cobra was the guardian of royalty in Egypt, symbolizing the kingly power of life and death. In mythology, the serpent was not always considered a bad demon, enemy of the Creator, but often appears as the emblem of wisdom, especially in connection with health-giving and life-giving gods, such as Ea, savior of mankind from the flood, and special "god of the physicians" in Babylon; Thoth, the god of wisdom in Egypt, who healed the eye of Horus and brought Osiris to life again; Apollo, the embodiment of physical perfection, and his son, Aeseulapius, most famous giver of physical and moral health and curer of disease among the Greeks. Among the Hebrews also a seal (1500-1000 BC) shows a worshipper before a horned serpent raised on a pole (Wm. Hayes Ward). In Phoenician mythology the serpent is also connected with wisdom and long life, and it is found on the oldest Hebrew seals and on late Jewish talismans (Revue biblique internationale, July, 1908, 382-94); at Gezer, in Palestine, a small "brazen serpent" (a cobra) was found in the "cave of oracles," and in early Christian art Jesus the Lord of Life is often represented standing triumphantly upon the serpent or holding it in His fist. In the Hebrew narrative found in Nu 21, the serpent evidently appears as a well-known symbol representing the Divine ability to cure disease, being erected before the eyes of the Israelites to encourage faith and stop the plague. It was not a totem, for the totem belongs to a single family and is never set up for the veneration of other families (Ramsay, Cities of Paul, 39). Hezekiah destroyed it because it was receiving idolatrous worship (2Ki 18:4), though there is no hint that such worship was ever a part of the official temple cult (Benzinger); for if this had been done, the earlier prophets could hardly have remained silent. The above explanation seems preferable to the one formerly offered that the serpent was merely a copy of the disease-bearer, as the images offered by the Philistines were copies of the ulcers that plagued them (1Sa 6:4).

See further NEHUSHTAN.

(3) Teraphim:

(4) Image of Jealousy:

Image of jealousy (cemel).—It is not certain what this statue was which was set up by the door of the inner gate of the Jerusalem temple (Eze 8:3). It was no doubt some idol, perhaps the image of the Asherah (2Ki 21:7; 23:6), which certainly. had previously been set up in the temple and may have been there again in this day of apostasy. "Jealousy" is not the name of the idol, but it was probably called "image of jealousy" because in a peculiar manner this particular image seems to have been drawing the people from the worship of Yahweh and therefore provoking Him to jealousy.

(5) Chambers of Imagery:

Chambers of imagery (chadhre maskitho).—Does Ezekiel mean that in his heart every man in his chambers of imagery was an idol-worshipper, or does this refer to actual wall decorations in the Jerusalem Temple (Eze 8:11,12)? Most expositors take it literally. W.R. Smith has been followed almost if not quite universally in his supposition that a debased form of vermin-worship is described in the "creeping things and abominable beasts" (Eze 8:10). But while this low and ignorant worship was an ancient cult, it had been banished for centuries from respectable heathen worship, and it seems inconceivable that these Israelites who were of the highest class could have fallen to these depths, or if they had done so that the Tammuz and sun-worship should have been considered so much worse (Eze 8:13,14). To the writer it seems more probable that the references are to Egyptian or Greek mysteries which would be described by a Hebrew just as Ezekiel describes this secret chamber. It is now known that the Greek mysteries experienced a revival at exactly this era, and it was probably this revival which was making itself felt in Jerusalem, for Greek influence was at this time greatly affecting Palestine (see Duruy, Hist of Greece, II, 126-80, 374; Cobern, Commentary on Ezekiel and Daniel, 80-83, 280-82; and separate articles, CHAMBERS OF IMAGERY; IMAGERY).

(6) Ephod:

Ephod (’ephodh).—There is no doubt that this was the name of a vestment or ritual loin cloth of linen worn by common priests and temple servants and on special occasions by the king (1Sa 2:18; 22:18; 2Sa 6:14). The ephod of the high priest was an ornamental waist coat on the front of which was fastened the holy breastplate containing the pocket in which were the Urim and Thummim (Ex 28:6,30; 29:5; 39:2-5; Le 8:28).

There are several passages, however, which have convinced many scholars that another ephod is mentioned which must be an image of Yahweh (see EPHOD). The chief passages relied upon are Jud 8:26,27, where Gideon made an ephod with 1,700 shekels of gold and "set" this in Ophrah, where it became an object of worship. So in Jud 17:4; 18:14-20, 1Sa 23:6,9; 30:7, etc.Micah provides an ephod as well as an image and pillar for his sanctuary; in 1Sa 21:9 the sword of Goliath is preserved behind the ephod; while in various places the will of Yahweh is ascertained, not by putting on the ephod, but by "bringing it near" and "bearing" and "carrying" it (1Sa 23:6,9; 30:7, etc.). On the basis of these passages Kautzsch (HDB, V, 641) concludes most inconsistently that the ephod appears "exclusively as an image of Yahweh." Driver, after an examination of each text, concludes that just in one passage (Jud 8:27) the term "ephod" is certainly used of the gold casing of an image, and that therefore it may also have this meaning in other passages (HDB, I, 725). It does not seem quite certain, however, that a ceremonial vestment heavily ornamented with gold might not have been "set" or "erected" in a holy place where later it might become an object of worship. If this had been an idolatrous image, would Hosea have deplored its loss (Ho 3:4), and would its use not have been forbidden in some Bible passage?

Kautzsch’s view that the ephod meant primarily the garment used to clothe Divine image, which afterward gave its name to the image itself, is a guess unsustained by the Scriptures quoted or, I think, by any archaeological parallel. We conclude that there is no certain proof that this was an image of Yahweh, though was used ritualistically in receiving the oracles of Yahweh (compare Kuenen, Religion of Israel, I, 100; Kittel, Hist of the Hebrews, II, 42; Konig, Die Hauptprobleme, 59-63).

See also IDOLATRY; CALF, GOLDEN.

LITERATURE.

See especially W.R. Smith, Religion of the Semites; E. B. Tylor, Primitive Culture; J. G. Frazer, Golden Bough (3 vols); Baethgen, Beitrage zur sem. Rel.-Gesch.; Kittel, Hist of the Hebrews; Nowack, Hebrew Arch., II; Baudissin, Studien z. sem. Rel.-Gesch. For recent excavations, L.P.H. Vincent, Canaan d’apres l’expl. recente, 1907; R.A.S. Macalister, The Excavation of Gezer (1912); William Hayes Ward, Cylinders and Other Ancient Oriental Seals, 1909.

Camden M. Cobern

i-maj-i-na’-shun (yetser, sheriruth; dianoia): "Imagination" is the translation of yetser, properly "a shaping," hence, "a thought" (Ge 6:5; 8:21; De 31:21; 1Ch 28:9; 29:18). In Isa 26:3 yetser is translated "mind" (King James Version margin "thought" or "imagination"), "whose mind is stayed on thee" (the Revised Version margin "or imagination"); in Ps 103:14 it is "frame"; of sheriruth, "obstinacy," "stubbornness" (De 29:19; Jer 3:17; 7:24; 9:14; 11:8; 13:10; 16:12; 18:12; 23:17); in Ps 81:12 the King James Version it is, "lust," margin "hardness or imaginations"; 3 times of machashebheth, "thought" or "purpose" in the King James Version (Pr 6:18; La 3:60,61); once of dianoia, "mind," "understanding" (Lu 1:51); of logismos, "reasoning" (2Co 10:5); and of dialogismos, "reasoning through" (Ro 1:21 the King James Version).

The Revised Version (British and American) gives "stubbornness" in each instance where sheriruth is in the King James Version translated "imagination"; in Pr 6:18 the American Standard Revised Version has "purposes"; the Revised Version (British and American) has "devices" (La 3:60,61) and "reasonings" (Ro 1:21), "imagination" for "conceit" (Pr 18:11), and (English Revised Version) for "device" (La 3:62).

"Imagination" is frequent in Apocrypha, e.g. Ecclesiasticus 22:18 (dianoema); 37:3 (enthumema, "wicked imagination"); 40:2 (dialogismos, the Revised Version (British and American) "expectation").

W. L. Walker

i-maj’-in (chashabh; meletao): The word most frequently translated "to imagine" in the Old Testament, only in the King James Version and the English Revised Version, not in the American Standard Revised Version, is chashabh, "to bind," "combine," "think" (Job 6:26; Ps 10:2; 21:11; 140:2; Ho 7:15; Na 1:9,11; Zec 7:10; 8:17); we have also haghah in the King James Version and the English Revised Version, but not in the American Standard Revised Version, "to meditate," "mutter," "speak" (Ps 2:1; 38:12); zamam, "to devise" (Ge 11:6 the King James Version); charash, "to grave," "devise" (Pr 12:20 the King James Version); hathath, "to break in upon," to "attack unjustly" (Ps 62:3 the King James Version); meletao, "to meditate" (Ac 4:25).

W. L. Walker

i-mal-ku’-e (Imalkoue; the King James Version Simalcue): An Arabian prince to whom Alexander Balas entrusted the upbringing of his young son Antiochus. Tryphon, who had formerly been on the side of Alexander, persuaded Imalcue to set up the young Antiochus (Antiochus VI) against Demetrius, who had incurred the enmity of his men of war (1 Macc 11:39,40). Antiochus confirmed Jonathan in the high-priesthood and appointed him to be one of the king’s friends (11:57). In Josephus (Ant., XIII, v, 1) the name is given as Malchus.

J. Hutchison

im’-la (yimlah, "fullness"?): Father of the prophet Micaiah (1Ki 22:8,9; 2Ch 18:7,8).

i-mak’-u-lat kon-sep’-shun:

1. Definition:

The historic designation of the Roman Catholic dogma promulgated by Pope Pius IX on December 8, 1854, in the Papal Bull entitled "Ineffabilis Deus." The term is often incorrectly applied, even by those whose intelligence should make such an error impossible, to the VIRGIN BIRTH of Christ (which see).

2. Statement of the Dogma:

The central affirmation of this proclamation, which was read in Peter’s in the presence of over two hundred bishops, is expressed in the following words: It is proclaimed "by the authority of our Lord Jesus Christ and the blessed Apostles Peter and Paul and in our own authority, that the doctrine which holds the blessed Virgin Mary to have been, from the first instant of her conception, by a singular grace and privilege of Almighty God, in view of the merits of Christ Jesus the Saviour of Mankind, preserved free from all stain of original sin, was revealed by Cod, and is, therefore, to be firmly and constantly believed by all the faithful" (see Schaff, A History of the Creeds of Christendom, II, 211, 212).

3. Objections to the Dogma:

(1) Drawn from Specifically Protestant Principles.

Objections to the dogma are mainly two:

(a) the claim to authority upon which the proclamation rests. There is every reason to believe that one of the major motives to the entire transaction was the wish, on the part of Pius and his advisers, to make an unmistakable assertion of absolute doctrinal authority by the Roman pontiff. To Protestants of all shades of opinion there would be unbearable offense in the wording of the decree, even if assent could be given to the doctrine itself. The whole vital issue of the Reformation is involved in the use by an ecclesiastic of the words "in our own authority" in addition to the words "by the authority of our Lord Jesus Christ and the blessed Apostles Peter and Paul."

(b) The tendency to Mariolatry in the entire movement. As we shall see, the ascription of Divine honors to Mary is avoided in the public statement of the dogma and in the defense of it by Roman Catholic writers, but one has but to survey the course of discussion leading up to the publication of 1854, and subsequent to it, to discover a growing tendency to lift Mary out of the realm of human beings and to endow her with Divine attributes and functions. An extended discussion of Mariolatry lies beyond the range of this article (see MARY); it is only necessary to point out the obvious connections (see Roman Catholic Dictionary and church histories, sub loc.).

(2) Drawn from Roman Catholic Principles.

It is far from the truth to suppose that there are no objections to this modern dogma save those which are specifically Protestant. From the viewpoint of the devout Roman Catholic, and for the sake of the prestige of the papacy, this particular dogma seems to have been unfortunately chosen.

(a) It Has No Basis in Scripture.

The only attempt made to provide a Scriptural argument is by using a vague and unsatisfactory parallel between Mary and Eve before the Fall, to be found in the writings of certain church Fathers who did not hold the papal dogma but unconsciously provided a slender and most insecure basis for it (see inacanus). Most Roman Catholic writers are intelligent enough to admit that theory of inspired tradition alone can be appealed to in support of the idea. The ordinary and only tenable argument is that the ecclesiastical promulgation and acceptance of the doctrine prove its apostolic origin (see Catholic Dictionary, sub loc.).

(b) It Weakens the Authority of the Church.

It would almost seem as if the doctrines of ecclesiastical authority and particularly of papal infallibility had, in this unfortunate proclamation, reached a reductio ad obsurdum for the comfort of their foes. Notice with care the historical standing of this dogma:

(i) The acknowledged absence of all positive evidence for apostolic origin and primitive authority (see Catholic Dictionary ut supra).

(ii) The abundant positive evidence that the principal Fathers of the early church did not believe in the sinlessness of Mary (see list of names and references given by H.C. Sheldon, History of the Christian Church, sub loc.).

(iii) The uncertain and equivocal testimony per contra drawn from the early Fathers. They are practically confined to the following: Ephrem Syrus (Carmina, Hymn 27, strophe 8), where he says "Truly it is Thou and Thy mother only who are fair altogether. For in Thee there is no stain and in Thy mother no spot"; Augustine (De Natura et Gratia, cap. 26), "Two were made simple, innocent, perfectly like each other, Mary and Eve," etc. To these may be added the words of Irenaeus: "The knot of Eve’s disobedience was untied by Mary’s obedience" (Catholic Dictionary, 422). In regard to these three passages it may reasonably be contended that even if these statements necessarily implied the Immaculate Conception of Mary, which they certainly do not, they would still have to be estimated against the many weighty statements which may be brought forward on the other side.

(iv) The prolonged controversy over the doctrine. From the earliest time when the idea of Mary’s miraculous freedom from sin appears, up to the Old Catholic agreement of 1874, devout and faithful Roman Catholics have protested against the addition of this unscriptural dogma to the faith of the church. Bonaventura (Locus Theol., VII, 1) says: "All the saints who have made mention of this matter, with one mouth have asserted that the blessed Virgin was conceived in original sin." With the statement of the Old Catholic agreement we may safely sum up the ecclesiastical situation, even from the viewpoint of those who hold to the doctrinal validity of tradition. Art. X reads: "We reject the New Roman doctrine of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary, as being contrary to the tradition of the first 13 centuries, according to which Christ alone is conceived without sin."

(3) Drawn from General Considerations of Christian Doctrine.

The most serious objections to this offensive and gratuitous dogma are not at all specifically Protestant but, rather, broadly Christian. It is necessary at this point to assure ourselves that we understand (as many Protestants evidently do not) just what is meant by the doctrine as a doctrine. According to the accepted Roman Catholic explanation, Mary, at the supposed stage of her conception when the soul was actually infused into the body waiting for it, received the special grace of God whereby she was delivered from all stain of original sin. The point which Protestants need especially to note is that, according to Roman Catholic ideas, this gracious act of God was performed on the basis of the foreseen merits of Christ’s sacrifice. This tones down the offensiveness of the doctrine in that it does not per se imply the equality of Mary with Christ, but rather the contrary, in so far as the grace bestowed upon her was gained by anticipation from Him. Roman Catholic writers naturally emphasize this fact in recommending the doctrine to Protestant minds. None the less the offense remains. The "Immaculate Conception" necessarily implies the "immaculate life," and on the same basis of supernatural grace, else would the special miracle have occurred in vain and the fall of Adam been repeated in Mary. Hence, a full account of the doctrine would be that Mary was completely and miraculously redeemed at her conception and completely and miraculously kept from sin throughout her whole life. Apart from all questions as to the rightful place of Mary in Christian thought, this idea involves utter doctrinal confusion. It means that Mary never became a true human being and never lived a true human life. Redemption by a miraculous process begun at conception and carried on throughout the life is an utter impossibility, for the Holy Spirit does not work impersonally, and miraculous holiness which is holiness of a purely Divine character, without a free, cooperating human factor, is no human holiness at all. This dogma reads Mary out of the human family, reduces her to an image and makes her life a phantasm. Moreover, the parallels which are adduced in its support are not true parallels at all.

Our Lord’s sinlessness was not mechanically guaranteed by His miraculous conception (see VIRGIN BIRTH) but was His own achievement through the Holy Spirit granted to Him and personally appropriated. The Hallowing of Children at the Font (see Catholic Dictionary, 470a), the sanctifying of those "separated from the womb" (Ga 1:15) to God’s service, does not imply the miraculous guarantee of artificial sinlessness, but such a gracious influence as enables the subject freely cooperating to obtain victory over sin as a controlling principle. Actual sin and need of forgiveness is not pretermitted by such special grace.

We can only say, in conclusion, that every reason, which usually operates in a Christian mind to insure rejection of a false teaching, ought to preclude the possibility of accepting this peculiar dogma which is Scripturally baseless, historically unjustified and doctrinally unsound.

LITERATURE.

The best simple and reasonably fair-minded discussion of this dogma from the Roman Catholic viewpoint is to be found in the Catholic Dictionary already mentioned, where wide references will be found. For the Protestant view consult any authoritative church history, especially that of Professor H.C. Sheldon where copious references to Patristic literature will be found.

Louis Matthews Sweet

i-man’-u-el (‘immanu’el): The name occurs but 3 times, twice in the Old Testament (Isa 7:14; 8:8), and once in the New Testament (Mt 1:23). It is a Hebrew word signifying "God is with us." The form "Emmanuel" appears in Septuagint (Emmanouel).

1. Isaiah Rebukes Ahaz:

In 735 BC Ahaz was king of Judah. The kingdom of Israel was already tributary to Assyria (2Ki 15:19,20). Pekah, king of Israel, a bold and ambitious usurper, and Rezin, king of Syria, formed an alliance, the dual object of which was, first, to organize a resistance against Assyria, and second, to force Ahaz to cooperate in their designs against the common tyrant. In the event of Ahaz’ refusal, they planned to depose him, and to set the son of Tabeel, a choice of their own, upon the throne of David. To this end they waged war against Judah, advancing as far as Jerusalem itself, but without complete success (Isa 7:1). Ahaz, a weak king, and now panic-stricken, determined to invoke the aid of Tiglath-pileser, king of Assyria (2Ki 16:7). This he actually did at a later stage in the war (2Ki 6:9; 15:29). Such a course would involve the loss of national independence and the payment of a heavy tribute. At this period of crisis, Isaiah, gathering his disciples around him (Isa 8:16), is told to deliver a message to the king. Ahaz, though making a show of resistance against the coalition, is in reality neither depending upon the help of Yahweh nor upon the courage of his people. Isaiah, in an effort to calm his fears and prevent the fatal alliance with Assyria, offers him a sign. This method is specially characteristic of this prophet. Fearing to commit himself to the policy of Divine dependence, but with a pretense at religious scruples, "Neither will I tempt Yahweh," the king refuses (Isa 7:12). The prophet then chides him bitterly for his lack of faith, which, he says, not only wearies men, but God also (Isa 7:13).

2. The Sign of "Immanuel":

He then proceeds to give him a sign from God Himself, the sign of "Immanuel" (Isa 7:14). The interpretation of this sign is not clear, even apart from its New Testament application to Christ. The Hebrew word translated "virgin" in English Versions of the Bible means, more correctly, "bride," in the Old English sense of one who is about to become a wife, or is still a young wife. Ps 68:25 English Versions of the Bible gives "damsels."

Isaiah predicts that a young bride shall conceive and bear a son. The miracle of virgin-conception, therefore, is not implied. The use of the definite article before "virgin" (ha-‘almah) does not of itself indicate that the prophet had any particular young woman in his mind, as the Hebrew idiom often uses the definite article indefinitely. The fact that two other children of the prophet, like Hosea’s, bore prophetic and mysterious names, invites the conjecture that the bride referred to was his own wife. The hypothesis of some critics that a woman of the harem of Ahaz became the mother of Hezekiah, and that he was the Immanuel of the prophet’s thought is not feasible. Hezekiah was at least 9 years of age when the prophecy was given (2Ki 16:2).

Immanuel, in the prophetic economy, evidently stands on the same level with Shear-jashub (Isa 7:3) as the embodiment of a great idea, to which Isaiah again appeals in Isa 8:8 (see ISAIAH, VII).

3. Was It a Promise or a Threat?:

The question as to whether the sign given to Ahaz was favorable or not presents many difficulties. Was it a promise of good or a threat of judgment? It is evident that the prophet had first intended an omen of deliverance and blessing (Isa 7:4,7). Did the king’s lack of faith alter the nature of the sign? Isa 7:9, "If ye will not believe," etc., implies that it might have done so. The omission of 7:16, and especially the words "whose two kings thou abhorrest," greatly simplifies this theory, as "the land," singular, would more naturally refer to Judah than to Syria and Ephraim collectively. The omen would then become an easily interpreted threat, referring to the overthrow of Judah rather than that of her enemies. Immanuel should eat curdled milk and honey (7:15), devastation reducing the land from an agricultural to a pastoral one. The obscure nature of the passage as it stands suggests strongly that it has suffered from interpolation. The contrary theory that the sign was a promise and not a prediction of disaster, has much to commend it, though it necessitates greater freedom with the text. The name "Immanuel" implies the faith of the young mother of the child in the early deliverance of her country, and a rebuke to the lack of that quality in Ahaz. It is certain also that Isaiah looked for the destruction of Syria and Ephraim, and that, subsequent to the Assyrian invasion, salvation should come to Judah through the remnant that had been faithful (11:11). The fact that the prophet later gave the name of Maher-shalal-hash-baz to his new-born son, a name of good omen to his country, further strengthens this position. The omission of 7:15,17 would make the sign a prophecy of the failure of the coalition. It is plain, whichever theory be accepted, that something must be eliminated from the passage to insure a consistent reading.

4. Its Relation to the Messianic Hope:

The question now presents itself as to what was the relation of Immanuel to the Messianic prophecies. Should the emphasis be laid upon "a virgin," the son, or the name itself? For traditional interpretation the sign lay in the virgin birth, but the uncertainty of implied virginity in the Hebrew noun makes this interpretation improbable. The identification of the young mother as Zion personified, and of the "son" as the future generation, is suggested by Whitehouse and other scholars. But there is no evidence that the term ‘almah was used at that time for personification. The third alternative makes Immanuel a Messiah in the wider use of the term, as anticipated by Isaiah and his contemporaries. There can be little doubt but that there existed in Judah the Messianic hope of a national saviour (2Sa 7:12). Isaiah is expecting the arrival of one whose character and work shall entitle him to the great names of 9:6. In him should dwell all the fullness of God. He was to be "of the stem of Jesse," the bringer of the Golden Age. The house of David is now beset by enemies, and its reigning representative is weak in faith. The prophet therefore announces the immediate coming of the deliverer. If he had intended the virgin-conception of Christ in the distant future, the sign of "Immanuel" would have possessed no immediate significance, nor would it have been an omen to Ahaz. With regard to the Messianic idea, Mic 5:3 ("until the time that she who travaileth hath brought forth") is of importance as indicating the prevalent thought of the time. Recent evidence shows that even in Babylonia and Egypt there existed expectations of a divinely born and wonderful saviour. To this popular tradition the prophet probably appealed, his hearers being easily able to appreciate the force of oracular language that is to us obscure. There is much to confirm the view, therefore, that the prophecy is Messianic.

5. The Virgin Birth:

The use of the word as it relates to the virgin birth of Christ and the incarnation cannot be dealt with here (see PERSON OF CHRIST). These facts, however, may be noted. The Septuagint (which has parthenos, "virgin") and the Alexandrian Jews interpreted the passage as referring to the virgin birth and the Messianic ministry. This interpretation does not seem to have been sufficiently prominent to explain the rise of the idea of miraculous virgin conception and the large place it has occupied in Christological thought.

See VIRGIN BIRTH.

Arthur Walwyn Evans

im’-er (’immer):

(1) A priest of David’s time (1Ch 24:14), whose descendants are mentioned in Ezr 2:37; 10:20; Ne 3:29; 7:40; 11:13.

(2) A priest of Jeremiah’s time (Jer 20:1).

(3) A place in Babylonia (Ezr 2:59; Ne 7:61).

i-mor’-tal, im-or-tal’-i-ti (athanasia, 1Co 15:53; 1Ti 6:16, aphtharsia, literally, "incorruption," Ro 2:7; 1Co 15; 2Ti 1:10, aphthartos, literally, "incorruptible," Ro 1:23; 1Co 15:52; 1Ti 1:17):

1. Preliminary—Need of Definition and Distinction

2. Biblical Conception

I. THE NATURAL BELIEF

1. Its Origin

2. Philosophical Arguments

(1) The Soul Spiritual

Soul not Inherently Indestructible

(2) Capacities of Human Nature

(3) The Moral Argument

II. THE BIBLICAL DOCTRINE—THE OLD TESTAMENT

1. Starting-Point—Man’s Relation to God

Man’s Nature

2. Sin and Death

3. Grace and Redemption—The True Immortality

Deliverance from Sheol

4. Later Jewish Thought

III. THE CHRISTIAN HOPE

1. Immortality through Christ

(1) Survival of the Soul

(2) Union with Christ in Unseen World

(3) The Resurrection

(4) The Wicked Also Raised

(5) Eternal Life

2. Contrasts

LITERATURE

1. Preliminary—Need of Definition and Distinction:

In hardly any subject is it more necessary to be careful in the definition of terms and clear distinction of ideas, especially where the Biblical doctrine is concerned, than in this of "immortality." By "immortality" is frequently meant simply the survival of the soul, or spiritual part of man, after bodily death. It is the assertion of the fact that death does not end all. The soul survives. This is commonly what is meant when we speak of "a future life," "a future state," "a hereafter." Not, however, to dwell on the fact that many peoples have no clear conception of an immaterial "soul" in the modern sense (the Egyptians, e.g. distinguished several parts, the Ka, the Ba, etc., which survived death; often the surviving self is simply a ghostly resemblance of the earthly self, nourished with food, offerings, etc.), there is the more serious consideration that the state into which the surviving part is supposed to enter at death is anything but a state which can be described as "life," or worthy to be dignified with the name "immortality." It is state peculiar to "death" (see DEATH); in most cases, shadowy, inert, feeble, dependent, joyless; a state to be dreaded and shrunk from, not one to be hoped for. If, on the other hand, as in the hope of immortality among the nobler heathen, it is conceived of, as for some, a state of happiness—the clog of the body being shaken off—this yields the idea, which has passed into so much of our modern thinking, of an "immortality of the soul," of an imperishableness of the spiritual part, sometimes supposed to extend backward as well as forward; an inherent indestructibility.

2. Biblical Conception:

It will be seen as we advance, that the Biblical view is different from all of these. The soul, indeed, survives the body; but this disembodied state is never viewed as one of complete "life." For the Bible "immortality" is not merely the survival of the soul, the passing into "Sheol" or "Hades." This is not, in itself considered, "life" or happiness. The "immortality" the Bible contemplates is an immortality of the whole person—body and soul together. It implies, therefore, deliverance from the state of death. It is not a condition simply of future existence, however prolonged, but a state of blessedness, due to redemption and the possession of the "eternal life" in the soul; it includes resurrection and perfected life in both soul and body. The subject must now be considered more particularly in its different aspects.

I. The Natural Belief.

1. Its Origin:

In some sort the belief in the survival of the spirit or self at death is a practically universal phenomenon. To what is it traceable? A favorite hypothesis with anthropologists is that it has its origin in dreams or visions suggesting the continued existence of the dead (compare H. Spencer, Eccles. Instit., chapters i, xiv). Before, however, a dream can suggest the survival of the soul, there must be the idea of the soul, and of this there seems a simpler explanation in the consciousness which even the savage possesses of something within him that thinks, feels and wills, in distinction from his bodily organs. At death this thinking, feeling something disappears, while the body remains. What more natural than to suppose that it persists in some other state apart from the body? (Compare Max Muller, Anthrop. Religion, 281.) Dreams, etc., may help this conviction, but need not create it. It is only as we assume such a deeper root for the belief that we can account for its universality and persistence. Even this, however, while an instinctive presumption, can hardly be called a proof of survival after death, and it does not yield an idea of "immortality" in any worthy sense. It is at most, as already said, a ghostly reduplication of the earthly life that is thus far reached.

2. Philosophical Arguments:

(1) The Soul Spiritual.

The more philosophical arguments that are adduced for the soul’s immortality. (or survival) are not all of equal weight. The argument based on the metaphysical essence of the soul (see Plato’s Phaedo) is not in these days felt to be satisfying. On the other hand, it can be maintained against the materialist on irrefragable grounds that the soul, or thinking spirit, in man is immaterial in Nature, and, where this is granted, there is, or can be, no proof that death, or physical dissolution, destroys this conscious spirit. The presumption is powerfully the other way. Cicero of old argued that death need not even be the suspension of its powers (compare Tusc. Disp. i.20); Butler reasons the matter from analogy (Anal., I, chapter i); modern scientists like J.S. Mill (Three Essays, 201) and Professor Huxley (Life and Letters, I, 217 ff; compare William James, Ingersoll Lecture) concede that immortality cannot be disproved. The denial one hears from various sides more frequently than formerly is therefore not warranted. Still possibility is not certainty, and there is nothing as yet to show that even if the soul survives death, its new state of existence has in it anything desirable.

Soul not Inherently Indestructible

It was hinted that one use which the Greeks made of the metaphysical argument was to prove the indestructibility of the soul—its immortality in the sense of having no beginning and no end. This is not the Christian doctrine. The soul has no such inherent indestructibility. It is dependent on God, as everything else is, for its continued existence. Did He withdraw His sustaining power, it would cease to exist. That it does continue to exist is not doubted, but this must be argued on other grounds.

(2) Capacities of Human Nature.

A much more apprehensible argument for immortality—more strictly, of a future state of existence—is drawn from the rich capacities and possibilities of human nature, for which the earthly life affords so brief and inadequate a sphere of exercise. It is the characteristic of spirit that it has in it an element of infinitude, and aspires to the infinite. The best the world can give can never satisfy it. It has in it the possibility of endless progress, and ever higher satisfaction. It was this consideration which led Kant, with all his theoretical skepticism, to give immortality a place among his "doctrinal beliefs" (see his Critique of Pure Reason, Bohn’s translation, 590-91), and moved J.S. Mill to speak of it as the only hope which gave adequate scope to the human faculties and feelings, "the loftier aspirations being no longer kept down by a sense of the insignificance of human life by the disastrous feeling of ‘not worth while’ "( Three Essays, 249). Yet when these arguments are calmly weighed, they amount to no more than a proof that man is constituted for immortality; they do not afford a guarantee that this destiny might not be forfeited, or if they yield such a guarantee for the good, they hardly do so for the wicked. The belief, in their case, must depend on other considerations.

(3) The Moral Argument.

It is, as Kant also felt, when we enter the moral sphere that immortality, or the continued existence of the soul, becomes a practical certainty to the earnest mind. With moral personality is bound up the idea of moral law and moral responsibility; this, in turn, necessitates the thought of the world as a moral system, and of God as moral Ruler. The world, as we know it, is certainly a scene of moral administration—of probation, of discipline, of reward and penalty—but as obviously a scene of incomplete moral administration. The tangled condition of things in this life can satisfy no one’s sense of justice. Goodness is left to suffer; wickedness outwardly triumphs. The evil-doer’s own conscience proclaims him answerable, and points to future judgment. There is need for a final rectification of what is wrong here. But while a future state seems thus called for, this does not of itself secure eternal existence for the wicked, nor would such existence be "immortality" in the positive sense. In view of the mystery of sin, the lamp of reason grows dim. For further light we must look to revelation. II. The Biblical Doctrine—the Old Testament.

1. Starting-Point—Man’s Relation to God:

The Biblical view of immortality starts from man’s relation to God. Man, as made in the image of God (Ge 1:27), is fitted for the knowledge of God, for fellowship with Him. This implies that man is more than an animal; that he has a life which transcends time. In it already lies the pledge of immortality if man is obedient.

Man’s Nature.

With this corresponds the account given of man’s creation and original state. Man is a being composed of body and soul; both are integral parts of his personality. He was created for life, not for mortality. The warning, "In the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die" (Ge 2:17), implies that if man continued obedient he would live. But this is not an immortality of the soul only. It is a life in the body (compare Ge 3:22). Its type is such cases as Enoch and Elijah (Ge 5:24; 2Ki 2:11,12; compare Ps 49:15; 73:24).

2. Sin and Death:

The frustration of this original destiny of man comes through sin. Sin entails death (see DEATH). Death in its physical aspect is a separation of soul and body—a breaking up of the unity of man’s personality. In one sense, therefore, it is the destruction of the immortality which was man’s original destiny. It does not, however, imply the extinction of the soul. That survives, but not in a state that can be called "life." It passes into Sheol—the sad, gloomy abode of the dead, in which there is no joy, activity, knowledge of the affairs of earth, or (in the view of Nature) remembrance of God, or praise of His goodness (on this subject, and the Hebrew belief in the future state generally, see ESCHATOLOGY OF THE OLD TESTAMENT; DEATH; SHEOL). This is not future "life"—not "immortality."

It is the part of grace and redemption to restore immortality in the true sense. Had the world been left to develop in sin, no further hope could have come to it. The picture of Sheol would have become ever darker as the idea of retribution grew stronger; it could never become brighter.

3. Grace and Redemption—the True Immortality:

But God’s grace intervened: "Deliver him from going down to the pit, I have found a ransom" (Job 33:24). God’s mercy breaks in on the hopelessness of man’s lot. He gives to man His promises; makes His covenant with man; admits man to His fellowship (Ge 3:15; 4:4; 5:24; 6:8,9; 12:1-3; 15, etc.). In this fellowship the soul was raised again to its true life even on earth. But this held in it also a hope for the future. The promises placed in the forefront as tokens of God’s favors were indeed predominatingly temporal—promises for this life—but within these (the kernel within the shell) was the supreme possession of God Himself (Ps 4:6 f; 16:2). This held in it the hope of redemption and the principle of every good.

Deliverance from Sheol.

Here we reach the core of the Old Testament hope of immortality. Such fellowship as the believer had with God could not be lost, even in Sheol; beyond that was deliverance from Sheol. In their highest moments it was this hope that sustained patriarchs, psalmists, prophets, in their outlook on the future. Doubt might cloud their minds; there might be seasons of darkness and even despair; but it was impossible in moments of strong faith to believe that God would ever really desert them. The eternal God was their dwelling-place; them were everlasting arms (De 33:27; compare Ps 90:1). Their hope of immortality, therefore, was, in principle, the hope not merely of an "immortality of the soul," but likewise of resurrection—of complete deliverance from Sheol. Thus it is clearly in the impassioned outburst of Job (19:25-27; compare 14:13 ff), and in many of the psalms. The hope always clothes itself in the form of complete deliverance from Sheol. Thus in Ps 17:14 f, the wicked have their portion "in this life," but, "As for me, I shall behold thy face in righteousness; I shall be satisfied, when I awake, with thy likeness" (the American Standard Revised Version "with beholding thy form"); and in Ps 49:14 f, the wicked are "appointed as a flock for Sheol," but "God will redeem my soul from the power of Sheol; for he will receive me" (same expression as that regarding Enoch, Ge 5:24; compare Ps 73:24). It will be remembered that when Jesus expounded the declaration, "I am the God of Abraham," etc., it was as a pledge of resurrection (Mt 22:31 f). The idea comes to final expression in the declaration in Da of a resurrection of the just and unjust (12:2). For further development and illustration see ESCHATOLOGY OF THE OLD TESTAMENT.

4. Later Jewish Thought:

Later Jewish thought carried out these ideas of the Old Testament to further issues. A blessed future for the righteous was now accepted, and was definitely connected with the idea of resurrection. The wicked remained in Sheol, now conceived of as a place of retribution. The Gentiles, too, shared this doom.

See ESCHATOLOGY.

III. The Christian Hope.

1. Immortality through Christ:

In full consonance with what is revealed in part in the Old Testament is the hope of immortality discovered in the New Testament. The ring of this joyful hope is heard in every part of the apostolic writings. "Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ," says Peter, "who according to his great mercy begat us again unto a living hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, unto an inheritance incorruptible, and undefiled, and that fadeth not away, reserved in heaven for you" (1Pe 1:3 f). Paul declares, "Our Saviour Christ Jesus, who .... brought life and immortality (incorruption) to light through the gospel" (2Ti 1:10). In Ro 2:7 he had spoken of those who "by patience in well-doing seek for glory and honor and incorruption, eternal life." This immortality, it is seen, is part of the eternal life bestowed through Jesus on believers. It is guaranteed by Christ’s own resurrection and life in glory. The nature of this hope of the gospel may now be further analyzed.

(1) Survival of the Soul.

The soul survives the body. A future state for both righteous and wicked is plainly declared by Jesus Himself. "He that believeth on me," He said to Martha, "though he die, yet shall he live; and whosoever liveth and believeth on me shall never die" (Joh 11:25 f). To His disciples He said, "If I go and prepare a place for you, I come again, and will receive you unto myself; that where I am, there ye may be also" (Joh 14:3). Compare His words to the penitent thief: "To-day shalt thou be with me in Paradise" (Lu 23:43). The survival of both righteous and wicked is implied in the parable of the Rich Man and Lazarus (Lu 16:19-31). So in many other places (e.g. Mt 5:29 f; 10:28; 11:21-24; 12:41, etc.). The same is the teaching of the epistles. The doctrine of a future judgment depends on and presupposes this truth (Ro 2:5-11; 2Co 5:10, etc.).

(2) Union with Christ in Unseen World.

Death for the redeemed, though a result of sin, does not destroy the soul’s relation to God and to Christ. The eternal life implanted in the soul in time blossoms in its fruition into the life and blessedness of eternity (Ro 8:10 f; Php 1:21; Col 1:27). The soul is, indeed, in an incomplete state till the resurrection. It "waits for our adoption, to wit, the redemption of our body" (Ro 8:23). But its state, though incomplete, is still a happy one. Hades has lost its gloom, and is for it a "Paradise" (Lu 23:43). It dwells in a chamber of the Father’s house (Joh 14:2 f; 17:24). It is to be, even in the unclothed state ("absent from the body"), "at home with the Lord" (2Co 5:8). It is for it an object of desire to be "with Christ" in that state after death (Php 1:21). The pictures in Rev, though highly figurative, indicate a condition of great blessedness (Re 7:9-17).

(3) The Resurrection.

The fullness of the blessedness of immortality implies the resurrection. The resurrection is a cardinal article of Christ’s teaching (Mt 22:29-32; Joh 5:25-29; 11:23-26). He Himself is the Lord of life, and life-giver in the resurrection (Joh 5:21,25,26; 11:25, "I am the resurrection, and the life"). The resurrection of believers is secured by His own resurrection. Jesus died; He rose again (see RESURRECTION). His resurrection carries with it the certainty of the resurrection of all His people. This is the great theme of 1Co 15. As Christ lives, they shall live also (Joh 14:19). The believers who are alive at His Parousia shall be changed (1Co 15:51; 1Th 4:17); those who are dead shall be raised first of all (1Th 4:16). The resurrection body shall be a body like to Christ’s own (Php 3:21)—incorruptible, glorious, powerful, spiritual, immortal (1Co 15:42 ff, 53 f). This is not to be confused with sameness of material particles (1Co 15:37 f), yet there is the connection of a vital bond between the old body and the new. This is the hope of the believer, without which his redemption would not be complete.

(4) The Wicked Also Raised.

The wicked also are raised, not, however, to glory, but for judgment (Joh 5:29; Ac 24:15; Re 20:12-15). The same truth is implied in all passages on the last judgment. Excluded from the blessedness of the righteous, their state is described by both Jesus and His apostles as one of uttermost tribulation and anguish (e.g. Mt 25:46; Mr 9:43-50; Ro 2:8 f). This is not "immortality" or "life," though the continued existence of the soul is implied in it (see PUNISHMENT, EVERLASTING; HELL; RETRIBUTION).

(5) Eternal Life.

The condition of the blessed in their state of immortality is one of unspeakable felicity of both soul and body forever. There are, indeed, degrees of glory—this is carefully and consistently taught (Mt 25:14; Lu 19:12; 1Co 3:10-15; 15:41; Php 3:10-14; 2Ti 4:7; 1Joh 2:28)—but the condition as a whole is one of perfect satisfaction, holiness and blessedness (compare Mt 13:43; 25:34; Ro 2:7,10; Ro 12:3 ff, etc.). The blessedness of this eternal state includes such elements as the following:

(1) restoration to God’s image and likeness to Christ (1Co 15:49; 2Co 3:18; Eph 4:24; Col 3:10; 1 Joh 3:2);

(2) perfect holiness in the possession of God’s Spirit (2Co 7:1; Php 1:6; Re 21:27; 22:4,11);

(3) the unveiled vision of God’s glory (Re 22:4; compare Ps 17:15);

(4) freedom from all sorrow, pain and death (Re 21:3 f);

(5) power of unwearied service (Re 22:3).

2. Contrasts:

The contrast between the Biblical view of immortality and that of heathenism and of the schools will now be obvious. It is not mere future existence; not a bare, abstract immortality of the soul; it is the result of redemption and of renewal by God’s spirit; it embraces the whole personality, soul and body; it is not shared by the unholy; it includes the perfection of rational, moral and spiritual blessedness, in an environment suitable to such glorified existence. As such it is the supreme prize after which every believer is called to strive (Php 3:13 f).

LITERATURE.

Ingersoll Lectures on Immortality, by Professor William James, Professor Osler, etc.; Salmond, Christian Doctrine of Immortality; Orr, Christian View of God and the World, Lects iv, v, with App. to v; works specified in the article on ESCHATOLOGY.

James Orr

i-mu-ta-bil’-i-ti, i-mu’-ta-b’-l (ametathetos): Occurs in Heb 6:17,18 of the unchangeableness of the Divine counsel. It is the perfection of Yahweh that He changes not in character, will, purpose, aim (Mal 3:6; so of Christ, Heb 13:8).

See FAITHFULNESS; UNCHANGEABLE.

im’-na (yimna‘): A descendant of Asher (1Ch 7:35).

im’-na (yimnah):

(1) Eldest son of Asher (Ge 46:17, the King James Version "Jimnah"; Nu 26:44, the King James Version "Jimna"; 1Ch 7:30).

(2) A Levite of Hezekiah’s time (2Ch 31:14).

im’-nits (yimni): Descendants of IMNAH (q.v. (1)) (Nu 26:44, the King James Version "Jimnites").

im-part’ (metadidomi, "to share"): "They .... imparted (the King James Version "added") nothing to me" (Ga 2:6); that is, did not propose any correction or addition to my teaching. "That I may impart unto you some spiritual gift" (Ro 1:11) expresses the apostle’s hope that the Roman believers may increase in faith and love through his teaching and influence.

"To impart unto you .... our own souls" (1Th 2:8) meant to spend their utmost strength and to expose their lives in their service.

im-ped’-i-ment: Found in Mr 7:32, "had an impediment in his speech," as a translation of mogilalos, comparative of mogos, "toil" and lalos, "speech," i.e. one who speaks with difficulty. In the Septuagint the word is used as a translation of ‘illem, "dumb" (Isa 35:6).

im-pled’ (Ac 19:38 the King James Version, "Let them impIead one another"): "Implead" means "to sue at law," hence, the Revised Version (British and American) "Let them accuse one another." Court days are kept, let them prosecute the suit in court and not settle matters in riot. egkalein, means "to call in," "to call to account."

im-por’-ta-b’l (dusbastaktos): An obsolete word, meaning "unbearable" (Latin: im, "not," portabilis, "bearable") found in Pr Man, "Thine angry threatening (the Revised Version (British and American) "the anger of thy threatening") toward sinners is importable"; compare Rheims version, Mt 23:4, "heavy burdens and importable"; Chaucer ("Clerk’s Tale" C.T.), "For it were importable though they wolde."

im-por-tu’-ni-ti: Occurs only in Lu 11:8, where it is the rendering of anaideia (Westcott-Hort, anaidia). This Greek word implies an element of impudent insistence rising to the point of shamelessness which the English word "importunity" fails to express, thus weakening the argument of the parable, which is that if by shameless insistence a favor may be won, even from one unwilling and ungracious, still more surely will God answer the earnest prayer of His people. God’s willingness to give exceeds our ability to ask. The parable teaches by way of contrast, not by parallel.

David Foster Estes

im-po-zish’-un.

See HANDS, IMPOSITION (LAYING ON) OF.

im-pos’-i-b’-l (verb adunateo; adjective adunatos): "To be impossible" is the translation of adunateo, "to be powerless," "impotent" (Mt 17:20; Lu 1:37, the Revised Version (British and American) "void of power") adunatos, "powerless," etc., is translated "impossible" Mt 19:26; Mr 10:27; Lu 18:27; Heb 6:4,18; 11:6; "impossible" in Heb 6:4 is in the Revised Version (British and American) transferred to 6:6); anendektos, "not to be received" or "accepted," is also translated "impossible" (Lu 17:1). In several of these passages it is affirmed that "nothing is impossible with God," but, of course, this means nothing that is consistent with the Divine nature, e.g. (as Heb 6:18) it is not possible for God to lie. So, when it is said that nothing is impossible to faith, the same limitation applies and also that of the mind or will of God for us. But much more is possible to a strong faith than a weak faith realizes, or even believes.

W. L. Walker

im’-po-tent (astheneo, adunatos): The verb signifies "to be without strength," and derivatives of it are used in Joh 5:3,7 the King James Version and Ac 4:9 to characterize the paralyzed man at Bethesda and the cripple at the Temple gate. For the same condition of the Lystra lame man the word adunatos is used, which is synonymous. In these cases it is the weakness of disease. In this sense the word is used by Shakespeare (Love’s Labor Lost, V, ii, 864; Hamlet, I, ii, 29). The impotent folk referred to in the Epistle of Jeremy (Baruch 6:28) were those weak and feeble from age and want; compare "impotent and snail-paced beggary" (Richard III, IV, iii, 53).

Alexander Macalister

im-priz’-’-n-ment.

See PUNISHMENTS; PRISON.

im-pu’-ri-ti.

See UNCLEANNESS.

im-pu-ta’-shun:

I. MEANING AND USE OF THE TERM

II. THE THREEFOLD USE OF THE TERM IN THEOLOGY

Original Sin, Atonement, Justification

III. THE SCRIPTURAL BASIS OF THESE DOCTRINES

1. Imputation of Adam’s Sin to His Posterity

2. Imputation of the Sins of His People to Christ

3. Imputation of the Righteousness of Christ to His People

LITERATURE

I. Meaning and Use of the Term.

The word "imputation," according to the Scriptural usage, denotes an attributing of something to a person, or a charging of one with anything, or a setting of something to one’s account. This takes place sometimes in a judicial manner, so that the thing imputed becomes a ground of reward or punishment. The word is used in the King James Version a number of times to translate the Hebrew verb chashabh and the Greek verb logizomai. These words, both of which occur frequently in Scripture, and which in a number of instances mean simply "to think," express the above idea. That this is the case is clear also from the other English words used in the King James Version to translate these Hebrew and Greek words, as, for example, "to count," "to reckon," "to esteem." Thus chashabh is translated in the King James Version by the verb "to impute" (Le 7:18; 17:4; 2Sa 19:19); by the verb "to reckon" (2Sa 4:2); by "to count" as something (Le 25:31 English versions). The verb in 1Sa 22:15 is sim. Similarly, logizomai is translated by the verb "to impute" (Ro 4:6,8,11,22,23,24; 2Co 5:19; Jas 2:23); by the verb "to count" (Ro 2:26; 4:3,5); "to account" (Ga 3:6); and by the verb "to reckon" (Ro 4:4,9,10). In the Revised Version (British and American) the word used to render logizomai is the verb "to reckon."

These synonyms of the verb "to impute" bring out the idea of reckoning or charging to one’s account. It makes no difference, so far as the meaning of imputation is concerned, who it is that imputes, whether man (1Sa 22:15) or God (Ps 32:2); it makes no difference what is imputed, whether a good deed for reward (Ps 106:30 f) or a bad deed for punishment (Le 17:4); and it makes no difference whether that which is imputed is something which is personally one’s own prior to the imputation, as in the case above cited, where his own good deed was imputed to Phinehas (Ps 106:30 f), or something which is not personally one’s own prior to the imputation, as where Paul asks that a debt not personally his own be charged to him (Phm 1:18). In all these cases the act of imputation is simply the charging of one with something. It denotes just what we mean by our ordinary use of the term. It does not change the inward state or character of the person to whom something is imputed. When, for example, we say that we impute bad motives to anyone, we do not mean that we make such a one bad; and just so in the Scripture the phrase "to impute iniquity" does not mean to make one personally bad, but simply to lay iniquity to his charge. Hence, when God is said "to impute sin" to anyone, the meaning is that God accounts such a one to be a sinner, and consequently guilty and liable to punishment. Similarly, the non-imputation of sin means simply not to lay it to one’s charge as a ground of punishment (Ps 32:2). In the same manner, when God is said "to impute righteousness" to a person, the meaning is that He judicially accounts such a one to be righteous and entitled to all the rewards of a righteous person (Ro 4:6,11).

II. The Threefold Use of the Term in Theology.

Original Sin, Atonement, Justification:

Three acts of imputation are given special prominence in the Scripture, and are implicated in the Scriptural doctrines of Original Sin, Atonement and Justification, though not usually expressed by the words chashabh and logizomai. Because, however, of its "forensic" or "judicial" meaning, and possibly through its use in the Vulgate (Jerome’s Latin Bible, 390-405 A.D.) to translate logizomai in Ro 4:8, the term "imputation" has been used in theology in a threefold sense to denote the judicial acts of God by which the guilt of Adam’s sin is imputed to his posterity; by whi