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between the promise given to Abraham and the giving of the Law. The Law was a
covenant enacted between God and the Jewish people, requiring fulfillment by both
parties. But with the promise to Abraham, all the obligations were assumed by God,
which is implied in the statement, “but God is one.”¶ In the Sept., Job 9:33, daysman.¶
MEDITATE
1.
(
1
, 3191), primarily, “to care for” (akin to
, “care”; cf.
,
“it is a care”), denotes (a) “to attend to, practice,” 1 Tim. 4:15,
RV
, “be diligent in” (
KJV
,
“meditate upon”); to practice is the prevalent sense of the word, and the context is not
against this significance in the
RV
rendering; some mss. have it in Mark 13:11; (b) “to
ponder, imagine,” Acts 4:25. See
IMAGINE
.¶
2.
(
$
1
, 4304), “to premeditate,” is used in Luke 21:14.¶
Note:
In the corresponding passage in Mark 13:11, the most authentic mss. have the verb
, “to be anxious beforehand” (
RV
); see No. 1.
For
MEDDLER
see
BUSYBODY
MEEK, MEEKNESS
A. Adjective.
$
or
(
$ Y
, 4239) denotes “gentle, mild, meek”; for its significance see
the corresponding noun, below, B. Christ uses it of His own disposition, Matt. 11:29; He
gives it in the third of His Beatitudes, 5:5; it is said of Him as the King Messiah, 21:5,
from Zech. 9:9; it is an adornment of the Christian profession, 1 Pet. 3:4.¶ Cf.
,
“gentle, of a soothing disposition,” 1 Thess. 2:7; 2 Tim. 2:24.¶
B. Nouns.
1.
$
, or
, an earlier form, (
$ Y
, 4240) denotes “meekness.” In its
use in Scripture, in which it has a fuller, deeper significance than in nonscriptural Greek
writings, it consists not in a person’s “outward behavior only; nor yet in his relations to
his fellow-men; as little in his mere natural disposition. Rather it is an inwrought grace of
the soul; and the exercises of it are first and chiefly towards God. It is that temper of
spirit in which we accept His dealings with us as good, and therefore without disputing or
resisting; it is closely linked with the word
$
[humility], and follows
directly upon it, Eph. 4:2; Col. 3:12; cf. the adjectives in the Sept. of Zeph. 3:12, “meek
and lowly”; … it is only the humble heart which is also the meek, and which, as such,
does not fight against God and more or less struggle and contend with Him. This
meekness, however, being first of all a meekness before God, is also such in the face of
men, even of evil men, out of a sense that these, with the insults and injuries which they
may inflict, are permitted and employed by Him for the chastening and purifying of His
elect” (Trench,
- !
Sec.xlii). In Gal. 5:23 it is associated with
, “self-control.”
The meaning of
$
“is not readily expressed in English, for the terms meekness,
mildness, commonly used, suggest weakness and pusillanimity to a greater or less extent,
whereas
$
does nothing of the kind. Nevertheless, it is difficult to find a rendering
less open to objection than ‘meekness’; ‘gentleness’ has been suggested, but as
$
describes a condition of mind and heart, and as ‘gentleness’ is appropriate rather to