Reference: Heathen
Easton
(Heb plural goyum). At first the word goyim denoted generally all the nations of the world (Ge 18:18; comp. Ga 3:8). The Jews afterwards became a people distinguished in a marked manner from the other goyim. They were a separate people (Le 20:23; 26:14-45; De 28), and the other nations, the Amorites, Hittites, etc., were the goyim, the heathen, with whom the Jews were forbidden to be associated in any way (Jos 23:7; 1Ki 11:2). The practice of idolatry was the characteristic of these nations, and hence the word came to designate idolaters (Ps 106:47; Jer 46:28; La 1:3; Isa 36:18), the wicked (Ps 9:5,15,17).
The corresponding Greek word in the New Testament, ethne, has similar shades of meaning. In Ac 22:21; Ga 3:14, it denotes the people of the earth generally; and in Mt 6:7, an idolater. In modern usage the word denotes all nations that are strangers to revealed religion.
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After all, Abraham will surely become a great and powerful nation, and all the nations on the earth will pronounce blessings on one another using his name.
You must not walk in the statutes of the nation which I am about to drive out before you, because they have done all these things and I am filled with disgust against them.
"'If, however, you do not obey me and keep all these commandments -- if you reject my statutes and abhor my regulations so that you do not keep all my commandments and you break my covenant -- read more. I for my part will do this to you: I will inflict horror on you, consumption and fever, which diminish eyesight and drain away the vitality of life. You will sow your seed in vain because your enemies will eat it. I will set my face against you. You will be struck down before your enemies, those who hate you will rule over you, and you will flee when there is no one pursuing you. "'If, in spite of all these things, you do not obey me, I will discipline you seven times more on account of your sins. I will break your strong pride and make your sky like iron and your land like bronze. Your strength will be used up in vain, your land will not give its yield, and the trees of the land will not produce their fruit. "'If you walk in hostility against me and are not willing to obey me, I will increase your affliction seven times according to your sins. I will send the wild animals against you and they will bereave you of your children, annihilate your cattle, and diminish your population so that your roads will become deserted. "'If in spite of these things you do not allow yourselves to be disciplined and you walk in hostility against me, I myself will also walk in hostility against you and strike you seven times on account of your sins. I will bring on you an avenging sword, a covenant vengeance. Although you will gather together into your cities, I will send pestilence among you and you will be given into enemy hands. When I break off your supply of bread, ten women will bake your bread in one oven; they will ration your bread by weight, and you will eat and not be satisfied. "'If in spite of this you do not obey me but walk in hostility against me, I will walk in hostile rage against you and I myself will also discipline you seven times on account of your sins. You will eat the flesh of your sons and the flesh of your daughters. I will destroy your high places and cut down your incense altars, and I will stack your dead bodies on top of the lifeless bodies of your idols. I will abhor you. I will lay your cities waste and make your sanctuaries desolate, and I will refuse to smell your soothing aromas. I myself will make the land desolate and your enemies who live in it will be appalled. I will scatter you among the nations and unsheathe the sword after you, so your land will become desolate and your cities will become a waste. "'Then the land will make up for its Sabbaths all the days it lies desolate while you are in the land of your enemies; then the land will rest and make up its Sabbaths. All the days of the desolation it will have the rest it did not have on your Sabbaths when you lived on it. "'As for the ones who remain among you, I will bring despair into their hearts in the lands of their enemies. The sound of a blowing leaf will pursue them, and they will flee as one who flees the sword and fall down even though there is no pursuer. They will stumble over each other as those who flee before a sword, though there is no pursuer, and there will be no one to take a stand for you before your enemies. You will perish among the nations; the land of your enemies will consume you. "'As for the ones who remain among you, they will rot away because of their iniquity in the lands of your enemies, and they will also rot away because of their ancestors' iniquities which are with them. However, when they confess their iniquity and their ancestors' iniquity which they committed by trespassing against me, by which they also walked in hostility against me (and I myself will walk in hostility against them and bring them into the land of their enemies), and then their uncircumcised hearts become humbled and they make up for their iniquity, I will remember my covenant with Jacob and also my covenant with Isaac and also my covenant with Abraham, and I will remember the land. The land will be abandoned by them in order that it may make up for its Sabbaths while it is made desolate without them, and they will make up for their iniquity because they have rejected my regulations and have abhorred my statutes. In spite of this, however, when they are in the land of their enemies I will not reject them and abhor them to make a complete end of them, to break my covenant with them, for I am the Lord their God. I will remember for them the covenant with their ancestors whom I brought out from the land of Egypt in the sight of the nations to be their God. I am the Lord.'"
or associate with these nations that remain near you. You must not invoke or make solemn declarations by the names of their gods! You must not worship or bow down to them!
You terrified the nations with your battle cry; you destroyed the wicked; you permanently wiped out all memory of them.
The nations fell into the pit they had made; their feet were caught in the net they had hidden.
The wicked are turned back and sent to Sheol; this is the destiny of all the nations that ignore God,
Deliver us, O Lord, our God! Gather us from among the nations! Then we will give thanks to your holy name, and boast about your praiseworthy deeds.
Hezekiah is misleading you when he says, "The Lord will rescue us." Has any of the gods of the nations rescued his land from the power of the king of Assyria?
I, the Lord, tell you not to be afraid, you descendants of Jacob, my servant, for I am with you. Though I completely destroy all the nations where I scatter you, I will not completely destroy you. I will indeed discipline you but only in due measure. I will not allow you to go entirely unpunished."
(Gimel) Judah has departed into exile under affliction and harsh oppression. She lives among the nations; she has found no resting place. All who pursued her overtook her in narrow straits.
When you pray, do not babble repetitiously like the Gentiles, because they think that by their many words they will be heard.
Then he said to me, 'Go, because I will send you far away to the Gentiles.'"
And the scripture, foreseeing that God would justify the Gentiles by faith, proclaimed the gospel to Abraham ahead of time, saying, "All the nations will be blessed in you."
in order that in Christ Jesus the blessing of Abraham would come to the Gentiles, so that we could receive the promise of the Spirit by faith.
Fausets
(See GENTILES .)
Hastings
Morish
The Hebrew word goi is also translated 'Gentiles,' and 'people,' and very often 'nations:' it is used in contrast to Israel irrespective of those designated being civilised or not. All the nations were idolaters, but this is not implied in the word goi, nor in the qno" -->????? of the N.T., which is more frequently translated 'nations' and 'Gentiles.' In Mt 18:17 ??????? has a peculiar application: if an offending brother will not bear the church, the injunction is "let him be unto thee as an heathen man and a publican," that is, as an outsider, the heathen being outside the privileges of Israel, as one to be avoided: cf. Ro 16:17; 2Th 3:6,14.
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If he refuses to listen to them, tell it to the church. If he refuses to listen to the church, treat him like a Gentile or a tax collector.
Now I urge you, brothers and sisters, to watch out for those who create dissensions and obstacles contrary to the teaching that you learned. Avoid them!
Smith
Hea'then.
[GENTILES]
See Gentiles