Reference: Proselytes
Fausets
geerim. 1Ch 22:2, "the strangers," in Septuagint "proselytes, i.e. comers to Palestine, sojourners (Ex 12:48; 20:10; 22:21; Le 19:33). In New Testament converts to Judaism, "comers to a new and God-loving polity" (Philo). Israel's religious attitude attracted neighbouring people from the first. The Shechemites are an instance, only that passion and interest were their motive (Genesis 34). Circumcision was required as the condition. At the Exodus "a mixed multitude went up with Israel" (Ex 12:38). "The stranger" was bound by the law of the Sabbath (Ex 20:10; 23:12; De 5:14) and the Passover when he was circumcised (Ex 12:19,48), the feast of weeks (De 16:11), tabernacles (De 16:14), the day of atonement (Le 16:29), prohibited marriages (Le 18:26), and blood (Le 17:10), and Moloch worship (Le 20:2), and blasphemy (Le 24:16).
The city of refuge was open to him (Nu 35:15). Kind treatment in remembrance of Israel's own position as strangers formerly in Egypt (Ex 22:21; 23:9; De 10:18-19; Le 19:33-34), justice (Le 24:22; De 1:16; 24:17,19-21), share in gleanings and tithe of the third year (De 14:29), were the stranger's right. But he could not hold land nor intermarry with Aaron's descendants (Le 19:10; 21:14), he is presumed to be in a subject condition (De 29:11); Hobab and the Kenites (Nu 10:29-32; Jg 1:16), Rahab of Jericho (Jos 6:25), and the Gibeonites as "hewers of wood and drawers of water" (Joshua 9), are instances of strangers joined to Israel. The strangers were assembled with Israel at the feast of tabernacles at the cnd of every seven years, to hear the law (De 31:10-12; Jos 8:34-35).
Under the kings strangers rose to influential positions: Doeg the Edomite (1Sa 21:7), Uriah the Hittite (2Sa 11:3), Araunah the Jebusite (2Sa 24:23), Zelek the Ammonite (2Sa 23:37), Ithmah the Moabite (1Ch 11:46, the law in De 23:3 forbidding an Ammonite or Moabite to enter the congregation to the tenth generation does not forbid their settlement in Israel, the law must have been written in times long before David whose great grandmother was Ruth the Moabtress), Ittai the Gittite (2Sa 15:19), Shebna the secretary of state under Hezekiah (2Ki 18:37; Isa 22:15), Ebedmelech the Ethiopian under Zedekiah (Jer 38:7), the Cherethites and Pelethites. (See CHERETHITES; PELETHITES.) Hezekiah's triumph over Sennacherib was followed by many bringing gifts: unto Jehovah to Jerusalem (2Ch 32:23); this suggested the prophecy in Psalm 87 that Rahab (Egypt) and Babylon (whose king Merodach Baladan had sent a friendly embassy to Hezekiah), Philistia, Tyre, and Ethiopia should be spiritually born (Ps 51:5,10; 22:31; Isa 66:8; Joh 3:3,5; both Old and New Testament teach the need of the new birth) in Jerusalem as proselytes.
Tyre's alliance with David was a prophetic earnest of its future union with the kingdom of God, of which the Syrophoenician woman was a firstfruit (Mr 7:26), as Candace's eunuch the proselyte (Acts 8) was a pledge of Ethiopia's conversion. In times of judgment on Israel for apostasy the stranger became "the head" (De 28:43-44); but under David and Solomon they were made to do bondservice, 70,000 bearers of burdens, 80,000 hewers, 3,600 overseers (1Ch 22:2; 2Ch 2:17-18). In Ps 94:6, as the pagan do not make widow and strangers their chief object of attack, "the stranger" is probably the saint in relation to this world (Ps 39:12), and "the widow" is the widowed church awaiting Christ's glorious epiphany to avenge her on antichrist (Lu 18:3-8).
All the prophets anticipate the future sharing of proselytes in the kingdom of God, and even in the Holy Land as "sojourners" (Eze 47:22; Isa 2:2; 11:10; 56:3-6; Mic 4:1), and meantime plead their cause (Jer 7:6; Eze 22:7,29; Zec 7:10; Mal 3:5). After the return from Babylon many "had separated themselves from the people of the lands unto the law of God" with their families (Ne 10:28). Many, in Esther's time (Es 8:17), "of the people of the land became Jews, for the fear of the Jews fell upon them." In New Testament times these appear in the synagogues (Ac 13:42-43,50; 17:4; 18:7), come up to the feasts at Jerusalem (Ac 2:10). Roman centurions, a class promoted for military good conduct, were noble specimens of these proselytes (Lu 7:5; Ac 10:2,7,30), and were most open to gospel truth.
But Jewish fanaticism sought proselytes also by force and fraud, as John Hyrcanus offered the Idumeans the alternative of death, exile, or circumcision (Josephus, Ant. xiii, 9, section 3). Casuistry released the proselyte from moral obligations admitted before; and superstition chained him anew, hand and foot, e.g. the korban (Mt 15:4-6); and circumcision, canceling all previous relationships, admitted of incestuous marriages. Any good in paganism was lost, and all that was bad in traditional Judaism was acquired. Thus the proselyte became "twofold more the child of hell" than the scribes themselves (Mt 23:15). Considering that the end justified the means, the scribes "compassed sea and land to make one proselyte," yet, when made, the Jews despised the proselyte as a "leprosy cleaving (in perversion of Isa 14:1) to the house of Jacob"; "no wise man would trust a proselyte to the 24th generation" (Jalkuth, Ruth f. 163 a). They classed them into
(1) "Love proselytes," wishing to gain the beloved one.
(2) Man for woman or woman for man, where one embraced the married partner's Judaism.
(3) Esther proselytes, to escape danger (Es 8:17).
(4) King's table proselytes, seeking to gain court favor, as under Solomon.
(5) Lion proselytes, through dread of judgments: 2Ki 17:26 (Gem. Hieros., Kiddush 65, section 6). Simon ben Gamaliel said: "when a pagan comes to enter the covenant we ought to stretch out, our hand to him and bring him under the wings of God" (Jost, Judenth. 1:447).
The distinction between "proselytes of the gate" (from Ex 20:10, "the stranger that is within thy gates") and "proselytes of righteousness" was minutely drawn by the talmudic rabbis and Maimonides (Hilc. Mel. 1:6). The proselytes of the gate were not bound to circumcision, only to the seven precepts of Noah, namely, the six said to have been given to Adam:
(1) against idolatry,
(2) blasphemy,
(3) bloodshed,
(4) uncleanness,
(5) theft,
(6) the precept of obedience to authorities, and
(7) that given to Noah against "flesh with the blood"; but he had not the full Israelite privileges, he must not study the law nor redeem his firstborn.
But all this is rabbinical systematizing theory; in fact, the New Testament only in a general way recognizes two degrees of converts to Judaism. The eunuch of Candace was a sample of the full convert, circumcised and baptized at his admission (Otho, Lex Rabb., Baptism, for which the rabbis quoted Ex 19:10), followed by his presenting the corban offering of two turtle doves, as after a birth (Le 12:8). The presumed existence of this proselyte baptism for males and females throws light on John's baptism and the priests' question, "why baptizest thou then?" (Joh 1:25) and Joh 3:5,10, the Lord's words to Nicodemus, "art thou a master (teacher) of Israel, and knowest not these things?" Nicodemus ought to have understood the deeper sense to which Christ applied the familiar phrase "new birth" in connection with "baptism" of proselytes.
However, there is no mention of baptism of proselytes in the Bible, the Apocrypha, Philo, Josephus, or the older targums. The centurion Cornelius was a proselyte of a less strict kind, which the rabbis would call a proselyte of the gate; otherwise a special revelation would not have been needed to warrant Peter's opening the gospel kingdom to him, as it had not been needed to open the gospel to Candace's eunuch (Acts 8; 10). "Proselyte" occurs in New Testament only Mt 23:15; Ac 2:10; 6:5; 13:43. The common phrase is" devout men," "fearing" or "worshipping God" (Ac 10:2,7; 13:16,26,43,50; 16:14; 17:4,17; 18:7; Joh 12:20). From them came the largest accession to the Christian church.
See Verses Found in Dictionary
For seven days yeast must not be found in your houses, for whoever eats what is made with yeast -- that person will be cut off from the community of Israel, whether a foreigner or one born in the land.
A mixed multitude also went up with them, and flocks and herds -- a very large number of cattle.
"When a foreigner lives with you and wants to observe the Passover to the Lord, all his males must be circumcised, and then he may approach and observe it, and he will be like one who is born in the land -- but no uncircumcised person may eat of it.
"When a foreigner lives with you and wants to observe the Passover to the Lord, all his males must be circumcised, and then he may approach and observe it, and he will be like one who is born in the land -- but no uncircumcised person may eat of it.
The Lord said to Moses, "Go to the people and sanctify them today and tomorrow, and make them wash their clothes
but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God; on it you shall not do any work, you, or your son, or your daughter, or your male servant, or your female servant, or your cattle, or the resident foreigner who is in your gates.
but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God; on it you shall not do any work, you, or your son, or your daughter, or your male servant, or your female servant, or your cattle, or the resident foreigner who is in your gates.
but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God; on it you shall not do any work, you, or your son, or your daughter, or your male servant, or your female servant, or your cattle, or the resident foreigner who is in your gates.
"You must not wrong a foreigner nor oppress him, for you were foreigners in the land of Egypt.
"You must not wrong a foreigner nor oppress him, for you were foreigners in the land of Egypt.
"You must not oppress a foreigner, since you know the life of a foreigner, for you were foreigners in the land of Egypt.
For six days you are to do your work, but on the seventh day you must cease, in order that your ox and your donkey may rest and that your female servant's son and any hired help may refresh themselves.
If she cannot afford a sheep, then she must take two turtledoves or two young pigeons, one for a burnt offering and one for a sin offering, and the priest is to make atonement on her behalf, and she will be clean.'"
"This is to be a perpetual statute for you. In the seventh month, on the tenth day of the month, you must humble yourselves and do no work of any kind, both the native citizen and the foreigner who resides in your midst,
"'Any man from the house of Israel or from the foreigners who reside in their midst who eats any blood, I will set my face against that person who eats the blood, and I will cut him off from the midst of his people,
You yourselves must obey my statutes and my regulations and must not do any of these abominations, both the native citizen and the resident foreigner in your midst,
You must not pick your vineyard bare, and you must not gather up the fallen grapes of your vineyard. You must leave them for the poor and the foreigner. I am the Lord your God.
When a foreigner resides with you in your land, you must not oppress him.
When a foreigner resides with you in your land, you must not oppress him. The foreigner who resides with you must be to you like a native citizen among you; so you must love him as yourself, because you were foreigners in the land of Egypt. I am the Lord your God.
"You are to say to the Israelites, 'Any man from the Israelites or from the foreigners who reside in Israel who gives any of his children to Molech must be put to death; the people of the land must pelt him with stones.
He must not marry a widow, a divorced woman, or one profaned by prostitution; he may only take a virgin from his people as a wife.
and one who misuses the name of the Lord must surely be put to death. The whole congregation must surely stone him, whether he is a foreigner or a native citizen; when he misuses the Name he must be put to death.
There will be one regulation for you, whether a foreigner or a native citizen, for I am the Lord your God.'"
Moses said to Hobab son of Reuel, the Midianite, Moses' father-in-law, "We are journeying to the place about which the Lord said, 'I will give it to you.' Come with us and we will treat you well, for the Lord has promised good things for Israel." But Hobab said to him, "I will not go, but I will go instead to my own land and to my kindred." read more. Moses said, "Do not leave us, because you know places for us to camp in the wilderness, and you could be our guide. And if you come with us, it is certain that whatever good things the Lord will favor us with, we will share with you as well."
These six towns will be places of refuge for the Israelites, and for the foreigner, and for the settler among them, so that anyone who kills any person accidentally may flee there.
I furthermore admonished your judges at that time that they should pay attention to issues among your fellow citizens and judge fairly, whether between one citizen and another or a citizen and a resident foreigner.
but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord your God. On that day you must not do any work, you, your son, your daughter, your male slave, your female slave, your ox, your donkey, any other animal, or the foreigner who lives with you, so that your male and female slaves, like yourself, may have rest.
who justly treats the orphan and widow, and who loves resident foreigners, giving them food and clothing. So you must love the resident foreigner because you were foreigners in the land of Egypt.
Then the Levites (because they have no allotment or inheritance with you), the resident foreigners, the orphans, and the widows of your villages may come and eat their fill so that the Lord your God may bless you in all the work you do.
You shall rejoice before him -- you, your son, your daughter, your male and female slaves, the Levites in your villages, the resident foreigners, the orphans, and the widows among you -- in the place where the Lord chooses to locate his name.
You are to rejoice in your festival, you, your son, your daughter, your male and female slaves, the Levites, the resident foreigners, the orphans, and the widows who are in your villages.
An Ammonite or Moabite may not enter the assembly of the Lord; to the tenth generation none of their descendants shall ever do so,
You must not pervert justice due a resident foreigner or an orphan, or take a widow's garment as security for a loan.
Whenever you reap your harvest in your field and leave some unraked grain there, you must not return to get it; it should go to the resident foreigner, orphan, and widow so that the Lord your God may bless all the work you do. When you beat your olive tree you must not repeat the procedure; the remaining olives belong to the resident foreigner, orphan, and widow. read more. When you gather the grapes of your vineyard you must not do so a second time; they should go to the resident foreigner, orphan, and widow.
The foreigners who reside among you will become higher and higher over you and you will become lower and lower. They will lend to you but you will not lend to them; they will become the head and you will become the tail!
your infants, your wives, and the foreigners living in your encampment, those who chop wood and those who carry water --
He commanded them: "At the end of seven years, at the appointed time of the cancellation of debts, at the Feast of Temporary Shelters, when all Israel comes to appear before the Lord your God in the place he chooses, you must read this law before them within their hearing. read more. Gather the people -- men, women, and children, as well as the resident foreigners in your villages -- so they may hear and thus learn about and fear the Lord your God and carefully obey all the words of this law.
Yet Joshua spared Rahab the prostitute, her father's family, and all who belonged to her. She lives in Israel to this very day because she hid the messengers Joshua sent to spy on Jericho.
Then Joshua read aloud all the words of the law, including the blessings and the curses, just as they are written in the law scroll. Joshua read aloud every commandment Moses had given before the whole assembly of Israel, including the women, children, and resident foreigners who lived among them.
Now the descendants of the Kenite, Moses' father-in-law, went up with the people of Judah from the City of Date Palm Trees to Arad in the desert of Judah, located in the Negev. They went and lived with the people of Judah.
(One of Saul's servants was there that day, detained before the Lord. His name was Doeg the Edomite, who was in charge of Saul's shepherds.)
So David sent someone to inquire about the woman. The messenger said, "Isn't this Bathsheba, the daughter of Eliam, the wife of Uriah the Hittite?"
Then the king said to Ittai the Gittite, "Why should you come with us? Go back and stay with the new king, for you are a foreigner and an exile from your own country.
Zelek the Ammonite, Naharai the Beerothite (the armor-bearer of Joab son of Zeruiah),
I, the servant of my lord the king, give it all to the king!" Araunah also told the king, "May the Lord your God show you favor!"
The king of Assyria was told, "The nations whom you deported and settled in the cities of Samaria do not know the requirements of the God of the land, so he has sent lions among them. They are killing the people because they do not know the requirements of the God of the land."
Eliakim son of Hilkiah, the palace supervisor, accompanied by Shebna the scribe and Joah son of Asaph, the secretary, went to Hezekiah with their clothes torn and reported to him what the chief adviser had said.
Eliel the Mahavite, and Jeribai and Joshaviah, the sons of Elnaam, and Ithmah the Moabite,
David ordered the resident foreigners in the land of Israel to be called together. He appointed some of them to be stonecutters to chisel stones for the building of God's temple.
David ordered the resident foreigners in the land of Israel to be called together. He appointed some of them to be stonecutters to chisel stones for the building of God's temple.
Many were bringing presents to the Lord in Jerusalem and precious gifts to King Hezekiah of Judah. From that time on he was respected by all the nations.
"Now the rest of the people -- the priests, the Levites, the gatekeepers, the singers, the temple attendants, and all those who have separated themselves from the neighboring peoples because of the law of God, along with their wives, their sons, and their daughters, all of whom are able to understand --
Throughout every province and throughout every city where the king's edict and his law arrived, the Jews experienced happiness and joy, banquets and holidays. Many of the resident peoples pretended to be Jews, because the fear of the Jews had overcome them.
Throughout every province and throughout every city where the king's edict and his law arrived, the Jews experienced happiness and joy, banquets and holidays. Many of the resident peoples pretended to be Jews, because the fear of the Jews had overcome them.
They will come and tell about his saving deeds; they will tell a future generation what he has accomplished.
Hear my prayer, O Lord! Listen to my cry for help! Do not ignore my sobbing! For I am dependent on you, like one residing outside his native land; I am at your mercy, just as all my ancestors were.
Look, I was guilty of sin from birth, a sinner the moment my mother conceived me.
Create for me a pure heart, O God! Renew a resolute spirit within me!
They kill the widow and the one residing outside his native land, and they murder the fatherless.
In the future the mountain of the Lord's temple will endure as the most important of mountains, and will be the most prominent of hills. All the nations will stream to it,
At that time a root from Jesse will stand like a signal flag for the nations. Nations will look to him for guidance, and his residence will be majestic.
The Lord will certainly have compassion on Jacob; he will again choose Israel as his special people and restore them to their land. Resident foreigners will join them and unite with the family of Jacob.
This is what the sovereign master, the Lord who commands armies, says: "Go visit this administrator, Shebna, who supervises the palace, and tell him:
No foreigner who becomes a follower of the Lord should say, 'The Lord will certainly exclude me from his people.' The eunuch should not say, 'Look, I am like a dried-up tree.'" For this is what the Lord says: "For the eunuchs who observe my Sabbaths and choose what pleases me and are faithful to my covenant, read more. I will set up within my temple and my walls a monument that will be better than sons and daughters. I will set up a permanent monument for them that will remain. As for foreigners who become followers of the Lord and serve him, who love the name of the Lord and want to be his servants -- all who observe the Sabbath and do not defile it, and who are faithful to my covenant --
Who has ever heard of such a thing? Who has ever seen this? Can a country be brought forth in one day? Can a nation be born in a single moment? Yet as soon as Zion goes into labor she gives birth to sons!
Stop oppressing foreigners who live in your land, children who have lost their fathers, and women who have lost their husbands. Stop killing innocent people in this land. Stop paying allegiance to other gods. That will only bring about your ruin.
An Ethiopian, Ebed Melech, a court official in the royal palace, heard that Jeremiah had been put in the cistern. While the king was holding court at the Benjamin Gate,
They have treated father and mother with contempt within you; they have oppressed the foreigner among you; they have wronged the orphan and the widow within you.
The people of the land have practiced extortion and committed robbery. They have wronged the poor and needy; they have oppressed the foreigner who lives among them and denied them justice.
You must allot it as an inheritance among yourselves and for the foreigners who reside among you, who have fathered sons among you. You must treat them as native-born among the people of Israel; they will be allotted an inheritance with you among the tribes of Israel.
In the future the Lord's Temple Mount will be the most important mountain of all; it will be more prominent than other hills. People will stream to it.
You must not oppress the widow, the orphan, the foreigner, or the poor, nor should anyone secretly plot evil against his fellow human being.'
"I will come to you in judgment. I will be quick to testify against those who practice divination, those who commit adultery, those who break promises, and those who exploit workers, widows, and orphans, who refuse to help the immigrant and in this way show they do not fear me," says the Lord who rules over all.
For God said, 'Honor your father and mother' and 'Whoever insults his father or mother must be put to death.' But you say, 'If someone tells his father or mother, "Whatever help you would have received from me is given to God," read more. he does not need to honor his father.' You have nullified the word of God on account of your tradition.
"Woe to you, experts in the law and you Pharisees, hypocrites! You cross land and sea to make one convert, and when you get one, you make him twice as much a child of hell as yourselves!
"Woe to you, experts in the law and you Pharisees, hypocrites! You cross land and sea to make one convert, and when you get one, you make him twice as much a child of hell as yourselves!
The woman was a Greek, of Syrophoenician origin. She asked him to cast the demon out of her daughter.
because he loves our nation, and even built our synagogue."
There was also a widow in that city who kept coming to him and saying, 'Give me justice against my adversary.' For a while he refused, but later on he said to himself, 'Though I neither fear God nor have regard for people, read more. yet because this widow keeps on bothering me, I will give her justice, or in the end she will wear me out by her unending pleas.'" And the Lord said, "Listen to what the unrighteous judge says! Won't God give justice to his chosen ones, who cry out to him day and night? Will he delay long to help them? I tell you, he will give them justice speedily. Nevertheless, when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth?"
So they asked John, "Why then are you baptizing if you are not the Christ, nor Elijah, nor the Prophet?"
Jesus replied, "I tell you the solemn truth, unless a person is born from above, he cannot see the kingdom of God."
Jesus answered, "I tell you the solemn truth, unless a person is born of water and spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God.
Jesus answered, "I tell you the solemn truth, unless a person is born of water and spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God.
Jesus answered, "Are you the teacher of Israel and yet you don't understand these things?
Now some Greeks were among those who had gone up to worship at the feast.
Phrygia and Pamphylia, Egypt and the parts of Libya near Cyrene, and visitors from Rome,
Phrygia and Pamphylia, Egypt and the parts of Libya near Cyrene, and visitors from Rome,
The proposal pleased the entire group, so they chose Stephen, a man full of faith and of the Holy Spirit, with Philip, Prochorus, Nicanor, Timon, Parmenas, and Nicolas, a Gentile convert to Judaism from Antioch.
He was a devout, God-fearing man, as was all his household; he did many acts of charity for the people and prayed to God regularly.
He was a devout, God-fearing man, as was all his household; he did many acts of charity for the people and prayed to God regularly.
When the angel who had spoken to him departed, Cornelius called two of his personal servants and a devout soldier from among those who served him,
When the angel who had spoken to him departed, Cornelius called two of his personal servants and a devout soldier from among those who served him,
Cornelius replied, "Four days ago at this very hour, at three o'clock in the afternoon, I was praying in my house, and suddenly a man in shining clothing stood before me
So Paul stood up, gestured with his hand and said, "Men of Israel, and you Gentiles who fear God, listen:
Brothers, descendants of Abraham's family, and those Gentiles among you who fear God, the message of this salvation has been sent to us.
As Paul and Barnabas were going out, the people were urging them to speak about these things on the next Sabbath. When the meeting of the synagogue had broken up, many of the Jews and God-fearing proselytes followed Paul and Barnabas, who were speaking with them and were persuading them to continue in the grace of God.
When the meeting of the synagogue had broken up, many of the Jews and God-fearing proselytes followed Paul and Barnabas, who were speaking with them and were persuading them to continue in the grace of God.
When the meeting of the synagogue had broken up, many of the Jews and God-fearing proselytes followed Paul and Barnabas, who were speaking with them and were persuading them to continue in the grace of God.
But the Jews incited the God-fearing women of high social standing and the prominent men of the city, stirred up persecution against Paul and Barnabas, and threw them out of their region.
But the Jews incited the God-fearing women of high social standing and the prominent men of the city, stirred up persecution against Paul and Barnabas, and threw them out of their region.
A woman named Lydia, a dealer in purple cloth from the city of Thyatira, a God-fearing woman, listened to us. The Lord opened her heart to respond to what Paul was saying.
Some of them were persuaded and joined Paul and Silas, along with a large group of God-fearing Greeks and quite a few prominent women.
Some of them were persuaded and joined Paul and Silas, along with a large group of God-fearing Greeks and quite a few prominent women.
So he was addressing the Jews and the God-fearing Gentiles in the synagogue, and in the marketplace every day those who happened to be there.
Then Paul left the synagogue and went to the house of a person named Titius Justus, a Gentile who worshiped God, whose house was next door to the synagogue.
Then Paul left the synagogue and went to the house of a person named Titius Justus, a Gentile who worshiped God, whose house was next door to the synagogue.