Jewish synagogues of all ages and countries. The arrangements for the
women’s place in a separate gallery or behind a partition of lattice-work;
the desk in the centre, where the reader, like Ezra in ancient days, from his
‘pulpit of wood,’ may ‘open the book in the sight of all of people and read
in the book of the law of God distinctly, and give the sense, and cause
them to understand the reading’ (Nehemiah 8:4, 8); the carefully closed ark
on the side of the building nearest to Jerusalem, for the preservation of the
rolls or manuscripts of the law; the seats all round the building, whence
‘the eyes of all them that are in the synagogue’ may ‘be fastened’ on him
who speaks (Luke 4:20); the ‘chief seats’ (Matthew 23:6) which were
appropriated to the ‘ruler’ or ‘rulers’ of the synagogue, according as its
organization may have been more or less complete;”, these were features
common to all the synagogues.
Where perfected into a system, the services of the synagogue, which were
at the same hours as those of the temple, consisted, (1) of prayer, which
formed a kind of liturgy, there were in all eighteen prayers; (2) the reading
of the Scriptures in certain definite portions; and (3) the exposition of the
portions read. (See Luke 4:15, 22; Acts 13:14.)
The synagogue was also sometimes used as a court of judicature, in which
the rulers presided (Matthew 10:17; Mark 5:22; Luke 12:11; 21:12; Acts
13:15; 22:19); also as public schools.
The establishment of synagogues wherever the Jews were found in
sufficient numbers helped greatly to keep alive Israel’s hope of the coming
of the Messiah, and to prepare the way for the spread of the gospel in
other lands. The worship of the Christian Church was afterwards modelled
after that of the synagogue.
Christ and his disciples frequently taught in the synagogues (Matthew
13:54; Mark 6:2; John 18:20; Acts 13:5, 15, 44; 14:1; 17:2-4, 10, 17; 18:4,
26; 19:8).
To be “put out of the synagogue,” a phrase used by John (9:22; 12:42;
16:2), means to be excommunicated.
- SYNTYCHE fortunate; affable, a female member of the church at Philippi,
whom Paul beseeches to be of one mind with Euodias (Phil. 4:2,3). - SYRACUSE a city on the south-east coast of Sicily, where Paul landed
and remained three days when on his way to Rome (Acts 28:12). It was