Talmud. Here also we trace the outline of a Christian institution. The Church, either by itself or
by appointed delegates, was to act as a court of arbitration in all disputes its members. The elders
of the church were not however to descend to the trivial disputes of daily life. For the elders, as
for those of the synagogue, were reserved the graver offences against religion and morals.
Synagogue, The Great
On the return of the Jews from Babylon, a great council was appointed according to rabbinic
tradition, to reorganize the religious life of the people. It consisted of 120 members, and these were
known as the men of the Great Synagogue, the successors of the prophets, themselves, in their turn,
succeeded by scribes prominent, individually, as teachers. Ezra was recognized as president, Their
aim was to restore again the crown, or glory, of Israel. To this end they collected all the sacred
writings of the former ages and their own and so completed the canon of the Old Testament. They
instituted the feast of Purim organized the ritual of the synagogue, and gave their sanction to the
Shemoneh Esreh, the eighteen solemn benedictions in it. Much of this is evidently uncertain. The
absence of any historical mention of such a body, not only in the Old Testament and the Apocrypha,
but in Josephus, Philo, etc., has had some critics to reject the whole statement as a rabbinic invention.
The narrative of (Nehemiah 8:13) clearly implies the existence of a body of men acting as councillors
under the presidency of Ezra; and these may have been an assembly of delegates from all provincial
synagogues-a synod of the national Church.
Syntyche
(with fate), a female member of the church of Philippi. (Philemon 4:2,3) (A.D.57).
Syracuse
the celebrated city on the eastern coast of Sicily. “The city in its splendor was the largest and
richest that the Greeks possessed in any part of the world, being 22 miles in circumference.” St.
Paul arrived thither in an Alexandrian ship from Melita, on his voyage to Rome. (Acts 28:12) The
site of Syracuse rendered it a convenient place for the African corn-ships to touch at, for the harbor
was an excellent one, and the fountain Arethusa in the island furnished an unfailing supply of
excellent water.
Syria
is the term used throughout our version for the Hebrew Aram, as well as for the Greek Zupia.
Most probably Syria is for Tsyria, the country about Tsur or Tyre which was the first of the Syrian
towns known to the Greeks. It is difficult to fix the limits of Syria. The limits of the Hebrew Aram
and its subdivisions are spoken of under Aram. Syria proper was bounded by Amanus and Taurus
on the north by the Euphrates and the Arabian desert on the east, by Palestine on the south, by the
Mediterranean near the mouth of the Orontes, and then by Phoenicia on the west. This tract is about
300 miles long from north to south, and from 50 to 150 miles broad. It contains an area of about
30,000 square miles. General physical features .—The general character of the tract is mountainous,
as the Hebrew name Aram (from a roof signifying “height”) sufficiently implies. The most fertile
and valuable tract of Syria is the long valley intervening between Libanus and Anti-Libanus. Of
the various mountain ranges of Syria, Lebanon possesses the greatest interest. It extends from the
mouth of the Litany to Arka, a distance of nearly 100 miles. Anti-Libanus, as the name implies,
stands lover against Lebanon, running in the same direction, i.e. nearly north and south, and extending
the same length. [Lebanon] The principal rivers of Syria are the Litany and the Orontes. The Litany
springs from a small lake situated in the middle of the Coele-Syrian valley, about six miles to the
southwest of Baalbek. It enters the sea about five miles north of Tyre. The source of the Orontes
frankie
(Frankie)
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