not under sixty years of age; that they had been “the wife of one man,” probably meaning but once
married ; and that they had led useful and charitable lives. vs. (1 Timothy 5:9,10) We are not
disposed to identify the widows of the Bible either with the deaconesses or with the presbutides
Of the early Church. The order of widows existed as a separate institution, contemporaneously with
these offices, apparently for the same eleemosynary purpose for which it was originally instituted.
Wife
[Marriage]
Wilderness Of The Wandering
(The region in which the Israelites spent nearly 38 years of their existence after they had left
Egypt, and spent a year before Mount Sinai. They went as far as Kadesh, on the southernmost
border of Palestine, from which place spies were sent up into the promised land. These returned
with such a report of the inhabitants and their walled cities that the people were discouraged, and
began to murmur and rebel. For their sin they were compelled to remain 38 years longer in the
wilderness, because it showed that they were not yet prepared and trained to conquer and to hold
their promised possessions. The wilderness of the wandering was the great central limestone plateau
of the sinaitic peninsula. It was bordered on the east by the valley of the Arabah, which runs from
the Dead Sea to the head of the eastern branch of the Red Sea. On the south and south west were
the granite mountains of Sinai and on the north the Mediterranean Sea and the mountainous region
south of Judea. It is called the Desert of Paran, and Badiet et-Tih, which means “Desert of the
Wandering.” The children of Israel were not probably marching as a nation from place to place in
this wilder new during these 38 years, but they probably had a kind of headquarters at Kadesh, and
were “compelled to linger on as do the Bedouin Arabs of the present day, in a half-savage, homeless
state, moving about from place to place, and pitching their tents wherever they could find pasture
for their flocks and herds.”—E.H. Palmer. Toward the close of the forty years from Egypt they
again assembled at Kadesh, and, once more under the leadership of the Shechinah, they marched
down the Arabah on their way to the promised land.—ED.)
Willows
are mentioned in (Leviticus 23:40; Job 40:22; Psalms 137:2; Isaiah 44:4) With respect to the
tree upon which the captive Israelites hung their harps, there can be no doubt that the weeping
willow Salix babylonica, is intended. This tree grows abundantly on the banks of the Euphrates, in
other parts of Asia as in Palestine. The Hebrew word translated willows is generic, and includes
several species of the large family of Salices, which is well represented in Palestine and the Bible
lands, such as the Salix alba, S. viminalis (osier), S. aegyptiaca.
Willows, The Brook Of The
a wady mentioned by Isaiah, (Isaiah 15:7) in his dirge over Moab. It is situated on the southern
boundary of Moab, and is now called Wady el-Aksa.
Wills
Under a system of close inheritance like that of the Jews, the scope forbid bequest in respect
of land was limited by the right of redemption and general re-entry in the jubilee year; but the law
does not forbid bequests by will of such limited interest in land as was consistent with those rights.
The case of houses in walled towns was different, and there can be no doubt that they must, in fact,
have frequently been bequeathed by will, (Leviticus 25:30) Two instances are recorded in the Old
Testament under the law of the testamentary disposition, (1) effected in the case of Ahithophel, ( 2
Samuel 17:23) (2) recommended in the case of Hezekiah. (2 Kings 20:1; Isaiah 38:1) [Heir]
frankie
(Frankie)
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