2. A priestly family which appears in the same lists, Ezr 2*' = Neh 7-", Ezr 10-', Neh 10» [Heb.*]. The name is found also among 'the priests and Levites that went up with Zonibbabel,' Neh 12", where it is miswritten Rehum (:in-)) ; among the heads of priestly families in the days of Joiakim, Neh 12" ; and as the third of the 24 courses, 1 Ch 24". To which family Malchijah the s<m of IlariiM, one of the builders of the wall (Neh 3"), belonged cannot be determined. See GENF.AI.onv.
H. A. White.
HARIPH Cj-in, •pn, cf. ')^^l, ' autumn '). A family which returned from exile with Zembbabel (Neh 7"), and si''ned the covenant, Neh 10" [lli'b.*]. In Ezr 2'" the name ajipears atiJoRAii; so Lucian in Neh 7'"'Iwpi)*. Ilareph C,"'") is named ius a Calebite in 1 Ch 2°', and one of David's com-
304
HARLOT
HAIUMAGEDON
panions in 1 Ch 12' ia termed a Haruphite ('?>iq, ICi-thih/i), or Hariphite ("piq ficre). Tlie latter reaclinK, if correct, perhaps points to a connexion with Hariph. See GENEALOGY.
H. A. White. HARLOT {.ij'ii, nn;) .t^x, nv'ip, LXX an.l NT wipyri) is tlie name used in our En^'lish versions to ilestribe diU'erent classes of women who come under the han of moralitj-. It is sometimes applied generally to women, including married women, of i)rolligate life (Pr), but sjiecially it deuotes those who systematically gave themselves up to sucli a course of life, either for gain, or as a form of religious service. The existence of a class roughly corresponding to that which the name suggests to us may ue traced throughout tlie history of Israel, originating as it did out of universally working conditions, and after tlie Solomonic period developing to the full its shame- lessne.ss, its seductive arts, and its blighting inlluenci) (Is 23'«, Jer 3' 5', Ezk 16==, Pr 7'" 21)'). But in OT times the harlot represented more than a moral problem and a moral danger of the utmost gravity. It is not too much to say that slie was the concrete embodiment of the most powerful and insidious force menacing the purity and perman- ence of Slosaism. Like their kintlred who took possession of the valley of the Euplirates, like the Greeks who were invaded by Phoenician commerce and culture, the Hebrews in Canaan found them- selves in contact witli a type of religion wliich deified the reproductive forces of nature, and paid tliem homage in the form of licentious rites and orgies. The harlot was thus invested w ith sanctity as a member of the religious ca.ste, and the ques- tion was whether a licentious cult was to establish itself in the soil of Jalnvisra even as it naturalized itself in B.ibylon (of. Herod, i. 199), and in Cythera and Corinth (Strabo, viii. 6). And undoubtedly the Canaanitish leaven deeply infected the popular Hebrew religion. In the story of Tamar's intrigue to secure her rights from the house of lier deceased husband (Gn 3S), she is spoken of as a nyip — one of the consecrated class — when she sits at the entrance of a Ullage in the guise oi a harlot. Especially does Hosea (4") give us a vivid picture of the ex- tent to which the local sanctuaries, where tlie worship of Baal and Astarte had been syncretized with that of J", were coloured by the legitimated prostitution of servants of the divinities. In some sanctuaries a still lower depth was reached, and emasculated enthusiasts (DV"ip) earned for the shrine ' the wages of a dog ' by giving themselves up to that 'wiich is against nature.' These practices the prophets of the 8th cent, denounced as the height of impiety and the sure provocation of national judgments (Am 2', Hos 4"'^). By Asa .■iiid .Jehosliaphat steps were taken to purge the l;uid of the viler abomination (1 K 15'- 22^", cf. 14**) ; and the Dauterouomic code explicitly banished both classes of ' paramours ' from Israel, and prohibited the acceptance of their unholy gains as temple-revenue (Dt 23"- ", where see Driver's note in luc. with refl'. ). With idolatry prostitution was made an end of by the Exile. The Levitical legislation recalls the abominations of the Canaan- ites as the special ground of their rejection and destruction (Lv 20=^), and appears to have the class of harlots solely in view as created and sustained by moral depravity. The more important of its enactments are that which forbids a priest to take a harlot to wife (Lv 21'), and the injunction that the daughter of a priest playing the harlot shall be burnt with lire (v.^).
Upon the OT treatment of the subject it may be remarked as startling that there is no express con- demnation of sexual immorality which does not Involye violation of the marriage-bond. At the
most, fornication seems to be condemned in Pr as health- and weaUh-destroying folly, while the general tenor of the OT moralitj' is content to proscribe adultery and religious prostitution. In explanation of this, it may be ob.served that the true ethical attitude towards prostitution wius im- j)0ssible so long as marriage was in the transi- tional stage mirrored in OT, and that the OT at least unfolded a conception of the divine holiness and its relation to sexual purity which was destined to mature into the higher se.xual morality.
In NT the harlot, again, is associated with an important element of teaching. While it was part of the mission of the prophets to refute the horrible idea of the sacrednuss of her calling, it was 8 characteristic part of the work of Jesus to rescue her from the Pharisaic tribunal, and bring her within the pale ot mercy and redemption (Mt 2131.32) gi,g illustrates at once the compassion of Jesus, His insight into the unexpres.sed longings and possibilities of degraded human nature, and the regenerative power of sympathy. In the apostolic writings we see some reiietition of the conflict between the genius of revealed religion and the lax and antagonistic sexual morality of hea- thenism. In the Epistles to the Corinthians especially, St. Paul was addressing a community whose licentiousness had become a hyword even in the putrefying cities of the classical world ; and it is necessary for him to enlighten the Christian conscience as to the incompatibility of union with Christ with its hideous contrast in filthy ' conversa- tion' (1 Co 6'^-"). And in various apostolic passages the prohibition of the Decalogue is ex- plicated or exteniled so as expressly to exclude the sin in question (Gal (!'■'"■).