PENIEL (5x35 only in Gn 32”, LXX Εἴδος θεοῦ), elsewhere PENUEL (5x32). — This name appears on three occasions only, in connexion Soy fe with Jacob, Gideon, and Jeroboam. he word means ‘face of God,’ and is traced in Gn 32” to the fact that Jacob had there seen God ‘face to face.’ Perhaps a different derivation is alluded to in 33 (Wellh. ΤᾺ, xxi. 435). It has been sug-
ted (see Merrill, Last of the Jordan, p. 392) that fhe name may have been originally Εἶτα to some rojecting rock in whose contour a face was seen. We may compareStrabo’s (xvi. 2. 15f.) Θεοῦ πρόσωπον. The place was east of the Jordan, and somewhere on the line of the Jabbok. It was a city whose chief feature was a strong tower or castle (Jg 857), which at a much later period was rebuilt by Jero- boam (1 Καὶ 12%). These facts show that Penuel had considerable strategic importance. It was a at tribe from the eastern desert that invaded alestine and were driven back to their homes by Gideon (Jg6ff.). These invaders always entered the lowlands, that is, the plain of Esdraelon, and there was a main road from the Jordan Valley eastward by which they came and returned. On this road the castle of Penuel was designed to be a protection. Succoth, now Tell Deir' Alla, was on this road, and Penuel was in the hills not far beyond it. Such desert people never go over mountains when there is a good valley route open to them.
In the valley of the Jabbok, 4 miles from Suc-
eoth, two sharp hills, called Tulul edh-Dhahab,
autzsch’s .4 77), Réthel
PENTECOST 739
and covered with ancient ruins, rise to a height of 250 ft. ‘Whether approached from the west or the east, or looked down upon from the mountains above them, they form very striking objects. . . . On one side of the eastern hill a strong wall of massive stones runs from the summit to the foot. . . . The platform of the “tower” or castle was supported by a wall, the remains of which are 15 or 20 ft. high, which extends to a distance of over 100 ft. ese substantial structures, considering the size of the stones employed, must have been built at great expense. Phe stones are unhewn blocks, and appear to date from a remote period’ (Merrill, Last of the Jordan, pp. 390-392). That these desert invaders did not climb over mountains, that they followed a valley route, that the easy and main route to the t was through the valley of the Jabbok, and that at a certain point on this road these ruin-crowned hills exist at no great distance from Succoth,—all this seems to indi- cate them as the most probable site for Penuel. S. MERRILL.
PENINNAH (7333 ‘ pearl’ or ‘red coral’; Φεννάνα ; Phenenna).—The second wife of Elkanah, the father of Samuel. Despite the fact that Peninnah had borne him children, while Hannah, her rival or fellow-wife, was childless, the latter was the more favoured by Elkanah ; and this was doubtless the cause of the ill-will displayed by Peninnah towards her (1S 155). τ F. STENNING.
PENKNIFE (1207 ἫΒ ‘the knife of the scribe’; LXX τὸ ξυρὸν τοῦ γραμματέως [Symm. substitutes σμίλη for Eupév]).—Mentioned only in Jer 3055, where king Jehoiakim cut up Baruch’s roll of Jeremiah’s prophecies. Orientals use a reed pen in writing (calamus, Arab. kdldm), and always carry a knife for the al of mending it. Penknives are made in Damascus and in many of the villages of Lebanon ; they are without pari, ὦ backs, and are like miniature razors. y. CARSLAW.
PENNY.—See Money, p. 428%,
PENSION.—Only 1 Es 4% ‘He commanded to give all that kept the city ——_ and wages’ (xAjpous, AVm ‘portions of land,’ RV lands’). This is one of the ‘archaisms’ which Scrivener (Par. Bible, p. xv) blames the AV translators of the Apocr, for retaining. It is first found in the Geneva version, and is used in the orig. sense of ‘payment’ (Lat. pensio). This wider sense of the word is seen in Robinson’s translation of More's Utopia (Lumby’s ed. i, p. 50, Lupton’s ed. p. 83), ‘An other cummeth in wyth his v. egges, and advyseth ... to bringe to theyr parte certeyne peers of hys courte for greate pensions’ (Lat. certa pensione). J. HASTINGs.
PENTATEUCH.—See HEXATEUCH.
PENTECOST. — This term, adopted from the Gr., means ‘ fiftieth’ (ἡ πτεντηκοστή, scil. ἡμέρα), and was <piees by Greek-speaking Jews, as o'yDg 20 oY was by the Rabbins, to the second of the three chief Heb. festivals, because it fell (Ly 23°") on the fiftieth day after the offering of the barley-sheaf during the feast of unleavened bread (To 2', 2 Mac 12%; Jos. Ant. UL x. 6, XII. viii. 4, XIV. xiii. 4, xvul. x. 2, BJ τι. iii. 1, vi. v. 3; Philo, de Septen. § 21, see also de Decal. οι in NT Ac 9) 20", 1 Co 165. In OT it is called ‘the feast of harvest, the first-fruits of thy labours’ (Ex 23" yypo 25 weer N23, LXX ἑορτὴν θερισμοῦ πρωτογενημάτων τῶν ἔργων cov); ‘the feast of weeks, οἵ the first-fruits of wheat harvest’ (Ex 347 cpn vyp ‘23 πὴρτῷ 29, LXX ἑορτὴν ἑβδομάδων ; so also Dt 16,2Ch 8), and ‘the day of the first-fruits’ (Nu 28% ΟὝΣΣΟ of, LXX τῇ