,„ 1,,:.. o- • .. ', or in Ezr 2 and 8 (for other argumenU of a
similar kind, see Kucnen's Essay),
came afterwards to be spoken of as the Great Syna"0','ue was originally a meeting, and lot « permanent institution. ' It met once for al., and everything tliat is told about it, except wliat we read in Nehemiah, is jiure fable of the later Jews (OTJC 169). Historical criticism tlius leaves no place for the Great Synagogue of tradition.
LiTKRATillI!.— Buxtorfs Tiheruif me Comm. Slafsor. (1620) strenuously upholds the traditional view, and is still of value for its copious citation of testimony, which, however, >s u'*^," .',° a very uncritical fashion. On the other side is Ran s Diatribe de S:/n manna (ITie), which, although marked by an excess of anti-Jewish prejudice, shows true critical instinct, and antici- pates some of the weightiest of Kuenen's argumenu. T e question may be considered to have been finally settled, in the sense advocited above, by Kuenen in his famous '"™08"ph. Over (If mannen der groate synagoge, Amsterdam, IS.O Itr. by Budde mGemm. Abhaiuilunjen, pp. 125-ltiOl, whose conclusion, are .accepted by Ryle, Canon o/ OT, IMS. (valuable as con- taining the Jewish testimonies reUed on hv Buxtorf 1 : « ' d^-''°". Enlsteh. den AT A'anoiw, 120 5. ; Buhl, Canon and Text ofUl, 33ff.; W. B. Smith, 0WC2 169f, : and many others. Cf. further, Hartmann, DU enge rerbuidu.md. ^T rnU (LJXl, 120-ir.6; Taylor, Sayinys o/ the Jewish ^ «'*,?;« -Nl^a^^Tost" LOT" Introd. viit. ; Furst, hanan d. 4/" (1868), 12-3- .J°?J; Gesch. d. Jud. u. sein. Sect. i. 41-43, 91 95 f.; Geiger, Drsc/i-yt u UeberseU. d. Bibel, 124 1. ; Wellh. Phar. u. Sad. Ul., Dere.Cu% Emi sar fhistoire de la Palestine, 29-40 (tradi- tionalist) ;Tiontet, £»»ai «r«« ori-j.-^^rff* P. Y^«««/";'7''f pharu-ien (18S3), 91-97 ; Schurer, WV j^.iu 3o4f. IBJP"'- 354 f.l; Heidenheim, • Untersuch. uber die Syn., magna (SK, 1853 pp 93-100); Herzfeld, Gesch.;d. Judenth. a. 22^24 380 ff., iii -^44 1 , 270 f. ; Graetz, 'Die Grosse Versammlung Olonatf "chrift. 1857, pp. 31-37, 61-70); Bloch, Studim Z.Geschd. SaSi. d. dnZ,. i^«;,.(1876)100-132; Hamburger, ^ii. 8-
at least aiiproximately, by combinhig the above list with the lists in Neh s-1' and 95 ■ ' - " -"• " * ...",«"■-<
,milar kind, see 1
The very name 'Synagogue' seems inexplicable except upon Kuenen's view. It calls up neither a college of scribes nor a legislative body, but an assembly for religious service. The word nrj? (see Synagogue) denoted eitlier a congregation met for worsliip on the Sabbatli day, or, by metonymy, the building wliere it met. The name niif;ht be fittin'dy enough applied to the convocation of Nehemiah, which, as Kuenen rem.arks, w.-is not a law ■impoaing, but alaw-rceeti'tn? assembly; fjntl m the account of whose proceedings we hnd all the exercises characteristic of Synagogue worship, such as prayer, the reading of the Law, etc. 1 o this memorable convocation the epithet Great would, for a variety of reasons, be eminently
W. R. Smith agrees with Kuenen that what
tr^D Hoffmann, •DiHi^i.nTrderg^^^^
f Va'.;azin / H-toemo;<. to J,ulenth. x. (1883)43-63 ; S. Krauss.
•The Great Synod' (Jl^fi x. (1893) 347-377).
J. A. Selbie. SYNTYCHE (^wn'-x'?).— A member of thePhilip- pian Church whom St. Paul exliorts to become reconciled to EuoDIA, another member of the same Cliurch. They appear to have held a position of importance in the Church as ladies of some wealth and position, or possibly as deaconesses, like Phoebe in the Roman Churcli (Ro la^). Their disagreement was therefore not only unseemly it was a calamity for the entire Church. Both tlie names, Euodia and Syntyche, occur in the inscrip- tions (Lightfoot, Ep. to tite Philippi'ins*, p. lo8). There is no need, tlierefore, to introduce the far- fetched interpretation of the Tubingen school, that thev are allegorical personages rejiresenting the Jew-ish and Gentile sections of the Church.
J . CtIBB.
SYNZYGUS (TR SifiT"'. tut modem edd. ^u'- f„.yos) —If Simz'/fj'is is a proper name, he was a person to whom St. Paul addressed an entreaty to brin" about a reconciliation between Euodia and Svnrvche, two members of the Phihppian Cliurch who were at variance (Ph 4^). He was at the time in Philippi, and may have been the chief presbyter or bisliop of the Churcli. The sole objection to tliis interpretation-the only natural one-is that Synzygm is nowhere used in Greek literature as a proper name, nor is it found in the inscriptions (but see Vincent, arf loc). It was sut'-'ested by Weizsitcker that it may have been adopted by the bearer after his conversion to Christianity. The other interpretation w that aiVftryos here, as in classical Greek, signifies ' yoke- fellow,' and that the exhortation was addressed to a companion of the apostle who was with hira when he wrote, who was possibly his amanuensis (see vol. iii. p. 841"). Barnab.as, Silas, Epaphro- ditus, and Timotliy have been suggested. Lamsay (St Paul the Trav. 3.58) thinks that Luke was either 'the true yoke-fellow' or the actual bearer of the Epistle to Philippi. The suggestion of Renan (Saint Paul, p. 148) that the 'true yoke- fellow' is Lydia, who had become the wife of the apostle, is hardly to be Uken seriously. ^ ^^^^
SYRACUSE CZvpiKOvaaL, but Vulg. wrongly
SYRACUSE
SYKIAC VERSIONS
613
Binj:. iHi/nauin), situated on the west coast of Sicily, was the principal city of the island, and under the Komans was the capital of the eastern half. After the western half of Sicily was taken from Carthage hy the liunians (B.C. 241) at the close of the lirst I'unic War, the eastern lialf con- tinued to belong to the kingdom of Syracuse in alliance witli Home. In tlie second Punic War, Syracuse took the side of the Carthaginians, b\it was captured by Marcellus in 212, and the whole island thenceforward continued to be a Roman Province, though in two distinct divisions, in eaih of which a qua'stor was stationed, under the authority of the single governing pra;tor, who presided over the whole island.