• Peter, 17, 'It was the brazen serpent tliat healed,
not the eye that looked on it ; yet without a look- ing eye, there was no help to the wounded party by the promised virtue.' Though more generally, ' inlluence ' is also the nneaning in Melvill, Diary, 15, ' He was a man of rare wesdonie, judgment, and discretion ; and, tlierfor, mikle imployed in the trysts and etl'eares of the noble and gentle men of the countrc}-, whilk distracted him fra his calling, liinderit his vertew, and schortened his lytl'.' Even Coverdale has the word in the sense of righteous- ness or goodness, Ezk 3**. J. Hastings.
VISION (usually jMrr, Spaiux). In early Heb. re- ligion the vision had its closest allinity with the dream, — by which probably the conception of its character was determined, — and the two are usually coupled as the ordinary sources of prophetic oracles (Nu 12""-, Jer 23^'). Its recognized psycli jlogical condition was an emotional excitement in which the person was no longer master of his own thoughts or will (Nu 24'-f-, 1 S ly-""-). See Trance. In both dream and vision what carried religious significance was the fact that the presentation did not come throtigh the ordinary sense channels, or as a proiluct of the mind's conscious activity. On this account it was accepted as a revelation from God. When we come to the Prophets the concep- tion of revelation has undergone a change in cor- respondence witli religion in general. The dream disappears, together with the rapt utterance ; and prophecy becomes an ethical intercourse of the mind of man with God (Is 8'», Jer 23^). But, while there is no trace of ecstasy in the strict sense or its accompaniments, there are frequent allusions to times of extraordinary elevation of thought and feeling, times therefore of illumination. At such moments an issue becomes clear, a truth breaks on the mind, a resolution is formed (Is 6, Jer P). The result is sometimes presented as if it had come to the prophet in a manner analogous to sense experience, — the prophet sees, hears, questions, replies, — but the broad sense in which vision is used makes it clear that the pictorial intake was not the sotirce of his knowledge or resolution, but rather that the truth, having taken possession of his mind and heart, created the vision as its imaginative clothing. Even a verbal message, with no reference to a voice or appearance, is spoken of as a vision (Is 1' 21^ 22', Mic 1', Hab 2=). In Amos' vision of the ba.sket of summer fruits the motive for using the visional form is evidently the plaj- upon the word j'p. Again, as in the intricate description of Ezk 1, the vision is sometimes of a kind that could hardlj' be pictorially realized. Although, in fact, the primitive jihraseology is retained, — the prophet sees, hears, the hand of the Lord is ujjon him, — it is no longer used in the primitive sense. The vision has become a literary and poetical form consciously employed to embody and communicate truths that have become clear to the inner consciousness. The pre-exilic prophets make only sparing use of the direct visional form. In Ezekiel it is more common, but has lost its earlier imaginative 8i)ontaneitv, and assumed more the ch.aracter of an artilicial construction (Ezk l*"-). It is not found in Deuteio- Isaiah or in Ilaggai ; but it reappears in Zechariah, and con- tinues, in its most artificial form, to he employed by apocalyptic writers. In the NT it linds a place only [but ef. the use of t4 Spa^a in Mt K"] in the apocalyptic book of Revelation, and in those nar- ratives in Acts and the earlier part of Luke that bear the character of popular tradition. (See PkopiieCV and the Literature there cited).
W. Morgan.
VOPHSI (TC! [I'Ut text dub.]; B_'Io/3d, A 'la/JJ). — The lather of Nalibi, the Naphtalito si y, Nu 13'*.
J
872
VOW
VOW
YOW (inj, iij, fuxv)- — It was a universal custom in ancient religions, too natural to need explana- tion, for men to seek the help of tlie deity in times of peril or distress (Ps 66''- "), or to secure the fulKlnient of some much cherislied hope, by pro- mising him some special gift that would enlist his own interest on their side. Or their vow might be less of the nature of a bargain, and more the expres- sicm of unselhsh zeal and pious devotion. It might also be a promise to abstain from some comfort or even necessary of life. Among the Hebrews all these types of vow are to be found : for the last the term ijN 'bond,' which occurs only in Nu 30, was used.
Although we have no legislation on the subject in JE, the practice was very ancient. Thus Jacob TOWS at Betliel that if Elohira will be with him and give him bread and raiment, so that he comes to his father's house in peace, he will make the pillar a sanctuary of God, and pay tithe of all that He gives liiiu (Gn 28="-^ E). In the period of the Judges we have Jephthah's vow, that if J" delivered the Ammonites into his hand, he would offer as a burnt-offering the person who first came from his house to meet him (Jg 11™-"). Though it was his own daughter, the inviolable character of the vow in that primitive age, which had learnt none of the slippery shifts of casuistry, forced him to sacri- fice her. Hannah vowed that if J" would give her a son she would dedicate him to His service all the days of his life, and no razor should come upon his head (1 S 1")- It is interesting to notice that after the birth of Samuel, when Elkanah went for the yearly sacrifice to ShUoh, the writer speaks of him as going to offer the yearly sacrifice and his vow, as If the vow were as much a matter of course as the sacrifice (v.-'). {It seems unnecessary to sup-