We now get a group of passages which explain To^eioy. In Ex 8^ (7-'»), Jg 15', 2 (4) K 6'2 IP, 2 Ch 22", etc., it is the special ' store-closet' (leading or opening out from the larger room) in wliich the bedding required by night was stored during the day (rd Ta/iELa tuv koituv or Tap.e~iov K\iiiii>p).\ In such a 'closet' the Philistines were liiding while Delilah practised her wiles on Samson (Jg 16"- '2, LXX, also Ec 10^»). In such a ' closet ' for holding the bedding, the baby prince Joash was concealed when Athaliah murdered the rest of the royal family. Samson was possibly in the ' living-room ' when his wife's father prevented him from entering the ranetov (Jg 151 LXX, note the variant of A ei's t6v KoiTuva). Such small rooms or closets could be used as more private sleeping-rooms if required, and would also be available for private conference, concealment, or any similar purpose, as well as for the normal use of storing the bedding and other things which were not immediately required. Our Lord advised their use for private prayer. Thus storage was the primary purpose of the apartment. The other uses were secondary ones, or adaptations.
The AV ' closet ' is therefore quite as correct as the RV 'inner chamber.' Of course we do not think of an European cupboaid >Mth shelve=, in
.!«T«Ts») cf Liddell and &cott mb loce WH Notei on Ortho graph I 11 146 I'O The Texlii', Receptus according to hen \ pner has the older form in Mt (>> but the later one in the three
Carr <- / / ooh Tholuck =. /
Mount 1 1 ter huinoel and \
* f ""f " I Purdoe C ti/ I
1 " Hatto /■ ; i I bii- and J 1\ 11 IJ / /
which a ])erson could hardly stand. But Dryden (Fi(l)lcs) possibly uses 'closet' in the sense of a ' store-eloset,' as rafietov in Lk 12=*, though he iiuiy Iia\ e meant ' private chamber ' :
' He furnishes her closet first, and fills The crowded shelves with rarities of shells.' Shakespeare has the other use :
'The taper burncth in your closet' (Jid. Cms. ii. 1).« On the curious Latin renderings of d [promptaUbus) e (promj)tuariis) in Lk 12", and d (promptuariitm) in Lk 12=*, cf. Konsch, Itala vnd Vulgata, pp. 32 and 48, and Plummer, ' St. Luke,' in International Critical Commcntarij . GEORGE FARMER.
CLOTHES.— See Dress.
CLOUD.— The cloud appears in the Gospels at our Lord's Transfiguration (Mt 17' II Mk 9', Lk 9^*) and (if we may treat the first verses of the Book of Acts as practically jxart of St. Luke's Gospel) at His Ascension (Ac !'■'). Twice also it lias a place in His own prediction of His coming again (Mt 24** II Mk 132« II Lk 21=', Mt 26''-' || Mk 14«=).
The most interesting occurrence of this cloud is that in connexion with the Ascension ; but it is its appearance above the Mount of Transfiguration that rules the interpretation of its significance. For there a voice comes out of it wliich is that of the Heavenly Father : it is seen to be the veil of the Divine Presence. Veiling the glory which no mortal miglit see and live, veiling yet revealing the Presence of God, tlie cloud has two aspects, of which the greater and more characteristic is not the negative one of veiling, but that positive aspect in which it attests and manifests the Divine Pre- sence. To come under its shadow (a ' shadow,' it would seem, of light, since it was veij>i\ri ipwrem^) awoke in the disciples the dread felt by Jacob at Bethel. And for the same reason — that this cloud is a ' gate of heaven,' at which a man may stand to hear tlie voice of God. Here, in this bright cloud, the two spheres, earthly and heavenly, open upon each other. The cloud is less a veil than a lifting of the veil. Here the invisible barrier becomes a portal of heaven, through which may come the voice of the Almighty, and entering by which Christ is passed into heaven. It is a ' cloud of heaven ' : with earth and human life upon this side of it, and on the other side (not sky and stars, but) the invisible things of God, the heavenly sphere, the other world.
Thus in our Lord's Ascension we do not conceive of Him as ' going up ' fartlier than would symbolize and declare His departure from this world : ' He was taken up, and a cloud received Him out of their sight ' — they saw Him go and thejr saw what door opened to receive Him. As identifying this cloud with 'heaven,' compare Ac P, 'a cloud re- ceived him,' with 1" ' received up from you into heaven' : with which agrees 2 P 1"- '*, ' there came a voice to him out of the excellent glory . . . and this voice we (ourselves) heard brought out of heaven.' The voice out of the cloud was 'out of heaven ' — the disciples in beholding Christ enter the cloud ' beheld him going into heaven.'
If for us the cloud is as a door which closes, a veil that hides (as God verily is a God that hideth Himself), this is of „race thou canst not follow