Errlraia ; WeizsScker, The
inn MuiiMry in the Early
'inn Churchea; art.
, Cnmmunicm. with
■ist, Semi, i., also
i .. i.-iv. ; Harnack,
R. A. Falconer.
FETTERS.— See Chain.
FEYER (6 irvperds, and in Ac 28' ol wvperoi, with corresponding participle in Mt. and Mk. Tvp4<r- ffovaa). There are only five passages in the NT in Avhich fever is spoken of. and three of these, viz. Mt 8"'-, Mk l""'-, and l.k 4^'- are parallel pa.s- sages. One cannot say with certainty what specific fever is alluded to in these passages, or in Jn 4»=, where the healing of the nobleman's son is spoken
of. It may be, in. 1 1, lli.il St. Luke, whose
training as a physici;ui iiatni ally li'd him to speak with exactness about im ,lir:il m 1 1 ters, does specify the fever from wliich I'ctii - \\ifes mother was sutteriiig {<rwexoiJi4fr) rnpcrui fxtydXif). It has been
I
FIELD
FIERCENESS
591
contended that there was a specific fever known as ' the great fever,' and that it was this, whatever it may have been, from which the sick woman in Capernaum suttered. This, however, has been questioned, and perhaps it is rather the intensity of the fever than its specific character that is indi- cated by the word ' great.' Probably both Peter's wife's mother and the nobleman's son sufl'ered from malarial fever. Professor G. A. Smith tells us that the region about Tiberias is a very feverish region, and Dr. Cunningham Geikie says that malarial fever was common at Capernaum. It is very likely that there has always been a good deal of malarial fever about the shores of the Sea of Galilee, and especially about the more northerly portion of these shores. The fever from whicli the father of Publius suffered (Ac 28') was fever accompanying or accompanied by acute dysentery. See also artt. CUBES, p. 403'', and Disease, p. 463''.
Literature. — NT Commentaries ; artt. * Medicine ' in Hast- ings' UB and ' Diseases,' Eneyc. Biblica ; G. A. Smitli, BGHL i, p. 449 ; Cunningliam Geiliie, Life and Words of Christ, ii. 6 f.
George C. Watt. FIELD.—
Tile tliree Greek words (iy/jos, x'^P'^t Z'^P'ov) rendered 'field' in tiie Gospels are distinguisilable in meaning, and sometimes require more specific renderings. otypU in general means 'field ' in tiie sense of cultivated land, or open country thought of as subject to cultivation: e.ii. 'sowed good seed in his field' (Mt 132'), 'lilies of the ;if(ri,' 'grass of the field' (628-30), etc. j;<i^o! denotes generally a region, or district of country, as 'the regie
-- (Lk 31), 'the country of (he (
of Trachonitis'
: distir
■(Mk6i
(ilt 26^^), 'the parcel of aroNni n-. ,i. ..i. -, r, .i. ..,,,!,■, i,,
45), etc. But, on the oilier liiii.. I i u . I V >: .,i 1 1,,
country in distinction from 1 1 i I
XMfietused of fields of ripen.-'l -tun :.. m .li; i ■ l \, ,,ii li,.
fields, tor they are white' (i-f. J;i ^.' uho iuni.' rfapfd down vour fields') ; and where St. Mattliew uses i>.ct,- of ' tlie field of blood' (2(8), St. Luke uses x"?'" (Ac 119).
A knowledge of certain peculiarities of the fields of Palestine is helpful to the full understanding of several of the parables of our Lord and some other passages in the Gospels. There are now, as there were of old, numerous fields in Palestine ^\'here ' the lilies ' and many other flowers grow in gor- geous profusion without human care or culture, and where 'the grass of the field,' including fibrous weeds as well as shortlived flowers, when dried by the tropical sun, are still gathered as fuel, and used to heat ovens for baking Ijread (of. Mt 6-*- '■"'). The argument of the Master, drawn from ' the grass of the fielil which to-day is and to-morrow is cast into the oven,' still holds good, and still finds abundant illustration. It is true occasionally now, also, that after the owner of the land has 'sowed good seed in his field,' an enemy will in sheer spite creep in secretly and 'sow tares,' the noxious darnel (Lolium temulentum) ; but see Tares.
In Palestine, as in all unsettled countries, it was common, and in parts of the land it is still common, to resort to the field (the cultivated land or the open country) as a fit place in which to hide treasure (cf. Mt 13") In ancient times the land was peculiarly subject to revolutions, expo.sed to raids from wandering tribes, and, in some districts, liable to plunder from robbers at home. So, in the absence of safety vaults and the like, owners of treasure who feared rolibery or tliievery (Mt 25^), or who were setting off on a journey to a distant country, would bury their money, jewellery, etc., in the field. Then, if the owner were ki'lled in battle, or died in a far country, no one might know where his treasures were hid ; and, according to usage, such valuables when found, if no owner appeared to claim them, belonged to tlie owner of the land- -a, tact whicli gives point to the parable of the II.. I TicMiic (Mt 13«, cf. Job 3=', Pr2^). Many |ii i-i.n- .ur toniul digging for hid treasure in Egypt ami I'.ilcstiiie to-day, and not a few