W. Cruickshank.
GLASS.— See House, Mirror, Sea of Glass.
GLORY.— It is not proposed to embrace in this article all the words which our English versions reniler by 'glory'; it is confined to the most im- portant of these — d6^a.
As applied to men and things, S6^a has two principal meanings : (1) honour, praise, good repute (2 Co 68, 1 Th 2«) ; (2) that which by exciting admiration brings honour or renown ; a natural perfection (1 P l^^ : 'the glory of flesh'; 1 Co 1540. 41 . « glory of the celestial . . . the terrestrial,' etc. ; 1 Co IP* : ' long hair is a glory to a woman ') ; or a circumstance which reflects glory upon one (1 Th 2^" : St. Paul's converts are a ' glory ' to him ; Eph 3'^ : St. Paul's suflerings are a ' glory ' to his converts ; 2 Co 8^' : worthy Christians are the 'glory ' of Christ; Rev 212^- 2« : the kings of the earth and the nations bring their ' glory ' into the New Jeru- salem. Cf. Hag 27-»).
jNIinor significations are {a) that which is falsely regarded as bringing honour to oneself (Ph 3^*), and (6) persons endued with glory (Jude^, 2 P 2'°3b ' dignities ' in both AV and RV, the reference prob- ably being to angelic powers).
In the numerous and important passages Avhere the idea of ' glory ' is associated with God and the heavenly world, with Christ, Christians, and the Christian life here and hereafter, we find the same two principal meanings. There is the glory which belongs to the Divine Being in itself, in Avhich God manifests Himself to His creatures, so far as such manifestation is possible, and the glory Avhich He receives back from His creatures ; the out- shining {Erscheinungsform) of the Divine nature, and the reflexion of that outshining in the trust, adoration, and thanksgiving of men and angels, as also in the silent testimony of His works, and especially by the results of the Divine redemption in the character and destiny of the redeemed.
I. 1. The glory vhich is native to the Being of
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God. — To the modern mind the chief difficulty of this conception, as presented in the NT, is due to that fusion in it of the phj'sical, the rational, and the ethical, which is characteristic of biblical psychology throughout. In biblical thought these elements are conceived not abstractly, as if con- stituting separate spheres of being, but as they are given in experience, as inter-dependent and integral to the unitj' of life. Thus, whatever ethical con- tent comes to be associated with the Glory of God, the basis of the conception is physical — the splen- dour which is inseparable from the Divine Presence in the celestial world. In the OT, when Jahweh lifts the veil that hides Him from mortal eyes, the medium of theophany is always Light, a supra- mundane but actually visible radiance (which is localized and assumes a definite uniformity in the Sliekinah-glory).
For later Judaistic developments, see Weber's Judische Theo- logie, pp. 16-2 flf. , 275 tl. In apocalyptic the ' glory ' is definitely associated with the sovereig-nty of God in the heavenly world (1 En. XXV. 3), and is especially connected with the Divine Throne (i6. ix. 4, xiv. 20). In the Ascension of Isaiah (x. 16, xi. 32) it is equivalent to the Person of God ; God is ^ /neyoAij So^a. So^a in this sense of ' radiance ' is unknown to ordinary Greek literature. Deissinann's suggestion, that this may have been an ancient meaning which survived in the vernacular and so passed into the dialect of the LXX, seems more probable than Reitzenstein's, who, on the ground of certain magical papyri, claims for it an origin in Egyptian-Hellenistic mysticism.
In the NT the same idea lies behind the use of the concept 56fa. Wherever the celestial world is projected into the terrestrial, it is in a radiance of supernatural light (Mt I7^ Ac 26^^ Mt 28^, Ac 12^ etc. ) ; and this is ultimately the radiance that emanates from the presence of God, who dwells in 'light unapproachable' (1 Ti e^"). To this the term 56^a is frequently applied — at Bethlehem (Lk 2\ and at the Transfiguration (2 P 1") ; the ' glory ' of God is the light of the New Jerusalem ; Stephen looking up saw the ' glory of God ' (Ac 7^*) ; and the redeemed are at last presented faultless before the presence of His glory (Jude^ ; cf. 1 En. xxxix. 12).
With St. Paul the conception is less pictorial ; the rational and ethical elements implicit in it come clearly into view. With him also the d6^a is fundamentally associated with the idea of celestial splendour, to which, indeed, his vision of the glori- fied Christ gave a new and vivid reality ; but the idea of revelation, of the Glory as God's self- manifestation, becomes prominent. St. Paul's thought does not rest in the symbol, but passes to the reality which it signifies— the transcendent majesty and sovereignty that belong to God as God ; and for St. Paul the most sovereign thing in (iod, divinest in the Divine, is the sacrificial sin- bearing love revealed in the Cross. God's glory is displayed in His mercy (Ro 9'^), in the ' grace which he freely bestowed upon us in the Beloved ' (Eph 1") ; its perfect living reflexion is in the face of Jesus Christ (2 Co 4«). Yet it is the glory, not of an ethical ideal, but of the Living God, God upon the Throne, self-existent, su])reme over all being. It is especially associated with the Divine /i-pdros (Col I'l, Eph3'«) and TrXoOros (Ro 9-^ Ph 4'9, Eph 3^") by which the Apostle expresses the irresistible sovereign power and the inexhaustible fullness of God in His heavenly dominion. Believers are * strengthened with all power, according to the Kparoi of his glory,' i.e. in a measure corresponding with the illimitable spiritual power signified by the glory which manifests the Divine King in His supra-mundane Kingdom. Every need of oelievers is supplied 'according to his riches in glory, in Christ Jesus '(Ph 4'"), i.e. according to the bound- less resources which belong to God as Sovereign of the spiritual universe, and are made available through Clirist as Mediator. Christ is raised from the dead through ' the glory of the Fatiier '