Mitylene is mentioned only incidentally in Acts (20"). The ship in which St. Paul sailed from Assos to Patara in the month of April lay over- night either in the northern harbour of Mitylene (which Strabo mentions as ij.iyas Kal fiaBvt [XIII. ii. 2]), or else in the roadstead outside. Mitylene was about 30 miles S. from Assos — an easy day's sail. It was contrary to the general practice to sail at night in the yEgean, where, throughout the summer season, the N. wind commonly blows fresh in the morning and dies away towards evening. In later Christian times the whole island of Lesbos came to be called Mitylene. The Turks, who captured it in A.D. 1462, have corrupted its name into Midullii.
Literature. — Conybeare-Howson, Life and EpiaUes of St. Paul, new ed., London, 1877, ii. 201 ; H. F. Tozer, Tlie Isiands of the sEfiean, Oxford, 1890, p. 134 f. ; W. M. Ramsay, St. I'aul the Traveller and the Roman Citizen, London, lS9i), p. 291 ff.
James Strahan. MNASON. — Mnason, an 'early disciple' (apx^l-f uad-qTij, i.e.., probably, a disciple from the beginning
[cf. Ac 11", iv dpxv]), is mentioned in Ac 21" as the liostof St. Paul in .Jerusalem. Theamliiguity of the text has caused much di.scussion. Grammatically it may mean either that Mna.son accomijanicd Si. Paul and his friends from Ca'sarea to .lerusalem .and then took in St. Paul, or that St. Paul's friends brought him to Jerusaloui to lodge with Mniuson. Moreover, Cod. U and Syr. p. niarg. (Ti.sch.) introduce a variant reading which makes Mna.son entertain St. Paul in a village on the way. But the dilliculty is met by observing that the mind of the author of Acts is picturing the com- pany after v.'^ as already in Jeru.salem, as having Mnason as host, and being welcomed by the dis- ciples. Nothing further is known of Mnason. The name occurs as a personal one some 30 times in the CIG, Gra?c. sept., vol. i., and al.so in Kailiel, no. 2393 (368). Cod. N and one or two Versions read 'Jason' for 'Mnason'; cf. 'Manibres' for'Jam- bres' (see Jannes and Jambkes).
W. F. Cobb. MODERATION.— See Temperakce.
MOLOCH.— Moloch (Ac 7'^) occurs in a quota- tion from Am 5-'^. The Hebrew has ' your king ' ; thus the LXX may either be an explanatory gloss or represent another text. Moloch is spoken of in the OT as the god of the Ammonites, and is evi- dently the national deity, just as Chemosh is the god of Moab, and Jahweh the God of Israel, though the worship of other gods is not precluded. The Israelites regarded Moloch as an 'abomina- tion,' and their temporary adoption of the worship of Moloch in the Valley of Hinnom gave rise to the ominous meaning attaching to ' Gehenna.'
F. W. WORSLEY.
MONEY.— See Wealth. MONOGAMY.— See Marriage. MONTH.— See Time.
MOON. — There is only one reference to the natural light of the moon — there will be no need of the moon to shine in the heavenly Jerusalem (Rev 21-'). The change in colour or obscuring of the moon denotes some great judgment, e.g. the moon will be turned into blood before the great Day of the Lord (Ac '2-"). So again at the opening of the sixth seal ' the moon became as blood ' (Rev 6'-). At the sounding of the fourth trumpet a third of the moon's disk is obscured (Rev 8'-). In Rev 12' the woman who appears as a sign in heaven has the moon under her feet as a footstool (see Sun). In Col 2"^ St. Paul warns the Colossians to let no man judge them in respect of a holy day or of the new moon — a monthly festival of the Jews. These things had served their purpose under the old dispensation and were but shadows and types of the realities of the new. See Holy Day.
Morley Stevenson.
MORALITY.— See Ethics.
MORNING-STAR.— See Day-Stae.
MORTIFY.— This word translates (AV and RV) 0avaTovv (Ro 8'^) and KKpoSv (Col 3'). Elsewhere in the NT the former word is applied only to the in- fliction of physical death (by the Greek medical writers to ' mortihcation ' in the pathological sense), the latter to senile decay of the vital powers (Ro 4'", He 11'-). In the passages cited the words are synonymous, and are used, as the contexts plainly show, in an ethical sense. Although St. Paul ia far from dis])araging the necessity of wholesome self-discipline (1 Co 9-''), the idea, readily suggested by the associations of the word ' mortify,' of 8 ffradual subjugation of the bodily appetites by th«
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MOSES
practice of bodily austerities, is here foreign to liis thought. His exliortiition is to 'put to death the (evil) practices of tlie body' (Ko 8"), and this is to be done, not by physical means, but by the ' spirit' ; and again to i)iit to death ' the members which are upon the earth' {i.e. the impure and selfish lusts of which the bodily members are the natural instruments — fornication, uncleanness, etc.), and for this end the rules of an arbitrary asceticism are of no value (Col 2'"-").
The main emphasis of St. Paul's doctrine of sanctification is ever on the positive issue of the believer's vital union with Christ — that ' newness of life' which by its native force expels and ex- cludes the lustings of the lower nature (Ro 13'*, Gal 5", Eph 5'", 2 Ti 2==); yet necessarily the negative principle is also involved. By man, in his present state, spiritual life is realizable only through the slaying of sin ; union with tlie Cruci- fied implies crucifixion of the passions and lusts (Gal 5**). While 'raised together with Christ,' we 'seek the things that are above' (Col 3'), the con- verse fact that in Christ ' we died ' (Col 3') carries with it the converse requirement, as it does also the power, to kill out what is base and sensual and to hold all natural appetites in rigid subordination to the highest ends of life. KoBERT LAW.