More important are the internal indications that the book was written amid the sights and sounds of the infinite sea. It has the word doKaaaa 25 times, and it is full of the clashing of waves. No fitter scene could be found for the composition of the Apocalypse than the traditional one, and, if there were any reason to question the story of the author's banishment to the island, one would have
to .saj', 'si non fe vero, 6 ben trovato.' Nowhere is ' the voice of many waters ' more musical than in Patmos ; nowhere does the rising and .setting sun make a more splendid 'sea of glass mingled with fire'; yet nowhere is the longing more natural that the sejiarating sea — the occanus dissoriabilU of Horace (Od. I. iii. 22) — should be no more.
Small and inhospitable islands were often used as pl.aces of banishment (relegatio) in the Ist cent. (Pliny, HN IV. xii. 23 ; Tac. Ann. iii. 08, iv. 30, XV. 71). According to liusebius (HE iii. 18), Jerome (de Vir. Illustr. 9), and others, St. John was exiled to Patnios under Domitian in A.D. 95, and released about 18 months afterwards under Nerva. W. M. Ramsay thinks that, as St. John was not a first-class prisoner, he must have been condemned not only to banishment but to hard labour for life (The Letters to the Seven Churches of Asia, 1904, p. 82 11'.). At any rate, St. John was in Patmos ' for (dm) the word of God ' (Rev P). The meaning of the phrase is much disputed, some holding that it expresses the human cause, others the over-ruling Divine purpose, of his exile. He was banished either because of his loyalty to truth already revealed, or for the reception of truth about to be revealed. The former interpretation probably gives the writer's real meaning, but the latter (preferred by B. Weiss and others) contains a thought well worth expressing. While the authorities of F.phesus, moved perhaps by some mysterious impulse to spare the saint's life, trans- ported him to the lonely island in order tliat the city might be freed from his too insistent word and testimony, he was providentially taken into a re- treat where he was beside ' the deep sea and the mighty things.' The story of his exile is outlined in two phrases : ' I was in the isle ... I was in the Spirit' (Rev P- ">). The realism was trans- figured, and in that jEgean where .'Escliylus heard irovTio}v Kv^iarijov dvrjpiOfiov yiXacfia {Pruin. 89 f.), St. John listened to 'the voice of a great multitude, and as the voice of many waters' (Rev 19").
Literature. — L. Ross, lieisen avf den griechischen Inseln des agdisrhen Mecres, Halle, 1840-1S45 ; V. Gu^rin, Description de Cite de Patmos et de file de SarmiS. Paris, 1S56 ; H. F. Tozer, Islands of the ^gean, London, 1890, pp. 178-195.
James Strahan. PATRIARCH (rarpiipxT)!, from irarpid, ' clan,' and ipxVt ' rule '). — A patriarch is the father or head of a Trarpid or clan. As applied to Bible characters, the term usually denotes either the forefathers of the hum.an race or the progenitors of Israel — Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and his twelve sons. In the LXX of 1 Ch 2i^^ 27", 2 Ch 19^ 20" trarpi.&px'ii. renders various Hebrew terms, wliich appear in our EV as ' principal fathers,' ' heads of fathers' houses,' and 'captains.' In 4 Mac 7" re- ference is made to 'our patriarchs Abraham, Isaac and Jacob' (cf. 4 Mac 16==). In the NT the term is applied to Abraham (He 7''), to the sons of Jacob (Ac 7"''), and also to David, in a text (2-') where it has greater dignity than the ordinary ' king ' would have had. It was of David that St. Peter, speaking nera Ttajipvcrla.!, ' had to say something not altogether favourable, in order that thereby the glory of Christ might be the more enhanced. There is therefore in this passage a trpoSepavda, or previous mitigation of what he is about to say ' (Bengel, in loco). James Strahan.
PATROBAS (naT/)6(3o?, a Greek name, contracted from I'atrobius). — Patrobas is the fourth of a group of five names (all Greek) of persons 'and the brethren with them ' saluted by St. Paul in Ro 16". Nothing is known of any member of this group. It is suggested that together they forme<l an eKKX-qiria or household church, the locality of
138
PATTERX
PAUL
which we shall suppose to liave been Koine or Ejihesus, accoidin'j; to our view of the destination of these salutations. This is more probable than tliat they were slaves belon^iii'; to some j;reat establishment, or members of a civic gild. Cf. the salutation to another group of live persons 'and all the saints that are with them' in tlio verse following. In each case the names mentioned probably represent ' the tirst nucleus, the leading iiidisiduals,' of the congregation (see C. von \Veizs;ioUer, Apostolic Age, Eng. tr., i. [1894] 39Sf.), and perhaps the first mentioned (Asyncritus, v.'-", I'hilologus, v.'=) was the recognized leader. AH, however, may have been heads of .separate Christian households. For the occurrence of tlie name Patrobas on in.scriptions of the Imperial household see J. B. Lightfoot, Phi/lp/nant>', 1878, p. 170. T. B. Allworthy.
PATTERN — In the EV of the NT 'pattern' occurs seven times, representing four ditt'erent words in the original — rinros, vwoTuiraaa, iiirddeiy/ia, and avrlrviroi'.