7. Pentecost as a Christian festival. — There is no sign whatever in the NT tluit the Church observed this season as a festival, or, as in the case of Passover, superimpo.sed Christian associa- tions on an ancient Hebrew feast. Epiphanius (4th cent.) interprets Ac 20'" as showing that St. Paul observed the feast, and either deliherately or loosely read into the text the verb ttoiiJo-t) ('EffireuSd', Sttois TTOi^ffj) TJ);" ll(pT7iK0(rrrii> els ' IepoinraXi)M, quoted in J. Bingham, Antiqtiities, XX. vi. 6). (Truly it is a substantially ditl'erent thing to h.-istcu to Jerusalem to keep Pentecost from hurrying to be at Jerusalem at Pentecost.) St. Paul had little enough to do with keeping festivals. Pentecost here appears as a mere note of time. Bengel's note ad loc. is to the point : ' in festo, raagni con- ventus : magna lucrifaciendi occasio.'
The 2nd cent, passes (a period fraught with all sorts of problems for the Church historians), and in Tertullian we find Pentecost definitely referred to as a Christian feast, familiar and established (de Idol. 14) : ' Non Dominicum diem, nop Pente- costen, etiam si nossent, nobiscum communicassent; timerent enim ne Christiani viderentur.' A few sentences later he speaks again of Pentecost not as one day but as a period— ' excerpe singulas solennitates nationum, et in ordinem exsere Pente- costen implere non poterunt' (cf. also de Corona, 3). And from the time when the scheme of dis- tinctive Christian festivals came to be developed it would appear that the whole fifty days elapsing between Easter and Pentecost were called by the latter name (Lat. Quinquagcsima) and were re- garded as a time of joy and happy commemoration (see R. Hooker, Ecclesiastical Polity, IV. xiii. 7 — 'which fifty days were called Pentecost, though most commonly the last day of them which is Whitsunday be so called').
So anciently among the Jews the ' days of the Omer,' as the period between Passover and Weeks was called, being a time of harvest operations, was a time of joy. It is food for thought, indeed, that the principal feasts of the Christian Churcii
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PEOPLE
sliould bo iiionliled on a system so parallel with that of the .lows. How strange, if indeed we have lieie a primitive reference to nature and tlie great yearly crises of springtime and liarvest, in sucli climatic conditions as tliose of Palestine, that these should gatlier new associations sacred for the Jew, and again in turn gather very ditl'erent associations rendering them sacred in Christian eyes !
Ultimately Pentecost was limited to the fiftieth day from Easter Day, thougli, still later, festivities tended to prolong themselves over the week follow- ing ; hence ' Whitsunijrfe,' suggesting an extended festivity rather tlian one day. As connected especially with that effusion of the Holy Spirit which marked the beginnings of the Church's history, the festival was pre-eminently from the first a favourite time for baptisms (Tertullian, de Bapt. 19).
As in Passover, the Christian Church for the most part took over the name of the festival from the Jews. It was Pentecost for both. But iust as Easter replaced Pascha in English and kindred languages, so Whitsunday replaced Pentecost in England through Norse innuence. Before the Norman Conquest the season was always known in England as ' Pentecoste.' The meaning of Whit- sunday has been the subject of much controversy, but has been generally explained by a reference to the white garments of the newly-baptized. W. W. Skeat gives it decidedly as White Sunday, with this explanation (see An Etyniologiral Dictionary of the English Language, Oxford, 1910, s.v.).
Literature. — Besides the works quoted in the course of the article there may be mentioned G. T. Purves, art. * Pentecost' in BDB ; I. Benzinger, art. ' Pentecost ' in EBi ; art. ' Festivals and Fasts [Christian), [Hebrew], [Jewish],' in ERE; O. Zockler, art. ' Pfingsten ' in PRE^ ; J. L. Magnus, art. ' Pentecost' in JE\ A. Edersheim, The Temple: its Ministry atid Services as they were at the Time of Jesus Christ, London, n.d. : E. von Dobschiitz, Ostern und P/ingsten, Leipzig, 1903 ; M. Friedlander, The Jewish Religion, London, 1891.
J. S. Clemens.
PEOPLE (Xa6s and i \a6s).—\a6s (without art.) designates ' Israel' in Jude" (cf. Sir 46', Wis 18'^), 'Gentile believers' in St. James's speech at the Council (Ac IS") ; the fact that St. Luke himself does not use Xois of Christians is justly regarded as a proof of the early date of Acts (Harnack, Acts of the Apostles, Eng. tr., London, 1909, p. 51). Xctol 'Icrpa^X in the prayer of the Church (Ac 4") is an interesting addition to those ' gathered together against the Lord and against his Christ' (Ps 2-). In Ro 9^^- -" St. Paul applies the promises of Israel's restoration in Hos I'" 2^ to the calling of the Gen- tiles (' God, in reversing His sentence on Israel, em- braces in the arms of His mercy all who were not His people, and says of them all, that they should be My people and beloved' [E. B. Pusey, Minor Prophets, London, 1886, p. 22] ; cf. Ro 1 1=- ="• ^2). In 1 P 2'" Hosea's prophecy is applied to the Gentile Christians of Asia Minor: they, before receiving the gospel, belonged to the most diverse races, and were not a people at all ; now they are become ' a people of God,' even a \ah% eis ■Kepnrolrjixiv (v.' ; cf. Is 43-1, Mai 3" LXX). In Tit 2'^ Christians are called a Xait xeptoiVios — the LXX rendering of nVjp ny in Ex 19', Dt 7" (.see S. R. Driver's notes, Cambridge Bible for Schools, 'Exod.', Cambridge, 1911, p. 171, ICC, 'Deut.'2, Edinburgh, 1896, p. 100). The occurrence of Xais (without art.) in Lk 1", Ac 18'° also deserves attention. A Xais is the usual designation for the Jewish people in the religious or political sense (Mt 2'' 4^, Jn 11™ 18", Ac 3^ 21™ 26"•_=^ He 7", 2 P 2i). In Mt 1=' (tAk XaAi* ai/roD = tAk ' IcrpaiJX in Ps 129* LXX) the apolo- getic purpose of this Gospel reveals itself as in 1' — 'Jesus the Messiah, who fulfils the promises to the house of David and the seed of Abraham.' 6