constituted, or abrogate ancient ones ; or that it was lawful for bishops to appoint any new thing without the judgment and will of their presbytery." — Eiig.Cyc; Bib. Sac. 1850, p. 501 ; Cunningham, Reformers, Essay vii(Edinb. 1862, 8vo); Hook, Eccles. hi>g. ii, 3^4 sq.
Beza's MS. See Cambridge Manuscript.
Be'zai (Heb. Betsay',TJL2, probably the same name as Besai ; Sept. Bacaov, Baai, and I3jj<t£i', v. r. Baa- <7)';c, Beast, and Bijm), the head of one of the families who returned from the Babylonian captivity to the number of 324, including himself (Ezra ii, 17; Nell. vii. 23). B.C. 536. He was perhaps one of those that sealed the covenant (Neh. x, 18). B.C. 410.
Bezal'eel (Heb. Betsalel', 'bs'b^a, m [otherwise son cf, q. d. "3] the shadow of God, i. e. under his protection; Sept. Bto-tXei/X v. r. [in Ezra] BeatXi'iX and Bter(7t<\///\), the name of two men.
1. The artificer to whom was confided "by Jehovah the design and execution of the works of art required for the tabernacle in the wilderness (Exod. xxxi, 2; xxxv, 00 ; xxxvii, 1 ; 2 Chron. i, 5). B.C. 1657. His charge was chiefly in all works of meti.l, wood, and stone, Aholiab being associated with him for the textile fab- rics; but it is plain from the terms in which the two arc mentioned (xxxvi, 1, 2; xxxviii, 22), as well as from the enumeration of the works in Bezaleel's name in xxxvii and xxxviii, that he was the chief of the two, and master of Aholiab's department as well as his own. Bezaleel was of the tribe of Judah, the son of Uri, the son of II ur (or Chur). Hur was the offspring of the marriage of Caleb (one of the chiefs of the great family of Pharez) with Ephrath (1 Chron. ii, 20^50), and one of his sons, or descendants (comp. Ruth iv, 20), was Salma or Salmon, who is handed down under the title of " father of Bethlehem," and who, as the great-grandfather of Boaz, was the direct progenitor of king David (1 Chron. ii, 51, 54; Ruth iv, 21).— Smith, s. v. See Bethlehem ; Hur.
2. One of the sons of Pahath-moab, who divorced the foreign wife, whom he had taken after the exile (Ezra x, 30). B.C. 458.
Be'zeh (Heb. id. pt3, lightning; Sept. Bi'CcK and B«£ek), the name apparently of two places in Pales- tine.
1. The residence of Adoni-bezek, i. e. the "lord of Bezek" (Judg. i, 5), in the "lot (b~}Z) of Judah" (verse 3), and inhabited by Canaanites and Perizzites (verse 4). This must have been in the mountains ("up"), not far from Jerusalem (ver. 7) ; possibly on the emi- nence near Deir el-Ghafr, marked by Van de Yelde (Map) at four miles S.W. of Bethlehem (comp. Robin- son, Researches, ii, 337, £38). Sand (Itincr. p. 182) mentions a village Bezek two miles west of the site of Beth-zur, but this lacks confirmation. Others propose other identifications, even the Bezetha on the north of Jerusalem. See Bezeth.
2. The rendezvous where Saul numbered the forces of Israel and Judah before going to the relief of Ja- besh-gilead (1 Sam. xi, 8). From the terms of the narrative this cannot have been more than a day's march from Jabesh, and was therefore doubtless some- where in the centre of the country, near the Jordan valley. In accordance with this is the mention by Eusebius and Jerome (Ont mast. s. v. BtZiic, Btzecli) cf two places of this name seventeen miles from Neapolis (Shechem), on the road to Bcth-shean. This would place it at Khulat-MaUh, on the descent to the Jordan, near Succoth. The Sept. inserts iv Boyui after the name, possibly alluding to some " high place" at which this solemn muster took place. This Josephus gives as Bala (BaXa, Ant. vi, 5, 3). Schwarz (rales/, p. 158) says that "Bezek is the modern village Azhik, Wxz English miles south of Bcth-shean ;" but no other traveller speaks of such a name.
BEZEL!
797
BIBLE
Be'zer (Ileh. Bt'tser, '1X3, ore of gold or silver, as in Psa. lxxvi, 13), the name of a place and also of a man.
1. (Sept. Boaop or Bu'erop.) A place always called "Bezer in the wilderness" ("13"I532), being a city of the Reubenites, with "suburbs," in the Mishor cr downs, set apart by Moses as one of the three cities of refuge on the east of the Jordan (Dent, iv, 43; Josh, xx, 8), and allotted to the Merarites (Josh, xxi, ,-JG; 1 Chron. vi, 78). In the last two passages the cx:;ct specification, ""liSifilSl, "in the plain country," of the other two is omitted, but traces of its former presence in the text in Josh, xxi, 16 are furnished us by the reading of the Sept. and Vulg. (rt)v Boaop ii> rij ipt]- 11(7), T))v M i a lit [Alex. Miawp] Kai to. Tripttnropia ; Bosor in solitudine, Misor et Jascr). Bezer ma}' be the Bosoit (q. v.) of 1 Mace, v, 26, 30. Reland rashly identifies it with the Bozra of Arabia Deserta (Palast. p. 661) ; and Sehwarz (Palest, p. 229) makes it to be a Talmudical Kenathirin Cp*"lT02), which he finds in "an isolated high mound called Jebel Kuwetta, S.E. of Aroer, near the Anion," meaning doubtless Jebel- Ghuweiteh, which lies entirely without the bounds of Reuben. Bezer seems to correspond in position and name with the ruined village Burazin, marked on Van de Velde's Map at 12 miles N. of E. from Heshbon (comp. Robinson, Researches, iii, Append, p. 170).