The bow is frequently mentioned symbolically in Scripture. In Psa. vii, 12, it implies victory, signi- fying judgments laid up in store against offenders. It is sometimes used to denote lying and falsehood (Psa. lxiv, 4 ; exx, 4; Jer. be, :;)■ probably from the many circumstances which tend to render a bow inoperative, especially in unskilful hands. Hence also "a deceitful bow" | l'sa. lxxviii. 57 ; IIos. vii, 16"), with which eom- pare Virgil's "Perfidusensisfrangitur" (-/■.'». xii, 731). The bow also signifies any kind of arms. The bow and the spear are most frequently mentioned, because the ancients used these most (l'sa. xliv, (I; xlvi, 9; Zech. x, !; Josh, xxiv, 12). In Ilabak. iii, 9, "thy bow was mint' hare" means that it was drawn out of its case. The Orientals used to carrV their bows in a case bung on their girdles. See WTemysa,Sym.lJic. s.v.
In _' Sain. i. 18, (he Auth. Vers, has "Also he (Da- vid ) bade them teach the children of Judah the use of the bow." •• Here," Bays Professor Robinson (Addit. t<> Calmet), "the words 'the use of an' not in the lie- brew, and convey a sense entirely false to the English reader. It should be 'teach them the bow,' i. e. the .s >/</ <y'j m : bow, from the mention of this weapon in ver. 22. This mode of selecting an inscription to a poem <>r work is common in the East ; so in the Koran the Becond Sura is entitled the cow, from the incidental mention in it of the red heifer; comp. Num. xix, 2. In a similar manner, the names of the books of the Pentateuch in the Hebrew Bibles are merely the first word in eaeb book."— Kitto. See Poetry (Hebrew)
For the "Bow in the Cloud," see Rainbow.
Bowden, John, D.D., a minister of the Protestant Episcopal Church, was born in Ireland in 1751. At an early age he came to America, and soon after en- tered Princeton College, where he remained two years, and then returned to Ireland. On his second visit to America he entered King's (now Columbia) College, N. Y., where he graduated in 1772, and then repaired to England for ordination. In 1774 he became assist- ant minister of Trinity Church, N. Y. ; but after the commencement of the Revolution he retired to Nor- walk, Conn., and thence to Jamaica, L. I., where he occasionally officiated. In 1784 he accepted the rec- torship of the church at Norwalk, and in 1789 went to St. Croix, West Indies. Returning to the United States, he settled at Stratford, Conn., taking charge of the Episcopal Academy in Cheshire. In 1796 he declined the episcopate for the diocese of Connecticut in consequence of delicate health, and in 1802 became professor of moral philosophy, belles-lettres, and logic in Columbia College, where he remained, discharging the duties of his office "with great fidelity and accept- ance," till 1817, when, on the 31st of Juh-, he died at Ballston Spa. He published a Treatise on Episcopacy (N. Y., 1807, and often, 2 vols. 12mo) :— A Full-length Portrait of Calvinism, besides a number of pamphlets, chiefly on Episcopacy and Ordination. — Sprague, An- nals, v, 306.
Bowels (C"1"^, meim' ; -**crP, raehamim' ; tT7rX«7X*'") are often Put Dy t,le Hebrew writers for the internal parts generally, the inner man, and so also for heart, as we use that term. Hence the bowels are made the seat of tenderness, mercj% and compas- sion; and thus the scriptural expressions of the bowels being moved, bowels. of mercy, straitened in the bow- els, etc. By a similar association of ideas, the bowels are also sometimes made the seat of wisdom and under- standing (Job xxxviii, 36 ; Psa. Ii, 10; Isa. xvi, 11).
Bowen, George Dixon, M.D., a Methodist Epis- copal minister, was born in Indiana 1823, converted at fourteen, entered the itinerant ministry in the Phila- delphia Conference 1844, and emigrated to Davenport, Iowa, 1857, at which appointment he died in May, 1858. " He was an able minister of the New Testa- ment, and a skilful defender of the doctrines of the Church." His labors were a "succession of triumphs." — Minutes of Conferences for 1858, p. 235.
Bowen, John, a minister of the Methodist Episco- pal Church, was born in Bedford county, Pa., June 8, 1793, was licensed to preach in 1820. in 1823 he was admitted on trial in the Baltimore Conference ; ordain- ed a deacon by Bishop Soule, April 10, 1825, and an elder by Bishop Roberts, April 15, 1827. During two- and-forty years he fulfilled this ministry which he had received of the Lord Jesus, to testify the Gospel of the grace of God ; twenty-three in Pennsylvania, fourteen in Maryland (including nearly four years of superan- nuation), and Wxq in Virginia. Twenty-six of these years were on large circuits, and twelve in stations. He died Nov. 18. 1864.— Minutes <f Conferences, 1865, p. 11 ; Christian Advocate, May 11,*1805.
Bowen, Nathaniel, D.D., bishop of the Protest- ant Episcopal Church in South Carolina, was born in Boston June 29, 1779, and educated at Charleston College, where he graduated in 1794. In 1801 he be- came chaplain to the Orphan House in Charleston ; thence he removed to Providence, R. I., as rector of St. John's. Subsequently he became rector of St. Michael's, Charleston, and afterward of Grace Church, New York, where he remained from 1809 to 1818. Early in 1818 he accepted the episcopate of South Car- olina, "without," as lie expresses himself, "pride of distinction." and solemnly impressed with the convic- tion that " humility is the indispensable requisite of elevated station in the ministry." In 1831 he visited England, not merely for purposes of relaxation, but