HEBER
129
HEBREW
" Twice the oifer was declined on account of his wife and chilli, but immediately after the second refusal he wrote (Jan. 12. 1823) stating his willingness to go to India. He congratulated himself upon the fact that no worldly motives led him to this decision. The prospects of use- fulness in so grand a field as India overbore all pecuni- ary considerations, and they had no intluence in deter- mining his conduct when the proposition of going to that country was first made to him. Besides, he had often expressed his liking for such a sphere of action, and he had " a lurking fondness for all which belongs to India or Asia." On the 22d of April he saw Hodnet for the last time, and, after having been consecrated, he embarked for his diocese on the 16th of June, 1823. The diocese of Calcutta extended at this time over the Avhole of India, and embraced Ceylon, the ]\Iam-itius, and Australasia. In India the field of the bishop's la- bors was tliree times larger than Great Britain and Ire- land. The number of chajilains who constituted his staff at Bengal was fixed at twenty-eight, but this number was never completed, and of the number who were appointed several were on furlough. The bishop had no council to assist him, was required to act on his oAvn responsibility, and to write almost every official document with liis own hand. On the 15th of June, 1824, bishop Heber began the visitation of his vast dio- cese. He visited nearly every station of importance in the upper provinces of Bengal and north of Bombay, and after an absence from Calcutta of about eleven months, during which he had seldom slept out of his cabin or tent, he arrived at Bombay. The journal whi.'h he kept diuring his visitation (published under the title Narrative of a Joiirne;/ in Upper India, Lond. 1829, 3 vols. 8vo, since reprinted in Miuray's Home and Colonial Library) shows the extent of his observations on general subjects, and the graphic power which he possessed of describing the novel scenes in which he was placed. From April to August he remained at Bombay to investigate and superintend the interests of the western portion of his diocese. On the 15th of Au- gust he sailed for Ceylon, and after remaining there sohie time he proceeded to Calcutta, which he reached on the 21st of October. If it had been possible to have educated his children in India, he was now prepared, he states, to end his days among the objects of his solici- tude. In February', 182(5, he left Calcutta for Madras to visit the southern provinces. On the 1st of April he aiTived at Trichinopoli, and on the 3d, after investi- gating the state of the mission and confirming fifteen natives, on whom he bestowed the episcopal benedic- tion in the Tamul language, he retired to use a cold bath, in wdiich he was found dead about half an hour afterwards. Within less than three weeks he would have completed his forty-third year. The candor, mod- esty, and simplicity of bishop lleber's manners, his un- wearied earnestness, and his mild and steady zeal, com- bined with his talents and attainments, had inspired veneration and respect not only among the European, but the native population of India" {Enfjlish Ci/clopcvdia, s. v.). In theology he was an Arminian. His wdiole life, after his elevation to the episcopate, was devoted to its great duties. He had a profound faith in the fun- damental doctrines of the Gospel, and of their adaptation to the heathen. His heart daily breathed the most ear- nest wishes for the diffusion of its precious blessings. His tastes and pursuits were all subordinated to that grand object, and, had he been spared to the usual term of life, there is no doubt that a career, begun in the spirit and prosecuted on the system of itinerancy he had adopted, would have yielded" a rich harvest of spiritual fruit to the Lord of his vineyard. Besides the works above men- tioned, he published"7',r/;.s// S.rmms (Lond. 1844, 5th ed. 2 vols. 8vo). His J'<>< tin, I 1 1 r„ /,.s> are printed in various editions. See Life (fj/,h,r.\iy his Widow (Lond. 1830, 2 vols. 4to) ; Robinson, Lust Days of Heber (1830, 8vo) ; Memoir of Heber, abridged from the large ed. (Boston, 1856, 12mo) ; Krohn, H.'s Leben u. Nachrichten iiber In-
dien (Berlin, 1831, 2 vols.) ; Quarterly Review (London), xliii, 366 ; Edinhuryh Reviev, lii, 431 ; Villemain, Rcvve des deux Mondes, Dec. 15, 1857 ; Herzog, Real-Encyklop. xix, 606.
He'berite (Numb, xxvi, 45). See Heber, 4.
Hebrew (Heb. Ibri', i-12?. plur. di^ni^ or t]'i*'l35>, Exod. iii, 18 ; fem. ^^"13^, " Hebrewess," plur. ni'nsr, Greek 'E/3paiof), a designation of the people of Israel, used first of their progenitor Abraham (Gen. xiv, 13 ; Sept. r<p TT-epaTTj). This name is never in Scripture ap- ])lied to the Israelites except when the speaker is a for- eigner (Gen. xxxix, 14, 17 ; xli, 12 ; Exod. i, 16 ; ii, 6 ; 1 Sam, iv, 6, 9, etc.), or when Israelites speak of them- selves to one of another nation (Gen. xl, 15 ; Exod. i, 19 ; Jonah i, 9, etc.), or when they are contrasted with other peoples (Gen. xUii, 32 ; Exod. i, 3, 7, 15 ; Deut. xv, 12 ; 1 Sam. xiii, 3, 7). See Gesenius, T/ies. Heb. s. v. (The only apparent exception is Jer. xxxiv, 9 ; but here there is probably such an implied contrast between the Jews and other peoples as would bring the usage under the last case.) By the Greek and Latin writers this is the name by which the descendants of Jacob are designated when they are not called Jews (Pausan. v. 5, 2 ; vi, 24, 6; Pint. Sym^jos. iv, 6, 1; Tacit. /list, v, 1); and Jose- phus, who affects classical pecidiarities, constantly uses it. In the N, T. we find the same contrast between He- brews and foreigners (Acts vi, 1 ; Phil, iii, 5) : the He- brew language is distinguished from all others (Luke xxiii, 38 ; John v, 2 ; xix, 13 ; Acts xxi, 40 ; xxvi, 14 ; Rev. ix, 11); while in 2 Cor. xi, 22 the word is used as only second to Israelite in the expression of national pe- cidiarity. On these facts two opposing hj^potheses have been raised ; the one that Israelite or Jew was the name by which the nation designated itself (just as the Welsh call themselves Cymry,thougl\ in speaking of themselves to a Saxon they would probably use the name Welsh) ; the other is that " Hebrew" is a national name, merely indicative of the people as a people, while Israelite is a sacred or religious name appropriate to them as the chosen people of God. This latter opinion Gesenius dis- misses as "without fomidation" (Lexicon by Robinson, s. v.), but it has received the deliberate sanction of Ewald (Ausfikrl. Lehrb. der Heb. Spr. p. 18, 5th ed.).