SERVANT OF Jehovah (fi^n'' ^^V, SovXog roij Kvpiov, "servant of the Lord," also in the phrase "my servant," etc.), a term used tropically in several senses.
1. A worshipper of God (Neh. i, 10) ; so the Israelites in general (Ezra v, 11), and Daniel in particular (Dan. vi, 21). In this sense it is applied as an epithet to the pious : e. g. to Abraham (Psa. cv, 6, 42), Joshua (Josh, xxiv, 29 ; Judg. ii, 8), Job (Job i, 8, etc.), David (Psa. xviii, 1, etc.), Eliakim (Isa. xxii, 20), Zerubbabel (Hag. ii, 24), and to saints in general (Psa. xxxiv, 23, etc.; Isa, liv, 17, etc.). See Saint.
2. A minister or ambassador of God, called and sent to perform any service (Isa. xlix, 6), e. g. Nebuchad- nezzar, whom God used as his instrument in chastising his people (.Tcr, xxvii, 6; xliii, 10); but usually some favorite servant, as the angels (Job iv, 18), or prophets (Amos iii, 7 ; Jcr, vii, 25, etc, ; Dan, ix, 6 ; Ezra ix, 1 1), especially IMoses (Deut, xxxiv, 5; Josh.i, 1, 13, 15; Psa. cv, 26), and Isaiah (Isa, xx, 3). Sometimes the two ideas of a pious worshipper of God and a special messen-
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ger sent by him seem to have coalesced, as in the pas- sages relating to Abraham and Moses, and particularly in those where Israel or Jacob, i. e. the people of Israel, is addressed by this honorable and endearing appella- tion (as Isa. xli, 8, etc. ; Jer. xxx, 10, etc. ; Ezek. xxviii, 25; xxxvii, 25; comp. Hos. xi, 1).
3. Peculiarly the Messiah is thus typified, especially in the latter chapters of Isaiah (more particularly xlii, 1; lii, 13; comp. Matt, xii, 13), as pre-eminently Je- hovah's chosen servant for accomplishing the work of redemption. See Gesenius, Comment, in Jesa, ad loc. ; Stier, [Vofds of the Lord Jesus, ii, 566 [Am. ed.J ; Steu- del, De i"i 13? (Tub. 1829); Umbreit, Der Knecht Gottes (Hamb. 1840) ; Schmutz, Le Serviteur de Jeho- vah (Strasb. 1858); Oehler, Knecht Jehovah's (Stuttg. 1865); Urwick, The Servant of Jehovah (Edinb. 1877). See DoL'BLE Sknse.
Servants. See Slaves.
Servator, in Roman mythology, was a surname of Jupiter, signifying the pi-eserver.
Server, one who assists the priest at the celebration of the holy eucharist by lighting the altar-tapers, ar- ranging the books, bringing bread, wine, and water for the sacrifice, and by making the appointed responses in the name and behalf of the assembled congregation. He was sometimes called "adjutor." The Chigiiiacs allowed one server, but the Cistercians, in obedience to pope Soter's injunction and the plural wording of the Dominus cobiscum, required always two. — Lee, Gloss, of Liturcj. Terms, s. v.
Servetus, Michael {Serveto, surnamed Beves, known in France as Michel de Villeneitce), unipiestion- abl}' the leading Antitrinitarian in the period of the Keformation, was born at Villancuva, in Arragon, in 1509 or 1511, and belonged to an ancient Christian fam- ily of prominence, perhaps of noble rank. His father was a jurist and notary, and Michael was sent at an early age to Toidouse in preparation for a similar ca- reer; but his impetuous anil imaginative spirit was not attracted by the dry study of jurispruiience, and turned with preference towards theological investiga- tions, prompted, perhaps, by the fact that at Toulouse he first became acquainted with the Bible. The above statements are taken from his own testimony at the Ge- neva trial, and are probably truthful in the main ; but it is difficult to harmonize them with his declarations at Vienne, according to which he entered the service of father Quintana, the confessor of Charles V, at the early age of perhaps fourteen or fifteen years, and with his master accompanied the court to Italy on the occasion of the emperor's coronation at Bologna, and to Germany on its return. The further statement that he remained with Quintana in Germany until the death of the latter in 1532 is known to be positively untrue, since he was at Basle, and alone, by the close of the summer of 1530; and the Geneva testimony' recites that he came to Basle di- rect from Toulouse, bj' way of Lyons and Geneva, with- out referring in any way to travels in Italy or Germany.
\^'hen Servetus came to Basle he was without expe- rience in the Christian life, and his moral consciousness was undeveloped. Keligion was not to him an answer to the questionings of the human heart — a dissolving of doubts in the field of morals, a deliverance from in- ternal conflicts. The unmistakably speculative tenden- cy of his mind led him to conceive of Christianity as being first of all a system of doctrine, and he had al- ready developed a scheme in which the doctrines of God and of his manifestation in Christ, in their specu- lative aspects, were regarded as constituting its essential basis. The object of his visit was to find a publisher for the book in which he had embodied his views, and to secure the favorable regards of the Swiss reformers in behalf of the modifications he jjroposed to introduce into the teaching of the Keformation. (Ecolampadius, however, found his statements of doctrinal views ob-