Unchangeableness of God. See Attributes
OF (ioD; iM.MUrAIlILITY.
Uncial Letters — so called as being an inch (Lat. uncia) long — characters of a large and round form used in some ancient MSS. The earliest form of an alpha- bet is its capitals, and the oldest Greek and Latin MSS. are written entirely in capitals. Uncial letters, which began to take the place of capitals in the middle of the 5th century, differ from them in being composed of rounded and not straight lines, and exhibiting a ten- dency towards greater expedition in style. Uncial writing arose as writing on papyrus or vellum became common, the necessity for more rapid execution leading to the practice of curving the lines. Its being more easily learned than the cursive style was probahly the cause of its becoining the favorite mode of writing books of importance among the monkish scribes: while legal instruments, which required greater despatch, were exe- cuted In' professional scribes in a corrupted form of the Roman cursive hand. L^ncial writing prevailed from the 6th to the 8th, or even 10th, century. The follow- ing specimens of uncial Greek and Latin writing are from a MS. of the four gospels and Acts of the Apostles in both languages, written early in the 6th century, and presented to the University of Cambridge by Theodore Beza in 1581. The passage is from John xxi, 19 — " sig- nifying by what death he should glorify God."
Greek Uncials.
?1CMlpK-Ahsi5c)\>^CT)OXT'elr\ONCyiirfiCAblTdcn
Latin man being altogether of necessity for salvation." It also affirms that there are two swords, a spiritual and material — the one to be einployed by the Church, ami the other_/o/- the Church under the direction of its head ; and that to deny the subservience of the latter to the former is to maintain the doctrine of two principles, and to fall into the heresy of the Manichajans. See Trench, Mediceval Church Hist. p. 282.
Unbelief, the refusing assent to testimony, the withholding of due belief. According to Kant, it is the withholding of assent to that which, though objective- ly insuiRcient as a ground of cognition, is subjectively sufficient as a ground of faith. Moral unbelief is the rejection of that which, though we cannot know it, is yet morally iiecessarj', as faith in God, freedom, and immortality. " It includes," says Dr. (iuyse, " disaffec- tion to God, disregard to his word, prejudices against the Redeemer, readiness to give credit to any other than him, inordinate love to the world, and preferring of the applause of men to the ajiprobation of God." •• Unbelief," says Charnock, ''is the greatest sin, as it is the foundation of all sin: it was Adam's first sin; it is a sin against the Gospel, against the highest testimony; a refusal to accept of Christ u[)on the terms of the Gos- l)cl. It strikes peculiarly at (iod ; is the greatest re-
Uucials.
During the 6th and 7th centuries a transitional style of writing prevailed in Itah', and to some extent else- where, in which the letters approximated more nearly to the Roman cursive hand: this passed by a gradual transition into the minuscule manner, or small hand, which, from the beginning of the 10th ceiiturj', became usual in MSS. See Silvestre, Universal Palceography (fransl. and edit, by Sir F. Madden, Lond. 1850) ; Traite de JJiplomatique, par deux Religieux Bentidictins de la Congregation de St.-Maur (Paris, 1755). — Chambers's Encyclop. s. v. See Mani'sckipts.
Unciicumcised (^I^S, i.e. having a foreskin, ciKpo^ivfTriai' t'x*"'''! *'"f' *" aKpojivaTia, the prepuce, alone, for " uncircumcision"), a word literally denoting a heathen among the Jews. So also it is sometimes used figuratively "of uncircumcised lips," i. e. dull of speech^, stammering, one whose lips still have, as it were, the foreskin, and are therefore too thick and large to bring out words easily and fluently (Exod. vi, 12, 30). So, likewise, ''their ear is uncircumcised," shut u|) by a fore- skin (Jer. vi, 10) ; also "their uncircumcised heart," to which the precepts of religion and piety cannot pene- trate (Lev. xxvi, 41 ; Dent. X, 16; Jer. iv, 4; Ezek. xliv,. 9; Isa. vi, 10; Acts vii, 51 ; James i, 21 ; Col. ii, 18). So, also, " the foreskin of a tree," i. e. uncircumcised
UNCLEAN
632
UNCLEAN
fruit, the fruit of the first three years, which by the law was to be regarded as unclean (Lev. xix, 2o). Isee Cut-
CUMCISION.
Unclean (usually some form of the verb N":-, which is the technical term for ceremonuil pollutum; oKiibapTOC, impure; but occasionally ri1"i", nuled ; Unp, coiineau/ecl ; T^^^, Jillk ; Koii'oc, cominuii). In this article we treat ol'yr;o(/ prohibited by the Mosaic law, reserving defilements of tha pt?svu fur the f(jllow- ing article. See Clkan.
The .lews were forbidden to eat things strangled, or dead of themselves, or through beasts or birds of prey; whatever beast did not both [lart the hoof and chew the cud; and certain other smaller animals rated as "creep- ing things" (y'^'J); certain classes of birds mentioned in Lev. xi and Ueut. xiv, twenty or twenty-one in all ; whatever in the waters had not both fins and scales; whatever winged insect had not besides four legs the two hind- legs for leaping; besides things offered in sacrifice to idols; and all blood or whatever contained it (save perhaps the blood of fish, as would appear from that only of beast anil bird being forbidden [Lev. vii, 26]), and therefore flesh cut from the live animal ; as also all fat, at any rate that disposed in masses among the in- testines, and probably wherever discernible and separa- ble among the flesh (iii, 14-17; vii, '2o). The eating of blood was ]irohil>ited even to " the stranger that s((journeth among you" (xvii, 10, 12, 13, 14), an exten- sion which we do not trace in other dietary precepts; e. g. the thing which died of itself was to be given "unto the stranger that is in thy gates" (Deut. xiv, 21). As regards blood, the |)roliibition indeed dates from the declaration to Noah against '"flesh with the life thereof which is the blood thereof," in (ien. ix, 4, which was perhaps regarded by Moses as still binding upon all Noah's descendants. The grounds, however, on which the similar precept of the Apostolic Council, in Acts xv, 20, 21, appears based, relate not to any obligation rest- ing still unbroken on the Gentile world, but to the risk of promiscuous offence to the Jews and Jewish Chris- tians, "_/(>/• Moses of old time hath in every city them that preach him." Hence this abstinence is reckoned among '•necessary things" {rtt iTrav(ijKt(;), and "things offered to idols," altliough not solely, it may be pre- sumed, on the same grounds, are placed in the same class with "blood and things strangled" (('nri^faS^in tioioXo^vTwi' Kai dinaTix; Kcii winKTOv, ver. 28, 29). Besides these, we find the prohibition twice recurring against "seething a kid in its mother's milk.'' It is added, as a final injunction to the code of dietary pre- cepts in Deut. xiv, after the crowning declaration of ver. 21, "Jar thou art an holy people inito the Lord thy (jod ;" but in Exod. xxiii, iO; xxxiv, 20, the context relates to the bringing first-fruits to the altar, and to the "angel" who was to "go before" the people. To this precept we shall have occasion further to return.