Oven
OVEN
See BREAD.
Fuente: American Tract Society Bible Dictionary
Oven
(Heb. , tannur’, from the same root with the Chaldee to smoke, Gr. ), originally any receptacle for fire, as a furnace or kiln (comp. Gen 15:17; Isa 31:9); but usually an oven for baking bread and cakes (see Exo 7:23; Lev 2:4), not only that used by the baker (Hos 7:4; Hos 7:6-7), but also that in which the mistress of a house baked her bread (Lev 26:26; and see Jahn. Bibl. Archaeol. 1:213; 2,182). This oven was built of brick, and was smeared within and without with clay. A fire. was kindled within it, and the dough was placed upon the side, where it baked, and was called , maapheh tannur (Lev 2:4). The of the Greeks appears to have been of a similar construction. Each household possessed such an article (Exo 8:3), and it was only in times of extreme dearth that the same oven sufficed for several families (Lev 26:26). It was heated with dry twigs and grass (Mat 6:30), and the loaves were placed both inside and outside of it. It was also used for roasting meat (Mishna, Taan. 3:8). The heat of the oven furnished Hebrew writers with an image of rapid and violent destruction (Psa 21:9; Hos 7:7; Mal 4:1). But the Hebrews did not always possess such an oven, and often seem to have baked their bread on the ground, which was first heated by a fire, or on thin plates of metal, and sometimes to have made an excavation in the earth, which answered the purpose (see Gesenius, Thesaur. s.v. ). SEE BAKE.
Among the modern Orientals the dough, when prepared, is not always baked at home. In towns there are public ovens and bakers by trade; and although the general rule in large and respectable families is to bake the bread at home, much bread is bought of the bakers by unsettled individuals and poor persons; and many small households send their dough to be baked at the public oven, the baker receiving for his trouble a portion of the baked bread, which he adds to his day’s stock of bread for sale. Such public ovens and bakers by trade must have existed anciently in Palestine, and in the East generally, as is evident from Hos 7:4 and Jer 37:21. The latter text mentions the bakers’ street (or, rather, bakers’ place or market), and this would suggest that, as is the case at present, the bakers, as well as other trades, had a particular part of the bazaar or market entirely appropriated to their business, instead of being dispersed in different parts of the towns where they lived. SEE CRACKNEL.
For their larger operations the bakers have ovens of brick, not altogether unlike our own; and in large houses there are similar ovens. The ovens used in domestic baking are, however, usually of a portable description, and are large vessels of stone, earthenware, or copper, inside of which, when properly heated, small loaves and cakes are baked, and on the outer surface of which thin flaps of bread, or else a large wafer-like biscuit, may be prepared. This is adapted to the nomad state, and is the article generally intended by the Hebrew term tannur. It usually consists of a large jar made, of clay, about three feet high, and widening towards the bottom, with a hole for the extraction of the ashes (Niebuhr, Desc. de l’Arab. p. 46). Occasionally, however, it is not an actual jar, but an erection of clay in the form of a jar, built on the floor of the house (Wellsted, Travels, 1:350). The oven is frequently covered with a chimney made of mud, to create a draught.
Another mode of making bread is much used, especially in the villages. A pit is sunk in the middle of the floor of the principal room, about four or five feet deep by three in diameter, well lined with compost or cement. When sufficiently heated by a fire kindled at the bottom, the bread is made by the thin pancake-like flaps of dough being, by a peculiar knack of hand in the women, stuck against the oven, to which they adhere for a few moments, till they are sufficiently dressed. As this oven requires considerable fuel, it is seldom used except in those parts where that article is somewhat abundant, and where the winter cold is severe enough to render the warmth of the oven desirable, not only for baking bread, but for warming the apartment. SEE FURNACE.
Another sort of oven, or rather mode of baking, is much in use among the pastoral tribes. A shallow hole, about six inches deep by three or four feet in diameter, is made in the ground; this is filled up with dry brushwood, upon which, when kindled, pebbles are thrown to concentrate and retain the heat. Meanwhile the dough is prepared, and when the oven is sufficiently heated the ashes and pebbles are removed, and the spot well cleaned out. The dough is then deposited in the hollow, and is left there over night. The cakes thus baked are about two fingers thick, and are very palatable. There can be little doubt that this kind of oven and mode of baking bread were common among the Jews. Hence Hezel very ingeniously, if not truly, conjectures (Real-Lexikon, s. Vo Brod) comes the (salley choriy, Sept. , Vulg. canistra Jarin(e), hole-bread baskets, of Gen 40:16, which he renders, or rather paraphrases, baskets full of bread baked in holes, not white baskets, SEE BASKET, as in the A.V., nor baskets full of holes, as in our margin; nor white bread, as in most of the Continental versions, seeing that all bread is white in the East. As the process is slower and the bread more savory than any other, this kind of bread might certainly be entitled to the distinction implied in its being prepared for the table of the Egyptian king.
There is a baking utensil called in Arabic tajen, which is the same word () by which the Sept. renders the Heb. (miachabhadth), pan in Lev 2:5, etc. This leaves little doubt that the ancient Hebrews had this tajen. It is a sort of pan of earthenware or iron (usually the latter), flat, or slightly convex, which is put over a slow fire, and on which the thin flaps of dough are laid and baked with considerable expedition, although only one cake can be baked in this way at a time. This is not a household mode of preparing bread, but is one of the simple and primitive processes employed by the wandering and semi-wandering tribes, shepherds, husbandmen, and others, who have occasion to prepare a small quantity of daily bread in an easy, off-hand manner. Bread is also baked in a manner which, although apparently very different, is but a modification of the principle of the tajen, and is used chiefly in the. houses of the peasantry. There is a cavity in the fire-hearth, in which, when required for baking, a fire is kindled and burned down to hot embers. A plate of iron, or sometimes copper, is placed over the hole, and on this the bread is baked. SEE BREAD.
Another mode of baking is in use chiefly among the pastoral tribes, and by travelers in the open country, but is not unknown in the villages. A smooth, clear spot is chosen in the loose ground, a sandy soil so common in the Eastern deserts and harder lands being preferred. On this a fire is kindled, and when the ground is sufficiently heated the embers and ashes are raked aside, and the dough is laid on the heated spot, and then covered over with the glowing embers and ashes which had just been removed. The bread is several times turned, and in less than half an hour is sufficiently baked. Bread thus baked is called in Scripture (uggah), cake (Gen 18:6; 1Ki 17:13; Eze 4:12, etc.), and the indication 1Ki 19:6 is very clear, cake baken on the coals (coal- cakes), i.e. cakes baked under the coals. The Sept. expresses this word very fairly by , panis subcinericius (Gen 18:6; Exo 12:39). According to Busbequius (Itin. p. 36), the name of Ilugath, which he interprets ash-cakes, or ash-bread, was in his time still applied in Bulgaria to cakes prepared in this fashion; and as soon as a stranger arrived in the village the women baked such bread in all haste, in order to sell it to him. This conveys an interesting illustration of Gen 16:6, where Sarah, on the arrival of three strangers, was required to bake quickly such ash-bread though not for sale, but for the hospitable entertainment of the unknown travelers. The bread thus prepared is good and palatable, although the outer rind, or crust, is apt to smell and taste of the smoke and ashes. The necessity of turning these cakes gives a satisfactory explanation of Hos 7:8, where Ephraim is compared to a cake not turned, i.e. only baked on one side, while the other is raw and adhesive. SEE ASH-CAKE.
Fuente: Cyclopedia of Biblical, Theological and Ecclesiastical Literature
Oven
Heb. tannur, (Hos. 7:4). In towns there appear to have been public ovens. There was a street in Jerusalem (Jer. 37:21) called “bakers’ street” (the only case in which the name of a street in Jerusalem is preserved). The words “tower of the furnaces” (Neh. 3:11; 12:38) is more properly “tower of the ovens” (Heb. tannurim). These resemble the ovens in use among ourselves.
There were other private ovens of different kinds. Some were like large jars made of earthenware or copper, which were heated inside with wood (1 Kings 17:12; Isa. 44:15; Jer. 7:18) or grass (Matt. 6:30), and when the fire had burned out, small pieces of dough were placed inside or spread in thin layers on the outside, and were thus baked. (See FURNACE)
Pits were also formed for the same purposes, and lined with cement. These were used after the same manner.
Heated stones, or sand heated by a fire heaped over it, and also flat irons pans, all served as ovens for the preparation of bread. (See Gen. 18:6; 1 Kings 19:6.)
Fuente: Easton’s Bible Dictionary
Oven
tanur. Fixed or portable. The fixed ovens were inside towns. The portable ovens consisted of a large clay jar, three feet high, widening toward the bottom, with a hole to extract the ashes. Sometimes there was an erection of clay in the form of a jar, built on the house floor. Every house had one (Exodus viii. 3 ); only in a famine (lid one suffice for several faro-flies (Leviticus xxvi. 26). Tile heating fuel was dry grass and twigs (Blurt. vt. 30: “grass, which to-day is, to-morrow is cast into the oven”). The loaves were placed inside, and thin cakes outside of it.
Image of consuming vengeance (Mal 4:1). Psa 21:9; “Thou shalt make them as a fiery oven in the time of Thine anger… burning with Thy hot, wrath in the day of the Lord.” Hos 7:4, 7: “they are all adulterers, as an oven heated by (burning from) the baker,” i.e. the fire burns of itself, even after tlle baker has ceased to feed it with fuel. “Who teaseth from raising (rather from heating it meeir) after he hath kneaded the dough until it be leavened:” he omits to feed it only during the short time of the fermentation of the bread. So their lusts were on fire even in the short respite that Satan gives, till his leaven has worked. 2Pe 2:14, “cannot cease from sin.”
Fuente: Fausset’s Bible Dictionary
Oven
OVEN ().In the reference to fuel for the village oven (Mat 6:30, Luk 12:28) the term grass is used generally for any wild produce of the fields, including thorns and thistles.
The Bible references to the baking of bread correspond to the three principal methods now employed in Palestine. (1) The simplest is that in use among the Bedouin or migratory Arabs of the desert. It is to make a slight hollow in the ground at the tent door, and burn upon it dry grass or twigs until sufficient hot ash is made for the baking of the bread cakes (Gen 18:6, 1Ki 17:12; 1Ki 19:6). An improvement upon this is seen in the small villages, where the conditions of life are more stationary. The hollow is deepened a little more, and covered with large pebbles in order to retain the heat, and the bread is either laid upon these after the ashes have been brushed aside, or, without removal of the ashes, the bread is laid upon a convex metal disc or griddle slightly raised above the fire-place. (2) The next stage of advance is seen in the large, pot-like hole dug in the ground, and lined with a smooth coating of plaster. The same kind of fuel is laid as before on the pebbles at the bottom, and the thin cakes are fired by being placed for a minute on the hot concave surface of the oven. The work of baking is done by a woman who sits beside the oven, and from time to time adds a few handfuls of fuel. She has on one side the tray of dough from which she tears out a small piece, and after rolling it out into a thin cake she distends it still further by slapping it over one arm and then over the other. She then lays it upon a circular cushion-like pad kept for the purpose, and thus applies it to the plaster surface of the pot oven. As each loaf, about a foot and a half in diameter and of wafer-like thinness, is rapidly fired, it is placed upon the pile of bread on her other side. This is the ordinary oven for home-made bread in the villages, the tannr of the OT and the simpler form of the klibnos of the NT. In the warning of Lev 26:26, the predicted scarcity of fuel and flour would be such that ten women in one cluster or section of the village houses, instead of using in turn the same oven for their separate households, would have to unite their little stock of flour to make a baking to be done by one of them, and then receive by weight the share of bread belonging to each.
(3) The final form is that of the bakers oven. The ordinary village usually has one of these, in which baking is done on three or more days of the week, and the towns are furnished with a larger number in daily use on account of the increased demand. The oven recess, instead of being a hollow in the ground, is now a vault about twelve feet long, four feet high, and eight feet broad, built in the bake-house. The pebbles of the primitive form are represented by a pavement of squared stone along the length and breadth of the semi-cylindrical vault. Upon it is laid fuel of the same kind as before, with an addition of thicker twigs and pieces of cleft wood, and the fire is kept up until sufficient heat has been produced. The hot ashes are then brushed off and banked up on each side, and the bread is laid on this cleared space of the hot stone pavement (Isa 44:19, Jer 37:21). The heat is considerably greater than what is needed for the more gradual firing of our larger European loaf, and the Oriental oven thus became the emblem of vehement desire (Hos 7:6-7) and the indignant anger of God (Psa 21:9).
G. M. Mackie.
Fuente: A Dictionary Of Christ And The Gospels
Oven
OVEN.See Bread.
Fuente: Hastings’ Dictionary of the Bible
Oven
uv’n. See BREAD; FURNACE.
Fuente: International Standard Bible Encyclopedia
Oven
Except in cities where there were those who followed the trade of the baker, with built-up ovens, it was customary for every household to have its own simple oven. A hole was dug in the ground and coated with clay, which hardened with the heat of the fire. Any species of grass soon dried in the sun and was then thrown into the oven to heat it. The bread was made into thin cakes which were baked by being stuck to the sides of the oven, or placed on a cover at the top. There are many instances in scripture where on the arrival of a visitor bread had to be kneaded and baked for them. Exo 8:3; Lev 2:4; Lev 7:9; Lev 11:35; Lev 26:26; Lam 5:10; Hos 7:4-7; Mat 6:30; Luk 12:28. The heat of the oven is used symbolically for rapid destruction. Psa 21:9; Mal 4:1.
Fuente: Concise Bible Dictionary
Oven
For baking
– General references
Exo 8:3; Lev 2:4; Lev 7:9; Lev 11:35; Lev 26:26 Bread
Figurative
Psa 21:9; Hos 7:4; Hos 7:6-7; Mal 4:1; Mat 6:30; Luk 12:28
Fuente: Nave’s Topical Bible
Oven
Oven. The Eastern oven is of two kindsfixed and portable. The former is found only in towns, where regular bakers are employed. Hos 7:4. The latter is adapted to the nomad state. It consists of a large jar made of clay, about three feet high and widening toward the bottom, with a hole for the extraction of the ashes. Each household possessed such an article, Exo 8:3; and it was only in times of extreme dearth that the same oven sufficed for several families. Lev 26:26. It was heated with dry twigs and grass, Mat 6:30, and the loaves were placed both inside and outside of it.
Fuente: People’s Dictionary of the Bible
Oven
Oven. The eastern oven is of two kinds — fixed and portable. The former is found only in towns, where regular bakers are employed. Hos 7:4. The latter ia adapted to the nomad state, it consists of a large jar made of clay, about three feet high and widening toward the bottom, with a hole for the extraction of the ashes.
Each household possessed such an article, Exo 8:3, and it was, only in times of extreme dearth, that the same oven sufficed for several families. Lev 26:26. It was heated with dry twigs and grass, Mat 6:30, and the loaves were placed both inside and outside of it.
Fuente: Smith’s Bible Dictionary
Oven
is mentioned in Mat 6:30; Luk 12:28. The form of “oven” commonly in use in the east indicates the kind in use as mentioned in Scripture. A hole is sunk in the ground about 3 feet deep and somewhat less in diameter. The walls are plastered with cement. A fire is kindled inside, the fuel being grass, or dry twigs, which heat the oven rapidly and blacken it with smoke and soot (see Lam 5:10). When sufficiently heated the surface is wiped, and the dough is molded into broad thin loaves, placed one at a time on the wall of the “oven” to fit its concave inner circle. The baking takes a few seconds. Such ovens are usually outside the house, and often the same “oven” serves for several families (Lev 26:26). An “oven” of this sort is doubtless referred to in Exo 8:3 (see Hastings, Bib. Dic.).
Fuente: Vine’s Dictionary of New Testament Words
Oven
Psa 21:9 (a) In this way GOD describes His fierce anger which will bring great suffering upon His enemies.
Hos 7:4 (a) This strange figure describes the terrible passions that occupy the hearts of ungodly men who burn in their hatred of one another, or in their lusts for one another. GOD describes it as a heat that so destroys the virtues of the soul that only evil remains.
Mal 4:1 (a) This picture represents the fierce wrath of GOD which will be poured out on this earth in the day of Jacob’s trouble. At this time the Lord will come forth from Heaven to rule the nations with a rod of iron.