Ethnarch
Ethnarch
This comparatively rare term is derived from , a race, and , to rule; perhaps the nearest English equivalent is chief. The word is not known before the 2nd cent. b.c., and appears to indicate a ruler appointed by or over a people who were themselves part of a larger kingdom or empire, the appointment being made or recognized by its overlord or suzerain as valid. The purpose of such an appointment was perhaps primarily to safeguard the religion of a people. The earliest instance of an ethnarch known to us is that of Simon Maccabaeus. In 1Ma 14:47 Simon accepts from the people the following offices- (to be high priest and to be general and ethnarch of the Jews and their priests and to rule over all); and in 1Ma 15:2 a letter of King Antiochus of Syria is addressed to him as (great priest and ethnarch). From 1Ma 15:1-2 it is clear that the was the Jews themselves, and indeed almost everywhere where the term ethnarch occurs, it refers to a ruler over Jews. Josephus (Ant. xiv. vii. 2) shows us that the large Jewish community in the great city of Alexandria had an ethnarch over it, and he defines his duties precisely thus: , (he governs the race and decides trials in court and has charge of contracts and ordinances as if he were an absolute monarch).
An inscription (Le Bas-Waddington, Voyage archologique en Grce et en Asie Mineure, Paris, 1847-77, vol. iii. no. 2196 = W. Dittenberger, Orientis Grci Inscriptiones Select, Leipzig, 1905, vol. ii. no. 616) from a village, El-Mlikje in the Hauran, mentions by the names ethnarch and general (or praetor) of nomads a chief of nomad Arabs of the time of Hadrian or Antoninus Pius who must have submitted to the Emperor.
These passages will help to illustrate the reference in 2Co 11:32. The man there mentioned was doubtless ruler of the Jews in Damascus and its territory, who were permitted to exercise their own religious law very freely and fully (Ramsay, Pictures of the Apostolic Church, London, 1910, p. 90). He was under Aretas, who has the title (king, i.e. of Arabia), and, indeed, as has been said, the ethnarch was always lower than a king. This fact is illustrated by interesting passages in Josephus (Bellum Judaicum (Josephus) ii. vi. 3, Ant. XVII. xi. 4), where Caesar Augustus makes Archelaus not , but , of half of the territory that had belonged to Herod, promising him the higher title later, if certain conditions were fulfilled; and in Pseudo-Lucian (Macrob. 17, ed. Jacobitz, Leipzig, 1896, vol. iii. p. 198), where a man is proclaimed instead of of the Bosporus.
A. Souter.
Fuente: Dictionary of the Apostolic Church
Ethnarch
(), properly ruler of a nation; hence generally a praefect of a district or city (Lucian, Macrob. 17), e.g. Simon Maccabaeus, as head of the Jewish crommonwealth (1Ma 14:47, “governor;” 15:1, 2, “prince ;” Josephus, Ant. 13:6, 6); Archelaus, appointed lay his father’s will and the emperor’s ratification, his viceroy in Judaea (Josephus, War, 2:6, 3), of the national head (modern “patriach”) of time Jews in Egypt (Josephus, Ant. 14:7, 2; conp. Strabo, 16:798). Spoken of the “governor” or mayor of the city of Damascus (2Co 11:02), under the Arabian king Aretas (q.v.). (See Walch, Disert. in Acta Aposit. 2:85.)
Fuente: Cyclopedia of Biblical, Theological and Ecclesiastical Literature
Ethnarch
ETHNARCH is a Greek word translated by governor in 2Co 11:32. It is used also of Simon the high priest (1Ma 14:47; 1Ma 15:1-2). Its exact meaning is uncertain, but it appears to indicate the ruler of a nation or tribe which is itself living with separate laws, etc., amidst an alien race.
A. Souter.
Fuente: Hastings’ Dictionary of the Bible
Ethnarch
ethnark (2Co 11:32 margin). See GOVERNOR.