Nakedness
Nakedness
NAKEDNESS ().Oriental dress is generally a draping of the figure in one or more continuous gowns or cloaks. The clothing may be drawn to the body by the waist-band or sash, but the tendency is to avoid as far as possible any exact shaping and rigid fastening of the costume, as such close adaptation to the figure is considered both immodest and undecorative, and in a warm climate would cause friction and perspiration (Eze 44:18). With Orientals, to a greater extent than in the West, out-door dress carries a meaning of investiture and embellishment, with a consciousness of self-appreciation and an expectation of comment. This is partly because in the daytime, in the retirement of the family, they undress more than is customary in the West. In the OT, the garments that were continually put on and off, as one went out and returned to the house, were called suits of apparel or exchange (Jdg 17:10, Isa 3:22). The cotton or linen gown worn beneath these is the permanent under-garment, and any one wearing only this is conventionally said to be naked or unclothed. In this loose costumea long robe reaching to the feetmembers of the family, both male and female, attend to their active household duties, or enjoy the passive luxury of the unoccupied hour. It is, however, unbecoming to receive visitors in such undress, and hence the impropriety of entering without due announcement and permission received, or of looking down from the flat roof of the house into a neighbours enclosure. The linen cloth mentioned in Mar 14:51-52 was a substitute for the ordinary under-garment. The solitary fisherman when diving from the side of the Lake of Galilee after his cast-net usually divests himself of all clothing. The same is frequently done in summer weather when fishermen haul the drag-net into the boat (Joh 21:7), or a loincloth is worn, as in the case of the tanner and potter at their work.
Nakedness thus means: (1) the state of undress permitted in Oriental family life, and preferred as an adaptation to the climate; (2) insufficiency, amounting sometimes to complete want, of clothing, involving discomfort and suffering in the case of the poor and destitute (Mat 25:36, Rom 8:35, 2Co 11:27); (3) the nudity connected with immodest behaviour (Exo 20:26), or inflicted as a humiliation on prisoners of war (Isa 20:4); and (4) in a metaphorical sense, unnatural and shameless disloyalty to God (Eze 23:29, Rev 3:18).
G. M. Mackie.
Fuente: A Dictionary Of Christ And The Gospels
Nakedness
See Naked
Fuente: The Poor Mans Concordance and Dictionary to the Sacred Scriptures
NAKEDNESS
“To observe one’s garments that one may not go naked,” signifies, as has been shewn under GARMENTS, to make reason and Scripture the rule of one’s actions.
According to this analogy, nakedness signifies sin or folly. Thus, in Gen 3:7, it is taken for sin in general; and in Exo 32:25; Eze 16:36; and 2Ch 28:19, for idolatry. And so elsewhere in the Scriptures, all kinds of vice, more or less, but in the highest sense, idolatry, the main act of rebellion and apostasy against God, and all the degrees and acts of it, or dependent and consequent upon it, come under the notion of filthiness or nakedness or sores; and therefore to be in the highest degree naked, is to be guilty of idolatry. This sin, and that of fornication, which is often in Holy Writ modestly called the uncovering of the shame or nakedness, are a-kin; the idolatrous rites of the ancient times being performed with not only fornication, but all the lascivious postures imaginable, and shewing what modesty requires to be hidden.
Nakedness signifies also guilt, shame, poverty, or misery any way, as being the consequence and punishment of sin, and of idolatry in particular-a crime which God never leaves unpunished. Thus, in Jer 49:10, “I have made Esau bare, I have uncovered his secret places, and he shall not be able to hide himself; his seed is spoiled, and his brethren and his neighbours, and he is not,”-signifies the destruction of Esau. So, in Isa 47;3, the prophet concerning Babylon says, “Thy nakedness shall be uncovered, yea thy shame shall be seen;” that is, thou shalt be humbled and made a slave.
The Indian Interpreter, chap. 116., explains the symbol, of distress, poverty, and disgrace.
The nakedness of enemies is, by the interpreters of omens constantly explained as signifying that by some discovery of their secrets, a way would be ‘made to vanquish them in the end. Of this there is a remarkable instance in Procopius.f1 He observes, that when the Persians came to besiege Amida in Mesopotamia, the besieged made such resistance, that the king ordered the siege to be raised; and then some lewd women, in derision, took up their coats and shewed him their nakedness. The magicians having observed this, hindered the raising of the siege, giving out that this was an omen, that shortly the besieged should shew what they had most hidden. Accordingly, a little after, a secret way was discovered by which the town was taken.
F1 Procop. Persic. L. i. c. 7.
Fuente: A Symbolical Dictionary
Nakedness
NUDITY. These terms, beside their ordinary and literal meaning, sometimes signify void of succour, disarmed. So, after worshipping the golden calf, the Israelites found themselves naked in the midst of their enemies. Nakedness of the feet was a token of respect. Moses put off his shoes to approach the burning bush. Most commentators are of opinion, that the priests served in the tabernacle with their feet naked; and afterward in the temple. In the enumeration that Moses makes of the habit and ornaments of the priests, he no where mentions any dress for the feet. Also the frequent ablutions appointed them in the temple seem to imply that their feet were naked. To uncover the nakedness of any one, is commonly put for a shameful and unlawful conjunction, or an incestuous marriage, Lev 20:19; Eze 16:37. Nakedness is sometimes put for being partly undressed; en deshabille. Saul continued naked among the prophets; that is, having only his under garments on. Isaiah received orders from the Lord to go naked; that is, clothed as a slave, half clad.
Thus it is recommended to clothe the naked; that is, such as are ill clothed. St. Paul says, that he was in cold, in nakedness; that is, in poverty, and want of raiment. Naked is put for discovered, known, manifest. So Job 26:6 : Hell is naked before him. The sepulchre, the unseen state, is open to the eyes of God. St. Paul says, in the same sense, Neither is there any creature that is not manifest in his sight; but all things are naked and open unto the eyes of him with whom we have to do, Heb 4:13.