PEARLS
PEARLS
Were ranked by the ancients among the most precious substances, Jer 17:4, and were highly valued as ornaments for women. Their modest splendor still charms the Orientals, and a string of pearls is a favorite decoration of eastern monarchs. The kingdom of heaven is compared to a goodly pearl, so superior to all others that the pearl merchant sold all others that he could obtain for it the highest price, Mat 13:45,46 . The gates of heaven are described as consisting of pearls; “every several gate was one pearl,” Jer 21:21 . The Savior forbade his apostles to cast their pearls before swine, Mat 7:6 ; that is, to expose the precious truths of the gospel unnecessarily to those who reject them with scorn and violence.Pearls are a stony concretion in a species of oyster, found in the Persian gulf, on the coast of Ceylon, Java, Sumatra, etc., and in smaller quantities in various other places in both hemispheres. It is not known whether the pearl is a natural deposit, or the consequence of disease, or of the lodging of some foreign body, as a grain of sand, within the shells. The pearl oyster grows in clusters, on rocks in deep water; and is brought up by trained divers, only during a few weeks of calm weather in spring. The shell itself yields the well- known “mother of pearl.”
Fuente: American Tract Society Bible Dictionary
Pearls
It is doubtful that pearls are mentioned in the Old Testament. The word gabish, rendered ‘pearl’ in Job 28:18, appears to mean crystal; and the word peninim, which our version translates by ‘rubies,’ is now supposed to mean coral [CORAL]. But in the New Testament the pearls are repeatedly mentioned. In Mat 13:45-46, a merchant (traveling jeweler) seeking goodly pearls, finds one pearl of great price, and to be able to purchase it, sells all that he hasall the jewels he had previously secured. In 1Ti 2:9, and Rev 17:4, pearls are mentioned as the ornaments of females; in Rev 18:12-16, among costly merchandise; and Rev 21:21, the twelve gates of the heavenly Jerusalem are ‘twelve pearls.’ These intimations seem to indicate that pearls were in more common use among the Jews after than before the captivity, while they evince the estimation in which they were in later times held. The island of Tylos (Bahrein) was especially renowned for its fishery of pearls; the Indian Ocean was also known to produce pearls. Pearls have at all times been esteemed one of the most valuable commodities of the East. Their modest splendor and simple beauty appear to have captivated the Orientals, even more than the dazzling brilliancy of the diamond, and have made them at all times the favorite ornament of despotic princes. In the West, the passion for this elegant luxury was at its height about the period of the extinction of Roman freedom, and they were valued in Rome and Alexandria as highly as precious stones. In Asia this taste was of more ancient date, and may be traced to a period anterior to the Persian dynasty; nor has it ever declined. A string of pearls of the largest size is an indispensable part of the decorations of an Eastern monarch. It was thus that Tippoo was adorned when he fell before the gates of his capital; and it is thus that the present ruler of the Persians is usually decorated.
Fuente: Popular Cyclopedia Biblical Literature
PEARLS
Mat 13:45; 1Ti 2:9; Rev 17:4; Rev 18:12; Rev 21:21