Shaving
SHAVING
The Jews shaved their beards and hair in time of mourning, repentance, or distress, Job 1:20 Jer 48:37, and in certain ceremonial purifications, Lev 14:9 Num 8:7 . At other times they wore them long, like other oriental nations-except the Egyptians, who kept their beards shaved, as we learn from Herodotus and from antique monuments. Hence Joseph shaved before he was presented to Pharaoh, Gen 41:14 . See BEARD.
Fuente: American Tract Society Bible Dictionary
Shaving
See Hair, Nazirites.
Fuente: Dictionary of the Apostolic Church
Shaving
(properly , ). The ancient Egyptians were the only Oriental nation who objected to wearing the beard. Hence, when Pharaoh sent to summon Joseph from his dungeon, we find it recorded that the patriarch shaved himself (Gen 41:14). Shaving was therefore a remarkable custom of the Egyptians, in which they were distinguished from other Oriental nations, who carefully cherished the beard, and regarded the loss of it as a deep disgrace. That this was the feeling of the Hebrews is obvious from many passages (see especially 2Sa 10:4); but here Joseph shaves himself in conformity with an Egyptian usage, of which this passage conveys the earliest intimation, but which is confirmed not only by the subsequent accounts of Greek and Roman writers, but by the ancient sculptures and paintings of Egypt, in which the male figure is usually beardless. It is true that in sculptures some heads have a curious rectangular beard, or rather beard case attached to the chin; but this is proved to be an artificial appendage by the same head being represented sometimes with and at other times without it, and still more by the appearance of a band which passes along the jaws and attaches it to the cap on the head or to the hair. It is concluded that this appendage was never actually worn, but was used in sculpture to indicate the male character. SEE BEARD.
The practice of shaving. the beard and hair, and sometimes the whole body, was observed among the Hebrews only under extraordinary circumstances. The Levites on the day of their consecration, and the lepers at their purification, shaved all the hair off their bodies (Num 8:7; Lev 14:8-9). A woman taken prisoner in war, when she married a Jew, shaved the hair off her head (Deu 22:12), and the Hebrews generally, and also the nations bordering on Palestine, shaved themselves when they mourned, and in times of great calamity, whether public or private (Isa 7:20; Isa 15:2; Jer 41:5; Jer 48:37; Bar 6:30). God commanded the priests not to cut their hair or beards in their mournings (Lev 21:5). It may be proper to observe that, among the most degrading of punishments for: women is the loss of their hair; and the apostle hints at this (1Co 11:6): If it be a shame for a woman to be shorn or shaven, etc. SEE HAIR.
Modern Orientals shave the head alone, and that only in the case of settled residents in towns (Van Lennep, Bible Lands, p. 517). SEE BARBER.
Fuente: Cyclopedia of Biblical, Theological and Ecclesiastical Literature
Shaving (2)
In the early Church the clergy were exhorted to a decent mean in dress and habits. Thus, for instance, long hair and baldness, by shaving the head or beard, being then generally reputed indecencies in contrary extremes, the clergy were obliged to observe a becoming mediocrity between them. This is the meaning, according to its true reading, of that controverted canon of the fourth Council of Carthage, which says that a clergyman shall neither indulge long hair, nor shave his beard: Clericus nec comam nutriat, nec barbam radat. Sidonius Apollinaris (lib. 4, ep. 24) describes his friend Maximus Palatinus, a clergyman, as having his hair short and his beard long. Shaving of the monks was performed at certain fixed times, the razors being kept in an ambry close to the entrance to the dormitory (Bingham, Christ. Antiquities, 6, 4, 15). Eustathius, the heretic, was for having all virgins shorn or shaven at their consecration, but the Council of Gangra immediately rose up against him and anathematized the practice, passing a decree in these words: If any woman, under pretense of an ascetic life, cut off her hair, which God hath given her for a memorial of subjection, let her be anathema, as one that disannuls the decree of subjection. Theodosius the Great added a civil sanction to confirm the ecclesiastical decree. See Bingham, Antiquities of the Christian Church, 7, 4, 6. SEE TONSURE.
Fuente: Cyclopedia of Biblical, Theological and Ecclesiastical Literature
Shaving
shaving (in Job 1:20, , gazaz, usually , galah; in Act 21:24, , xurao): Customs as to shaving differ in different countries, and in ancient and modern times. Among the Egyptians it was customary to shave the whole body (compare Gen 41:14). With the Israelites, shaving the head was a sign of mourning (Deu 21:12; Job 1:20); ordinarily the hair was allowed to grow long, and was only cut at intervals (compare Absalom, 2Sa 14:26). Nazirites were forbidden to use a razor, but when their vow was expired, or if they were defiled, they were to shave the whole head (Num 6:5, Num 6:9, Num 6:18 ff; compare Act 21:24). The shaving of the beard was not permitted to the Israelites; they were prohibited from shaving off even the corner of their beard (Lev 21:5). It was an unpardonable insult when Hanun, king of the Ammonites, cut off the half of the beards of the Israelites whom David had sent to him (2Sa 10:4; 1Ch 19:4).
Shaving with a razor that is hired is Isaiah’s graphic figure to denote the complete devastation of Judah by the Assyrian army (Isa 7:20).
Fuente: International Standard Bible Encyclopedia
Shaving
Forbidden to Nazarites
Num 6:5; Jdg 13:5
Forbidden to priests
Eze 44:20 Beard
Fuente: Nave’s Topical Bible
SHAVING
Gen 41:14; Lev 13:33; Num 6:9; Num 8:7; 2Sa 10:4; Job 1:20; Eze 44:20
Act 21:24
Fuente: Thompson Chain-Reference Bible
Shaving
In time of mourning the Jews shaved their heads, and neglected to trim their beards. The king of the Ammonites shaved off half the beards of David’s ambassadors, which was the greatest insult he could offer. This will appear from the regard which the easterns have ever paid to the beard. D’Arvieux gives a remarkable instance of an Arab who, having received a wound in his jaw, chose to hazard his life rather than to suffer his surgeon to take off his beard. It was one of the most infamous punishments of cowardice in Sparta, that they who turned their backs in the day of battle were obliged to appear abroad with one half of their beard shaved, and the other half unshaved. The easterns considered the beard as venerable, because it distinguished men from women, and was the mark of freemen in opposition to slaves. It was still, in times comparatively modern, the greatest indignity that could be offered in Persia. Shah Abbas, king of that country, enraged that the emperor of Hindostan had inadvertently addressed him by a title far inferior to that of the great shah-in-shah, or king of kings, ordered the beards of the ambassadors to be shaved off, and sent them home to their master. One of the buffoons of the bashaw, says Belzoni, took it into his head one day, for a frolic, to shave his beard, which is no trifle among the Turks; for some of them, I really believe, would sooner have their head cut off than their beard. In this state he went home to his women, who actually thrust him out of the door; and such was the disgrace of cutting off his beard, that even his fellow buffoons would not eat with him till it was grown again.