Topic
Hinge
2 passages cited, from 3 classic reference works.
These works date from 1884–1915 and are in the public domain. They reflect the Protestant scholarship of their time: their history, archaeology and dates can be out of date, and where they interpret, other traditions read the text differently. The verses are shown in the King James Version, the wording these works were written against.
The verses
The passages the works cite, those cited by more of them first.
- Proverbs 26:14Easton · Smith · ISBE
As the door turneth upon his hinges, so doth the slothful upon his bed.
- 1 Kings 7:50Smith · ISBE
And the bowls, and the snuffers, and the basons, and the spoons, and the censers of pure gold; and the hinges of gold, both for the doors of the inner house, the most holy place, and for the doors of the house, to wit, of the temple.
In the reference works
Easton's Bible Dictionary (1897) · 1 references
(Heb. tsir), that on which a door revolves. “Doors in the East turn rather on pivots than on what we term hinges. In Syria, and especially in the Hauran, there are many ancient doors, consisting of stone slabs with pivots carved out of the same piece inserted in sockets above and below, and fixed during the building of the house” (Prov. 26:14).
Smith's Bible Dictionary (1884) · 2 references
International Standard Bible Encyclopedia (1915) · 2 references
hinj (poth): Hinges of Jewish sacred buildings in Scripture are mentioned only in connection with Solomon's temple. Here those for the doors, both of the oracle and of the outer temple, are said to have been of gold (1Ki 7:50). By this is probably to be understood that the pivots upon which the doors swung, and which turned in the sockets of the threshold and the lintel, were cased in gold. The proverb, "As the door turneth upon its hinges, so doth the sluggard upon his bed" (Pr 26:14), describes the ancient mode of ingress and egress into important edifices. In the British Museum are many examples of stone sockets taken from Babylonian and Assyrian palaces and temples, engraved with the name and titles of the royal builder; while in the Hauran doors of a single slab of stone with stone pivots are still found in situ. Hinges, as we understand the word, were unknown in the ancient world.
See HOUSE, II, 1.
W. Shaw Caldecott
Texts: Easton's Bible Dictionary (1897); Smith's Bible Dictionary (1884); International Standard Bible Encyclopedia (1915), from the CrossWire SWORD modules (public domain). Verse references were parsed from the works' own markup and checked against the KJV verse list.