Phinehas
According to the Hebrew Bible, Phinehas (also spelled Phineas, Phinees was a priest during the Exodus. The grandson of Aaron and son of Eleazar, the High Priests (Exodus 6:25), he distinguished himself as a youth at Shittim with his zeal against the heresy of Peor.
Quotes about
[edit]- Just then one of the Israelites came and brought a Midianite woman into his family, in the sight of Moses and in the sight of the whole congregation of the Israelites, while they were weeping at the entrance of the tent of meeting. When Phinehas son of Eleazar, son of Aaron the priest, saw it, he got up and left the congregation. [...] The Lord spoke to Moses, saying: ‘Phinehas son of Eleazar, son of Aaron the priest, has turned back my wrath from the Israelites by manifesting such zeal among them on my behalf that in my jealousy I did not consume the Israelites. Therefore say, “I hereby grant him my covenant of peace. It shall be for him and for his descendants after him a covenant of perpetual priesthood, because he was zealous for his God, and made atonement for the Israelites."
- Numbers 25,6-7;10-13 (NRSV).
- Moses sent them to the war, a thousand from each tribe, along with Phinehas son of Eleazar the priest, with the vessels of the sanctuary and the trumpets for sounding the alarm in his hand.
- Numbers 31,6 (NRSV).
- Then the priest Phinehas son of Eleazar and the chiefs returned from the Reubenites and the Gadites in the land of Gilead to the land of Canaan, to the Israelites, and brought back word to them. The report pleased the Israelites; and the Israelites blessed God and spoke no more of making war against them, to destroy the land where the Reubenites and the Gadites were settled. The Reubenites and the Gadites called the altar Witness;[a] ‘For’, said they, ‘it is a witness between us that the Lord is God.’
- Joshua 22,32-34 (NRSV).
- He sent darkness, and made the land dark;
- they rebelled against his words.
- He turned their waters into blood,
- and caused their fish to die.
- Their land swarmed with frogs,
- even in the chambers of their kings.
- He spoke, and there came swarms of flies,
- and gnats throughout their country.
- Psalms 105,28-31 (NRSV).
- Phinehas son of Eleazar ranks third in glory
- for being zealous in the fear of the Lord,
- and standing firm, when the people turned away,
- in the noble courage of his soul;
- and he made atonement for Israel.
- Sirach 45,23 (NRSV).
- Thus he burned with zeal for the law, just as Phinehas did against Zimri son of Salu.
- 1 Maccabees 2,26 (NRSV).
- Phinehas our ancestor, because he was deeply zealous, received the covenant of everlasting priesthood.
- 1 Maccabees 2,54 (NRSV).
