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Manners & Customs

Double Invitations

BANQUET INVITATIONS In some parts of the East a custom of double invitations to an entertainment has been observed. Some time before the feast is to be served, an invitation is sent forth; and then, when the appointed time draws near, a servant is sent again, this time to announce that everything is ready. There are several examples of this custom...

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Eating Alone

EATING ALONE DISLIKED IT IS A PART of Oriental etiquette to want to share hospitality with others. After a meal has been prepared. an Arab has been heard to call out three times from a high spot in the neighborhood, inviting men to come and partake of the meal. These men of the desert do not like to eat their meal alone.1 The patriarch Job felt th...

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Kissing a Guest

Kissing. Guests in Holy Land homes expect to be kissed as they enter. When entertained by a Pharisee, JESUS commented on his reception by saying to him, "Thou gavest me no kiss" (Luke 7:45). The difference between the Oriental and the Occidental way of greeting each other is made clear by one who lived in Israel many years. Here men shake hands wh...

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Protecting a Guest

PROTECTING A GUEST In the lands of the East, when a host accepts a man to be his guest he thereby agrees at whatever the cost to defend his guest from possible enemies during the time of his entertainment. Dr. Cyrus Hamlin, an American missionary in the East, was entertained by a governor. The host took a piece of roast mutton and handed it to the...

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Eggs

EGGS Sometime between the days of Elijah and the time of CHRIST the domestic fowl and the everyday use of eggs was introduced into Israel.30 There would seem to be one early Old Testament reference to what might be the egg of a hen. It is Job 6:6: "Is there any taste in the white of an egg?" We know that the use of eggs, among the Galileans aroun...

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Washing Clothes

WASHING CLOTHES The Arab women in washing their clothes today usually go to nearby sources of water such as streams, pools, or watering troughs. They will dip their clothes in and out of the water, and then placing them upon flat stones which abound in Israel, they will beat them with a club which is about a foot and a half long. They carry the wa...

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Tunics

THE INNER GARMENT - TUNIC OR SHIRT The tunic (often translated "coat") was a shirt which was worn next to the skin. It was made of leather, haircloth, wool, linen, or in modern times, usually of cotton. The simplest form of it was without sleeves and reached to the knees or sometimes to the ankles. The well-to-do wore it with sleeves and extending...

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Washing the Hands

WASHING OF HANDS BEFORE EATING Orientals are careful to wash their hands before a meal, but they would think that the Occidental way of washing in the water already made dirty by the hands, to be very untidy and disgraceful. The servant or whoever takes his place, pours water on the hands to be washed as they are held over a basin. Often the basi...

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Tables

Table. In many cases the Arab custom would seem to indicate to the Westerner that they use no table at all when serving a meal. Actually, a mat spread upon the ground serves the purpose of a table. This is especially true of the tent Arab. This was the early Semitic table of Old Testament times, for the Hebrew word "Shool-khawn," usually translated...

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Rejecting Invitations

"COMPELLING" GUESTS TO ATTEND The following words of CHRIST's parable need to be understood from an Oriental point of view: "And the Lord said unto the servant, Go out into the highways and hedges, and compel them to come in, that my house may be filled" (Luke 14:23). The usual brief invitation in America, and the ready acceptance of it would be ...

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