Rahab

3 definitions found

From Easton's 1897 Bible Dictionary [easton]:

  Rahab
     insolence; pride, a poetical name applied to Egypt in Ps. 87:4;
     89:10; Isa. 51:9, as "the proud one."
     
       Rahab, (Heb. Rahab; i.e., "broad," "large"). When the Hebrews
     were encamped at Shittim, in the "Arabah" or Jordan valley


     opposite Jericho, ready to cross the river, Joshua, as a final
     preparation, sent out two spies to "spy the land." After five
     days they returned, having swum across the river, which at this
     season, the month Abib, overflowed its banks from the melting of
     the snow on Lebanon. The spies reported how it had fared with
     them (Josh. 2:1-7). They had been exposed to danger in Jericho,
     and had been saved by the fidelity of Rahab the harlot, to whose
     house they had gone for protection. When the city of Jericho
     fell (6:17-25), Rahab and her whole family were preserved
     according to the promise of the spies, and were incorporated
     among the Jewish people. She afterwards became the wife of
     Salmon, a prince of the tribe of Judah (Ruth 4:21; 1 Chr. 2:11;
     Matt. 1:5). "Rahab's being asked to bring out the spies to the
     soldiers (Josh. 2:3) sent for them, is in strict keeping with
     Eastern manners, which would not permit any man to enter a
     woman's house without her permission. The fact of her covering
     the spies with bundles of flax which lay on her house-roof (2:6)
     is an 'undesigned coincidence' which strictly corroborates the
     narrative. It was the time of the barley harvest, and flax and
     barley are ripe at the same time in the Jordan valley, so that
     the bundles of flax stalks might have been expected to be drying
     just then" (Geikie's Hours, etc., ii., 390).
     

From Hitchcock's Bible Names Dictionary (late 1800's) [hitchcock]:

  Rahab, proud; quarrelsome (applied to Egypt)
  

From Hitchcock's Bible Names Dictionary (late 1800's) [hitchcock]:

  Rahab, large; extended (name of a woman)