Stranger

Moses inculcated and enforced by numerous and by powerful considerations, as well as by various examples of benevolent hospitality, mentioned in the book of Genesis, the exhibition of kindness and humanity to strangers. There were two classes of persons who, in reference to this subject, were denominated strangers, נרים . One class were those who, whether Hebrews or foreigners, were destitute of a home, in Hebrew תושבים . The others were persons who, though not natives, had a home in Palestine; the latter were נרום , strangers or foreigners, in the strict sense of the word. Both of these classes, according to the civil code of Moses, were to be treated with kindness, and were to enjoy the same rights with other citizens, Lev 19:33-34; Lev 24:16; Lev 24:22; Num 9:14; Num 15:14; Deu 10:18; Deu 23:7; Deu 24:17; Deu 27:19. In the earlier periods of the Hebrew state, persons who were natives of another country, but who had come, either from choice or from necessity to take up their residence among the Hebrews, appear to have been placed in favourable circumstances. At a latter period, namely, in the reigns of David and Solomon, they were compelled to labour on the religious edifices which were erected by those princes; as we may learn from such passages as these: “And Solomon numbered all the strangers that were in the land of Israel, after the numbering wherewith David his father had numbered them; and they were found a hundred and fifty thousand and three thousand and six hundred; and he set three score and ten thousand of them to be bearers of burdens,” &c, 1Ch 22:2; 2Ch 2:1; 2Ch 2:16-17. The exaction of such laborious services from foreigners was probably limited to those who had been taken prisoners in war; and who, according to the rights of war, as they were understood at that period, could be justly employed in any offices, however low and however laborious, which the conqueror thought proper to impose. In the time of Christ, the degenerate Jews did not find it convenient to render to the strangers from a foreign country those deeds of kindness and humanity which were not only their due, but which were demanded in their behalf by the laws of Moses. They were in the habit of understanding by the word רע , neighbour, their friends merely, and accordingly restricted the exercise of their benevolence by the same narrow limits that bounded in this case their interpretations; contrary as both were to the spirit of those passages which have been adduced above, Lev 19:18.

Is sometimes used in a special sense, easily understood from the context. It usually denotes a foreigner, who is not a native of the land in which he resides, Gen 23:4 . The Mosaic Law enjoined a generous hospitality towards foreign residents, saying, "Thou shalt love him as thyself," Lev 19:33,34 Deu 10:18,19 24:17 27:19. They were subject to the law, Exo 20:10 Lev 16:20, and were admitted to many of the privileges of the chosen people of God, Num 9:14 15:14.\par The strangers whom David collected to aid in building the temple, 1Ch 22:2, probably comprised many of the remnants of the Canaanite tribes, 1Ki 9:20,21 . Hospitality to strangers, including all travellers, was the duty of all good citizens, Job 31:32 Heb 13:2 .\par

Stranger. A "stranger," in the technical sense of the term, may be defined to be a person of foreign, that is, non-Israelitish, extraction resident within the limits of the Promised Land. He was distinct from the proper "foreigner," inasmuch as, the latter still belonged to another country, and would only visit Palestine as a traveller: he was still more distinct from the "nations," or non-Israelite peoples. The term may be compared with our expression "naturalized foreigner".

The terms applied to the "stranger" have special reference to the fact of residing in the land. The existence of such a class of persons among the Israelites is easily accounted for the "mixed multitude" that accompanied them out of Egypt, Exo 12:38 formed one element the Canaanitish Population, which was never wholly extirpated from their native soil, formed another and a still more important one, and the captives taken in war formed a third; fugitives, hired servants, merchants, etc., formed a fourth.

With the exception of the Moabites and Ammonites, Deu 23:3, all nations were admissible to the rights of citizenship under certain conditions. The stranger appears to have been eligible to all civil offices, that of king excepted. Deu 17:15. In regard to religion, it was absolutely necessary that the stranger should not infringe any of the fundamental laws of the Israelitish state. If he were a bondman, he was obliged to submit to circumcision, Exo 12:44, if he were independent, it was optional with him, but if he remained uncircumcised, he was prohibited from partaking of the Passover, Exo 12:48, and could not be regarded as a full citizen.

Liberty was also given to an uncircumcised stranger in regard to the use of prohibited food. Assuming, however, that the stranger was circumcised, no distinction existed in regard to legal rights had between the stranger and the Israelite; to the Israelite is enjoined to treat him as a brother. Lev 19:34; Deu 10:19.

It also appears that the "stranger" formed the class, whence the hirelings were drawn; the terms being coupled together in Exo 12:45; Lev 22:10; Lev 25:6; Lev 26:40. The liberal spirit of the Mosaic regulations respecting strangers presents a strong contrast to the rigid exclusiveness of the Jews, at the commencement of the Christian era. The growth of this spirit dates from the time of the Babylonish captivity.

A foreigner settled among the covenant people, without Israelite citizenship, but subject to Israel’s laws, and having a claim to kindness and justice (Exo 12:49; Lev 24:22; Lev 19:34; Lev 25:6; Deu 1:16; Deu 24:17-18; Deu 24:19; Deu 10:18-19; Deu 16:11; Deu 16:14; Deu 26:11). (See PROSELYTES.) In contrast to one "born in the land," not transplanted, "ezrach." Geer, toshab; geer implies the stranger viewed in respect to his foreign origin, literally, one turned aside to "another people"; toshab implies his permanent residence in the hind of hision. Distinguished from the "foreigner," nakri, who made no stay in Israel. The stranger included the "mixed multitude" from Egypt (Exo 12:38); the Canaanites still remaining in Palestine and their descendants, as Uriah the Hittite and Araunah the Jebusite, Doeg the Edomite, Ittai the Gittite; captives in war, fugitives, and merchants, amounting under Solomon to 153,600 males (2Ch 2:17), one tenth of the population.

Strictly, the stranger had no share in the land. It is to be a peculiarity of restored Israel that the stranger shall inherit along with the native born (Eze 47:22). Still anomalies may have been tolerated of necessity, as that of Canaanites (on conversion to the law) retaining land from which Israel had been unable to eject their forefathers. Strangers were excluded from kingship. Though tolerated they must not violate the fundamental laws by blaspheming Jehovah, breaking the sabbath by work, eating leavened bread at the Passover, infringing the marriage laws, worshipping Moloch, or eating blood (Lev 24:16; Lev 18:26; Lev 20:2; Lev 17:10; Lev 17:15; Exo 20:10; Exo 12:19). If the stranger were a bondservant he had to be circumcised (Exo 12:44). If free he was exempt, but if not circumcised was excluded from the Passover (Exo 12:48); he might eat foods (Deu 14:21) which the circumcised stranger might not eat (Lev 17:10; Lev 17:15).

The liberal spirit of the law contrasts with the exclusiveness of Judaism after the return from Babylon. This narrowness was at first needed, in order to keep the holy seed separate from foreign admixture (Nehemiah 9; 10; 13; Ezra 10). But its degeneracy into proud, morose isolation and misanthropy our Lord rebukes in His large definition of "neighbour" in the parable of the good Samaritan (Luk 10:36). The law kept Israel a people separate from the nations, yet exercising a benignant influence on them. It secured a body of 600,000 yeomen ready to defend their own land, but unfit for invading other lands, as their force was ordained to be of infantry alone. Interest front a fellow citizen was forbidden, but from a stranger was allowed, subject to strict regard to equity. The hireling was generally taken from strangers, the law guarded his rights with tender considerateness (Deu 24:14-15). (See NETHINIM; SOLOMON’S SERVANTS.)

1. This term was applied to any sojourning among the Israelites, who were not descendants of Israel. The law gave injunctions against the oppression of such. Num 15:14-30.

2. Gentiles are also called ’strangers’ from the covenants of promise (Eph 2:12), showing that the covenants made with Israel did in no wise embrace the Gentiles, though God’s grace at all times extended to them.

3. Those called strangers in 1Pe 1:1 were Jews away from their own land: sojourners of the dispersion.

4. Both the O.T. and the N.T. saints were and are strangers upon earth. David said, "I am a stranger with thee, and a sojourner, as all my fathers were." Psa 39:12. They "confessed that they were strangers and pilgrims on the earth." Heb 11:13. The same is true of the saints now. 1Pe 2:11. Their citizenship is in heaven, and this earth is no longer their home or their rest.

STRANGER.—The Authorized Version has only the one rendering—‘stranger’—for five different words in the Greek. It is the natural translation of the term which has the most general signification—ξένος (Mat 25:35; Mat 25:43; Mat 27:7 etc.); and there is no other word in English to express the exact force of ἀλλότριος (Mat 17:25-26, Joh 10:5; cf. Joh 10:12—the ἀλλότριος is the one ‘whose own the sheep are not’). For ἀλλογενής the proper equivalent is ‘alien,’ as in Luk 17:18 ((Revised Version margin) ). For πάροικος and παρεπίδημος Revised Version NT 1881, OT 1885 rightly uses ‘sojourner’ (Act 7:29, 1Pe 2:11; cf. Luk 24:18, 1Pe 1:1, Heb 11:13). These words indicate a sentiment which is (1) racial or national (Mat 17:25-26 the kings of the earth take tribute from ‘strangers,’ not from sons), (2) humanitarian (Mat 25:35 ‘I was a stranger, and ye took me in’), and (3) religious (1Pe 2:11 ‘I beseech you as sojourners and pilgrims to abstain,’ etc.).

Generally, however, it may be said that the connexion in which the words occur in NT is illustrative of the difference between the current Jewish conception of the stranger in the time of Christ, and that which is suggested by the Gospel. Jesus found His countrymen steeped in the idea that all foreigners were ‘dogs,’ that ‘the peoples’ was a term almost synonymous with ‘the heathen,’ and that only under rigid conditions and upon sufferance might a non-Jew obtain any of the privileges considered to be the Divine right of a Jew. He left His followers possessed of the thought, however unconscious they might be of all that it involved, that to Him the Samaritan and the Gentile, the man outside the pale and the man of no caste, were as much the objects of His mission as the favoured son of Abraham. ‘Stranger,’ to the average Jew, was the name for one with whom he might have commercial dealings and certain social or political relations, but with whom religious affinity or fellowship was practically impossible; to Jesus it meant one who had a special claim upon Him and His (Mat 25:35 ff.). The impression which He created was not merely that Christianity meant a deepening and extending of that sense of the sacred duty of hospitality and kindness which already existed in the Jewish mind, as it does throughout the East (Exo 23:9; Exo 22:21, Luk 19:35, Deu 10:18-19, Jer 7:6 etc.; cf. the practice existing among the Essenes, Josephus BJ ii. viii. 4, 5), but that it involved a complete change of the attitude which assumed that a different treatment was to be meted out to the stranger from that which was naturally shown to one’s own kith and kin (Mat 5:43-48 etc.). See, further, artt. Cosmopolitanism, Hospitality, Gentiles, Universalism.

It is further to be noticed that Christianity gave a new signification to the word ‘stranger.’ The way had been prepared by the use of the Hebrew word ‘Ger’ (LXX Septuagint . πάροικος, see artt. ‘Ger’ in DB [Note: Dictionary of the Bible.] and ‘Stranger’ in Encyc. Bibl.), which designated the sojourner who dwelt within the gates of Israel, and who, while having a certain status there and a temporary home, belonged to another country. The fact also that the Jews themselves had from the time of Abraham so often been sojourners in a land not their own (Act 7:6; Act 7:29, Heb 11:9), and the lessons taught by the dispersion in postexilic times, led to that metaphorical use of the term which has entered so largely into religious speech and poetry. The follower of Christ saw in it a description of himself as of one who was absent from his proper country, and whose citizenship was in heaven (Php 3:20). When St. Peter writes to the ‘sojourners of the Dispersion’ (1Pe 1:1), and beseeches them ‘as sojourners and pilgrims’ to abstain from fleshly lusts (1Pe 2:11), he is diverting the term from a geographical to a spiritual sense (cf. 1Pe 1:17). The writer of the Epistle to the Hebrews has the same thought, ‘For we have not here an abiding city, but we seek after the city which is to come’ (Heb 13:14; cf. Heb 11:13-16).

Literature.—Uhlhorn, Chr. Charily in the Ancient Ch.; Brace, Gesta Christi, ch. xvi.; Seeley, Ecce Homo, chs. xiv. xvii.

J. Ross Murray.

See Gentile; Hospitality; Proselyte.

STRANGER.—This seems, on the whole, the most suitable English word by which to render the Heb. zâr, which is a participle denoting primarily one who turns aside, one who goes out of the way, i.e. for the purpose of visiting or dwelling in another country. It has frequently the meaning foreigner, in contrast to ‘Israelite,’ especially with the added notion of hostility (cf. ‘estranged’), and in antithesis to ‘Israel’ (e.g. Hos 7:9; Hos 8:7, Isa 1:7, Eze 7:21; Eze 11:9, Joe 3:17, Oba 1:11, Psa 54:3 etc.). In P [Note: Priestly Narrative.] the word takes on a technical meaning found nowhere outside the Hexateuch, and exclusively post-exilic. It means ‘layman’ (which might with advantage be substituted for EV [Note: English Version.] ‘stranger’), as opposed to a Levite (see Num 1:51; Num 18:7), or to a priest proper, or Aaronite (see Exo 29:33; Exo 30:33, Num 3:10; Num 3:38; Num 18:2, Lev 22:10; Lev 22:12 f. (H [Note: Law of Holiness.] )).

The ‘strange woman’ of Pro 2:16 etc. has the same technical sense as ‘foreign woman’ with which it stands in parallelism, viz. harlot.

Sojourner (sometimes tr. [Note: translate or translation.] of tôshâb, ‘settler’ [see below]) is frequently substituted by RV [Note: Revised Version.] for the AV [Note: Authorized Version.] ‘stranger,’ as tr. [Note: translate or translation.] of gçr. The ger was originally a man who transferred himself from one tribe or people to another, seeking, and usually obtaining, some of the rights of natives. A whole clan or tribe might be gçrîm in Israel, as e.g. the Gibeonites (Jos 9:1-27), the Beerothites (2Sa 4:2). The Israelites are themselves often spoken of as ‘sojourners’ in the land of Egypt (see Gen 15:13, Exo 22:21; Exo 23:9, Lev 19:24 (H [Note: Law of Holiness.] ), Deu 10:19; Deu 23:7 etc.). In the oldest Israelitish code (the Book of the Covenant, Exo 21:1 to Exo 23:13), the gçr is protected against injustice and violence (Exo 21:20, Exo 23:9). The D [Note: Deuteronomist.] code (c [Note: circa, about.] . b.c. 620) goes much further, for, besides making more explicit and urgent the duty of defending, helping, and even loving the ‘sojourner’ (Deu 10:18; Deu 14:29; Deu 24:14; Deu 24:19), and also securing to him his rights (Deu 24:17, Deu 27:1-9), the gçr was to be allowed to participate in the three great annual feasts (Deu 16:11 ff; cf. Deu 5:14 and Exo 23:12). He is not, however, compelled, though allowed, to follow his protector’s religion (Deu 14:29, 1Ki 11:7). That he occupies a status inferior to that of the born Israelite is indicated by the fact that he is classed with the widow and orphan as needing special consideration (Deu 10:18, Deu 14:29, Deu 29:14; Deu 29:19), and that the right of intermarrying is denied him (Deu 7:1 ff., Deu 23:4). When, however, we come to P [Note: Priestly Narrative.] and to other parts of the OT which belong to the same stage of history and religion, we find the ‘sojourner’ almost on an equal footing with the native Israelite,—he is fast becoming, and is almost become, the proselyte of NT and Rabbinical times. His position has now religious rather than political significance. He is expected to keep the Sabbath and to observe the Day of Atonement, as well as the three great feasts (Lev 16:29). He is to eat unleavened bread during Passover week (Exo 12:19; Passover and the Feast of Unleavened Bread are now blended), and, if circumcised (not otherwise), to keep the full Passover itself. But the gçr is not even yet the full equal of the Israelite, for he is not compelled to be circumcised, and no one can belong to the congregation who has not submitted to that rite (Exo 12:47 ff., Num 9:14); he has not yet received the right of intermarriage (Gen 34:14), and is prohibited from keeping Jewish slaves (Lev 25:47 ff.).

The closing of the ranks of Judaism, helped by the Exile, by the reforms of Ezra and Nehemiah, by the Samaritan schism, and consummated by the Maccabæan wars, led to the complete absorption of the ‘sojourner.’ The word prosçlytos (representing the Heb. gçr), common in classical Greek for one who has come to a place (Lat. advena), acquired in Hellenistic Greek the meaning which meets us often in the NT (Mat 23:15, Act 2:6 etc.). See Proselyte.

The indiscriminate use of ‘stranger’ with the meaning of ‘sojourner,’ and of ‘alien’ and ‘foreigner’ is very confusing. ‘Foreigner’ is the proper rendering of Heb. nokri. The Heb. tôshâb (lit. ‘dweller’) is a post-exilic substitute for gçr (‘sojourner’) in the original non-religeous sense of the latter. For the sake of distinction it might be uniformly rendered ‘settler’ (EV [Note: English Version.] ‘sojourner,’ ‘stranger,’ ‘foreigner’). See, for the relations of Israel to foreigners proper, art. Nations.

T. Witton Davies.