Prayer Tents Bible References - Prayer Tents

GAMES

Ancient games occurred as public events or pastimes for private leisure. From the time of Alexander the Great athletic festivals helped define society by being attached to religious cults and adding honor to a deity. Alexander brought the games to Tyre, and Antiochus Epiphanes introduced them to Palestine, drawing bitter opposition from the Jewish orthodox (1 Macc. 1:14-15; 2 Macc. 4:9-20; 6:7). The important Greek games — the Olympic games held at Olympia, the Pythian games at Delphi, the Nemean games at Argos, and the Isthmian games on the Corinthian isthmus — featured events like running, wrestling, discus, and javelin throwing.

Pure athletics was only one of Rome’s interests. The Romans freely exploited the value of the games as entertainment, introducing chariot and horse races, boxing, bullfights, and gladiatorial shows. By the time of Augustus, games in the emperor’s honor, usually connected with emperor worship, were held in every major provincial city throughout the empire. An Ephesian inscription lists the accomplishments of one Daphnus, including his presidency over a 13-day festival of games that apparently offered gladiatorial contests. Even in Palestine games were established by Herod the Great in cities like Caesarea and Jerusalem. Herod’s building projects in Jerusalem included a theater, amphitheater, stadium, and hippodrome. Jericho and Tiberias also had these structures.

Roman interest in athletics was expressed in the arena of the gymnasium. More than just an area for physical training, the gymnasium also provided a public bath and a center for the social life of the city. Both cultural and athletic training were conducted in gymnasiums throughout the empire to prepare young men to fulfill their responsibilities to society. Activities associated with the gymnasium and the games are referred to frequently in the NT. Paul compares the Christian life to running a race (1 Cor. 9:24-27; Gal. 2:2; 5:7; Phil. 3:14) as do the Pastoral Epistles to fighting (1 Tim. 1:18; 2 Tim. 4:7).

Private games were also enjoyed in the ancient world. Game boards and playing pieces have been discovered in Mesopotamia and Egypt. A tomb at Ur yielded a board game that used 14 marked playing pieces and pyramidal dice, which dictated the moves of the pieces. A game called “hounds and jackals,” with ivory pegs topped with carved heads of dogs and jackals, was found in the tomb of Renseneb in Thebes dating from the 12th dynasty (ca. 1990-1708 b.c.). The tomb of King Tutankhamen yielded a game board, which also served as a box to store the game pieces and pyramidal dice. Some game boards are inlaid with ivory, ebony, shell, gold, or blue paste. At Umm el-Bayyâreh a game board was carved into a flat stone on a guardpost overlooking Petra. In Palestine such games have been discovered at Kiriath-sepher, Tell al-Ajul, Beth-shemesh, and Gezer dating from as early as the 16th century. Literary references portray prisoners and soldiers playing games of chess or dice in their spare time.

Bibliography. V. C. Pfitzner, Paul and the Agon Motif. NovTSup 16 (Leiden, 1967); E. Schürer, The History of the Jewish People in the Age of Jesus Christ (176 b.c.–a.d. 135) 2, rev. ed. (Edinburgh, 1979); W. H. Stephens, The New Testament World in Pictures (Nashville, 1987).

Dennis Gaertner

Prayer Tents Bible References - Prayer Tents

GAMES

Eerdmans Dictionary of the Bible (2000)