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HEATHEN

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Originally appearing in Volume V13, Page 159 of the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.
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HEATHEN , a See also:

term originally applied to all persons or races who did not hold the Jewish or See also:Christian belief, thus including Mahommedans. It is now more usually given to polytheistic races, thus excluding Mahommedans. See also:Pile derivation of the word has been much debated. It is See also:common to all Germanic See also:languages; cf. See also:German See also:Heide, Dutch heiden. It is usually ascribed to a See also:Gothic hairi, See also:heath. In See also:Ulfilas' Gothic version of the See also:Bible, the earliest extant See also:literary See also:monument of the Germanic languages, the Syrophoenician woman (See also:Mark vii. 26) is called See also:hai)ino, where the See also:Vulgate has gentilis. " Heathen," i.e. the See also:people of the heath or open See also:country, would thus be a See also:translation of the Latin paganus, See also:pagan, i.e. the people of the pagus or See also:village, applied to the dwellers in the country where the See also:worship of the old gods still lingered, when the people of the towns were Christians (but see PAGAN for a more tenable explanation of that term). On the other See also:hand it has been suggested (PTO f:y,S. See also:Bugge, Indo-German. Forschungen, v.

178, quoted in the New See also:

English See also:Dictionary) that Ulfilas may have adopted the word from the Armenian hetanos, i.e. See also:Greek EBvi7, tribes, races, the word used for the " Gentiles " in the New Testament. Gentilis in Latin, properly meaning " tribesman," came to be. used of foreigners and non-See also:Roman peoples, and was adopted in ecclesiastical usage for the non-Christian nations and in the Old Testament for non-Jewish races.

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