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•STEEL The “bow of steel” in (A.V.) 2 Samuel 22:35; Job 20:24; Psalm 18:34 is in the Revised Version “bow of brass” (Hebrews kesheth-nehushah). In Jeremiah 15:12 the same word is used, and is also rendered in the Revised Version “brass.” But more correctly it is copper (q.v.), as brass in the ordinary sense of the word (an alloy of copper and zinc) was not known to the ancients.
•STEPHANAS crown, a member of the church at Corinth, whose family were among those the apostle had baptized (1 Corinthians 1:16; 16:15, 17). He has been supposed by some to have been the “jailer of Philippi” (comp. Acts 16:33). The First Epistle to the Corinthians was written from Philippi some six years after the jailer’s conversion, and he was with the apostle there at that time.
•STEPHEN one of the seven deacons, who became a preacher of the gospel. He was the first Christian martyr. His personal character and history are recorded in Acts 6. “He fell asleep” with a prayer for his persecutors on his lips (7:60). Devout men carried him to his grave (8:2).
It was at the feet of the young Pharisee, Saul of Tarsus, that those who stoned him laid their clothes (comp. Deuteronomy 17:5-7) before they began their cruel work. The scene which Saul then witnessed and the words he heard appear to have made a deep and lasting impression on his mind (Acts 22:19, 20).
The speech of Stephen before the Jewish ruler is the first apology for the universalism of the gospel as a message to the Gentiles as well as the Jews. It is the longest speech contained in the Acts, a place of prominence being given to it as a defence.