ANANIAS (an'a-ni'as), (Gr. 'Aeav(as, as, of Gr. rInaniah, protected by Jehovah).
1. High- Priest. Ananias, son of Nebed.ens, was made high-priest in the time of the procurator Tiberius Alexander (about A. D. 47), by Herod, king of Chalets, who for thus purpose removed Joseph, son of Camydus, from the high priest hood ( Joseph. xx :5, 2). He held the office also under the procurator Cumanus, who succeeded Tiberius Alexander Being implicated in the quarrels of the Jews and Samaritans, An anias was, at the instance of the latter ( who, be ing dissatisfied with the conduct of Cumanns, appealed to Unmudius Quadrants, president of Syria), sent in bonds to Rome, to answer for his conduct before Claudius Caesar. The em peror decided in factor of the accused party. An anias appears to have returned with credit, and to have remained in his priesthood until Agrippa gave his office to Ismael, the son of Tabi (Antiq. xx :8, 8), who succeeded a short time before the departure of the procurator Felix, and occupied the station also under his successor Festus. An anias, after retiring from his high-priesthood, 'increased in glory every day' (Antiq. xx:1, 2), and obtained favor with the citizens and with Albinus, the Roman procurator, by a lavish use of the great wealth he had horded.
The prosperity of Ananias met with a dark and painful termination. The assassins (sicarii) who played so fearful a part in the Jewish war, set fire to his house in the commencement of it, and compelled him'to seek refuge by conceal ment, but being discovered in an aqueduct he was captured and slain (Antiq. xx:9, 2; Bell. Jud. ii 9).
It was this Ananias before whom Paul was brought, in the procuratorship of Felix (Acts xxiii:2, 3). The noble declaration of the apostle, 'I have lived in all good conscience before God until this day,' so displeased him that he com manded the attendant to smite him on the face. Indignant at so unprovoked an insult, the apostle replied, 'God shall smite thee, thou whited wall,' a threat which the previous details serve to prove wants not evidence of having taken effect. Paul, however, immediately restrained his anger, and allowed that he owed respect to the office which Ananias bore. After this hearing Paul was sent to Cxsarea, whither Ananias repaired in order to lay a formal charge against him before Felix, who postponed the matter, detaining the apostle mean while, and placing him under the supervision of a Roman centurion (Acts xxiv).
2. Husband of Sapphira. A Christian belong
ing to the infant church at Jerusalem, who, con spiring with his wife Sapphira to deceive and defraud the brethren, was overtaken by sudden death, and immediately buried. The Christian community at Jerusalem appear to have entered into a solemn agreement that each and all should devote their property to the great work of further ing the gospel and giving succor to the needy. Accordingly they proceeded to sell their posses sions and brought the proceeds into the common stock of the church (Acts iv:32, 37). The apos tles then had the general disposal, if they had not also the immediate distribution, of the com mon funds. The contributions, therefore, were designed for the sacred purposes of religion (Acts v:t-II).
As all the members of the Jerusalem church had thus agreed to hold their property in com mon, for the furtherance of the holy work in which they were engaged, if any one of them withheld a part, and offered the remainder as the whole, he committed two offenses—he de frauded the church and was guilty of falsehood ; and as his act related not to secular but to re ligious affairs, and had an injurious bearing, both as an example and as a positive transgression against the Gospel, while it was yet struggling into existence, Ananias lied not unto man, hut unto God, and was guilty of a sin of the deepest dye. Had Ananias chosen to keep his property for his own worldly purposes, he was at liberty, as Peter intimates, so to do, but he had in fact alienated it to pions purposes, and it was there fore no longer his own. Yet he wished to deal with it in part as if it were so. showing at the same time that lie was conscious of his misdeed, by presenting the residue to the common treasury as if it had been his entire property. He wished to satisfy his selfish cravings, and at the same time to enjoy the reputation of being purely dis interested, like the rest of the, church. He at tempted to serve God and Mammon. The origi nal evocrOicraro, cn-os-fis'ah-to, is much more ex pressive of the nature of his misdeed than our common version, `kept back' (part of the price). The Vulgate renders it 'fraudavit,' and both Wycliffe and the Rheims Version employ a cor responding term, 'clef raudid,"defrauded! In the only other text of the New Testament where the word is found (Tit. ii:to), it is translated 'purloin ing.' It is, indeed, properly applied to the con duct of persons who appropriate to their own pur poses money destined for public uses.