PEDAGOGICS – The science of education. The fundamental law of Biblical pedagogy is that the child should be instructed in the doctrines of religion and should know them so clearly that he will realize that he ought to live in accordance with...
PEDAT B. ELEAZAR – Palestinian amora of the fourth generation (first half of the fourth century). He was his father's pupil (Ber. 77b; M. Ḳ. 20a) and the assistant lecturer ("amora") of R. Assi. If the latter asked him to repeat any of his...
PEDIGREE – Table of descent and relationship; sometimes given in narrative form. Jews have always carefully recorded their genealogies (see article), but owing to their wide and frequent dispersions very few can trace their descent further...
PEDLERS – See Hawkers and Pedlers.
PEDRO I. – King of Portugal (1357-67). This monarch, whose motto was "What the soul is to the body, justice is to the state and to society," was a model of justice, at least in his attitude toward the Jews. Two youths of noble blood who...
PEDRO II. – King of Aragon (1196-1213). Inspired with a desire to receive his kingly crown from the pontiff himself, he journeyed in 1204 to Rome, where Pope Innocent III. crowned him with his own hand and received his oath that he would be...
PEDRO II. (PEDRO D'ALCANTARA) – Emperor of Brazil; born Dec. 2, 1825; died at Paris Dec. 5, 1891. He succeeded his father, Pedro I., and assumed personal control of the government in July, 1840. The last years of his life were spent in exile after his...
PEDRO III. – King of Aragon (1276-85). Although Pedro III. protected the Jews from the hatred of the clergy, who destroyed their vineyards and disturbed their graves, and though he took especially severe measures against the Bishop of...
PEDRO IV. – King of Aragon (1336-87). During the whole of his long reign he showed himself just toward the Jews in his state, and more gracious than any of his predecessors. He had a Jewish body-physician, Rabbi Menahem, whose pupil in...
PEDRO DE LA CABALLERIA – See Caballeria, De la.
PEDRO DE LUNA – See Benedict XIII.
PEDRO DE TOLEDO – Viceroy of Naples; friend and protector of the Jews; he employed (c. 1530) Don Samuel Abravanel, the youngest son of Don Isaac Abravanel, as minister of finance, and allowed his daughter Leonora, afterward the wife of the grand...
PEG – See Tent.
PEḤAH – An office, based upon a Babylonian model, and which existed in Palestine as early as the Biblical period, being mentioned, for instance, during the reign of Solomon (c. 900 B.C.), although no details are given concerning it (I...
PEINE – German town in the province of Hanover. It belonged formerly to the bishopric of Hildesheim. Jews lived there as early as the fourteenth century. On July 27, 1428, Magnus, Bishop of Hildesheim, pawned the Jews of the city and...
PEIRINS – See Dauphiné.
PEISER, RAPHAEL B. JACOB – Rabbi of Peisern in the eighteenth century. He was the author of the "Or la-Yesharim" or "En Ya'aḳob," containing novellæ on the treatises Pesaḥim, Shabbat, Beẓah, Ketubot, Rosh ha-Shanah, and Ḥullin, while he commented also...
PEISER, SIMON B. JUDAH LÖB – Rabbi in Lissa; born at Peisern, Poland, about 1690. He was the author of "Naḥalat Shim'oni," an important work of reference consisting of four sections: (1) onomasticon of the Bible, quoting all haggadot which are found in the...
PEIXOTTO – American Jewish family, originally from Spain, whence members thereof migrated by way of Holland to Curaçao, in the West Indies. The original name of this family was Maduro, but while still in Spain a Maduro married a Peixotto...
PEKAH – Son of Remaliah and a king of Israel in the period of anarchy between the fall of the dynasty of Jehu (750 B.C.) and the overthrow of Samaria (722 B.C.). The Biblical records of his activity are found in II Kings xv. 25-31, II...
PEKAHIAH – King of Israel in succession to his father (736-735 B.C.), according to P. Rost in Schrader, "K. A. T." 3d ed., i. 320 (but see Chronology), Menahem (II Kings xv. 23-26). He ascended the throne at a time when the kingdom of...
PELETHITES – See Cherethites.
PELICAN – Unclean bird mentioned in Lev. xi. 18 and Deut. xiv. 17. Reference to its habit of living in ruins and desolate places is made in Isa. xxxiv. 11 and Zeph. ii. 14 (A. V. "cormorant") and in Ps. cii. 7 (A. V. 6). From its habit of...
PELTIN, SAMUEL HIRSH – Polish author; born at Mariampol, government of Suwalki, May, 1831; died at Warsaw Sept. 30, 1896. In his youth he studied Bible, Talmud, sciences, and languages, and in 1855 settled in Warsaw, where in 1865 he established the...
PEN – An instrument for writing. The older expressions for "writing," which later occur as archaisms in lofty speech, mean "to cut in," "to scratch" ("ḥaḳaḳ," "ḥaraṭ," "ḥarat," "ḥarash"). There is no mention, therefore, of pens, but...