FINE

ISBE

fin (adj., from Latin finire, "to finish"): Indicates superior quality. Only in a few instances does "fine" represent a separate word: (1) Tobh, "good," qualifies gold ( 2Ch 3:5 , 8 , "fine gold"; compare Ge 2:12 , "good"); fine gold ( La 4:1 , the King James Version "most fine gold," the Revised Version (British and American) "most pure gold," literally, "good fine gold"), copper ( Ezr 8:27 , the Revised Version (British and American) "fine bright brass"); Tabh, Aramaic ( Da 2:32 , "fine gold"). (2) paz, "refined" ( So 5:11 , "the most fine gold"). (3) chelebh, "fatness," "the best of any kind"; compare Ge 45:18 ; De 32:14 , etc. ( Ps 81:16 , "the finest of the wheat," the Revised Version, margin Hebrew "fat of wheat"). (4) sariq, "fine combed" ( Isa 19:9 , "fine flax," the Revised Version (British and American) "combed flax"). In other places it expresses a quality of the substantive: kethem, "fine gold" ( Job 31:24 ; Da 10:5 , the Revised Version (British and American) "pure gold"); paz, used as a noun for refined gold ( Job 28:17 ; Ps 19:10 ; Pr 8:19 ; Isa 13:12 ; La 4:2 ); charuts, "fine gold" ( Pr 3:14 ; compare Ps 68:13 , "yellow gold"); coleth, "flour," rendered "fine flour," rolled or crushed small ( Le 2:1 , 4 , 5 , 7 , etc.); semidalis, "the finest wheaten flour" ( Re 18:13 ); qemach coleth, "fine meal" ( Ge 18:6 ); cadhin, "linen garment" (Septuagint sindon, Pr 31:24 the King James Version; Isa 3:23 ); shesh, "white," "fine linen" ( Ge 41:42 ; Ex 25:4 , etc.); in Pr 31:22 the King James Version has "silk"; sheshi ( Eze 16:13 , "fine flour"); 'eTun, "what is twisted or spun," "yarn" ( Pr 7:16 the King James Version, "fine linen of Egypt" the Revised Version (British and American) "yarn of Egypt"); buts, "fine white cloth," "cotton or linen," "fine linen" ( 1Ch 4:21 ; Eze 27:16 , etc.; 2Ch 5:12 , King James Version "white," the Revised Version (British and American) "fine"); bussos, "byssus," "linen" from buts Septuagint for which, 2Ch 2:14 ; 3:14 ), deemed very fine and precious, worn only by the rich ( Lu 16:19 ; Re 18:12 ); bussinos, "byssine" made of fine linen, Septuagint for buts (1Ch 5:27) ( Re 18:16 , "clothed in fine linen," the Revised Version (British and American) "arrayed," Re 19:8 , 14 ); sindon, "fine linen" (Mr 5:46, "He bought fine linen," the Revised Version (British and American) "a linen cloth"; compare Mr 14:51 , 52 ; Mt 27:59 ; Lu 23:53 ); it was used for wrapping the body at night, also for wrapping round dead bodies; sindon is Septuagint for cadhin ( Jud 14:12 , 13 ; Pr 31:24 ); chalkolibanon ( Re 1:15 ; 2:18 , the King James Version "fine brass"). The meaning of this word has been much discussed; chalkos is "brass" in Greek (with many compounds), and libanos is the Septuagint for lebhonah, "frankincense," which word was probably derived from the root labhan, "to burn"; this would give glowing brass, "as if they burned in a furnace"; in Da 10:6 it is nehosheth qalal, the King James Version "polished brass," the Revised Version (British and American) "burnished" (qalal is "to glow"). Plumptre deemed it a hybrid word composed of the Greek chalkos, "brass," and the Hebrew labhan, "white," a technical word, such as might be familiar to the Ephesians; the Revised Version (British and American) has "burnished brass"; Weymouth, "silver-bronze when it is white-hot in a furnace"; the whiteness being expressed by the second half of the Greek word. See Thayer's Lexicon (s.v.). In Apocrypha we have "fine linen," bussinos (1 Esdras 3:6), "fine bread"; the adjective katharos, separate ( /APC Judith 10:5, the Revised Version, margin "pure bread"); "fine flour" (Ecclesiasticus 35:2; 38:11); semidalis (Bel and the Dragon verse 3; /APC 2Macc 1:8, the Revised Version (British and American) "meal offering"). W. L. Walker