I consider them as a lot of refuse, that I may gain Christ and be found in union with him.” (Phil. 3:8, 9) The Greek word here rendered “refuse” (skuʹba·lon) denotes either excrement or the things left from a feast and thrown away from the table. Even if the apostle had the latter meaning in mind, his evaluation of “all things” as “refuse” emphasizes the high value he placed on gaining and being found in union with Christ.—See DOVE’S DUNG.

DUNGEON

David felt as though he was in a dungeon at the time he was hiding in a cave as an outlaw refugee from King Saul. His circumstances looked very dark, with his life constantly in danger, traps in his pathway and no other place to flee. He prayed to Jehovah for liberation. (Ps. 142:7) Isaiah uses the term symbolically in two places: (1) at chapter 24, verse 22, speaking of kings being gathered together in a dungeon in the day when Jehovah becomes king, and (2) chapter 42, verse 7, concerning those in spiritual darkness and imprisonment. The aged Simeon, under inspiration, applied the latter prophecy to those to whom Jesus Christ would bring the light of truth.—Luke 2:25-32; see PRISON.

DURA

(Duʹra).

The plain where Nebuchadnezzar set up a gold image.—Dan. 3:1.

Though places as distant as 270 miles (434 kilometers) from Babylon have been suggested as Dura’s location, it is Biblically described as being “in the jurisdictional district of Babylon,” and so apparently was relatively near that city. For this reason, most geographers today accept Tulul Dura, six miles (9.7 kilometers) SE of Babylon, as the most likely of the many proposed sites. The ruins of a dried-brick mound measuring forty-six feet (14 meters) square were discovered here and have been conjectured by some to be the base of Nebuchadnezzar’s image. Nevertheless, the Akkadian term dûru, meaning “circuit,” “wall” or “walled place,” appears frequently in Mesopotamian place-names, making any positive identification impossible at this time.

DUST

Fine particles of matter, light enough to be raised and borne easily by currents of air. Strong winds passing over dry desert regions, common to Bible lands, often produce violent dust storms that are considered by some to be more dreadful than storms encountered at sea. Volcanic eruptions, fires, and agricultural activities are among common causes of mineral dust. Vegetable matter produces dust in the form of pollen, molds, plant fiber and seed parts. Dust is also indirectly produced by animals, resulting from dried dung, fine hair and bacteria.

Although some may consider dust to be a nuisance, it is a provision of the Creator that is essential to mankind’s existence and comfort. (Prov. 8:22, 26) Scientists hold that no condensation of moisture as rain, fog or mist could occur if it were not for certain water-absorbing salts that comprise a portion of the atmosphere’s dust. Moreover, without the light-scattering property of atmospheric dust, the eyes of earth’s creatures would be exposed to unbearable glare of the sun’s direct rays, and the familiar phenomenon of dusk and beautifully colored sunsets would cease to occur.

The Creator used “dust from the ground” when he formed the first man (Gen. 2:7; 1 Cor. 15:47, 48), and when Adam was sentenced for disobeying God’s law, Jehovah decreed: “To dust you will return.” (Gen. 3:19) God also pronounced a curse of great prophetic significance when saying to the serpent in Eden: “Upon your belly you will go and dust is what you will eat [bite] all the days of your life.” (Gen. 3:14) While the serpent would not subsist only on dust, it would ingest some dust with its food because of its lowly condition on the ground.

SIGNIFYING FRAILTY, MORTALITY AND LOWLINESS

In view of man’s fall from perfection, dust is sometimes used figuratively for mankind’s frailty. God shows mercy to those fearing him, “remembering that we are dust.” (Ps. 103:13, 14; Gen. 18:27) It is also symbolic of the mortality of humans, for at death “back to their dust they go.” (Ps. 104:29; Eccl. 3:19, 20; 12:1, 7) Since man returns to the dust at death, the grave is sometimes figuratively called “the dust.” (Ps. 22:29; 30:9) The dust of the ground can denote a lowly condition. Jehovah is “a Raiser of a lowly one from the dust.”—1 Sam. 2:8; Ps. 113:7

REPRESENTING NUMEROUSNESS

In the Scriptures great numbers of people are compared to dust for their numerousness. Thus, God promised Abram (Abraham): “I will constitute your seed like the dust particles of the earth.” (Gen. 13:14, 16) Jehovah also made a similar promise to Jacob. (Gen. 28:10, 13, 14) Concerning the Israelites during their wilderness trek, Balaam asked: “Who has numbered the dust particles of Jacob, and who has counted the fourth part of Israel?” (Num. 23:10) Jehovah had greatly increased Abraham’s offspring through Isaac and Jacob. Jehovah’s bountiful provision of manna for his covenant people in the wilderness is indicated by the statement that “he proceeded to make sustenance rain upon them just like dust, even winged flying creatures just like the sand grains of the seas.”—Ps. 78:24-27; Ex. 16:11-18; Num. 11:31, 32.

USE IN GOD’S JUDGMENT OF NATIONS

Due to the nations’ relative insignificance from God’s standpoint, he accounts them “as the film of dust on the scales.” (Isa. 40:15) Jehovah’s fear-inspiring power was manifested in connection with his blows against one such nation, Egypt. When the third blow was to begin, in keeping with God’s command to Moses, “Aaron stretched out his hand with his rod and struck the dust of the earth, and the gnats came to be on man and beast.” When this occurred throughout Egypt, the magic-practicing priests, unable to duplicate this miracle, had to admit. “It is the finger of God!”—Ex. 8:16-19.

The Israelites, too, were told that if they failed to keep God’s commandments, they could expect various maledictions, one of these being drought, for it was stated: “Jehovah will give powder and dust as the rain of your land. From the heavens it will come down upon you until you have been annihilated.”—Deut. 28:15, 24.

SYMBOLIC OF LAMENTATION AND DEBASEMENT

To symbolize their mournful lamentation over Jerusalem’s destruction by the Babylonians in 607 B.C.E., the older men of the city are represented as sitting on the earth in silence, having “brought up dust upon their head.” (Lam. 2:10) Many years earlier, through Isaiah, Jehovah prophetically called upon Babylon to come down off her throne, saying: “Come down and sit down in the dust, O virgin daughter of Babylon. Sit down on the earth where there is no throne, O daughter of the Chaldeans.” (Isa. 47:1) Babylon was reduced to this low state in 539 B.C.E., at her conquest by the Medes and Persians. And, due to the destruction of symbolic Babylon the Great, ship captains, voyagers, sailors and all those making a living by the sea are depicted as throwing dust upon their heads and bemoaning her devastation.—Rev. 18:17-19

OTHER USES

Dust is also Scripturally linked with repentance. When Job made a retraction for talking without understanding in arguing his case before God he said: “I do repent in dust and ashes.”—Job 42:1, 3, 6.

Causing foes to “lick the dust” means vanquishing them, effecting their complete subjection. (Ps. 72:9; Mic. 7:16, 17) Tossing dust into the air or throwing it at a person were ways of registering strong disapproval of him. It is a custom in parts of Asia to demand justice against a criminal by throwing dust on him. Unjustifiably enraged by certain words of Paul, a crowd in Jerusalem showed their animosity against him by “tossing dust into the air.” Through their emotional demonstration and their words they made their disapproval of Paul clear to the military commander. (Acts 22:22-24) Similarly, Shimei manifested disapproval of David’s kingship by “walking abreast of him that he might call down evil; and he kept throwing stones while abreast of him, and he threw a lot of dust.”—2 Sam. 16:5-13.

Jesus Christ instructed his disciples that when anyone failed to receive them or listen to their words, they were to shake or wipe the dust off their feet upon leaving that house or that city. This practice served “for a witness against them,” implying that Jesus’ followers were peacefully departing and leaving that house or that city to the consequences that would come from God.—Matt. 10:11-15; Luke 9:5; 10:10-12; Acts 13:50, 51.

DYES, DYEING

The art of imparting particular hues and tints to thread, fabric and other materials through various processes by employing coloring matter was known and practiced before the days of Abraham and is probably as old as the art of weaving. The Israelites used such goods as blue thread, coccus scarlet material and wool dyed reddish purple for the tabernacle and for priestly garments. (Ex. chaps. 25-28, 35, 38, 39) Dyeing, more of a domestic activity in earlier times, eventually became quite a commercial enterprise in various places. The early Egyptians were noted for their particularly brilliant dyed goods (Ezek. 27:7) and, after Egypt’s decline, Tyre and other Phoenician cities became important dye centers. The discovery of dye plants throughout Palestine shows that the Hebrews also practiced the art of dyeing.

ANCIENT PROCESSES

Dyeing processes varied from place to place. Sometimes the thread was dyed, whereas in other cases the dye was applied to finished cloth. It seems that thread was bathed in dye twice, being squeezed after its removal from the vat the second time so that the valued dye could be retained. The thread was thereafter laid out so that it could dry.

Each material had to be treated in a different way. Sometimes, though rarely, the coloring matter had a natural affinity for the fiber being dyed. But when that was not so, it was necessary to treat the material first with a mordant, a substance having an attraction for both the fiber and the dye. To serve as a mordant, a substance must at least have an attraction for the coloring matter, so that it will combine with it to form a colored compound that is insoluble. Discoveries show that the Egyptians employed mordants in dyeing processes. For instance, red, yellow and blue were three of the colors they used, and it is said that such dyes could not have been fixed without using oxides of arsenic, iron and tin as mordants.

Evidently, animal skins were first tanned and then dyed. Even recently in Syria, ram skins have been tanned in sumac and then the dye has been applied. After the drying of the dye, the skins have been rubbed with oil and then polished. Shoes and other leather items used by the Bedouins have thus been dyed red and may well remind one of the “ram skins dyed red” used for the tabernacle.—Ex. 25:5.

Interesting in connection with dyed materials is a building inscription of Assyrian King Tiglath-pileser III. After telling of his military campaigns against Palestine and Syria, he states that he received tribute from a certain Hiram of Tyre and other rulers. The listed articles include “linen garments with multicolored trimmings, blue-dyed wool, purple-dyed wool, . . . also lambs whose stretched hides were dyed purple, (and) wild birds whose spread-out wings were dyed blue.”—Ancient Near Eastern Texts Relating to the Old Testament, edited by James B. Pritchard, 2d ed., 1955, pp. 282 283.

SOURCES OF DYES

Dyes were acquired from various sources. In Palestine, yellow dyes were obtained from almond leaves and ground pomegranate rind, though the Phoenicians also used turmeric and safflower. The Hebrews could obtain black dye from the bark of the pomegranate tree and red from the roots of the madder plant. Indigo plants that were probably brought into Palestine from Egypt or Syria could be used for blue dye. Part of one method used to impart purple hues to wool consisted of steeping the wool in grape juice overnight and sprinkling powdered madder on it.

Coccus scarlet and crimson dyes had as their source the oldest dyestuff known, a parasitic homopterous insect of the family Coccidae (the Coccus ilicis). Because the living female, about the size of a cherry pit, resembles a berry, the Greeks applied to it their word kokʹkos, meaning “berry.” The Arab name for the insect is qirmiz or kermez, from which the English word “crimson” is derived. This insect is found throughout the Middle East. Only its eggs contain the purplish-red dyestuff, rich in kermesic acid. Toward the end of April the wingless female, filled with eggs, attaches herself by means of her proboscis to the twigs, and sometimes to the leaves, of the small holm oak. The grubs or kermes are gathered and dried and the valued dye is obtained by boiling them in water. This is the red dye that was used extensively for the appurtenances of the tabernacle and for the garments worn by Israel’s high priest.

Purple dye was obtained from shellfish or mollusks such as the Murex trunculus and Murex brandaris. In the neck of these creatures there is a small gland containing but a single drop of fluid called “the flower.” Initially it has the appearance and consistency of cream, but upon exposure to air and light it gradually changes to a deep violet or reddish purple. These shellfish are found along the shores of the Mediterranean Sea and the shades of color acquired from them vary according to their location. The larger specimens were broken open individually and the precious fluid was carefully removed from them, whereas the smaller ones were crushed in mortars. Since the amount of fluid acquired from each shellfish was quite small, accumulating a considerable amount was a costly process. Hence, this dye was expensive and garments dyed purple became the mark of wealthy persons or those in high station. (Esther 8:15; Luke 16:19) Another shellfish (the cerulean mussel) has been suggested as the source of a blue dye.

Ancient Tyre became famous for a purple or deep-crimson dye known as Tyrian or Imperial purple. Though the Tyrians are said to have employed a method of double-dyeing, the exact formula used to obtain this color is unknown. The coloring matter was evidently obtained from the Murex and Purpura mollusks, piles of emptied shells of the Murex trunculus having been found along the shore of Tyre and in the vicinity of Sidon. The Phoenician city of Tyre is depicted by Jehovah as having wool dyed reddish purple and other colorful materials, as well as carrying on trading in such articles.—Ezek. 27:2, 7, 24; see COLORS.

EAGLE

[Heb., ne·sherʹ; Gr., ae·tosʹ].

Some believe that the Hebrew name derives from a root word meaning “to tear in pieces or lacerate.” Others view it as onomatopoeic (that is, a name whose very sound suggests the thing meant), and believe that ne·sherʹ represents a “rushing sound,” or “gleaming flash,” hence a bird that dives after its prey, plummeting downward with a rushing sound and like flashing light through the