A church dictionary

by Walter Farquhar Hook

E. Aisle windows.

t. Jamb shafts. u. Tracery (Perpendicular). v. Mullions. w. Transom. x. Batement lights.

y. Tracery (Geometrical). z. Cusping or foliation. aa. Tracery (Flowing). bb. Hood, in the exterior more correctly dripstone. cc. Corbel, or label.

DECORATIONS COMMON TO BOTH.

1. Arcading (Norman to Decorated.) 2. Panelling (Perpendicular). 3. Niche. 4. Panel. 5. String.

BEADS, or BEDES. A word of Saxon origin, which properly signifies prayers; hence Bidding the Bedes meant desiring the prayers of the congregation, and from the forms used for this purpose before the Reformation is derived the Bidding of prayer, prescribed by the English canons of 1603. (See Bidding Prayer.) From denoting the prayers themselves, the word came to mean the little balls used by the Romanists in rehearsing and numbering their Ave-marias and Paternosters. (See Rosary.) A similar practice prevails among the dervises and other religious persons throughout the East, as well Mahometans as Buddhists and other heathens. The ancient form of the Bedes, or Bidding Prayer, is given in the Appendix to Collier’s Eccl. Hist. vol. ii. No. 54, which shows that our present Bidding Prayer was founded on that model.

BEATIFICATION. (See Canonization.) In the Romish Church, the act by which the pope declares a person happy after death. Beatification differs from canonization. In the former the pope does not act as a judge in determining the state of the beatified, but only grants a privilege to certain persons to honour him by a particular religious worship, without incurring the penalty of superstitious worshippers. In canonization, the pope blasphemously speaks as a judge, and determines, ex cathedrâ, on the state of the canonized. It is remarkable, that particular orders of monks assume to themselves the power of beatification.

BEDDERN, BEDERNA. The name still retained of the vicar’s college at York, and of the old collegiate building at Beverley. Query, whether it may be somewhat the same as Bedehouse, i. e. an hospital?—Jebb.

BEGUINES. A congregation of nuns, founded either by St. Begghe, duchess of Brabant, in the seventh century, or by Lambert le Begue, a priest and native of Liege, who lived in the twelfth century. They were established first at Liege, and afterwards at Nivelle, in 1207, or, as some say, in 1226. From this last settlement sprang the great number of Beguinages, which are spread over all Flanders, and which have passed from Flanders into Germany. In the latter country, some of them fell into extravagant errors, and persuaded themselves that it was possible in the present life to attain to the highest perfection, even to impeccability, and a clear view of God, and in short, to so eminent a degree of contemplation, that, after this, there was no necessity of submitting to the laws of mortal men, civil or ecclesiastical. The Council of Vienne, in 1311, condemned these errors, but permitted those who continued in the true faith to live in chastity and penitence, either with or without vows. There still subsist many communities of Beguines in Flanders.—Hist. des Ord. Relig. viii. c. i.

BEL AND THE DRAGON (THE HISTORY OF). An apocryphal and uncanonical book of Scripture. It was always rejected by the Jewish Church, and is extant neither in the Hebrew nor the Chaldee language, nor is there any proof that it ever was so. St. Jerome gives it no better title than “the fable of Bel and the Dragon.” It is, however, permitted to be read, as well as the other apocryphal writings, for the instruction and improvement of manners.