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Scribe (or Scrivener) is an ancient profession, a person who could read and write. This usually indicated secretarial and administrative duties such as dictation and keeping business, judicial, and history records for rulers such as kings, nobility, temples, and cities. Later the profession developed for example into public servants , accountants, and lawyers.

In ancient Egypt with its complex hieroglyphic script scribes had even their own god, Imhotep.

1 Scribes in the Bible

Scribes is anciently held various important offices in the public affairs of the nation. The Hebrew word so rendered (sopher) is first used to designate the holder of some military office (Judg. 5:14; A.V., "pen of the writer;" R.V., "the marshal's staff;" marg., "the staff of the scribe"). The scribes acted as secretaries of state, whose business it was to prepare and issue decrees in the name of the king (2 Sam. 8:17; 20:25; 1 Chr. 18:16; 24:6; 1 Kings 4:3; 2 Kings 12:9-11; 18:18-37, etc.). They discharged various other important public duties as men of high authority and influence in the affairs of state.

There was also a subordinate class of scribes, most of whom were Levites. They were engaged in various ways as writers. Such, for example, was Baruch, who "wrote from the mouth of Jeremiah all the words of the Lord" (Jer. 36:4, 32).

In later times, after the Captivity, when the nation lost its independence, the scribes turned their attention to the law, gaining for themselves distinction by their intimate acquaintance with its contents. On them devolved the duty of ultiplying copies of the law and of teaching it to others (Ezra 7:6, 10-12; Neh. 8:1, 4, 9, 13). It is evident that in New Testament times the scribes belonged to the sect of the Pharisees, who supplemented the ancient written law by their traditions (Matt. 23). The titles "scribes" and "lawyers" (q.v.) are in the Gospels interchangeable (Matt. 22:35; Gospel of MarkThe Gospel of Mark is the second in the most usual sequence of printing of the New Testament Gospels. The commonly accepted range of dates for the text in its existing form are ca. AD 65, the traditional date for the death of Peter, to ca. AD 80, a termin 12:28; LukeThe Gospel of Luke is the third of the four canonical Gospels of the New Testament, which tell the story of Jesus Christ's life, death, and resurrection. Although the text does not name its author, the modern consensus follows the traditional view that th 20:39, etc.).

2 See also

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• People : Michael William BalfeMichael William Balfe ( May 15, 1808 October 20, 1870), was an Irish composer, best known today for his opera The Bohemian Girl''. Balfe was born in Dublin, where his musical gifts became apparent at an early age. The only instruction he received was from, MuhammadMuhammad ( Arabic also transliterated Mohammad Mohammed and formerly Mahomet following Latin spelling) was the founder of Islam, and is revered by Muslims as the final prophet of God. According to his traditional Muslim biographies (called sirah in Arabic, John Barbour, Ibn Warraq, Baruch, Sidney Rigdon, John Milton, Beowulf, Margery Kempe
• Other : Anglo-Norman language, Irish poetry, Uncial, Mail, Saint-Louis-du-Ha! Ha!, Quebec

This entry incorporates text from Easton's Bible Dictionary, 1897, with some modernisation.