Bible dictionaries

Pinnacle

What Bible dictionaries say about “Pinnacle”, one article after the other.

Easton’s Bible Dictionary & Webster’s 1828 Dictionary

Pinnacle - (Easton's Bible Dictionary)

A little wing, (Matt. 4:5; Luke 4:9). On the southern side of the temple court was a range of porches or cloisters forming three arcades. At the south-eastern corner the roof of this cloister was some 300 feet above the Kidron valley. The pinnacle, some parapet or wing-like projection, was above this roof, and hence at a great height, probably 350 feet or more above the valley.

Pinnacle - (Webster's 1828 Dictionary)

PIN'NACLE, n. [L. pinna.]

1. A turret, or part of a building elevated above the main building.

Some metropolis

With glistering spires and pinnacles adorn'd.

2. A high spiring point; summit.

PIN'NACLE, v.t. To build or furnish with pinnacles.

Matthew George Easton, Easton’s Bible Dictionary; Noah Webster, American Dictionary of the English Language (1828)

The article in Easton + Webster 1828

International Standard Bible Encyclopedia (ISBE 1915)

pin'-a-k'-l (pterugion (Mt 4:5; Lu 4:9, the Revised Version margin "wing")) "The pinnacle of the temple" is named as the place to which the devil took Jesus, and there tempted Him to cast Himself down. It is not known what precise elevated spot is meant, whether a part of the roof of the temple itself, or some high point in the adjacent buildings overlooking the deep ravine. It was more probably the latter.

International Standard Bible Encyclopedia — James Orr, general editor and contributors; CrossWire SWORD module ISBE 2.2

The article in ISBE 1915

Smith’s Bible Dictionary

(of the temple), (Matthew 4:5; Luke 4:9) The Greek word ought to be rendered not a pinnacle, but the pinnacle. The only part of the temple which answered to the modern sense of pinnacle was the golden spikes erected on the roof to prevent birds from settling there. Perhaps the word means the battlement ordered by law to be added to every roof. (According to Alford it was the roof of Herod’s royal portico of the temple,"which overhung the ravine of Kedron from a dizzy height" --600 or 700 feet.-ED.)

William Smith; revised by F. N. Peloubet and M. A. Peloubet; CrossWire SWORD module Smith 1.3

The article in Smith