Noah Webster's Dictionary (n. pl.) Goddess of the seasons, or of the hours of the day. Int. Standard Bible Encyclopedia HOURS OF PRAYER The Mosaic law did not regulate the offering of prayer, but fully recognized its spontaneous character. In what manner or how far back in Jewish history the sacrificial prayer, mentioned in Luke 1:10, originated no one knows. In the days of Christ it had evidently become an institution. But ages before that, stated hours of prayer were known and religiously observed by all devout Jews. It evidently belonged to the evolutionary process of Jewish worship, in connection with the temple-ritual. Devout Jews, living at Jerusalem, went to the temple to pray (Luke 18:10 Acts 3:1). The pious Jews of the Diaspora opened their windows "toward Jerus" and prayed "toward" the place of God's presence (1 Kings 8:48 Daniel 6:10 Psalm 5:7). The regular hours of prayer, as we may infer from Psalm 55:17 and Daniel 6:10, were three in number. The first coincided with the morning sacrifice, at the 3rd hour of the morning, at 9 AM therefore (Acts 2:15). The second was at the 6th hour, or at noon, and may have coincided with the thanksgiving for the chief meal of the day, a religious custom apparently universally observed (Matthew 15:36 Acts 27:35). The 3rd hour of prayer coincided with the evening sacrifice, at the ninth hour (Acts 3:1; Acts 10:30). Thus every day, as belonging to God, was religiously subdivided, and regular seasons of prayer were assigned to the devout believer. Its influence on the development of the religious spirit must have been incalculable, and it undoubtedly is, at least in part, the solution of the riddle of the preservation of the Jewish faith in the cruel centuries of its bitter persecution. Mohammedanism borrowed this feature of worship from the Jews and early Christians, and made it one of the chief pillars of its faith. Henry E. Dosker PRAYER, HOURS OF See HOURS OF PRAYER.

Multi-Version Concordance Hours (4 Occurrences) John 11:9 Jesus answered, "Aren't there twelve hours of daylight? If a man walks in the day, he doesn't stumble, because he sees the light of this world. (WEB KJV WEY ASV BBE DBY WBS YLT NAS RSV NIV) Acts 5:7 About three hours later, his wife, not knowing what had happened, came in. (WEB KJV WEY ASV BBE DBY WBS YLT NAS RSV NIV) Acts 19:34 But when they perceived that he was a Jew, all with one voice for a time of about two hours cried out, "Great is Artemis of the Ephesians!" (WEB KJV WEY ASV BBE DBY WBS YLT NAS RSV NIV) 2 Corinthians 11:25 Three times I have been beaten with Roman rods, once I have been stoned, three times I have been shipwrecked, once for full four and twenty hours I was floating on the open sea. (WEY)