Psalm 37:25 - "... yet I have not seen the righteous forsaken or his children begging bread."

A beggar is a person who lives on the charity of others; there were (and are) professional beggars, who solicited alms publicly, and even went from door to door. They are still numerous in the East; they are usually "lame, maimed, or blind" (Luke 14:13). The commonest and most pathetic form of infirmity is blindness; some of these blind beggars are led by children and have regular places to station themselves.

The begging was sometimes only a simple statement of poverty. "I am poor," "I want a loaf of bread," or "give me the price of a loaf of bread." But occasionally they used the expressive gesture of bringing the forefinger across the teeth and holding it up as a proof that there was absolute…