| To accommodate the people and to enjoy the repose of midday, Roman governors, Suetonius tells us, mounted the bema at sunrise. |
| In Greece the bema was the general name of any raised platform. |
| The two smaller compartments and apses at the sides of the bema were sacristies, the diaconicon and prothesis. |
| At the far end of every ancient pagan basilica there was an elevated area called the bema. |
| Still it rejoiced him to hear the noble truths of democracy delivered as it were from the bema. |
| The bema also appears in synagogues, and from it the Pentateuch and Torah are read. |
