Frontlets
    occurs only in Ex. 13:16; Deut. 6:8, and 11:18. The meaning of
    the injunction to the Israelites, with regard to the statues and
    precepts given them, that they should "bind them for a sign upon
    their hand, and have them as frontlets between their eyes," was
    that they should keep them distinctly in view and carefully
    attend to them. But soon after their return from Babylon they
    began to interpret this injunction literally, and had
    accordingly portions of the law written out and worn about their
    person. These they called tephillin, i.e., "prayers." The
    passages so written out on strips of parchment were these, Ex.
    12:2-10; 13:11-21; Deut. 6:4-9; 11:18-21. They were then "rolled
    up in a case of black calfskin, which was attached to a stiffer
    piece of leather, having a thong one finger broad and one cubit
    and a half long. Those worn on the forehead were written on four
    strips of parchment, and put into four little cells within a
    square case, which had on it the Hebrew letter called shin, the
    three points of which were regarded as an emblem of God." This
    case tied around the forehead in a particular way was called
    "the tephillah on the head." (See PHYLACTERY.)