PLANTS IN SCRIPTURE 137 



nuts, and almonds." 1 Now whether this, which Jacob 

 sent, were the proper balsam extolled by human writers, 

 you cannot but make some doubt, who find the Greek 

 translation to be prjcrcvr], that is, resina, and so may 

 have some suspicion that it might be some pure 

 distillation from the turpentine tree ; which grows 

 prosperously and plentifully in Judaea, and seems so 

 understood by the Arabic ; and was indeed esteemed 

 by Theophrastus and Dioscorides the chiefest of resinous 

 bodies, and the word resina emphatically used for it. 



That the balsam plant hath grown and prospered in 

 Judaea we believe without dispute. For the same is 

 attested by Theophrastus, Pliny, Justinus, and many 

 more. From the commendation that Galen afFordeth 

 of the balsam of Syria, and the story of Cleopatra, 

 rat she obtained some plants of balsam from Herod 

 .he Great to transplant into Egypt. But whether it 

 was so anciently in Judaea as the time of Jacob ; nay, 

 whether this plant was here before the time of Solomon, 

 that great collector of vegetable rarities, some dMM 

 may be made from the account of Joseph us, that the 

 queen of Sheba, a part of Arabia, among presents unto 

 Solomon brought some plants of the balsam tree, as 

 one of the peculiar estimables of her country. 

 1 Psalm civ. 17. 



