THE BALM OF GILEAD 



47. The Yu yan tsa tsu 1 has the following notice of an exotic plant 

 referred exclusively to Syria: "The plant H ^ & a-p'o-ts'an (*a-bwut- 

 sam) has its habitat in the country Fu-lin (Syria) . The tree is over ten 

 feet high. Its bark is green and white in color. The blossoms are 

 fine &lfl, two being opposite each other (biflorate) . The flowers resemble 

 those of the rape-turnip, man-tsm IE W (Brassica rapa-depressa) , 

 being uniformly yellow. The seeds resemble those of the pepper-plant, 

 hu-tsiao ~$ft $& (Piper nigrum). By chopping the branches, one obtains 

 a juice like oil, that is employed as an ointment, serving as a remedy for 

 ringworm, and is useful for any disease. This oil is held in very high 

 esteem, and its price equals its weight in gold." 



As indicated in the Pen ts'ao kan mu $i i? the notice of the plant 

 a-p'o-san has been adopted by two works, the C*enfu t'un hwi @ S$t 

 ^t H", which simply notes that it grows in Fu-lin; and the Hwa i hwa 

 mu k'ao IS Jt ffi /fC ^ ("Investigations into the Botany of China and 

 Foreign Countries")) which has copied the account of the Yu yan tsa 

 tsu without acknowledgment. Neither of these books gives any addi- 

 tional information, and the account of the Yu yan tsa tsu remains the 

 only one that we possess. 



The transcription *a-bwut(bwur)-sam, which is very exact, leads 

 to Aramaic and Talmudic afursama NDD^BNS (Greek fiaXcranov, 

 Arabic balessdn), the balm of Gilead (Amyris gileadensis, Balsamoden- 

 dron giliadense, or Commiphora opobalsamum, family Burseraceae) of 

 ancient fame. This case splendidly corroborates Hirth's opinion that 

 the language of Fu-lin (or rather one of the languages of Fu-lin) was 

 Aramaic. The last two characters p'o-ts'an (*bwut-sam) could very 

 well transcribe Greek balsam; but the element H excludes Greek and 

 any other language in which this word is found, and admits no other 

 than Aramaic. In Syriac we have apursama and pursdma (pursma), 

 hence Armenian aprsam or aprasam* In Neo-Hebrew, afobalsmon or 



1 Ch. 18, p. 12. 



2 Ch. 4, p. 15. 



3 1. LOEW, Aramaeische Pflanzennamen, p. 73. Also afarsma and afarsmon 

 (]. BUXTORF, Lexicon chaldaicum, p. 109; J. LEVY, Neuhebr. Worterbuch, Vol. I, 

 p. 151). Cf. S. KRAUSS, Talmudische Archaologie, Vol. I, pp. 234-236. 



4 HUBSCHMANN, Armenische Grammatik, p. 107. I do not believe in the Persian 

 origin of this word, as tentatively proposed by this author. 



429 



