the Week of Proper 24 / Ordinary 29
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King James Version
Job 30:4
Bible Study Resources
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They pluck wild greens from among the bushes and eat from the roots of broom trees.
They pluck salt-wort by the bushes; and the roots of the broom are their meat.
They pluck salt-wort by the bushes; And the roots of the broom are their food.
They gathered desert plants among the brush and ate the root of the broom tree.
By the brush they would gather herbs from the salt marshes, and the root of the broom tree was their food.
Who cut up mallows by the bushes, and juniper roots [for] their food.
They pluck salt herbs by the bushes. The roots of the broom are their food.
"They pluck [and eat] saltwort (mallows) among the bushes, And their food is the root of the broom shrub.
they pick saltwort and the leaves of bushes, and the roots of the broom tree for their food.
and eeten eerbis, aud the ryndis of trees; and the roote of iunyperis was her mete.
They plucked mallow among the shrubs, and the roots of the broom tree were their food.
They gather tasteless shrubs for food and firewood,
They pluck salt-wort by the bushes; And the roots of the broom are their food.
They are pulling off the salt leaves from the brushwood, and making a meal of roots.
They pluck saltwort and bitter leaves; these, with broom tree roots, are their food.
They gather the salt-wort among the bushes, and the roots of the broom for their food.
They pull up salt plants in the desert and eat the roots from the broom tree.
They pluck salt-wort with wormwood; and the roots of the broom are their food.
Who cut vp mallowes by the bushes, and Iuniper rootes for their meate.
They pick plants that taste of salt among the bushes. And they eat the root of the broom bush.
they pick mallow and the leaves of bushes, and to warm themselves the roots of broom.
They cut vp nettels by the bushes, & the iuniper rootes was their meate.
For they had lost their power completely.
They pulled up the plants of the desert and ate them, even the tasteless roots of the broom tree!
Who used to pluck off the mallow by the bushes, with the root of the broom for their food;
And they ate grass, and barks of trees, and the root of junipers was their food.
they pick mallow and the leaves of bushes, and to warm themselves the roots of the broom.
Plucking vp nettles among the busshes, and the iuniper rootes for their meate.
Who compass the salt places on the sounding shore, who had salt herbs for their food, and were dishonorable and of no repute, in want of every good thing; who also ate roots of trees by reason of great hunger.
They plucked mallow among the shrubs,and the roots of the broom tree were their food.
They pluck mallukh by the bushes. The roots of the broom are their food.
They are picking salt herbs, the leaves of bushes, and the roots of broom trees to warm themselves.
those plucking mallow by the bushes, and broom roots for their food;
Those cropping mallows near a shrub, And broom-roots [is] their food.
pluckynge vp herbes from amonge the bu?shes, & the Iunipers rote was their meate.
Who pluck saltweed by the bushes, And whose food is the root of the broom shrub.
Who pluck mallow by the bushes, And broom tree roots for their food.
Who pluck mallow by the bushes, And whose food is the root of the broom shrub.
Who pluck mallow by the bushes,And whose food is the root of the broom tree.
Contextual Overview
Bible Verse Review
from Treasury of Scripure Knowledge
mallows: The Hebrew malluach, in Arabic, malluch, and in Syriac mallucho, is probably the Lalima or Lalimos of the Greeks, and halimus of the Romans, which Dioscorides describes as a kind of bramble, without thorns, the leaves of which are boiled and eaten.
juniper roots: The Hebrew rothem, in Arabic, ratim, and in Spanish, retama, most probably signifies the genista or broom, which is very abundant in the deserts of Arabia.
for their meat: 2 Kings 4:38, 2 Kings 4:39, Amos 7:14, Luke 15:16
Reciprocal: Job 15:23 - wandereth
Cross-References
Wherefore she said unto Abraham, Cast out this bondwoman and her son: for the son of this bondwoman shall not be heir with my son, even with Isaac.
And his concubine, whose name was Reumah, she bare also Tebah, and Gaham, and Thahash, and Maachah.
Then again Abraham took a wife, and her name was Keturah.
But unto the sons of the concubines, which Abraham had, Abraham gave gifts, and sent them away from Isaac his son, while he yet lived, eastward, unto the east country.
And she said, Behold my maid Bilhah, go in unto her; and she shall bear upon my knees, that I may also have children by her.
And she gave him Bilhah her handmaid to wife: and Jacob went in unto her.
And he put the handmaids and their children foremost, and Leah and her children after, and Rachel and Joseph hindermost.
And it came to pass, when Israel dwelt in that land, that Reuben went and lay with Bilhah his father's concubine: and Israel heard it. Now the sons of Jacob were twelve:
Thus saith the Lord , Behold, I will raise up evil against thee out of thine own house, and I will take thy wives before thine eyes, and give them unto thy neighbour, and he shall lie with thy wives in the sight of this sun.
Gill's Notes on the Bible
Who cut up mallows by the bushes,.... Which with the Troglodytes were of a vast size r; or rather "upon the bush" s or "tree"; and therefore cannot mean what we call mallows, which are herbs on the ground, and grow not on trees or bushes; and, besides, are not for food, but rather for medicine: though Plutarch t says they, were the food of the meaner sort of people; so Horace u speaks of them as such; and the word in the original is near in sound to a mallow; but it signifies something salt, wherefore Mr. Broughton renders it "salt herbs"; so Grotius, such as might grow by the seaside, or in salt marshes; and in Edom, or Idumea, where Job lived, was a valley of salt, see 2 Kings 14:7. Jarchi says it is the same with what the Syrians in their language call "kakuli", which with them is a kind of pulse; but what the Turks at this day call "kakuli" is a kind of salt herb, like to "alcali", which is the food of camels x the Septuagint render the word by "alima"; and, by several modern learned men, what is intended is thought to be the "halimus" of Dioscorides, Galen, and Avicenna; which is like unto a bramble, and grows in hedges and maritime places; the tops of which, when young and tender, are eaten, and the leaves boiled for food, and are eaten by poor people, being what soon filled the belly, and satisfied; and seem to be the same the Moors call "mallochia", and cry about the streets, as food for the poor to buy y: however it appears upon the whole to be the tops or leaves of some sort of shrub, which Idumean people used to gather and live upon. The following story is reported in the Talmud z concerning King Jannai, who
"went to Cochalith in the wilderness, and there subdued sixty fortified towns; and, upon his return, he greatly rejoiced, and called all the wise men of Israel, and said unto them, our fathers ate "malluchim" (the word used in this text of Job) at the time they were employed in building the sanctuary; so we will eat "malluchim" on remembrance of our fathers; and they set "malluchim" on tables of gold, and they ate;''
which the gloss interprets herbs; the name of which, in the Syriac language, is "kakuli"; the Targum is, who plucks up thorns instead of eatable herbs. Some a render the word "nettles", see Job 30:7;
juniper roots [for] their meat, or "bread" b; with the roots of which the poor were fed in time of want, as Schindler v observes: that bread may be, and has been made out of roots, is certain, as with the West Indians, out of the roots of "ages" and "jucca" c; and in particular juniper roots in the northern countries have been used for bread d; and there were a people in Ethiopia above Egypt, who lived upon roots of reeds prepared, and were called "rhisophagi" e, "root eaters": some render the words, "or juniper roots to heat", or "warm with" f, as the word is used in Isaiah 47:14; and coals of juniper have in them a very great and vehement heat, see Psalms 120:3; but if any part of the juniper tree was taken for this purpose, to warm with when cold, one should think the branches, or the body of the tree, should be cut down, rather than the roots dug up: another sense is given by some g, that meat or bread is to be understood of the livelihood these persons got by digging up juniper roots, and selling them: there are others that think, that not the roots of juniper, but of "broom" h, are meant, whose rape, or navew, or excrescence from the roots of it, seem to be more fit food. All this agrees with the Troglodytes, whom Pliny i represents as thieves and robbers, and, when pressed with famine, dig up herbs and roots: cutters of roots are reckoned among the worst of men by Manetho k.
r Diodorus Siculus, l. 3. p. 175. s עלי שיח "super virgulto", Montanus, Schultens; "super arbustum", Bochart. t In symposio septem sap. u "-----me pascunt olivae. Me cichorea levesque malvae". Carmin. l. 1. Ode. 31. Epod. Ode. 2. x Scheuchzer. Physic. Sacr. vol. 4. p. 760. y lbid. vid. Reinesium de Lingua Punic. c. 9. S. 20, 21. z T. Bab. Kiddushin, fol. 66. 1. a David de Pomis Lexic. fol. 80. 3. b לחמם "panis eorum", Montanus, Michaelis, Schultens. v Lexic. col. 1775. c Pet. Martyr. de Angleria, decad. 1. l. 1. d Olaus Magnus, de Ritu Gent. Septent. l. 12. c. 4. e Diod. Sic. l. 3. p. 159. f "Ad calefaciendum se", Pagninus so Kimchi, Sepher Shorash rad,
חמם. g Hillerus apud Schultens in loc. h שרש רתמים "radix genistarum", Michaelis, Schultens; so some in Mercerus, Drusius, & Gussetius, p. 839. i Nat. Hist. l. 37. c. 8. k Apotelesm. l. 5. v. 183.
Barnes' Notes on the Bible
Who cut up mallows - For the purpose of eating. Mallows are common medicinal plants, famous for their emollient or softening properties, and the size and brilliancy of their flowers. It is not probable, however, that Job referred to what we commonly understand by the word mallows. It has been commonly supposed that he meant a species of plant, called by the Greeks Hallimus, a sunfish plant, or “salt wort,” growing commonly in the deserts and poor land, and eaten as a salad. The Vulgate renders it simply “herbas;” the Septuagint, ἄλιμα alima. The Hebrew word, according to Umbreit, means a common salad of a saltish taste, whose young leaves being cooked, constituted food for the poorer classes. The Hebrew word מלוח mallûach is from מלח mâlach, “salt,” and properly refers to a marine plant or vegetable.
By the bushes - Or among the bushes; that is, that which grew among the bushes of the desert. They wandered about in the desert that they might obtain this very humble fare.
And juniper-roots - The word here rendered “juniper” רתם rethem, occurs only in this place, and in 1 Kings 19:4-5; Psalms 120:4. In each place it is rendered “juniper.” In 1 Kings it is mentioned as the tree under which Elijah sat down when he fled into the wilderness for his life; In Psalms 120:4, it is mentioned as a material for making coals. “Sharp arrows of the mighty, with coals of juniper.” It is rendered “juniper” by Jerome, and by the rabbis. The verb (רתם râqab) occurs in Micah 1:13, where it is rendered “bind,” and means to bind on, to make fast; and probably the plant here referred to received its name in some way from the notion of “binding” - perhaps because its long, flexible, and slender twigs were used for binding, or for “withes.” There is no evidence, however, that the “juniper” is in any case intended. It denotes a species of “broom - spartium junceum” of Linn., which grows abundantly in the deserts of Arabia. It is the “Genista raetam” of Forskal. “Flora” Egypt. Arab. p. 214.
It has small variegated blossoms, and grows in the water-courses of the Wadys. Dr. Robinson (Bibl. Researches, i. 299) says, “The Retem is the largest and most conspicuous shrub of these de sects, growing thickly in the water-courses and valleys. Our Arabs always selected the place of encampment (if possible) in a place where it grew, in order to be sheltered by it at night from the wind; and, during the day, when they often went on in advance of the camels, we found them not unfrequently sitting or sleeping under a bush of Retem, to protect them from the sun. It was in this very desert, a day’s journey from Beersheba, that the prophet Elijah lay down and slept beneath the same shrub. The roots are very bitter, and are regarded by the Arabs as yielding the best charcoal. The Hebrew name רתם rethem, is the same as the present Arabic name.” Burckhardt remarks, that he found several Bedouins in the Wady Genne collecting brushwood, which they burned into charcoal for the Egyptian market, and adds that they preferred for this purpose the thick roots of the shrub Rethem, which grew there in abundance. Travels in Syria, p. 483. It could have been only those who were reduced to the utmost penury and want that could have made use of the roots of this shrub for food, and this is doubtless the idea which Job means to convey. It is said to have been occasionally used for food by the poor. See Gesenius, Lex.; Umbreit in loc., and Schultens. A description of the condition of the poor, remarkably similar to this, occurs in Lucan, Lib. vii.;
- Cernit miserabile vulgus
In pecudum cecidisse cibos, et carpere dumos
Et morsu spoliare nemus.
Biddulph (in the collection of Voyages from the Library of the Earl of Oxford, p. 807), says he had seen many poor people in Syria gather mallows and clover, and when he had asked them what they designed to do with it, they answered that it was for food. They cooked and ate them. Herodotus, viii. 115, says, that the army of Xerxes, after their defeat, when they had consumed all the grain of the inhabitants in Thessaly, “fed on the natural produce of the earth, stripping wild and cultivated trees alike of their bark and leaves, to such an extremity of famine were they come.”
Clarke's Notes on the Bible
Verse Job 30:4. Who cut up mallows by the bushes — מלוח malluach, which we translate mallows, comes from מלח melach, salt; some herb or shrub of a salt nature, sea-purslane, or the salsaria, salsola, or saltwort. Bochart says it is the αλιμος of the Greeks, and the halimus of the Romans. Some translate it nettles. The Syriac and Arabic omit the whole verse. The halimus, or atriplex halimus, grows near the sea in different countries, and is found in Spain, America, England, and Barbary. The salsaria, salsola, or saltwort, is an extensive genus of plants, several common to Asia, and not a few indigenous to a dry and sandy soil.
And juniper roots for their meat. — רתמים rethamim. This is variously translated juniper, broom, furze, gorse, or whin. It is supposed to derive its name from the toughness of its twigs, as רתם ratham signifies to bind; and this answers well enough to the broom. Genista quoque vinculi usum praestat, "The broom serves for bands," says PLINY, Hist. Nat. lib. xxiv., c. 9. But how can it be said that the roots of this shrub were eaten? I do not find any evidence from Asiatic writers that the roots of the juniper tree were an article of food; and some have supposed, because of this want of evidence, that the word לחמם lachmam, for their bread, should be understood thus, to bake their bread, because it is well known that the wood of the juniper gives an intense heat, and the coals of it endure a long time; and therefore we find coals of juniper, גחלי רחמים gachaley rethamim, used Psalms 120:4 to express severe and enduring punishment. But that the roots of the juniper were used for food in the northern countries, among the Goths, we have a positive testimony from Olaus Magnus, himself a Goth, and archbishop of Upsal, in lib. vii., c. 4, of his Hist. de Gentibus Septentrionalibus. Speaking of the great number of different trees in their woods, he says: "There is a great plenty of beech trees in all the northern parts, the virtue whereof is this: that, being cut between the bark and the wood, they send forth a juice that is good for drink. The fruit of them in famine serves for bread, and their bark for clothing. Likewise also the berries of the juniper, yea, even the roots of this tree are eaten for bread, as holy Job testifies, though it is difficult to come at them by reason of their prickles: in these prickles, or thorns, live coals will last a whole year. If the inhabitants do not quench them, when winds arise they set the woods on fire, and destroy all the circumjacent fields." In this account both the properties of the juniper tree, referred to by Job and David, are mentioned by the Gothic prelate. They use its berries and roots for food, and its wood for fire.
