the Week of Proper 28 / Ordinary 33
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Bible Dictionaries
Heat
Hastings' Dictionary of the New Testament
or HEAT (καύσων), Matthew 20:12, Luke 12:55; Revised Version NT 1881, OT 1885 ‘scorching heat,’ with marg. ‘hot wind.’ καύσων in LXX Septuagint has both meanings: (1) scorching heat (Genesis 31:40, Isaiah 49:10, Sirach 18:16; Sirach 43:22); (2) the east wind (קָדִים), hot, dry, dust-laden, withering up all vegetation, and blowing from the desert, like the simoom (Job 27:21, Jeremiah 18:17, Ezekiel 17:10; Ezekiel 19:12, Jonah 4:8, Hosea 13:15), usually ἄνεμος or πνεῦμα καύσων. Authorized Version gives ‘burning heat,’ and Revised Version NT 1881, OT 1885 ‘scorching wind’ in James 1:11.
The first meaning seems preferable in Matthew 20:12, though Trench (Parables) and others incline to (Revised Version margin). ‘Onus intrinsecus, a labore; aestum extrinsecus, a sole’ (Bengel). Luke 12:55 belongs to a class of passages based on the observation of natural phenomena; cf. Matthew 5:45; Matthew 7:24 f., Matthew 24:27, Luke 10:18, John 3:8; John 12:24. Here also the rendering ‘scorching heat’ is the more usual, and seems to agree better than ‘hot wind’ or ‘east wind’ with the mention of the south wind (νότος) which immediately precedes. Possibly, however, the distinction was not so clearly marked between these two winds, since in Ezekiel 27:26 קָדִים (east wind) is translated in LXX Septuagint by τὸ πνεῦμα τοῦ νότου.
The only reference in the Gospels to heat for the purpose of warmth is John 18:18 ‘a fire of coals’ (ἀνθρακιάν), i.e. ‘of charcoal’ (Revised Version margin), coals having probably still this meaning at the time of the Authorized Version. See Wind.
Literature.—Grimm-Thayer, Lex. s.v. καύσων; Hasting's Dictionary of the Bible, and Encyc. Bibl. art. ‘Wind’; Thomson, Land and Book, pp. 295, 536 f.
W. H. Dundas.
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Hastings, James. Entry for 'Heat'. Hastings' Dictionary of the New Testament. https://www.studylight.org/dictionaries/eng/hdn/h/heat.html. 1906-1918.
