BRAMBLE:

A prickly shrub. The word serves as a translation for two Hebrew terms and a Greek one, all of which, however, should receive other renderings.

  • (1) "Aṭad" ( = the Assyrian "eṭidu") figures in the parable of Jotham. It is the last tree to which the other trees came in quest of a king for themselves (Judges ix. 14, 15). In Ps. lviii. 10 "aṭad" is translated "thorns" (compare Gen. l. 11, "goren ha-aṭad"). The plant is one of the rhamnus group.
  • (2) "Ḥoaḥ" () is only once translated "bramble"; elsewhere it is rendered "thorns."
  • (3) Bάτος, out of twelve times that it occurs, is once translated "bramble" (Luke vi. 44). See Thorns and Thistles.
E. C. G. B. L.
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