family Rallidae. It frequents marshes and the sedge by the banks of rivers in all the countries
bordering on the Mediterranean and is abundant in lower Egypt.
Swearing
[Oath]
Sweat, Bloody
One of the physical phenomena attending our Lord’s agony in the garden of Gethsemane is
described by St. Luke, (Luke 22:44) “His sweat was as it were great drops (lit. clots) of blood falling
down to the ground.” Of this malady, known in medical science by the term diapedesis, there have
been examples recorded in both ancient and modern times. The cause assigned is generally violent
mental emotion.
Swine
(Heb. chazir). The flesh of swine was forbidden as food by the Levitical law, (Leviticus 11:7;
14:8) the abhorrence which the Jews as a nation had of it may be inferred from (Isaiah 65:4) and
2 Macc 6:18,19. No other reason for the command to abstain from swine’s flesh is given in the law
of Moses beyond the general one which forbade any of the mammalia as food which did not literally
fulfill the terms of the definition of a clean animal” viz,, that it was to be a cloven-footed ruminant.
It is, however, probable that dietetical considerations may have influenced Moses in his prohibition
of swine’s flesh: it is generally believed that its use in hot countries is liable to induce cutaneous
disorders; hence in a people liable to leprosy the necessity for the observance of a strict rule.
Although the Jews did not breed swine during the greater period of their existence as a nation there
can be little doubt that the heathen nations of Palestine used the flesh as food. At the time of our
Lord’s ministry it would appear that the Jews occasionally violated the law of Moses with regard
to swine’s flesh. Whether “the herd of swine” into which the devils were allowed to enter, (Matthew
8:32; Mark 5:13) were the property of the Jewish or of the Gentile inhabitants of Gadara does not
appear from the sacred narrative. The wild boar of the wood, (Psalms 80:13) is the common Sus
scrofa which is frequently met with in the woody parts of Palestine, especially in Mount Tabor.
Sword
[Arms, Armor]
Sycamine Tree
is mentioned only in (Luke 17:6) There is no reason to doubt that the sycamine is distinct from
the sycamore of the same evangelist. (Luke 19:4) The sycamine is the mulberry tree (Morus). Both
black and white mulberry trees are common in Syria and Palestine.
Sycamore
(Heb. shikmah). Although it may be admitted that the sycamine is properly, and in (Luke 17:6)
the mulberry, and the sycamore the mulberry, or sycamore-fig (Ficus sycomorus), yet the latter is
the tree generally referred to in the Old Testament and called by the Septuagint sycamine, as ( 1
Kings 10:27; 1 Chronicles 27:28; Psalms 78:47; Amos 7:14) The Sycamore or fig-mulberry, is in
Egypt and Palestine a tree of great importance and very extensive use. It attains the size of a walnut
tree has wide-spreading branches and affords a delightful shade. On this account it is frequently
planted by the waysides. Its leaves are heart-shaped, downy on the under side, and fragrant. The
Fruit grows directly from the trunk itself on little sprigs, and in clusters like the grape. To make It
eatable, each fruit, three or four days before gathering, must, it is said, be punctured with a sharp
instrument or the finger-nail. This was the original employment of the prophet Amos, as he says.
(Amos 7:14) So great was the value of these trees that David appointed for them in his kingdom a
frankie
(Frankie)
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