Balm

Balm (for the original term, see below), a production more particularly ascribed to Gilead (Ge 37:25; Jer 8:2?). Balm or balsam is used as a common name for many of those oily, resinous substances which flow spontaneously or by incision from certain trees or plants, and are of considerable use in medicine and surgery. Kimchi and some of the modern interpreters understand the Hebrews word rendered "balm" to be that particular species called opobalsamum, or balm of Gilead, so much celebrated by Pliny, Strabo, Diodorus Siculus, Tacitus, Justin, and others, for its costliness, its medicinal virtues, and for being the product of Jud-ea only; and which Josephus says grew in the neighborhood of Jericho, the tree, according to tradition, having been originally brought by the Queen of Sheba as a present to King Solomon. On the other hand, Bochart strongly contends that the balm mentioned Jer 8:22, could not possibly be that of Gilead, and considers it as no other than the resin drawn from the terebinth or turpentine tree. Pliny says, "The trees of the opobalsamum have a resemblance to fir-trees, but they are lower, and are planted and husbanded after the manner of vines. On a particular season of the year they sweat balsam. The darkness of the place is, besides, as wonderful as the fruitfulness of it; for, though the sun shines nowhere hotter in the world, there is naturally a moderate and perpetual gloominess of the air." Mr. Buckingham observes upon this passage, that "the situation, boundaries, and local features of the valley of Jericho are accurately given in these details, though darkness, in the sense in which it is commonly understood, would be an improper term to apply to the gloom. At the present time there is not a tree of any description, either of palm or balsam, and scarcely any verdure or bushes to be seen, but the complete desolation is undoubtedly rather to be attributed to the cessation of the usual agricultural labors, and to the want of a proper distribution of water over it by the aqueducts, the remains of which evince that they were constructed chiefly for that purpose, rather than to any radical change in the climate or the soil." The balsam, carried originally, says Arab tradition, from Yemen by the Queen of Sheba, as a gift to Solomon, and planted by him in the gardens of Jericho, was brought to Egypt by Cleopatra, and planted at Ain- Shemesh, now Matara, in a garden which all the old travelers, Arab and Christian, mention with deep interest. The balsam of Jericho, or true balm of Gilead, has long been lost (De Sacy).

Balsam, at present, is procured in some cases from the fruit of a shrub which is indigenous in the mountains between Mecca and Medina. This shrub was cultivated in gardens in Egypt in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, and that this was also the case in Palestine, in very early times, appears from the original text in Ge 43:11, and Jer 46:11. The balsam of Mecca has always been deemed a substance of the greatest value; though it is not the only one possessing medicinal properties, yet it is, perhaps, more eminently distinguished for them than other balsamic plants of the same genus, of which sixteen are enumerated by botanists, each exhibiting some peculiarity. There are three species of this balsam, two of which are shrubs, and the other a tree. In June, July, and August they yield their sap, which is received into an earthen vessel. The fruit, also, when pierced with an instrument, emits a juice of the same kind, and in greater abundance, but less rich. The sap extracted from the body of the tree or shrub is called the opobalsamum; the juice of the balsam fruit is denominated carpobalsamum, and the liquid extracted from the branches when cut off, the xylobalsamum (Jahn, Bibl. Archaeol. 1, § 74). According to Bruce, "The balsam is an evergreen shrub or tree, which grows to about fourteen feet high, spontaneously and without culture, in its native country, Azab, and all along the coast to Babelmandeb. The trunk is about eight or ten inches in diameter, the wood light and open, gummy, and outwardly of a reddish color, incapable of receiving a polish, and covered with a smooth bark, like that of a young cherry-tree. It is remarkable for a penury of leaves. The flowers are like those of the acacia, small and white, only that three hang upon three filaments or stalks, where the acacia has but one. Two of these flowers fall off, and leave a single fruit. After the blossoms follow yellow fine-scented seed, inclosed in a reddish-black pulpy nut, very sweet, and containing a yellowish liquor like honey." A traveler, who as sumed the name of Al Bey, says that "there is no balsam made at Mecca; that, on the contrary, it is very scarce, and is obtained principally in the territory of Medina. As the repute of the balsam of Mecca rose, the balm of Gilead disappeared; though in the era of Galen, who flourished in the second century, and travelled into Palestine and Syria purposely to obtain a knowledge of this substance, it grew in Jericho and many other parts of the Holy Land. The cause of its total decay has been ascribed, not without reason, to the royal attention being withdrawn from it by the distractions of the country. In more recent times its naturalization seems to have been attempted in Egypt; for Prosper Alpinus relates that forty plants were brought by a governor of Cairo to the garden there, and ten remained when Belon traveled in Egypt, nearly two hundred and fifty years ago; but, whether from not agreeing with the African soil or otherwise, only one existed in the last century, and now there appears to be none. (See also Thomson, Land and Book, 2:193, 457.) See GILEAD, BALM OF.