Mustard Tree
Mustard Tree
Fig. 273Salvadora Persica
The Sinapi of the Greek Testament, rendered ‘mustard tree’ in the Authorized Version, has engaged the attention of many commentators, great difficulty having been experienced in finding a plant with the requisite characteristics, notwithstanding the several attempts which have been made. The subject was investigated by Dr. Royle in a paper read before the Royal Asiatic Society, on the 16th March, 1844. Having referred to the passages of the New Testament in which the word occurs (Mat 13:31; Mat 17:20; Mar 4:31; Luk 13:19; Luk 17:6), he first showed how unsuitable were the plants which had been adduced to the circumstances of the sacred narrative, and mentioned that his own attention had been turned to the subject in consequence of the present Bishop of Lichfield having informed him that Mr. Amueny, a Syrian student of King’s College, was well acquainted with the tree. Mr. A. stated that this tree was found near Jerusalem, but most abundantly on the banks of the Jordan and round the Sea of Tiberias; that its seed was employed as a substitute for mustard, and that it was called khardal, which, indeed, is the common Arabic name for mustard. Dr. Royle knew a tree of N.W. India, which was there called kharjal, and which appeared possessed of the requisite properties, but he could not find it mentioned in any systematic work, or local Flora, as a native of Palestine. The plant is Salvadora Persica, a large shrub, or tree of moderate size, a native of the hot and dry parts of India, of Persia, and of Arabia. Dr. Roxburgh describes the berries as much smaller than a grain of black pepper, having a strong aromatic smell, and a taste much like that of garden cresses. Irby and Mangles, in their travels, mention a tree which they suppose to be the mustard tree of Scripture. They met with it while advancing towards Kerak, from the southern extremity of the Dead Sea. It bore its fruit in bunches resembling the currant; and the seeds had a pleasant, though strongly aromatic taste, nearly resembling mustard. They say, ‘We think it possible that this is the tree our Savior alluded to in the parable of the mustard seed, and not the mustard plant which we have in the north, and which, even when growing large, can never be called a tree, whereas the other is really such, and birds might easily, and actually do, take shelter under its shadow.’ On further inquiry, Dr. Royle learned that a specimen of the tree had been brought home by Mr. W. Barker, and that it had been ascertained by Messrs. Don and Lambert to be the Salvadora Persica of botanists.
The paper above referred to concludes by stating it as an important fact, that the writer had come to the same conclusion as Irby and Mangles, by an independent mode of investigation, even when he could not ascertain that the plant existed in Palestine; which is, at all events, interesting, as proving that the name kharjal is applied, even in so remote a country as the northwest of India, to the same plant which, in Syria, is called khardal, and which no doubt is the ahardal of the Talmudists, one of whom describes it as a tree of which the wood was sufficient to cover a potter’s shed, and another says that he used to climb into it, as men climb into a fig-tree. Hence there can be little doubt but that Salvadora Persica is the mustard tree of Scripture. The plant has a small seed, which produces a large tree with numerous branches, in which the birds of the air may take shelter. The seed is possessed of the same properties, and is used for the same purposes, as mustard, and has a name, khardal, of which sinapi is the true translation, and which, moreover, grows abundantly on the very shores of the Sea of Galilee, where our Savior addressed to the multitude the parable of the mustard seed.