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.
