is, or was, familiar to readers of the Old Testament, but in the
revised translation he has partially disappeared. The earliest allusion
to him occurs in Exodus xxx., 25, where the holy anointing oil is
prescribed to be made “after the art of the apothecary”; and in the
same chapter, v. 29, incense is similarly ordered to be made into a
confection “after the art of the apothecary, tempered together.” The
Revised Version gives in both cases “the art of the perfumer,” and
instead of the incense being “tempered together” (c. xxx, v, 35) the
instruction is now rendered “seasoned with salt.” A further mention of
the art of the apothecary, or in the Revised Version, the perfumer, is
found again in connection with the same compounds in Exodus xxxvii.,
29. In 2 Chronicles xvi., 14, the apothecaries’ art in the preparation
of sweet odours and divers kinds of spices for the burial of King Asa
is again alluded to, and this time without any apparent reason the
Revised Version retains the old term. The next quotation (Nehemiah,
iii, 8) is particularly interesting. The Authorised Version says
“Hananiah, the son of one of the apothecaries,” worked on the repair
of the walls of Jerusalem by the side of Haraiah of the goldsmiths. In
the Revised Version Hananiah is described as “one of the apothecaries.”
Hebrew scholars tell us that the idiom employed shows that these men
belonged to guilds of apothecaries and goldsmiths respectively; a
pretty little insight into ancient Jewish trade history.
In Ecclesiastes, x, 1, we come to the oft quoted parallel, “Dead flies
cause the ointment of the apothecary to send forth a stinking savour,”
this being likened to a little folly spoiling a reputation for wisdom.
The revisers have substituted perfumer for apothecary in this text.
They certainly ought to have changed ointment for pomade in the same
text to explain their view of the meaning of the passage.
In the passage already quoted from the apocryphal book of
Ecclesiasticus, xxxviii, 8, “Of such doth the apothecary make a
confection,” and in xlix, 1, “The remembrance of Josias is like the
composition of the perfume made by the art of the apothecary,” the
revisers have not seen fit to alter the trade designation.
The words translated apothecary, compound, ointment, and confection in
the passages cited, and in many others in the Hebrew scriptures, are
all inflexions of the root verb, Rakach (in which the final ch is a
strong aspirate or guttural). Gesenius says of this root, “The primary
idea appears to be in making the spices small which are mixed with
the oil.” The apothecary, therefore, may be regarded as a crusher, or
pounder.