The Gourd, of which we read in Jonah, iv, 6-10, is Kikaion in Hebrew,
and there has been some doubt what the plant could have been which grew
so rapidly and was so quickly destroyed. It is stated that the Lord
made this grow over the booth which the prophet had erected in a single
night, and provide a shade of which Jonah was “exceedingly glad.” The
next morning, however, a worm attacked it, and it withered.
The author of “Harris’s Natural History of the Bible,” Dr. Thaddeus
M. Harris, of Dorchester, Massachusetts (1824), quotes from an earlier
work, “Scripture Illustrated,” a curious account of a violent dispute
between St. Jerome and St. Augustine in reference to the identification
of this plant. According to this author “those pious fathers ... not
only differed in words, but from words they proceeded to blows; and
Jerome was accused of heresy at Rome by Augustine. Jerome thought the
plant was an ivy, and pleaded the authority of Aquila, Symmachus,
Theodotion, and others; Augustine thought it was a gourd, and he was
supported by the Seventy, the Syriac, the Arabic, &c. Had either of
them ever seen the plant? Neither. Let the errors of these pious men
teach us to think more mildly, if not more meekly, respecting our own
opinions; and not to exclaim Heresy, or to enforce the exclamation,
when the subject is of so little importance as--gourd _versus_ ivy.”
While endorsing the practical lesson which the author just cited
extracts from his rather unpleasant story, I think I ought to append to
this narrative another which is given in Gerard’s Herbal (1597) which
seems to be incompatible with the previously quoted account of the
quarrel. This is what Gerard writes:--
“Ricinus, whereof mention is made in the fourth chapter and sixt verse
of the prophecie of Jonas, was called of the Talmudists kik, for in the
Talmud we reade Velo beschemen kik, that is in English, And not with
the oile of kik; which oile is called in the Arabian toong Alkerua, as
Rabbi Samuel the sonne of Hofni testifieth. Moreover a certain Rabbine
mooveth a question saying What is kik? Hereunto Resch Lachisch maketh
answer in Ghemara, saying Kik is nothing else but Jonas his kikaijon.
And that this is true it appeareth by that name kiki which the ancient
Greeke phisicions and the Aegyptians used, which Greeke word cometh
of the Hebrew kik. Hereby it appeereth that the olde writers long
ago, though unwittingly, called this plant by his true name. But the
olde Latine writers knew it by the name Cucurbita which evidently is
manifested by an Historie which St. Augustine recordeth in his Epistle
to St. Jerome where in effect he writeth thus:--That name kikaijon is
of small moment yet so small a matter caused a great tumult in Africa.
For on a time a certaine Bishop having occasion to intreat of this
which is mentioned in the fourth chapter of Jonas his prophecie (in
a collation or sermon which he made in his cathedral church or place
of assemblie), said that this plant was called Cucurbita, a Gourde,
because it increased to so great a quantitie in so short a space, or
else (saith he) it is called Hedera. Upon the novelty and untruth of
this doctrine the people were greatly offended, and there arose a
tumult and hurly burly, so that the bishop was inforced to go to the
Jews to aske their judgement as touching the name of this plant. And
when he had received of them the true name which was kikaijon, he made
his open recantation and confessed his error, and was justly accused of
being a falsifier of Holy Scripture.”
I quote the letter as Gerard gives it without quite understanding it,
and I have not been able to trace its origin. But it is clear that if
St. Augustine thought it was such a small matter he would hardly have
quarrelled so violently with St. Jerome about it. Probably, however,
the story of the quarrel is founded on this letter. Moreover the
conclusion seems to be that the gourd was not a cucurbita but the Palma
Christi.
The importance of Jerome’s translation of the word representing the
plant to be Ivy (Hedera) is that he incorporated it into his Latin
version of the Bible known as the Vulgate. The much older Septuagint
(Greek) translation gives “kolokyntha,” the bottle gourd, as the
rendering of the Hebrew kikaion. The Swedish botanist and theologian
Celsius strongly supported the view that Jonah’s gourd was the Palma
Christi in his “Hierobotanicon; sive de Plantis Sacrae Scripturae,”
1746. But though this tree is of very rapid growth, and is planted
before houses in the East for its shade, and though philological
arguments are in its favour, Dr. Hastings (“Encyclopædia Biblica”)
rejects the suggestion and prefers the Septuagint version because
he thinks the passage clearly indicates that a vine is intended. He
considers there is no support, either botanical or etymological, for
the selection of ivy to represent the gourd.