Cummin 大茴香 《聖經植物:第27筆》 三劃 屬性:大茴香 (Cuminum cyminum)與胡蘿蔔同類,屬於繖形花科,亦有人稱之為土茴香,是一年生的草本植物。大茴香的花為粉紅色或白花,集合成繖形。葉芳香,全裂成線形。果實細小似種子,香味濃郁而辛辣。經意:很早以前中東一帶的人就開始種植大茴香做為香料。它是中世紀最常見的香料之一,其精油可增強香水的香味,也是很好的按摩油。以色列人用棍子將果實搗碎用以調味 (賽28:27),有時甚至混在麵粉中做餅或魚肉的調味料。亞洲人亦喜歡將之加入菜餚、咖哩或與其他香料一起使用。法利賽人將之納入課稅的項目,所以遭到耶穌的指控 (太23:23)。產地:大茴香原產於地中海東部、西亞一帶。主要栽植於地中海東岸的利芬特 (Levant)。字源追溯:儲藏 (to store up or preserve), cummin (from its use as a condiment)對等譯字:LAY BY 一致譯字:cumin 欽定本譯:cummin 和合本譯:大茴香 經文出處:賽28:25他拉平了地面,豈不就撒種小茴香,播種大茴香,按行列種小麥,在定處種大麥,在田邊種粗麥呢?賽28:27原來打小茴香,不用尖利的器具,軋大茴香,也不用碌碡〔原文是車輪;下同〕;但用杖打小茴香,用棍打大茴香。太23:23你們這假冒為善的文士和法利賽人有禍了!因為你們將薄荷、茴香、芹菜,獻上十分之一,那律法上更重的事,就是公義、憐憫、信實,反倒不行了。這更重的是你們當行的;那也是不可不行的。
April 11 "What I tell you in the darkness, speak ye in the light."(Matt. 10:27.) OUR Lord is constantly taking us into the dark, that He may tell us things. Into the dark of the shadowed home, where bereavement has drawn the blinds; into the dark of the lonely, desolate life, where some infirmity closes us in from the light and stir of life; into the dark of some crushing sorrow and disappointment. Then He tells us His secrets, great and wonderful, eternal and infinite; He causes the eye which has become dazzled by the glare of earth to behold the heavenly constellations; and the ear to detect the undertones of his voice, which is often drowned amid the tumult of earth's strident cries. But such revelations always imply a corresponding responsibility─"that speak ye in the light─that proclaim upon the housetops." We are not meant to always linger in the dark, or stay in the closet; presently we shall be summoned to take our place in the rush and storm of life; and when that moment comes, we are to speak and proclaim what we have learned. This gives a new meaning to suffering, the saddest element in which is often its apparent aimlessness. "How useless I am!" "What am I doing for the betterment of men?" "Wherefore this waste of the precious spikenard of my soul?" Such are the desperate laments of the sufferer. But God has a purpose in it all. He has withdrawn His child to the higher altitudes of fellowship, that he may hear God speaking face to face, and bear the message to his fellows at the mountain foot. Were the forty days wasted that Moses spent on the Mount, or the period spent at Horeb by Elijah, or the years spent in Arabia by Paul? There is no short cut to the life of faith, which is the allvital condition of a holy and victorious life. We must have periods of lonely meditation and fellowship with God. That our souls should have their mountains of fellowship, their valley of quiet rest beneath the shadow of a great rock, their nights beneath the stars, when darkness has veiled the material and silenced the stir of human like, and has opened the view of the infinite and eternal, is as indispensable as that our bodies should have food. Thus alone can the sense of God's presence become the fixed possession of the soul, enabling it to say repeatedly, with the Psalmist, "Thou art near, O God." ─F. B. Meyer.