Page:Notes and Queries - Series 12 - Volume 1.djvu/110

 104

NOTES AND QUERIES.

112 S. I. FEB. 5, 1916.

33. Patreeyous, lentils, (Berachoth, 40 b).

34. Zippouren, onycha (Kerissous, 6 a).

35. Himelta, opium (Yoma, 81 b; Bera- -choth, 36).

36. Levounct, frankincense (Kerissous, 6).

37. Kinnomoun. cinnamon (ibid., 6 a).

38. Dveillim (dried figs), in Yoma, 83 b.

39. Zimmukim (raisins), in Yoma, 83 b.

40. Delooin (poppies), in Nedarim, 54 a.

41. Pull hamitzree (Egyptian beans) in Nedarim, 54 a.

Salt plays a large part in Rabbinical pharmacy. Physicians advised salt after every meal, and water after wine in order to avoid the risk of askerra = parched throat and suffocation (Berachoth, 40). Lentils '(adoshim), taken once a month (ibid., 40), were also held to destroy any tendency to those troubles. Bulmus may be a printer's error for kulmus (calamus), or the sugar- cane (Knei bosem of Ex. xxx. 23). Kolae (dried corn) is found in Avodah Zara, 38 b ; from that a popular drink (shociss) was made. Ground or milled into flakes or grains, kneaded with butter, honey, spices, and -\wine, it was a most refreshing dish, and very invigorating. Workmen, shepherds, and others found it most sustaining when merely -damped with water. Palpal (pepper) is mentioned in Tractates Sabbath, 65 a; Gittin, 69 a ; and Pesachim, 42 b ; and, along with finely matured wines and fat meats and little fishes (dogim ketannim), in Yoma. Strange to remark, fish, as diet "for all and sundry, does not seem to have to the Rabbins at all. In Cha-

giga, 10 a, occurs an epigram on pepper:
 * ' One peppercorn is worth a dozen dates."

Roush (hemlock or the head), laanoh (worm- wood), cheemoh (radish), dill, rue, narcissus, luf (arum), nightshade, kubla (camomiles), lupines, cocoa-nut, and castor-oil, cited by Celsius, Maimonides, Lightfoot, and Royle in their writings, have escaped my eye.

Reference has already been made to the presence in the Talmud of what the Rabbins stigmatized as " Darkei Hoamouree " (Shob- bos, 67 a), " the manners of the Amorites," viz., the popular fondness for " cures " by magic, amulets, charms, and incantations. The following (ibid., 67 a) is one of many -examples of the public will overriding the higher law of the Rabbins: " Women in a state of convalescence (meshoom refuoh) may walk abroad on the Sabbath day bearing a grasshopper's egg, a fox's tooth, or a charmed nail." Fevers, epilepsy (Berachoth, 34 b), shabreeree or temporary blindness (Gittin, 69), yerouko or jaundice (Tractate Shobbos), were all held by the hedyouteem (the masses), and

especially by their womenkind, to be amen- able to the traditional treatment by means of charms, and of unguents mystically pre- pared by the assia (homceopathist) of the town or village. Jaundice was combated by giving the patient yerokous (yellow messes) made of herbs; and there was a popular delusion about the sun's power to absorb the patient's fevers, as the follow- ing anecdote (Berachoth, 34 b) will illus- trate : One of the sons of Rabban Gamaliel lay stricken with fever. As a last resort Gamaliel dispatched two of his disciples to Rabbi Chaneena ben Dousa, a famous assia, who, as soon as they arrived, without speak- ing a word to them, ascended to his private chamber to pray. As he entered the room a flood of sunshine greeted him. Taking this for a good omen, he rejoined his anxious visitors and directed them to return joyously because his prayers had been heard and the boy " had been saved by the sun " (sJmychol- zosou cheimo), i.e., the fever had been taken away. Astonished at the working of the miracle, the young men asked him whether he was a prophet. " I am neither a prophet nor the son of a prophet, but I have been orally taught (kach mekooblannee) that when my prayers come freely (shegooro tefillosee be fee) all is well ; if not, then the patient is metoorof, torn asunder body from soul," it being an unlucky omen (Pesachim) if speech comes haltingly or things be done clumsily. Quacks would prescribe for shabreeree by muttering a sort of abracadabra made out of the word itself. In Tractate Shobbos, 67 a, a man had a bone in his throat, and the assia (local herbalist) procured a particular root (possibly hemlock because it signifies head, roush, as well), and, after laying it on his head for a time, muttered mystical sentences over him. The amulet called Darkoun or dragon (Berachoth, 62 b) opens up too wide a subject. Suffice it to say that Rashi in loco suggests that the malady called Droken in the text is a tumour which was believed to be curable by looking at a symbol of a dragon, in which ingenious word-play lay the seeds of the so-called Kabbalah, many of whose votaries in less enlightened centres of Judaism (known as Chassideem) still favour homoeopathic reme- dies and consult the bals^em (a degenerate type of the Talmudic assia), whose specious injunctions they carry out with regrettable fidelity. In Baba Mezia this dragon- charm is associated with the sun, and may, therefore, have been used by those simple- persons to charm away fevers, &c., as it