OIL oyl the gingili oil of commerce, extracted from Sesa mum orientale, a Bignoniaceous plant. Fine flour, oil, and honey were the gifts wherewith God fed His unfaithful people (Ezk 16") ; and wine, oil, and fine flour were the types of the luxuries imported by the mystic Babylon (Rev 18). The priestly stores of these commodities are mentioned in 1 C 9” and Ezr 6°; and a similar phrase, victuals, oil, and wine, is used in 2 Ch 11?! for the stores accumu- lated by Rehoboam in his fortified cities. Prob- ably the great system of underground storehouses, such as those found at Tell Zakariyeh and else- where (PEFSt, 1899), were for this purpose. The royal cellars of oil in David’s day were in charge of Joash (1 Ch 27%). There is a reference to these secret stores of agricultural produce in the petition of the suppliants to Ishmael (Jer 418).
Oil, wine, and barley were supplied as food by Solomon to Hiram’s workpeople (2 Ch 2%). The quantity allowed is given in y.’° as 20,000 baths= about 165,000 gallons (see also Jos. Ant. VII. ii. 9) ; but according to 1 Καὶ 5" the annual gift was 20 cors=about 1640 gallons.
Oil was an important Palestinian export. It was sent to Tyre, as stated not only in the passages cited above, but in Ezk 97}7, In Ezr 3’, meat, drink, and oil are said to have been given to the Tyrian workers occupied in building the second temple. There are allusions to this commerce in Shebiith, vi. 5. The trickery of John of Gischala in manipulating this trade is recited by Josephus (BJ τι. xxi. 2). Much of this oil sent to Tyre was for the Eevpaen market, but Israel sometimes sent the oil directly to Egypt (Hos 12"). Though oil was much used in Egypt, very little was pro- duced there. In Strabo’s time the olive tree was grown only in the Heracleote nome, but even there the oil produced had a disagreeable smell. Else- where in Egypt, he says, there are no olive trees except near Alexandria, but these furnished no oil (Xvi. i. 35). In the Anastasi Papyrus (4. xv. 4) ‘oil from the harbour’ is mentioned. The Egyp- tians called the olive trees dgam (Copt. Δ ΟΕΙΤῚ) and olive oil δὲ or det, different varieties of which, called pure oil, white, dry, and red, are mentioned in Papyrus Ebers and the Medical Papyrus of Berlin. In the earlier days of Ramses ΠῚ. there was a vigorous attempt to introduce olive culture into Egypt. In the great Harris Papyrus (pl. xxvii.) he says, ‘I made to thee (Tmu) fields of olives in thy town An; I provided many culti- vators to make pure, excellent oil of Egypt to illuminate thy great house’; and in his inventory (pl. xvii.) there are enumerated 2743 jars of Egyp- tian oil and 1810 of Syrian oil.
The uses of oil were numerous. The most ancient and widespread was that of external application (see ANOINTING, in vol. i. p. 101). ΑἸ] the Homeric references to oil are of this nature, and there are none to the use of oil as food. The same is notice- able in the earlier Egyptian literature, from which we learn that the ‘ oiling of the limbs and hair was as important to them as their clothes’ (Erman, Life in ἄπο. Egypt, 229). Most of the references to the secular use of oil in the Bible are also in the same sense of anexternal application. Such appli- cations were of two kinds: (a) as a cosmetic or part of the toilet, it imparts warmth to the body and protects it against the action of cold (Pliny, xy. 4), And, as the inferior oils used for this purpose are apt to become rancid, there was a special advantage in fresh oil (Ps 9910). (δ) Asa medicinal agent. Oil is an ingredient in a very large number of the remedies prescribed in the Papyrus Ebers for the most diverse diseases Pliny also speaks of its medicinal use (xv. 4. 7, xxiii. 3.4). Dion Cassius relates that oil and wine were employed both externally and internally
592 OIL
OIL TREE
er me A τ τσ συσυυ.555.5....υ...-ς---ς--------Ο--“"
for the unknown disease which attacked the army of Aelius Gallus in Arabia (liii. 29), as we read of their being used in the parable of the Good Samaritan (Lk 10*) ; see also Vegetius, Ars Veter- inaria, v. 14, 23, and Columella, de Re Rustica, vi. 30. 4. Herod the Great was bathed in oil when suffering from the violent abdominal dropsical disease in which he was eaten of worms (Jos. Ant. Xvi. vi. 5, and BJ 1. xxxiii. δ). Cf. Ja 5%, and art. ANOINTING, 4.
2. As part of a ceremony of consecration of kings, high priests (Ex 297-4), Lv 21, Nu 35%), or sacred things (see vol. i. Ν 101). The effect of this anointing was the complete setting apart for the Divine service Ly 10’, called in Ly 21" the ‘ crown of the anointing oil.’ Talmudic writers say that Saul, Jehu, and Joash were anointed with common oil; but for this there is no authority. For the sacred oil see OINTMENT.
3. As part of the ritual of the burial of the dead oil was used. This is referred to by our Lord (Mt 26", Mk 14*8, Lk 23%, Jn 19%), In the Rhind Papyrus the use of 206 fn of oil is prescribed for this purpose, and in the funeral Papyrus of {tr the anointing is said to renew the members and to enlarge the heart. The olive tree is described as springing from the eye of Horus, and the oil is said to be ‘ holy and separated for divine things.’