SWEARING.— See Oaths.
SWEAT. — The word ' sweat ' occurs only in one passage in the NT, namely Lk 22'", in the narra- tive of our Lord's agony in Gethsemane, where we read : ' His sweat became, as it were, great drojis of blood falling down upon the ground.' In ap- proaching the discussion of the passage there are three matters to be considered : (1) the textual problem, (2) the interpretation of the words ' be- came, as it wei'e,' and (3) the possibility of the Ithenomenon known as ' bloody sweat ' {hcema- drvsis).
1. In turning first to the textual question, we find that vv.'**-** are omitted in many of the best authorities for the text of the NT (the great uncials tJ^ABRT). A number of other uncials (ESVrAIl) mark the passage as doubtful ; and in tiie case of Codex N the hand of one corrector has ajjparently inserted it, while that of another has deleted it. The Church Fathei-s, Hilary, Jerome, and others bear witness that there were many MSS known to them which did not contain these two verses ; and certain MSS insert them in the parallel passage in Mt.'s Gospel, namely after Mt 26-». Of the Versions, one MS of the Old Latin omits them, as do also the best of the Egyptian, Armenian, and the oldest Sj'riac versions. Cyril of Alexandria omits the verses in his Homilies on Lk.'s Gosj)cl, while the silence of such writers as Clement of Alexandria and Origen cannot be without significance. One cursive MS (124) omits tiiem, while No. 13 has them inserted by a corrector. In the Gi'eek Lectionaries the verses are gener- ally omitted from the lesson in which they would naturally ajjpear, but are inserted in the Mt. pas- sage, a custom that seems to have influenced Chrj^sostom in his reference to the passage, thougli, as WH admit, 'a mere comparison of tlie parallel narratives of the Evangelists Avould suffice to sug- gest to him tlie reference.' On the other hand, the MSS that include the verses as they stand in Lk. are the following: uncials X*DF(tHKLM (^>l^XA, and nearly all cursives. While A omits
the passage, as we have seen, it has the reference section-number in the margin, showing that its presence in other MSS must have been known to the scribe. The verses are contained also in the majority of the MSS of the Old Latin, .some few Egyptian, the Syr-Pesh. and Syr-Hier. They are known also to Justin Martyr (who quotes them in his Dialogue ivith Tryj)ho, 103), Iren., Jerome, and Augustine. The verses gave rise to much discus- sion among early writers, some of whom held that they had been wilfully cut out by some who were afraid of their employment by unorthodox writer's ; though, on the other hand, they constituted a strong weapon of proof against those who denied the reality of our Lord's humanity.
The conclusion to be drawn from this evidence is that the main witness to the presence of the verses is of a Western order ; but this need not mean more than that, as is the habit of the Western text of Lk. in particular, many elements of tradition that would otherwise have been lost are contained in it. This is the conclusion to which WH come. Their words are : ' These verses can only be a fragment from the traditions, written or oral, which were, for a while at least, locally current beside the canonical Gospels, and which doubtless included matter of every degree of authenticity and intrinsic value. The.se verses and the first sentence of 23** may be safely called the most precious among the remains of this Evangelic tradition which were rescued from oblivion by the scribes of the 2nd century.' Neither do these editors think that there is any evidence of the omission of the verses for doctrinal reasons. It would appear, therefore, as if they stood very much in the same position as does the Pcricope Adultercv ; that is, as an early story of the Evangelic tradition that had not found its way into all the copies of the canonical Gospels.
2. The next point to consider is the interpreta- tion of the Avords ' as it were great drops of blood.' Here again there is a secondary question of reading, because certain manuscripts and versions (XVX, Vulg. Boh. ) read the genitive of the word rendered ' falling down,' agreeing with the word for ' blood,' and not the nominative in agreement with the word for 'drops,' as do the majority of the authorities. The Greek word dpofi^os, either with or without ai/j.aTos, can itself bear the meaning ' a drop of blood,' and is so used in classical Greek writers (see TEsch. Eiim. 184 ; Plato, Crit. 120 A). Tatian in his Diatcssnron renders in an exaggerated form, ' like a stream of blood,' Avhich Bernard supposes would be visible in the moonlight.
When Justin quotes the verse he also omits ' of blood ' ; but this may be because he regarded the word dp6fx^0L as bearing that signification. Even when all is said, however, the expression may not mean more than that there was a resemblance between the falling of the heavy drops of perspira- tion and the plashing of blood-gouts from a wound, so that the verse does not absolutely and neces- s.arily assert that blood flowed from our Lord's body in the moment of His extreme anguish.