BYSSUS (bys'sus).
(1) The Greek word ptIecros, bus'sos, fine linen, occurs in Luke xvi:19, where the rich man is described as being clothed in purple and fine linen and also in Rev. xviii:12, 16, and xix:8, 14, among the merchandise, the loss of which would be mourned for by the merchants trading with the mystical Babylon.
But it is by many authors still considered uncer tain whether this byssus was of flax or cotton. Reference has been made to this article both from bad and buts, and might be also from shesh. For, as Rosenmuller says: 'The Hebrew word shesh, which occurs thirty times in the two first books of the Pentateuch (v. SHESII, and Celsius, ii, p. 259), is in these places, as well as in Prov. xxxi 22, by the Greek Alexandrian translators, inter preted byssus, which denotes Egyptian cotton, and also the cotton cloth made from it. In the later writings of the Old Testament, as for example, in the Chronicles, the book of Esther, and Ezekiel, bus is commonly used instead of shesh, as an ex pression for cotton cloth.' (2) "The Heb. bad occurs in numerous passages of Scripture, as Exod xxviii:42, and xxxix:29; Lev. vi:to; xvi:4, 23, 32; 1 Sam. HA: xxii:i8; 2 Sam. vi Chron. xv:27; Ezek. ix : 2, 3. IT • x :2, 6, 7; Dan. x :5; xii :7. In all these places the word linen is used in the Authorized Version, and Rosenmaller (Botany of the Bible, p. 175) says, 'The official garments of Hebrew, as well as of Egyptian priests, were made of linen, in Hebrew bad.' Butz or bus occurs in i Chron. iv:21; xv :
27; 2 Chron. :14 ; iii:14; v:12; Esther i :6 ; viii: 15; Ezek. xxvii :16; and in these passages in the Authorized Version it is rendered fine linen and white linen.
(3) Mr. Harmer has justly observed that there were various sorts of linen cloth in the days of antiquity ; for little copious as the Hebrew lan guage is, there are no fewer than four different words, at least, which have been rendered 'linen,' or 'fine linen,' by our translators." These words are, bad, buts, pishet, and sheslA To which may be added carpas or karpas, and as Dr. Harris sug gests, sadin and seethun. But as it will be more satisfactory, in the midst of so many uncertain ties, to proceed from the known to the unknown. and from a knowledge of things to the names by which they were in early times indicated, so it will be desirable in this work to treat of the different substances employed for clothing, under the heads of COTTON, FLAX, and HEMP, as well as under SILK and Wool- J. F. R.
CAB (kab), (Heb. kab), a measure mentioned in 2 Kings vi:25. The Rabbins make it the sixth part of a seah or Saturn, and the eighteenth cart of an ephah, or the one hundred and eightieth part of a homer. In that case a cab contained three and one-third pints of our wine measure, or two and five-sixths pints of English corn mea sure.