CEPHAS (se'phas), (Gr. KnOEls, kay-fas').
A surname which Christ bestowed upon Simon (John i :42), and which the Greeks rendered by rlirpos and the Latins by Petrus, both words meaning a 'rock,' which is the signification of the original. (See PETER.) CERATIA (Gr. ker-ah-tee'ah), (Ceratonia) is the name of a tree of the family of Leguminous plants, of which the fruit used to be called Siliqua edulis and Siliqua The word Kerateeon occurs in Luke xv where it has been translated husks in the author tries where the tree is grown, especially in Spain and Egypt, and by the Arabs. They are given as food to cattle in modern, as we read they were in ancient, times; but, at the best, can only be considered very poor fare.
CETUBIlYI (ket'u-bim), (Heb. ket-u him', the writings).
One of the three larger divisions of the Old Testament used by the Hebrews, and thus dis tinguished from the Law and the Prophets as being in the first instance committed to writing and not delivered orally. Hence the book of Daniel is found in this division. This is the division of Scripture known also by the corre sponding Greek name of Hagiographa. It con tained Psalms, Proverbs, Job, Canticles, Ruth, Lamentations, Ecclesiastes, Esther, Daniel, Ezra and Nehemiah, and Chronicles.
( ka-baz ' ze - leth ), ( Heb.
chab-al-sel-eth'), occurs in two places in Scripture, first in the passage of Cant. where the bride replies, 'I am the Rose of Sharon and the h.!), of the valleys;' and secondly, in Is. xxxv:1, 'The wilderness and the solitary place shall be glad for them, and the desert shall rejoice and blossom as the rose.' In both passages we see that in the Auth. Vers., as also in some others, the word is con sidered to indicate the rose. The Sept. renders it simply by flower in the passage of the Canticles. In this it has been followed by the Latin Vulgate, Luther, etc. It is curious, however, as remarked by Celsius (Hiero, i, p. 489), that many of those who translate chabazzeleth by rose or flower in the passage of the Canticles render it by lily in that of Isaiah.
The rose was, no doubt, highly esteemed by the Greeks, as it was, and still is, by almost all Asiatic nations, and, as it forms a very frequent subject of allusion in Persian poetry, it has been inferred that we might expect some reference to so favorite a flower in the poetical books of the Scripture, and that no other is better calculated 7zed version. The Italians call the tree Caroba, the French Corroubier, and the English Carob tree. By some it has been thought, but appar ently without reason, that it was upon the husks of this tree that John the Baptist fed in the wil derness; from this idea, however, it is often called St. John's Bread and Locust-tree.
The Carob-tree grows in the south of Europe and north of Africa, usually to a moderate size, but it sometimes becomes very large, with a trunk of great thickness, and affords an agreeable shade. The quantity of pods borne by each tree is very considerable, being often as much as Boo or goo pounds weight ; they are flat, brownish-colored, from 6 to 8 inches in length, of a subastringent taste when unripe, but, when come to maturity, they secrete, within the husks and round the seeds, a sweetish-tasted pulp. When on the tree the pods have an unpleasant odor, but when dried upon hurdles they become eatable, and are valued by poor people, and during famine in the coun to illustrate the above two passages. But this does not prove that the word chabazzeleth, or any similar one, was ever applied to the rose. Other flowers, therefore, have been indicated, to which the name chabazzelcth may be supposed, from its derivation, to apply more fitly. RosenmUller re marks that the substantial part of the Hebrew name shows that it denotes a flower growing from a bulb. Some, fore, have selected the asphodel as the bulbous plant tended.
Celsius has al ready remarked that Bochart ha s translated chabaz zeleth by narcissus; and not without reason, as some Oriental translators have so explained it. In the Targum, Cant. Hit , instead of chabazzeleth we have narkom, which, however, should have been written narkos.
Narkom and narkos are, no doubt, the same as the Persian nurgus, and which, throughout the East indicates Narcissus Tazetta, or the polyan thus narcissus. The ancients describe and allude to the narcissus on various occasions, and Celsius has quoted various passages from the poets indi cative of the esteem in which it was held. As they were not so particular as the moderns in dis tinguishing species, it is probable that more than one may be referred to by them, and, therefore, that N. Tazetta may be included under the same name as N. Poeticus, which was best known to them. That the narcissus is found in Syria and Palestine is well known, as it has been mentioned by several travelers; and, also, that it is highly esteemed by all Asiatics from Syria even as far as India. Hence, if we allow that the word chabazzeleth has reference to a bulb-bearing root, it cannot apply to the rose. The narcissus. there fore, is as likely as any other of the bulbous tribe to have been intended in the above passages. —J. F. R. (See RosE.)