Pistacia palaestina
Encyclopedia
Pistacia palaestina is a tree or shrub common in the Levant
Levant
The Levant or ) is the geographic region and culture zone of the "eastern Mediterranean littoral between Anatolia and Egypt" . The Levant includes most of modern Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, Israel, the Palestinian territories, and sometimes parts of Turkey and Iraq, and corresponds roughly to the...

 region (especially Israel
Israel
The State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...

 and Syria
Syria
Syria , officially the Syrian Arab Republic , is a country in Western Asia, bordering Lebanon and the Mediterranean Sea to the West, Turkey to the north, Iraq to the east, Jordan to the south, and Israel to the southwest....

). It is called terebinth in English, a name also used for Pistacia terebinthus, a similar tree from the western Mediterranean Basin
Mediterranean Basin
In biogeography, the Mediterranean Basin refers to the lands around the Mediterranean Sea that have a Mediterranean climate, with mild, rainy winters and hot, dry summers, which supports characteristic Mediterranean forests, woodlands, and scrub vegetation...

.

Description

Pistacia palaestina is distinguished from P. terebinthus "by its egg-shaped leaflets, which are drawn into a long point, with somewhat hairy margins, and by more spreading and branching flower clusters."

History

The terebinth is mentioned in the Hebrew Scriptures (or Old Testament), where the Hebrew
Hebrew language
Hebrew is a Semitic language of the Afroasiatic language family. Culturally, is it considered by Jews and other religious groups as the language of the Jewish people, though other Jewish languages had originated among diaspora Jews, and the Hebrew language is also used by non-Jewish groups, such...

 word "elah" (plural "elot") is used, although the word is sometimes translated as "oak". (The Hebrew word "alon" means oak, and the words may be related. The two kinds of trees usually grow together.)
For you will be ashamed of the terebinths that you have taken pleasure in. (Isaiah
Isaiah
Isaiah ; Greek: ', Ēsaïās ; "Yahu is salvation") was a prophet in the 8th-century BC Kingdom of Judah.Jews and Christians consider the Book of Isaiah a part of their Biblical canon; he is the first listed of the neviim akharonim, the later prophets. Many of the New Testament teachings of Jesus...

 1:29. This may refer to idolatry associated with the trees, although in the Septuagint and Vulgate
Vulgate
The Vulgate is a late 4th-century Latin translation of the Bible. It was largely the work of St. Jerome, who was commissioned by Pope Damasus I in 382 to make a revision of the old Latin translations...

 the word is translated "idols", as the plural of "el".)


Terebinths are also mentioned in three successive chapters of Genesis (12:6, 13:18, 14:13) in reference to the places where Abram (later Abraham
Abraham
Abraham , whose birth name was Abram, is the eponym of the Abrahamic religions, among which are Judaism, Christianity and Islam...

) camped called Terebinths of Mamre
Mamre
Mamre , full Hebrew name Elonei Mamre , refers to a Canaanite cultic shrine dedicated to the supreme, sky god of the Canaanite pantheon, El. Talmudic sources refer to the site as Beth Ilanim or Botnah. it was one of the three most important "fairs", market place or caravanserai, in Palestine...

 the Amorite
Amorite
Amorite refers to an ancient Semitic people who occupied large parts of Mesopotamia from the 21st Century BC...

. Here the traditional rendering in English is "oaks of Mamre".

The most well-known clear reference to a terebinth (elah) in the Hebrew Scriptures is that of the Valley of Elah
Valley of Elah
The Valley of Elah, "the valley of the oak or terebinth" , best known as the place described in the Bible where the Israelites were encamped when David fought Goliath . It was near Azekah and Socho...

 or "Valley of the Terebinth" (עמק האלה), where David fought Goliath (1 Sam. 17:2, 19).

There are at least a few references in Judges; Ch 4 (in reference to Heber, the Kenite, of the children of Hobab), Ch 6 (in reference to an angel of the Lord who came to visit Gideon
Gideon
Gideon was an Israelite judge who appears in the Book of JudgesGideon may also refer to:- Religion :* Gideon , a figure in the Book of Mormon* Gideons International, distributor of copies of the Bible- Media :...

--most versions use 'oak'), and Ch 9 (in reference to the crowning of Abimelech
Abimelech
Abimelech was a common name of the Philistine kings.Abimelech was most prominently the name of a king of Gerar who is mentioned in two of the three wife-sister narratives in Genesis...

, by the terebinth of the pillar that was in Shechem—again most versions use 'oak'). This reference of Abimelech's crowning by an oak is actually referring to the Palestine Oak, closely related to the Kermes Oak. The Hebrew distinguishes the Palestine Oak and the Terebinth.
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