The Palm Tree in the Bible (7)
More on the word Tamar & a new Palm Tree

André H. Roosma
29 July 2014

When I was discussing Biblical Hebrew women’s names in a Dutch article, her name came up: תָּמָר - Tāmār [H8559] - the palm tree, especially the date palm. On this word I discovered some more – a reason to add yet another article to an old series about the palm tree.

Something else that instigated me to write about the palm tree again is that this Spring I decided to see whether a date palm could be cultivated here in our Dutch climate. Since I wrote my series of articles on the palm tree a couple of years ago, I also consume more dates myself.¹ Often the dry ones are offered here without stones, but in April I had quite some fresh ones with stones. Some of those date stones I put in a small pot with earth, which I gave a warm place above the central heating radia­tor and under glass. A few friends I told about the new experiment and waited. Around 25 June one of them asked how my palms were doing. I said: still I do not see anything come above the ground and they are standing there now already for two months, so I don’t think it is going to work. Just a few days later I was surprised, as I saw the glass on the little pot lifted... yes, by a new upshooting little date palm. One of the stones had germinated and was already more than 2 cm high. Here besides you see him – or her.

On the photo on the right side of the stem you just can discern the one -minuscule- cotyledon as a somewhat yellowish tip on the side of the stem. Yes, the palms belong – with the grasses – to the monocots or monocotyledons. Also in the ensuing weeks the likeness with the grasses was still considerable. The central little stem developed into the first leaf – still undivided and growing remarkably straight towards the sun. The window in front of which the pot stands is facing west, so the young palm grows a bit to the left.

Ten days later the first leaf had grown to be already 9 cm and the little plant looked already like this.

I am curious, how long it will last before he or she will form a second leaf. Yes, I say: he or she, for date palms are dioecious; so my young palm is either a he or a she (of course I hope that it is a she and one time I will be able to eat my own fruit from it). It is remarkable that something like this is in fact hidden in the Hebrew word תָּמָר - tāmār, for the first letter, the ת - tav is used as suffix to denote the feminine plural, and the מ - mem the masculine plural. The last letter, the ר - resh, was in the old script:¹ - the head (sideways) of a higher other/Other, often referring to God. So, the palm tree represents the feminine and masculine plurality in God. Yes, that fits well with what I noted in earlier articles about the palm tree as a symbol for fertility! I even considered to put above this article:

The feminine and masculine fruitful together ³

Okay, in the meantime my palm has grown further. Last Friday it was already 19 cm tall (see photo)! And last Monday I even had to repot her already because the roots were growing already out from the bottom of the pot. I am curious how it will go further and when the second leaf will appear! Yes, for the date palm needs a number of leaves or fronds to form the beginning of a trunk. The palm does not have a real tree trunk, but what looks like a trunk consists of a stack of leaf bases. So, a cross-section does not show any growth rings, as with real trees. That is not to say that the palm trunk is not sturdy, on the contrary. In antiquity it was a role-model for the pillars used in architecture. Before my palm is that far, we will have to wait a couple of years... :-)

In a previous article I already mentioned that the palm tree, in particular the date palm, was important in many religions and cultures in the old Middle-East and represented the Tree of Life. Also in Islam the date palm is important. There it is associated with peace and with paradise while also representing hospitality. In old Judaism it stood for fertility, grace and attractive elegance, from which the asso­cia­tion of a slender woman with a date palm, which we encounter in the Song of Songs (7: 7-8).
By the way, did you know that next to Israel also the United Nations has incorpo­rated palm fronds into her logo? There it refers to peace and victory. That notion of victory with the palm frond originates with the Romans. Their god/idol of victory - now the name of a popular brand of sport clothes - had the palm frond as symbol. And with the ancient Greeks an athlete who won got a palm frond as honor and symbol of victory.
Among early Christians the palm frond was a symbol of the resurrection of Jesus, and of victory of life over death; of the spirit over the flesh. So, for the perse­cuted early church it was an important symbol of hope.

Hallelu YaH !

Notes

1	Worldwide more and more dates are being consumed. According to the Dutch Wikipedia that is now already about 7 million tons - about a thousand times more than 50 years ago! Since the production in Iraq collapsed, Egypt has become the largest supplier with more than a million tons, followed by Iran, Saudi-Arabia and Algeria. The Wikipedia page on the date palm says that a date palm can produce 68 to 176 kilos of dates per season. This appears to count for the dried variant. Elsewhere I read that a palm can bring forth up to 300 kg fresh dates. Indeed: a fruitful tree! See also note 3 below on the health benefits of dates.
2	More information on the old Biblical script, as referred to here, in the Hallelu-YaH Draft Research Report: ‘The Written Language of Abraham, Moses and David – A study of the pictographic roots and basic notions in the underlying fabric of the earliest Biblical script’ , a living document by André H. Roosma, 1st English version: 18 April 2011 (1st Dutch original: January 2011).
3	Dates are very healthy. According research they contain strong anti-oxidants, help prevent or cure infections (anti-bacterial & anti-fungal), and in the prevention of the development of cancers and diabetes (II).* On the health benefits of dates for pregnant women something extra can be mentioned. A rather recent scientific medical investigation, carried out at a University in Jordan, has demonstrated that the daily intake of some dates can have a big positive effect for women in the last four weeks of pregnancy.** Upon admission in relation to the delivery of the baby, the women who had eaten about 6 dates daily, had a significantly higher mean cervical dilatation, significantly higher proportion of intact membranes, and more of them had good, short and spontaneous labour while requiring less medication or intervention... * T.H. Mallhi, M.I. Qadir, M. Ali, B. Ahmad, Y.H. Khan, A. Rehman, ‘Review: Ajwa date (Phoenix dactylifera)- an emerging plant in pharmacological research’, Pak. Jl Pharm. Sci., 27 (3); May 2014; p.607-16. PubMed-ID 24811825 A.H. Rahmani, S.M. Aly, H. Ali, A.Y. Babiker, S. Srikar, A.A. Khan, ‘Therapeutic effects of date fruits (Phoenix dactylifera) in the prevention of diseases via modulation of anti-inflammatory, anti-oxidant and anti-tumour activity’, Int. Jl Clin. Exp. Med., 7 (3), 15 Mar 2014; p.483-91. eCollection 2014. PubMed-ID 24753740. ** O. Al-Kuran, L. Al-Mehaisen, H. Bawadi, S. Beitawi, Z. Amarin, ‘The effect of late preg­nancy consumption of date fruit on labour and delivery’, Jl of Obstetrics & Gynaecology, 31 (1), January 2011; p.29–31. doi: 10.3109/01443615.2010.522267. PubMed-ID 21280989. In case the above has stimulated you to eat more dates, I can recommend the fresh Medjoul variant from Israel. No shop around? On the Internet they can be fount, a.o. at Mehadrin, though I have no experience with them yet. You have? Or with another supplier? Let us know!

Besides the date palm there are more extremely interesting palms. The Talipot palm is one of those. The fronds are fan-shaped to round, 5 meters in diameter and were used as sunshade, and also for roof coverings, thatching and as writing material. Only once in its life it flourishes – after about 50 to 70 years, but then it does so very well: its inflorescence is the largest in the entire plant kingdom, with up to 10 million small flowers and a size of 6 to 8 meters high. The fruits are each only 2 to 4 cm long, but can reach a total weight of two tons! After this very extensive flowering and fruit bearing the plant dies.

Reactions

The other articles in this series on the Palm Tree in the Bible are: ‘(1) - Symbol of the Tree of Life’, ‘(2) - Full of Rich Symbol­ism’, ‘(3) - Sign of God’s presence and speaking’, ‘(4) - Moses and the Big Fire in the Palm-Top’, ‘(5) - The ‘language’ of the palm tree’, ‘(6) - Pole and Palisade’, ‘The great golden Menorah – Sign of God’s Presence’.

home

,  news index

,  articles index