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Bible Dictionaries
Flag
Watson's Biblical & Theological Dictionary
or אחו , occurs Genesis 41:2; Genesis 41:18; Job 8:11; and סופּ? , weeds, Exodus 2:3; Exodus 2:5; Isaiah 19:6; John 2:5 . The word achu in the first two instances is translated "meadows," and in the latter, "flag." It probably denotes the sedge, or long grass, which grows in the meadows of the Nile, very grateful to the cattle. It is retained in the Septuagint in Genesis, εν τω αχει; and is used by the son of Sirach, Sir_40:16 , αχι and αχει ; for the copies vary.
"We have no radix," says the learned Chapelow, "for אחו , unless we derive it, as Schultens does, from the Arabic achi, ‘to bind or join together.'" Thus, Parkhurst defines it "a species of plant, sedge, or reed, so called from its fitness for making ropes, or the like, to connect or join things together; as the Latin juncus, a ‘bulrush,' a jungendo, from ‘joining,' for the same reason;" and he supposes that it is the plant, or reed, growing near the Nile, which Hasselquist describes as having numerous narrow leaves, and growing about eleven feet high, of the leaves of which the Egyptians make ropes.
The word סופּ? is called by Eben Ezra, "a reed growing on the borders of the river." Bochart, Fuller, Rivetus, Ludolphus, and Junius and Tremellius, render it by juncus, carex, or alga; and Celsius thinks it the fucus or alga, "sea weed." Dr. Geddes says there is little doubt of its being the sedge called sari, which, as we learn from Theophrastus and Pliny, grows on the marshy banks of the Nile, and rises to the height of almost two cubits. This, indeed, agrees very well with Exodus 2:3; Exodus 2:5 , and the thickets of arundinaceous plants, at some small distances from the Red Sea, observed by Dr. Shaw; but the place in Jonah seems to require some submarine plant.
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Watson, Richard. Entry for 'Flag'. Richard Watson's Biblical & Theological Dictionary. https://www.studylight.org/dictionaries/eng/wtd/f/flag.html. 1831-2.
