Color Wild Gourd

The wild gourd with a whole fruit, and one in section.

Description of Botanical Coloring Page: The gourd is  a  poisonous  fruit  which  grew  on  a"wild  vine"  at  Gilgal  (2  Kings 4: 38-41). Elisha who traveled much over Palestine, had with him a company of the ''sons of the prophets,'' who, at his command, filled a pot with vegetables to prepare for themselves a pottage. One found a wild vine in a field, and collected the gourds growning on it. Not knowing what they were, and supposing that they were fit for the pot, he shred  them  in.  When  the  pottage  was  served  it was  found  to  be  poisonous,  and  on  appeal  to Elisha,  he  miraculously  made  the  pottage  harmless. The  plant  that  best  fits  this  narrative  is  the colocynth,  which  has  a  stem  creeping  along  the ground,  with  triangular  leaves,  and  long  straggling tendrils  like  the  vine.  The  fruit  is  round, of  a  tempting  appearance,  mottled  with  green on a yellow ground, but it's pulpy interior has a nauseous taste, bitter as gall. It is found in sandy places near the Mediterranean and the Dead Sea. To a student from Shunem or Bethel it would be an unknown but attractive fruit.
       It seems very probable that this is the plant called in Deut. 32:32 " the vine of Sodom," which bore "grapes of gall," and that the rosh frequently referred to in Scripture under the name of  "gall" was also the colocynth. The rosh was a poisonous plant (Deut. 29:18), from which was obtained "water of gall." The medical qualities of the colocynth pill are derived from a watery extract of the bitter pulp of this gourd.
       The gourd that protected Jonah was some climbing plant of the same order as the wild gourd, which grew rapidly, and perished as quickly (Jonah 4:6-10). It could not be the palm-crist or castor-oil plant, as that is not an arbor tree, and would not accord with the narrative.
       The knops (knobs) carved in cedar wood which ornamented Solomon's Temple were probably cut in the shape of the gourd, as suggested by the revisers in the marginal note to 1 Kings 6:18.

Don't forget to drag the png. or jpg. into a Word Document and enlarge the image as much as possible before printing it folks. If you have a question about this coloring page, just type into the comment box located directly below this post and I'll try to get back to you as soon as I can.