Boil

Boil. See Medicine.

(שְׁחַין, shechin’, rendered "botch" in Deu 28:27; Deu 28:35), a burning sore or inflamed ulcer of an aggravated description, either local (as in the case of Hezekiah, 2Ki 20:7; Isa 38:21), or covering an extensive surface (as in the case of the Egyptians, Exo 9:9-11; Deu 28:27; Deu 28:35). SEE BLAINS. It is also applied to the ulcerated spots indicative of leprosy (Lev 13:18-20; Lev 13:23), and is the term used to designate the disease of Job (Job 2:7), probably the elephantiasis, or black leprosy. SEE LEPROSY.

The common gathering on the flesh, attended with inflammation, which the Hebrew word shechin implies. The boils were doubtless malignant when sent as a plague in Egypt, Exo 9:9-11; and they were severe in the case of Job when smitten by Satan. Job 2:7. Hezekiah’s boil was apparently of an aggravated type, though a lump of figs was blessed to his recovery. 2Ki 20:7; Isa 38:21. See also Lev 13:18-23.

By: Morris Jastrow, Jr., Charles Foster Kent

The rendering, in the English versions of the Scriptures, of the Hebrew word "sheḥin," which comes from a root meaning "to warm," and indicates an inflamed spot. In the Bible it is used to describe two distinct forms of disease, each characterized by a local swelling, exceedingly painful and accompanied by a discharge of pus: (1) the simple boil, limited to one spot and not contagious (Lev. xiii. 23); and (2) the loathsome eruptions characteristic of endemic elephantiasis, a form of leprosy so called because the feet of the victim swell to a great size and resemble the feet of an elephant.

This seems to have been the form of disease with which Job was afflicted (Job ii. 7), although the suddenness with which he was "smitten with sore boils from the sole of his foot unto his crown" is more suggestive of plague.

That the Jews distinguished between the first and the second type—which latter seems to have been known as the "botch [or boil] of Egypt" (Deut. xxviii. 27)—is clearly demonstrated by the law set forth in Lev. xiii. 18-23. Doubtful cases were brought before the priests. If the scar left by a boil was lower than the skin, and the hair upon it was white, the case was pronounced one of leprosy. In the absence of these signs the afflicted one was shut up for seven days. If at the end of that time the disease had spread it was a case of leprosy; if not, the scar was recognized as that of a simple boil, and the man was declared clean. See Leprosy.

(noun) (שׁחין, sh^eḥı̄n; ἕλκος, hélkos): A localized inflamed swelling. The Hebrew word is derived from a root probably meaning “to burn,” and is used as a generic term for the sores in the sixth plague of Egypt (Exo 9:9-11); for a sore which might be confounded with leprosy (Lev 13:18-23); for Job’s malady (Job 2:7) and Hezekiah’s disease (2Ki 20:1; Isa 38:21). Our English word is derived from the verb “to beal,” i.e. to suppurate, now obsolete except as a dialect word in Scotland and Ireland. Wyclif uses the name f or Lazarus’ sores (Luk 16:20), “houndis lickeden his bylis.” The Egyptian word sḥn is the name of an abscess, and occurs in the reduplicated form ḥnḥnt in Papyr. Ebers, CV. The plague of boils in Egypt came without warning immediately after the insect plagues of kinnı̄m (sandflies) and that of ‛ārōbh or flies, and followed the epizoötic murrain, which is suggestive in the light of the transmission of toxic germs by insects. It has been supposed by some to be elephantiasis, as Pliny says that this di sease was peculiar to Egypt (xxvi.5). A stronger case has been made out for its identity with confluent smallpox; but as it is not described as being a fatal disease, it may more probably have been an aggravated form of the ordinary gregarious furuncles or boils, due to the microbe streptococcus pyogenes.

Job’s body is said to have been covered with itchy, irritating sores which made his face unrecognizable, Job 2:12, caused continual burning pain (Job 3:24; Job 6:4), and which were infested with maggots (Job 7:5) and exhaled a nauseous fetor (Job 19:17). His sleep was destroyed and his nervous system enfeebled (Job 3:26) so that he required assistance to move, as he sat in the ashes (Job 2:8). Various diagnoses have been made of his malady, but it is most probable that it was a form of the disease known as “oriental sore,” or “Bagdad boil,” called in Algeria “Biskra batton,” in which the intensely itchy sores are often multiple, affecting the face, hands, and other exposed parts. The cases which I have seen have been very intractable and disfiguring.

Hezekiah’s boil was apparently more localized, and the indefinite description would accord with that of a carbuncle. It seems to have rendered him unclean (Isa 38:22), though the reference may be to the practice referred to in Lev 13:18 f. The “botch” of Egypt (Deu 28:27, Deu 28:35 the King James Version) is translation of the same word, as is “boil” in the Revised Version (British and American). Botch is an old English name for boil and occurs in Piers Plowman, and the adjective “botchy” is used in Troilus and Cressida (II, 1, 6). The word is cognate to the old French boche or poche, a form of our later word “pock.” The sores of Lazarus (Luk 16:20) were probably old varicose ulcers, such as are as common on the legs of the old and poor in the East as they are in the West.