48. _The Kingdom of Heaven is likened unto a man which sowed good Seed in his Field, but while men slept, his Enemy came and sowed Tares_ (or, as the Greek, _Zizania_) _among the Wheat._ Now, how to render _Zizania_, and to what species of Plants to confine it, there is no slender doubt; for the word is not mention'd in other parts of Scripture, nor in any ancient Greek Writer: it is not to be found in _Aristotle_, _Theophrastus_, or _Dioscorides_. Some Greek and Latin Fathers have made use of the same, as also _Suidas_ and _Phavorinus_; but probably they have all derived it from this Text. And therefore this obscurity might easily occasion such variety in Translations and Expositions. For some retain the word _Zizania_, as the Vulgar, that of _Beza_, of _Junius_, and also the Italian and Spanish. The Low Dutch renders it _Oncruidt_, the German _Oncraut_, or _Herba Mala_, the French _Turoye_ or _Lolium_, and the English _Tares_. Besides, this being conceived to be a Syriack word, it may still add unto the uncertainty of the sense. For though this Gospel were first written in Hebrew, or Syriack, yet it is not unquestionable whether the true Original be any where extant: And that Syriack Copy which we now have, is conceived to be of far later time than S. _Matthew_. Expositours and Annotatours are also various. _Hugo Grotius_ hath passed the word _Zizania_ without a Note. _Diodati_, retaining the word _Zizania_, conceives that it was some peculiar Herb growing among the Corn of those Countries, and not known in our Fields. But _Emanuel de Sa_ interprets it, _Plantas semini noxias_, and so accordingly some others. _Buxtorfius_, in his Rabbinical Lexicon, gives divers interpretations, sometimes for degenerated Corn, sometimes for the black Seeds in Wheat, but withall concludes, _an hæc sit eadem vox aut species, cum Zizaniâ apud Evangelistam, quærant alii_. But Lexicons and Dictionaries by _Zizania_ do almost generally understand _Lolium_, which we call _Darnel_, and commonly confine the signification to that Plant: Notwithstanding, since _Lolium_ had a known and received Name in Greek, some may be apt to doubt, why, if that Plant were particularly intended, the proper Greek word was not used in the Text. For _Theophrastus_[254] named _Lolium_ Αἰρα, and hath often mentioned that Plant; and in one place saith that Corn doth sometimes _Loliescere_ degenerate into _Darnel_. _Dioscorides_, who travelled over _Judæa_, gives it the same name, which is also to be found in _Galen_, _Ætius_ and _Ægineta_; and _Pliny_ hath sometimes latinized that word into _Æra_. [254] ἐξαίρησθαι. Theophrast. _Hist. Plant. l. 8_.