An Extinct Biblical Plant returns to Life

israel today

Tuesday, August 16, 2005

An Extinct Biblical Plant returns to Life
Israeli scientists have germinated a sapling from a date palm seed that is nearly 2,000 years old! “We are interested in preserving very valuable species in the Middle East,” Dr. Sarah Sallon, who heads the project, told israel today.

“Some of them are extinct but may be able to be resurrected.” Sallon, who works at the Louis Borick Natural Medicine Research Center in Jerusalem, said it is the oldest seed ever brought back to life. Until now, the oldest specie to be revived came from a 1,200-year-old lotus seed that was germinated in China.

The palm seed was found at the historic fortress of Masada near the Dead Sea, where 960 Jewish zealots chose suicide over capture by the Romans in 73 A.D. “We managed to get a few of these seeds, and we planted them, and some six or seven weeks later a bud appeared,” said Sallon.

The sapling is now about 14 inches (36 centimeters) tall. If it survives, the team hopes to revive the Judean date palm praised in the Bible. “In antiquity, there was a very famous date of ancient Israel,” Sallon said. “It was one of the most important exports of ancient Israel, it was on the coins, it was of extraordinary importance for the economy, for ceremonial reasons and also for medicinal reasons.”

There are plenty of lush date palms in Israel today, but they are not the original tree from Biblical times. They were imported from California, grown from a strain originating in Iraq. Scientists believe the Judean date might have had very different properties than the modern variety. And they hope the medicines of the ancient past can be the remedies of the future.

“The Judean date was used for all kinds of things from fertility, to aphrodisiacs, against infections, against tumors,” Sallon said. “This is all part of the folk story.”

‘A TIME TO PLANT’ (Eccl. 3:2) Dr. Sarah Sallon adds a new aspect to the restoration of Israel, a 2,000-year-old seed comes back to life