Reference: THISTLES AND THORNS
American
Under these terms, together with brambles, briers, and nettles, are included numerous troublesome plants, many of them with thorns, well fitted to try the husbandman's patience, Ge 3:18. Plants of this class were a symbol of desolation, Pr 24:31, and were often used as fuel, Ps 58:9; Ec 7:6; Isa 33:12. They also served for hedges, Ho 2:6. A petty village on the plain of Jericho is now protected against Arab horsemen by a hedge of thorny Nubk branches. Dr. Eli Smith, visiting the plain where Gideon once threatened to tear the flesh of the princes of Succoth with thorns and briers, noticed such plants there of remarkable size, some of the thistles rising above his head on horseback, Jg 8:7. Few of the Hebrew terms can now be affixed with certainty to particular varieties among the many found in Syria. The plant of which the thorny crown of the Savior was made, with the design to mock rather than to torture him, is supposed to have been the Zizyphus Spina Christi, a common tree with dark and glossy leaves, having many small and sharp spines on its round and pliant branches, Mt 27:29; Joh 19:2-3. Paul's "thorn in the flesh," 2Co 12:7-10, may have been some bodily infirmity, unfavorable to the success of his public ministrations. Compare Ga 4:13-14; 2Co 10:10.
See Verses Found in Dictionary
And thorns and weeds shall it cause to sprout forth to thee; and thou shalt eat the green herb of the field.
And Gideon will say, For this in Jehovah's giving Zebah and Zalmunna into my band, and I threshed your flesh with thorns of the desert and threshing-sledges.
Before your pots shall perceive the thorn, as living, as in wrath, he will sweep him away.
And behold, it came up all of it with thorns; brambles covered its face, and the wall of its stones was overthrown.
For as the voice of thorns under the pot, so the laughter of the foolish one. Also this is vanity.
And peoples were the burnings of lime; thorns cut down, in fire shall they be burnt
Therefore, behold me hedging in thy way with thorns, and I walled a wall and she shall not find her beaten paths.
And having twined a crown of thorns, they put upon, his head: and a reed upon his right hand: and having fallen upon the knees before him, they mocked him, saying, Hail, King of the Jews!
And the soldiers having twined a crown of thorns, put upon his head, and they put round him a purple robe, And said, Hail, King of the Jews! and they gave him blows with a rod.
And lest I be lifted up by the eminence of Revelation, a thorn in the flesh was given me, a messenger of Satan, that he might cuff me, lest I be lifted up. For this thrice besought I the Lord, that it remove away from me. read more. And he said to me, My grace suffices thee: for my power is perfected in weakness. Therefore very willingly will I boast rather in my weaknesses, that Christ's power may lodge upon me. Therefore am I contented in weaknesses, in reproaches, in necessities in expulsions, in extremities for Christ: for when I am weak, then am I strong.
And ye know that through weakness of the flesh I announced the good news to you before. And my temptation in my flesh, ye counted not as nothing, nor spurned; but as an angel of God ye received me, as Christ Jesus.