BUTTER

The Hebrew word usually rendered butter denotes, properly, sour or curdled milk, Ge 18:8; Jud 5:25; Job 20:17. This last is a favorite beverage in the East to the present day. Burckhardt, when crossing the desert from the country south of the Dead sea to Egypt, says, "Besides flour, I carried some butter and dried leben, (sour milk,) which, when dissolved in water, not only forms a refreshing beverage, but is much to be recommended as a preservative of health when travelling in summer." Yet butter may have been known to the Hebrews. It is much used by the Arabs and Syrians at the present day, and is made by pouring the milk into the common goatskin bottle, suspending this from the tent-poles, and swinging it to and fro with a jerk, until the process is completed. Still it is not certain that the Hebrew word rendered butter ever denotes that article. Even in Pr 30:33 we may render, "The pressing of milk bringeth forth cheese;" and everywhere else the rendering "curd," or "curdled milk," would be appropriate.

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Butter. Butter
(Heb. hemah), curdled milk (Gen. 18:8; Judg. 5:25; 2 Sam. 17:29), or butter in the form of the skim of hot milk or cream, called by the Arabs kaimak, a semi-fluid (Job 20:17; 29:6; Deut. 32:14). The words of Prov. 30:33 have been rendered by some “the pressure [not churning] of milk bringeth forth cheese.”

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BUTTER. → General scriptures concerning Ge 18:8; De 32:14; Jud 5:25; 2Sa 17:29; Job 20:17; Isa 7:15,22 → Made by churning Pr 30:33

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Ge 18:8; De 32:14; Jud 5:25; 2Sa 17:29; Pr 30:33; Isa 7:15

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butter. Butter, n. a food or substance made from cream

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But″ter (bŭt″tẽr), n. [[OE. botere, butter, AS. butere, fr. L. butyrum, Gr. βούτυρον; either fr. βούσ ox, cow + τυρόσ cheese; or, perhaps, of Scythian origin. Cf. Cow.]] 1. 1. An oily, unctuous substance obtained from cream or milk by churning.
2. 2. Any substance resembling butter in degree of consistence, or other qualities, especially, in old chemistry, the chlorides, as butter of antimony, sesquichloride of antimony; also, certain concrete fat oils remaining nearly solid at ordinary temperatures, as butter of cacao, vegetable butter, shea butter.
Butter and eggs (Bot.), a name given to several plants having flowers of two shades of yellow, as Narcissus incomparabilis, and in the United States to the toadflax (Linaria vulgaris). — Butter boat, a small vessel for holding melted butter at table. — Butter flower, the buttercup, a yellow flower. — Butter print, a piece of carved wood used to mark pats of butter; — called also butter stamp. Locke. — Butter tooth, either of the two middle incisors of the upper jaw. — Butter tree (Bot.), a tree of the genus Bassia, the seeds of which yield a substance closely resembling butter. The butter tree of India is the B. butyracea; that of Africa is the Shea tree (B. Parkii). See Shea tree. — Butter trier, a tool used in sampling butter. — Butter wife, a woman who makes or sells butter; — called also butter woman.