It’s in the Bible...
Did you know that essential oils and their aromatic useS are mentioned over 1,000 times in the Bible? It’s true. At first, I didn’t believe it either. In fact, the only biblical story I knew of was the birth of baby Jesus. He had Frankinsence brought to him, and that’s the only recollection I had of essential oils and biblical history.
What is mind blowing to me is, plants and their oils were not only historically used for medicine, trade and barter but also as a means to destroy the health of a kingdom. Destroy the groves of cypress or frankinsence and the community’s form of employment, trade and medicine is completely gone. In ancient times, groves of plants and trees brought in so much health and wealth to a city. People like Cleopatra, Queen of Sheba, King Solomon, King Herod and many more knew the financial and health benefits of tree groves/plants and oils.
In Biblical history, the balm of Gilead was a balmy oil known to be in the same family of frankincense and myrrh. It had an incredible scent and amazing skin healing properties. During 955 B.C. to Queen of Sheba decided to visit Jerusalem to see the wonders of Solomon’s court and to test his wisdom by asking hard questions (1 King 10). She came with a train of camels bearing spices, gold and precious stones. King Solomon was legendary in his time. He was known for his luxurious and wisdom. Apparently the queen was impressed, and so was Solomon. Tradition has it that Solomon was so impressed with the fragrance and healing properties of her balm oil that he persuaded the Queen to send him some seeds and young trees. He then established a grove near Jericho, which is how the balm acquired another name...Balm of Jericho. Just 1 pound of this balm oil would be about $150 in today’s market, but two lbs of silver in their time. It was said that the oil was yellow in color, sticky and when a few drops were rubbed into a wound it was said to bring rapid healing. A few drops taken internally or applied on the belly were said to “strengthen a weakened stomach” and was “the best stomachic known”. From the groves (trees that would produce the resin/oil/balm) the queen or king would collect about 200 talents a year. One talent is equal to 3,000 shekels...the profit from the balm would be about 720,000 shekels a year! In that day, this type of extra income could buy 103,000 tons of grain, 48,000 oxen, 4,800 horses or 1,200 chariots.
The balm of Jericho is just one story of several. You have the Cedars of Lebanon (Cedarwood 1 Kings 5:8-10), the balm trees planted by the Well of Matarya near Cairo, Egypt which were planted by Cleopatra 35 B.C., the Arabians and Egyptians distilling oil from rose petals as far back as 5000 B.C., the anointing of Aaron in Leviticus with the holy annointing blend, the anointing of Jesus prior to his death written in all 4 gospels, a hyssop branch used before the Passover (Exodus 12:22 plus hyssop oils is amazing by the way), Aaron stopping a plague with the holy anointing oil blend as instructed by God (Numbers 16: 46-50) and of course the story of baby Jesus where he was gifted frankinsence (Matthew 2:11). I could go on and on...really I could. Essential Oils and their aromatic plants are all over the Bible. How did I miss this before and why doesn’t the rest of the world know how ingrained essential oils were in our ancestors lives for overall health, wellness and income?
Well, friends, do you want the truth? “Essential oils are like fine wines. Even when harvested from the same fields, each year’s crop is slightly different because no two years ever have quite the same sunlight, temperature, wind and rain conditions. And, of course, plants that grow in different fields, in different countries, climates or continents can very greatly even though they may all be from the same species of plant. With a product (an essential oil) whose chemistry is never quite the same, pharmaceutical companies cannot produce the consistent “purity” upon which they rest their reputations. Hypothetically, Neither can a doctor who uses an oil product know if this month’s supply of frankincense or basil oil is like last month’s. In fact, they could count on it not being the same which also means the body can never develop a resistance to an essential oil. A pharmaceutical drug’s weakness is an essential oils strength.” This is also why Young Living requires such vigorous testing after an oil is distilled. An oil’s quality and chemistry must meet a certain standard because YL wants our quality to be just as potent as Biblical quality essential oils.
Essential oils were effective in Egypt and Israel thousands of years ago and are just as effective today. Clearly, on the third day of creation when God created plants He knew exactly what he was doing. To me, it’s now obvious that when God created our intricate body he purposely created our cellular receptor sites to respond and communicate with essential oils. He created plants to produce an intricate oil designed to communicate with our mind, body and soul. Essential oils were created on purpose, for a purpose.
...And the leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations. Revelations 22:2
*statistics from Dr. David Stewart’s book, Healing oils of the Bible
