Myrtle

Myrtle is a small evergreen tree, and Scripture sets it where life seems least likely. God promises, “I will plant in the wilderness the cedar, the shittah tree, and the myrtle” (Isaiah 41:19), and again, “instead of the brier shall come up the myrtle tree” (Isaiah 55:13). In Nehemiah 8:15 the people are told to fetch myrtle branches to make booths for the feast, and in Zechariah 1:8 a rider on a red horse stands among myrtle trees in a night vision. Isaiah 55 is the place to start.

4 verses

Nehemiah

Nehemiah 8:15

And that they should publish and proclaim in all their cities, and in Jerusalem, saying, Go forth unto the mount, and fetch olive branches, and pine branches, and myrtle branches, and palm branches, and branches of thick trees, to make booths, as it is written.

Isaiah

Isaiah 41:19

I will plant in the wilderness the cedar, the shittah tree, and the myrtle, and the oil tree; I will set in the desert the fir tree, and the pine, and the box tree together:

Isaiah 55:13

Instead of the thorn shall come up the fir tree, and instead of the brier shall come up the myrtle tree: and it shall be to the LORD for a name, for an everlasting sign that shall not be cut off.

Zechariah

Zechariah 1:8

I saw by night, and behold a man riding upon a red horse, and he stood among the myrtle trees that were in the bottom; and behind him were there red horses, speckled, and white.

From Easton's Bible Dictionary

Matthew George Easton, 1897

(Isa. 41:19; Neh. 8:15; Zech. 1:8), Hebrew hadas, known in the East by the name as, the Myrtus communis of the botanist. “Although no myrtles are now found on the mount (of Olives), excepting in the gardens, yet they still exist in many of the glens about Jerusalem, where we have often seen its dark shining leaves and white flowers. There are many near Bethlehem and about Hebron, especially near Dewir Dan, the ancient Debir. It also sheds its fragrance on the sides of Carmel and of Tabor, and fringes the clefts of the Leontes in its course through Galilee. We meet with it all through Central Palestine” (Tristram).

Read the full entry

From Smith's Bible Dictionary

William Smith, 1884

a plant mentioned in (Nehemiah 8:15; Isaiah 41:19; 55:13; Zechariah 1:8,10,11) The modern Jews still adorn with myrtle the booths and sheds at the feast of tabernacles. Formerly, as we learn from Nehemiah, (Nehemiah 8:15) myrtles grew on the hills about Jerusalem. "On Olivet." says Dean Stanley, "nothing is now to be seen but the olive and the fig tree:" on some of the hills near Jerusalem, however, Hasselquist observed the myrtle. Dr. Hooker says it is not uncommon in Samaria and Galilee. The Myrtus communis is the kind denoted by the Hebrew word. (It is a shrub or low tree sometimes ten feet high, with green shining leaves, and snow-white flowers bordered with purple, "which emit a perfume more exquisite than that of the rose." The seeds of the myrtle, dried before they are ripe, form our allspice. --ED.)