others in the Hebrew scriptures, are all inflexions of the root verb, Rakach (in which the final ch is a strong aspirate or guttural). Gesenius says of this root, "The primary idea appears to be in making the spices small which are mixed with the oil." The apothecary, therefore, may be regarded as a crusher, or pounder.
Pharmacy, Disgraceful.
The Greek word, pharmakeia, the original of our "pharmacy," had a rather mixed history in its native language. It does not seem to have exactly deteriorated, as words in all languages have a habit of doing, for from the earliest times it was used concurrently to describe the preparation of medicines, and also through its association with drugs and poisons and the production of philtres, as equivalent to sorcery and witchcraft. It is in this latter sense that it is employed exclusively in the New Testament. St. Paul, for instance (in Galatians, v, 20), enumerating the works of the flesh names it after idolatry. The word appears as witchcraft in the Authorised, and as sorcery in the Revised Version. Pharmakeia or one of its derivatives also occurs several times in the Book of Revelations (ix, 21; xviii, 23; xxi, 8, and xxii, 15), and is uniformly rendered sorcery or sorcerers in both versions, and is associated with crime. Hippocrates uses the verb Pharmakeuein with the meaning of to purge, but he elsewhere employs the same word with the meaning of to drug a person, to give a stupefying draught. In Homer the word "Pharmaka" appears in the senses of both noxious and healing drugs, and also to represent enchanted potions or philtres. The word "pharmakoi" in later times came to be used for the
