The term Christ (or similar) appears in English and most European languages, owing to the Greek usage of Khristós (transcribed in Latin as Christus
As on many other occasions, Jesus answered the question with a parable:
"It is like a grain of mustard seed, which, when it is sown in the earth, is less than all the seeds that be in the earth: But when it is sown, it groweth up, and becometh greater than all herbs, and shooteth out great branches; so that the fowls of the air may lodge under the shadow of it." [Mark 4.31,32]
No doubt the prolific yellow flowers of the mustard plant would be in evidence all around them as the people listened to Jesus' words, since, as one authority remarks, wild mustard is conspicuous in the vegetation around the Sea of Galilee. [Plants of the Bible - Michael Zohary]The mustard referred to by Jesus is probably which for a long time has been extensively cultivated, and in Bible times was the source of mustard seed oil and was also used as a medicament. It is an annual herb with large leaves clustered mainly at the base of the plant. Its central stem branches prolifically in its upper part and produces an enormous number of yellow flowers and small, many seeded linear fruits. It normally grows to just over a metre in height but specimens have been known to grow as high as five metres.
One writer, travelling in the region of Galilee during the last century, exclaimed: 'Is this wild mustard that is growing so luxuriantly and blossoming so fragrantly along our path? It is; and I have always found it here in spring and a little later than this, the whole surface of the vale will be gilded over with its yellow flowers. I have seen this plant in the rich plain of Akkar as tall as the horse and his rider.' [The Land and the Book - W M Thomson
