Gourd (Jonah’s Plant)
Archimandrite Nikifor’s Biblical Encyclopedia
(Jonah 4:6–11)—the rapidly growing plant appointed by God to shade Jonah and then struck by a worm. The Hebrew qiqayon does not securely identify a modern species; castor-oil plant, bottle gourd, and other plants have been proposed. The point of the narrative is God’s compassionate rebuke of Jonah, not botanical certainty. The “wild gourds” gathered during the famine in 2 Kings 4:38–41 are named by a different Hebrew term and may refer to colocynth; they should not be treated as the same plant. The illustration represents a member of the gourd family in accordance with the source’s nineteenth-century identification.