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HEAT ( êáýóùí ), Mat_20:12, Luk_12:55; Revised Version NT 1881, OT 1885 ‘scorching heat,’ with marg. ‘hot wind.’ êáýóùí in LXX Septuagint has both meanings: (1) scorching heat (Gen_31:40, Isa_49:10, Sir_18:16; Sir_43:22); (2) the east wind ( ÷ָãִéí ), hot, dry, dust-laden, withering up all vegetation, and blowing from the desert, like the simoom (Job_27:21, Jer_18:17, Eze_17:10; Eze_19:12, Jon_4:8, Hos_13:15), usually ἄíåìïò or ðíåῦìá êáýóùí . Authorized Version gives ‘burning heat,’ and Revised Version NT 1881, OT 1885 ‘scorching wind’ in Jam_1:11.
The first meaning seems preferable in Mat_20:12, though Trench (Parables) and others incline to (Revised Version margin) . ‘Onus intrinsecus, a labore; aestum extrinsecus, a sole’ (Bengel). Luk_12:55 belongs to a class of passages based on the observation of natural phenomena; cf. Mat_5:45; Mat_7:24 f., Mat_24:27, Luk_10:18, Joh_3:8; Joh_12:24. Here also the rendering ‘scorching heat’ is the more usual, and seems to agree better than ‘hot wind’ or ‘east wind’ with the mention of the south wind ( íüôïò ) which immediately precedes. Possibly, however, the distinction was not so clearly marked between these two winds, since in Eze_27:26 ÷ָãִéí (east wind) is translated in LXX Septuagint by ôὸ ðíåῦìá ôïῦ íüôïõ .
The only reference in the Gospels to heat for the purpose of warmth is Joh_18:18 ‘a fire of coals’ ( ἀíèñáêéÜí ), i.e. ‘of charcoal’ (Revised Version margin) , coals having probably still this meaning at the time of the Authorized Version . See Wind.
Literature.—Grimm-Thayer, Lex. s.v. êáýóùí ; Hasting's Dictionary of the Bible , and Encyc. Bibl. art. ‘Wind’; Thomson, Land and Book, pp. 295, 536 f.
W. H. Dundas.