When he hath made plain the face thereof, doth he not cast abroad the fitches, and scatter the cummin, and cast in the principal wheat and the appointed barley and the rie in their place?
When he hath made plain the face thereof - the surface of the ground: 'made plain,' or level, by harrowing.
Fitches - rather dill, or fennel, Nigella Romana, with black seed easily beaten out, used as a condiment and medicine in the East. So the Septuagint [mikron].
Cummin was used in the same way.
Cast in the principal wheat - or, as the Septuagint, plant the wheat in rows х sowraah (H7795)]; because wheat was thought to yield the largest crop by being planted sparingly (Pliny, 'Hist. Nat.,' 18: 21). 'Sow the wheat regularly' (Horsley). But Gesenius takes it from the Arabic sense of the word, like the English version, 'fat' or "principal" - i:e., excellent wheat. The Hebrew root, sarah, means, to rule, or be principal.
And the appointed barley, х nicmaan (H5567), from a conjectured Hebrew root, caaman (H5567): the same as the Chaldee Talmudic cameen, to mark out] - barley in a sack, marked as excellent, to serve as seed barley. Or else, 'barley in its appointed place'-marks being set in the fields to mark where the barley is to be set (Maurer).
And the rye (or spelt; Hebrew, kucemet (H3698 )) in their place ( gªbulaatow (H1367)) - 'in its (the field's) border' (Maurer). The several grains have their own places in the field-the wheat in the middle, the best and safest place. The Septuagint, Vulgate, Chaldaic, and Arabic translate, 'in their boundaries.' This is the best rendering. "In their place" or 'boundaries' answers to "here a little, and there a little" (Isaiah 28:10).