(rendered “botch” in Deut. 28:27, 35), an aggravated ulcer, as in the case of Hezekiah (2 Kings 20:7; Isa. 38:21) or of the Egyptians (Ex. 9:9, 10, 11; Deut. 28:27, 35). It designates the disease of Job (2:7), which was probably the black leprosy.
Boil
Boils turn up in Scripture as a sign of judgment and as an ordinary sickness. In Egypt, Moses sprinkled ashes toward heaven and it “became a boil breaking forth with blains upon man, and upon beast” (Exodus 9:10). The Philistines who kept the ark were struck with painful swellings in 1 Samuel 5. Leviticus 13 gives the priest a careful way of telling a healed boil from a spreading one, so a person could be pronounced clean or unclean. And in 2 Kings 20:7 Isaiah has a lump of figs laid on a king’s boil, “and he recovered.” Exodus 9 is the place to begin.
11 verses
Exodus
Exodus 9:9
And it shall become small dust in all the land of Egypt, and shall be a boil breaking forth with blains upon man, and upon beast, throughout all the land of Egypt.
Exodus 9:10
And they took ashes of the furnace, and stood before Pharaoh; and Moses sprinkled it up toward heaven; and it became a boil breaking forth with blains upon man, and upon beast.
Leviticus
Leviticus 13:18
The flesh also, in which, even in the skin thereof, was a boil, and is healed,
Leviticus 13:19
And in the place of the boil there be a white rising, or a bright spot, white, and somewhat reddish, and it be shewed to the priest;
Leviticus 13:20
And if, when the priest seeth it, behold, it be in sight lower than the skin, and the hair thereof be turned white; the priest shall pronounce him unclean: it is a plague of leprosy broken out of the boil.
Leviticus 13:21
But if the priest look on it, and, behold, there be no white hairs therein, and if it be not lower than the skin, but be somewhat dark; then the priest shall shut him up seven days:
Leviticus 13:22
And if it spread much abroad in the skin, then the priest shall pronounce him unclean: it is a plague.
Leviticus 13:23
But if the bright spot stay in his place, and spread not, it is a burning boil; and the priest shall pronounce him clean.
1 Samuel
1 Samuel 5:6
But the hand of the LORD was heavy upon them of Ashdod, and he destroyed them, and smote them with emerods, even Ashdod and the coasts thereof.
1 Samuel 5:9
And it was so, that, after they had carried it about, the hand of the LORD was against the city with a very great destruction: and he smote the men of the city, both small and great, and they had emerods in their secret parts.
2 Kings
2 Kings 20:7
And Isaiah said, Take a lump of figs. And they took and laid it on the boil, and he recovered.
From Easton's Bible Dictionary
Matthew George Easton, 1897