Even a farmer’s tool can carry a story. In 1 Samuel 13, Israel’s men had to go down to the Philistines to sharpen every man his share, his coulter, his axe and his mattock, a measure of how far the people had been pushed. In Isaiah 7, hills once “digged with the mattock” will be left to briers, thorns and wandering cattle. A mattock is a digging tool, something like a heavy hoe or pick. The word is old, but the picture is plain: ordinary work, and what happens when it stops. Read 1 Samuel 13:19-22 for the whole scene.
3 verses
But all the Israelites went down to the Philistines, to sharpen every man his share, and his coulter, and his axe, and his mattock.
Yet they had a file for the mattocks, and for the coulters, and for the forks, and for the axes, and to sharpen the goads.
And on all hills that shall be digged with the mattock, there shall not come thither the fear of briers and thorns: but it shall be for the sending forth of oxen, and for the treading of lesser cattle.
Matthew George Easton, 1897
(1.) Heb. ma’eder, an instrument for dressing or pruning a vineyard (Isa. 7:25); a weeding-hoe.
(2.) Heb. mahareshah (1 Sam. 13:1), perhaps the ploughshare or coulter.
(3.) Heb. herebh, marg. of text (2 Chr. 34:6). Authorized Version, “with their mattocks,” marg. “mauls.” The Revised Version renders “in their ruins,” marg. “with their axes.” The Hebrew text is probably corrupt.
William Smith, 1884
(Isaiah 7:25) The tool used in Arabia for loosening the ground, described by Neibuhr, answers generally to our mattock or grubbing-axe, i.e. a single-headed pickaxe. The ancient Egyptian hoe was of wood, and answered for hoe, spade and pick.