Moth

A moth is a small thing, and Scripture uses it as a picture of what does not last. Job speaks of people crushed more easily than a moth, and Isaiah says garments wear out and the moth eats them. Then he sets that beside something firmer: “my righteousness shall be for ever.” Jesus draws the lesson in plain terms, telling his hearers not to store up treasures where moth and rust spoil things, but in heaven. James speaks of riches corrupted and clothes eaten by moths. The thread is simple: what we hoard rots, and what God gives stays. Matthew 6 is a good place to begin.

8 verses

Job

Job 4:19

How much less in them that dwell in houses of clay, whose foundation is in the dust, which are crushed before the moth?

Job 13:28

And he, as a rotten thing, consumeth, as a garment that is moth eaten.

Job 27:18

He buildeth his house as a moth, and as a booth that the keeper maketh.

Isaiah

Isaiah 50:9

Behold, the Lord GOD will help me; who is he that shall condemn me? lo, they all shall wax old as a garment; the moth shall eat them up.

Isaiah 51:8

For the moth shall eat them up like a garment, and the worm shall eat them like wool: but my righteousness shall be for ever, and my salvation from generation to generation.

Matthew

Matthew 6:19

Lay not up for yourselves treasures upon earth, where moth and rust doth corrupt, and where thieves break through and steal:

Matthew 6:20

But lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust doth corrupt, and where thieves do not break through nor steal:

James

James 5:2

Your riches are corrupted, and your garments are motheaten.

From Easton's Bible Dictionary

Matthew George Easton, 1897

Heb. ‘ash, from a root meaning “to fall away,” as moth-eaten garments fall to pieces (Job 4:19; 13:28; Isa. 50:9; 51:8; Hos. 5:12).

Gr. ses, thus rendered in Matt. 6:19, 20; Luke 12:33. Allusion is thus made to the destruction of clothing by the larvae of the clothes-moth. This is the only lepidopterous insect referred to in Scripture.

From Smith's Bible Dictionary

William Smith, 1884

By the Hebrew word we are certainly to understand some species of clothes-moth (tinea). Reference to the destructive habits of the clothes-moth is made in (Job 4:19; 13:28; Psalms 39:11) etc. (The moth is a well-known insect which in its caterpillar state is very destructive to woollen clothing, furs, etc. The egg of the moth, being deposited on the fur or cloth, produces a very small shining insect, which immediately forms a house for itself by cuttings from the cloth. It east away the nap, and finally ruins the fabric. There are more than 1500 species of moths. --McClintock and Strong’s Cyclopedia.)