1st Samuel Chapter 13 verse 21 Holy Bible
yet they had a file for the mattocks, and for the coulters, and for the forks, and for the axes, and to set the goads.
read chapter 13 in ASV
For they had instruments for putting an edge on their ploughs and blades and forks and axes, and for putting iron points on their ox-driving rods.
read chapter 13 in BBE
when the edges of the sickles, and the hoes, and the forks, and the axes were blunted; and to set the goads.
read chapter 13 in DARBY
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.
read chapter 13 in KJV
Yet they had a file for the mattocks, and for the colters, and for the forks, and for the axes, and to sharpen the goads.
read chapter 13 in WBT
yet they had a file for the mattocks, and for the plowshares, and for the forks, and for the axes, and to set the goads.
read chapter 13 in WEB
and there hath been the file for mattocks, and for coulters, and for three-pronged rakes, and for the axes, and to set up the goads.
read chapter 13 in YLT
Pulpit Commentary
Pulpit CommentaryVerse 21. - A file. Margin, a file with mouths. The word only occurs here, and is translated a file on the authority of Rashi. Almost all modern commentators agree that it means bluntness, and that this verse should be joined on to the preceding, and the two be translated, "But all the Israelites went down to the Philistines to sharpen his sickle, and his ploughshare, and his axe, and his mattock, whenever the edges of the mattocks, and the ploughshares, and the forks, and the axes were blunt, and also to set (so the margin rightly) the goads." The Israelites were thus in a state of complete dependence upon the Philistines, even for carrying on their agriculture, and probably retained only the hill country, while their enemies were masters of the plains.
Ellicott's Commentary
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers(21) Yet they had a file for the mattocks . . .--This translation, the sense of which is not very clear, is supported by the Targum and by many of the great Hebrew commentators--Rashi, for instance. Gesenius and the majority of modern scholars, however, render the word in the original translated "file" (p'tsirah) by "bluntness." The passage then would run: "And there was bluntness (or dulness) of edge to the mattocks; "or," so that bluntness of the edges occurred to the mattocks." "The forks" were probably an instrument with three prongs, like our trident.And to sharpen the goads.--The words from "and there was bluntness," &c. (English Version, "they had a file"), down to "axes," form a parenthesis."This parenthesis indicates that the result of the burthensome necessity of going to the Philistines was that many tools became useless by dulness, so that even these poorer sort of arms did the Israelites not much service at the breaking out of the war."--Bunsen.The LXX. read this 21st verse with considerable changes: "And the vintage was ready to be gathered, and the tools were three shekels to the tooth to sharpen], and to the axe and to the scythe there was the same rate" (or, as the Greek has been rendered," tools cost three shekels apiece [to sharpen]").
