Hebrew word · H708

אֶ֫רֶג

'areg

shuttle

From ʾārag, "to weave". Appears only here and in Judg 16:14 (yətad hāʾereg, "the pin of the ʾereg", in the Samson and Delilah story). The meaning is "shuttle" (BDB) or more generally "loom, weaving" (some lexicons, compare HALOT).

Appears 2 times in 2 verses of the Hebrew Old Testament. ·

What it means

loom, shuttle

Abridged from Brown, Driver and Briggs, A Hebrew and English Lexicon of the Old Testament (1906), via STEPBible.org (CC BY 4.0).

In depth

From the study of Job 7:6

Range of meaning

From ʾārag, "to weave". Appears only here and in Judg 16:14 (yətad hāʾereg, "the pin of the ʾereg", in the Samson and Delilah story). The meaning is "shuttle" (BDB) or more generally "loom, weaving" (some lexicons, compare HALOT).

Against the English

KJV, BSB, WEB, NIV, ESV and NASB all have "weaver's shuttle". YLT has "weaving machine", which points to the loom as a whole. The Latin Vulgate has the web being cut off by the weaver.

Used elsewhere in the period

Weaving was everyday household work in ancient Israel and the Near East, done mostly by women on upright or ground looms (Prov 31:13, 19, 24). Isaiah 38:12 uses the same kind of picture for a life ending: Hezekiah says "like a weaver I have rolled up my life; he cuts me off from the loom."

Where it appears

Judges · 1

  1. Judges 16:14 הָאֶ֖רֶג the loom

    So while he slept, Delilah took the seven braids of his hair and wove them into the web. Then she tightened it with a pin and called to him, “Samson, the Philistines are here!” But he awoke from his sleep and pulled out the pin with the loom and the web.

Job · 1

  1. Job 7:6 אָ֑רֶג a weaver's shuttle

    My days are swifter than a weaver’s shuttle; they come to an end without hope.

    Here: The weaving tool, most likely the shuttle (or bobbin) that carries the thread back and forth across the loom. The root means "to weave", so the word may also mean the loom or the weaving itself (compare Judg 16:14). Either way, the picture is the quick back-and-forth of a hand loom.

Word data: STEPBible.org (CC BY 4.0), main text only.