Various words translated as “Worm"—Probable confusion of the words—The Rimmah and the Tole'ah—The Worm which destroyed Jonah's gourd—The Earthworm.
THE word “worm “occurs many times in the Authorized Version, and is a rendering of three Hebrew words. One is sâs, which has been already explained under the article Moth; the second is rimmah; and the third tole'ah. There is very great difficulty in ascertaining the real signification of these words, unless we assume that the Hebrews were not aware of the distinction between actual Annelida and the larvae of various insects.
Even at the present day we commit a similar error. We speak of the wire-worm, which is the larva of one kind of beetle. We say that wood is worm-eaten, signifying that it has been attacked by the larva of another kind of beetle. Then we use the word “palmer-worm" to signify the larva of a moth, “glowworm" to signify a beetle, “tape-worm” to signify an entozoon, and—strangest of all—” blindworm " to signify a lizard which can see perfectly well. We therefore need not wonder that the Hebrew language produces similar confusion of nomenclature.
The other words are frequently used in connection with each other. The Rimmah is the “worm" that was bred in the marina when it had been kept beyond the specified time, and it is evident that the larva of some insect, such as the blow-fly, is signified.
The word is evidently used in the same sense by Job. The “worm shall feed sweetly on him “(24:20). " They shall lie down alike in the dust, and the worms shall cover them “(21:26). The same word is employed in his lamentation over his evil case: “My flesh is clothed with worms and clods of dust; my skin is broken, and become loathsome “(7:5). In 25:6 he uses both words: "Man that is a worm, and the son of man that is a worm." This passage is more correctly rendered in the Hebrew Bible: "Man that is a worm (rimmah), and the son of man which is a maggot” (tole'ah). Both words are also used in connection with each other by Isaiah: “The worm (rimmah) is spread under thee, and the worms (tola'im) cover thee"(14:11).
The well-known passage in Job 19:2626And though after my skin worms destroy this body, yet in my flesh shall I see God: (Job 19:26) is altogether wrongly rendered in the text, the marginal translation being much more correct. The Worm is not mentioned at all in that passage, which the Jewish Bible renders as follows: “Even after my skin shall have been stripped off this [body] and flesh, I shall see God.”
The passage in Micah probably refers to the earthworm: "They shall lick the dust like a serpent, they shall move out of their holes like worms of the earth" (7:17). In this case, however, the expression is a general one, and, as may be seen by reference to the marginal translation, is more correctly rendered not as “worms," but as "creeping things.”