The offensive arms found in the Old Testament are
1. The SWORD, for which several Hebrew words are used:
1. barag, often translated “lightning”; it is “glittering sword” in Job 20:25.
2. chereb, a sword, as laying waste. It is the word commonly used in the Old Testament for sword (everywhere indeed except in the references given here under the other words): it was a straight tapering weapon, with two edges and a sharp point (Psalm 149:6; Isa. 14:19). It is used metaphorically for keen and piercing words, as in Psalm 57:4 and Psalm 64:3.
3. retsach, an undefined slaying weapon, translated “sword” only in Psalm 42:10.
4. shelach, a missile of death, as a dart (Job 33:18; Job 36:12; Joel 2:8).
5. pethichoth, from “to open,” is translated “drawn sword” in Psalm 55:21.
2. SPEARS.
1. chanith, thus named as being flexible: it is the word mostly used for the spear (1 Sam. 13:19; Psalm 57:4). It is this weapon that will be beaten into pruning hooks (Isa. 2:4; Mic. 4:3).
2. kidon, a smaller kind of lance, or javelin (Josh. 8:18, 26; Job 41:29; Jer. 6:23).
3. tselatsal, harpoon (Job 41:7).
4. qayin, lance (2 Sam. 21:16).
5. romach, spear used by heavy-armed troops, the iron head of a spear (Judg. 5:8). The pruning hooks are to be beaten into spears in the time of God’s judgments (Joel 3:10).
Bows
3. BOW, from which arrows are discharged, gesheth, generally made of wood, but sometimes of steel or brass (Job 20:24). It is constantly found in the Old Testament from Genesis to Zechariah. It is used to express punishment from God (Lam. 2:4; Lam. 3:12); and of men to show their power to injure (Psalm 37:14- 15). “A deceitful bow” expresses a man who fails just when his aid is most needed, as when a bow breaks suddenly (Psa. 78:57; Hos. 7:16).
A shepherd boy using a sling.
4. The SLING, by which stones are discharged, Bela. It was by means of this that David smote Goliath (1 Sam. 17:40, 49-50). Of the Benjamites there were 700 men lefthanded; “every one could sling stones at an hair breadth, and not miss” (Judg. 20:16). (In Proverbs 26:8 occurs another word for sling, margemah, but the passage is considered better translated “as he that putteth a precious stone in a heap of stones,” as in the margin.)
Catapult
5. “ENGINES,” with which Uzziah shot arrows and great stones (2 Chron. 26:15).