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coulter, plowshare

Concise Bible Dictionary:

An agricultural instrument that needed sharpening: some suppose that the word signifies a plowshare; others, a mattock (1 Sam. 13:20-21²⁰But all the Israelites went down to the Philistines, to sharpen every man his share, and his coulter, and his axe, and his mattock. ²¹Yet they had a file for the mattocks, and for the coulters, and for the forks, and for the axes, and to sharpen the goads. (1 Samuel 13:20‑21)).

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Plow and Plowshare

Strong’s Dictionary of Hebrew Words:

Number:

855 (find all occurrences in KJV Bible)

Transliteration:

’eth

Phonic:

ayth

Meaning:

of uncertain derivation; a hoe or other digging implement

KJV Usage:

coulter, plowshare

From Manners and Customs of the Bible:

Isaiah 2:4⁴And he shall judge among the nations, and shall rebuke many people: and they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruninghooks: nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more. (Isaiah 2:4). They shall beat their swords into plowshares.

See also Joel 3:10¹⁰Beat your plowshares into swords, and your pruninghooks into spears: let the weak say, I am strong. (Joel 3:10), and Micah 4:3³And he shall judge among many people, and rebuke strong nations afar off; and they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruninghooks: nation shall not lift up a sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more. (Micah 4:3). in the passage in Joel the expression is reversed: “Beat your plowshares into swords.” Commentators are divided as to the meaning of ittim, variously rendering it “plowshares,” “spades,” “hoes,” “mattocks.” The word refers to instruments for stirring up the soil in some way, and, so far as concerns capability of conversion to swords, these may as well have been plowshares as anything else. The plowshare was a small piece of iron, which somewhat resembled a short sword, and might easily have been beaten into one, and with equal facility a sword could have been changed into a plowshare.