Nail

From BibleEncyclopedia.Net

(1.) For fastening.

(a.) Hebrew yathed, “piercing,” a peg or nail of any material (Eze_15:3), more especially a tent-peg (Exo_27:19; Exo_35:18; Exo_38:20), with one of which Jael (q.v.) pierced the temples of Sisera (Jdg_4:21, Jdg_4:22). This word is also used metaphorically (Zec_10:4) for a prince or counsellor, just as “the battlebow” represents a warrior.

(b.) Masmer, a “point,” the usual word for a nail. The words of the wise are compared to “nails fastened by the masters of assemblies” (Ecc_12:11, A.V.). The Revised Version reads, “as nails well fastened are the words of the masters,” etc. Others (as Plumptre) read, “as nails fastened are the masters of assemblies” (Compare Isa_22:23; Ezr_9:8). David prepared nails for the temple (1Ch_22:3; 2Ch_3:9). The nails by which our Lord was fixed to the cross are mentioned (Joh_20:25; Col_2:14).

(2.) Of the finger (Heb. tsipporen, “scraping”). To “pare the nails” is in Deu_21:12 (marg., “make,” or “dress,” or “suffer to grow”) one of the signs of purification, separation from former heathenism (Compare Lev_14:8; Num_8:7). In Jer_17:1 this word is rendered “point.”

nāl:

(1) As denoting the finger-nail, the Hebrew word is צפּרן, cippōren Deu_21:12, the captive woman “shall shave her head, and pare her nails.” The latter was probably intended to prevent her from marring her beauty by scratching her face, an act of self-mutilation oriental women are repeatedly reported to have committed in the agony of their grief. Aramaic טפר, ṭephar (Dan_4:33, “his nails like birds' claws”).

(2) As pin or peg (for tents, or driven into the wall) the word is יתד, yāthēdh (in Jdg_4:21 the Revised Version (British and American), “tent-pin”); in Isa_22:23, “a nail in a sure place” is a peg firmly driven into the wall on which something is to be hung (Isa_22:24); compare Ecc_12:11, where the word is masmerōth, cognate with maṣmēr below.

(3) For nails of iron 1Ch_22:3 and gold 2Ch_3:9, and in Isa_41:7 and Jer_10:4, the word is מסמר, masmēr.

(4) In the New Testament the word is helos, used of the nails in Christ's hands Joh_20:25, and “to nail” in Col_2:14 (“nailing it to the cross”) is προσηλόω, prosēlóō.

In a figurative sense the word is used of the hard point of a stylus or engraving tool: “The sin of Judah is written with a pen of iron, and with the point (literally, “claw,” “nail”) of a diamond: it is graven upon the tablet of their heart, and upon the horns of your altars” Jer_17:1.