worm

Three different biblical words are used for worms.

1. Hebrew: sas

   denotes the caterpillar of the clothes-moth (Isaiah 51:8).

2. The manna bread worms (tola'im), but on the Sabbath there was not any worm (rimmah) therein (Exodus 16:20, 24). Here these words refer to caterpillars or larvae, which feed on corrupting matter.

   These two Hebrew words appear to be interchangeable (Job 25:6; Isaiah 14:11). Tola'im in some places denotes the caterpillar (Deuteronomy 28:39; Jonah 4:7), and rimmah, the larvae, as bred from putridity (Job 17:14; 21:26; 24:20).

   In Micah 7:17, where it is said, “They shall move out of their holes like worms,” perhaps serpents or “creeping things,” or as in the Revised King James Version, “crawling things,” are meant.

   The word is used figuratively in Job 25:6; Psalm 22:6; Isaiah 41:14; Mark 9:44, 46, 48; Isaiah 66:24.

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• animals