Spider

עכביש , Job 8:14; Isa 59:5. An insect well known, remarkable for the thread which it spins, with which it forms a web of curious texture, but so frail that it is exposed to be broken and destroyed by the slightest accident. To the slenderness of this filmy workmanship, Job compares the hope of the wicked. This, says Dr. Good, was “doubtless a proverbial allusion; and so exquisite, that it is impossible to conceive any figure that can more fully describe the utter vanity of the hopes and prosperity of the wicked.”

“Deceiving bliss! in bitter shame it ends, His prop a cobweb, which an insect rends.”

So Isaiah says, “They weave the web of the spider; of their webs no garment shall be made; neither shall they cover themselves with their works.”

Spider occurs in Job 8:14; Isa 59:5. In the first of these passages, the reference seems clear to the spider’s web, or literally, house, whose fragility is alluded to as a fit representation of the hope of a profane, ungodly, or profligate person; for so the original word really means, and not ’hypocrite,’ as in our version. The object of such a person’s trust or confidence, who is always really in imminent danger of ruin, may be compared for its uncertainty to the spider’s web. ’He shall lean upon his house (i.e. to keep it steady when it is shaken); he shall hold it fast (i.e. when it is about to be destroyed); nevertheless it shall not endure (Job 8:15). In the second passage (Isa 59:5) it is said, ’The wicked weave the spider’s web’ (literally, ’thin threads’); but it is added, ’their thin threads shall not become garments, neither shall they cover themselves with their works;’ that is, their artifices shall neither succeed, nor conceal themselves, as does the spider’s web. This allusion intimates no antipathy to the spider itself, or to its habits when directed towards its own purposes; but simply to the adoption of those habits by man towards his fellow-creatures. There has long been a popular prejudice against spiders, and the poet Thomson has stigmatized them as

’Cunning and fierce—

Mixture abhorred;’

but these epithets are in reality as unjustly applied to them (at least with reference to the mode by which they procure necessary subsistence), as to the patient sportsman, who lays snares for the birds that are to serve for the dinner of his family: while it can be further pleaded in behalf of spiders, that they are actively serviceable to the human race, in checking the superfecundity of other insects, and afford in their various procedures the most astonishing displays of that Supreme Intelligence by which they are directed.

A well-known insect, remarkable for the thread which it spins, and with which it forms a web of curious texture, but so frail that it is exposed to be broken and destroyed by the slightest accident. To the slenderness of this filmy workmanship Job compares the hope of the wicked, Job 8:14 . So also in Isa 59:5, it is shown that the works of sinners are utterly inadequate to cover or protect them. In Pro 30:28, it is said in our version that "the spider taketh hold with her hands, and is in kings’ palaces;" but the Hebrew employs here a different word, which signifies, according to the best interpreters, a species of lizard frequent in Palestine.\par

Spider. The Hebrew word, ’accabish, in Job 8:24; Isa 59:5, is correctly rendered "spider", but, the Hebrew word, semamith, is wrongly translated "spider" in Pro 30:28; it refers probably to some kind of lizard.

(But "there are many species of spider in Palestine: some which spin webs, like the common garden spider; some which dig subterranean cells and make doors in them, like the well-known trap-door spider of southern Europe; and some which have no web, but chase their prey upon the ground, like the hunting-spider and the wolf-spider." --Wood’s Bible Animals).

’akabish. Job 8:14, "the hypocrite’s trust shall be a spider’s web," namely, frail and transitory, notwithstanding its ingenuity; the spider’s web sustains it, the hypocrite’s trust will not sustain him. Hypocrisy is as easily swept away as the spider’s web by the wind; it is as flimsy, and is woven out of its own inventions, as the spider’s web out of its own bowels. Isa 59:5, "they weave the spider’s web ... their webs shall not become garments"; the point is the thinness of the garment, as contrasted with what is substantial (Pro 11:18). When a spider attacks a fly it plunges its two fangs into its victim, and through them (being tubular) injects poison. In Pro 30:28 translated semamith, "the gecko (’lizard") taketh hold with her hands, and is in kings’ palaces." it can run over smooth surfaces noiselessly in an inverted position, as flies on a ceiling. But the spider’s characteristic is not this, but to weave a web; it is in cottages rather than "palaces." The gecko teaches, as much as the spider taught Robert Bruce, the irresistible power of perseverance. The spider’s spinning organs serve as both hands and eyes (Kirby, Bridgwater Treatise, 2:186).

1. akkabish. This is known to be the spider by the web being referred to, which, as being very frail, illustrates the trust of the hypocrite, also the weaving of the wicked, which will not supply them with a garment. Job 8:14; Isa 59:5.

2. semamith. This is supposed to refer to a lizard, which has wide feet like hands, by which it holds fast to the wall while pursuing its prey. It is translated ’lizard’ in the R.V. but others prefer some species of spider. Pro 30:28.

See INSECTS:

SPIDER.—1. sĕmâmîth; See Lizard (7). 2. ‘akkâbîsh (cf. Arab. [Note: Arabic.] ‘ankabût), Job 8:14, Isa 59:5-6. Both references are to the frailness of the spider’s web.

E. W. G. Masterman.

spı̄´dẽr ((1) עכּבישׁ, ‛akkābhı̄sh; compare Arabic ‛ankabût, English Versions of the Bible “spider”; Septuagint ἀράχνη, aráchnē (Job 8:14; Isa 59:5); (2) שׂממית, s^emāmı̄th, “lizard,” the King James Version “spider”; Septuagint καλαβώτης, kalabṓtēs (Pro 30:28)): S^emāmı̄th of Pro 30:28 is probably the gecko, a kind of lizard, as Septuagint and the Revised Version (British and American) have it. See LIZARD. In Job 8:14 the spider’s web is an emblem of frailty: “Whose confidence shall break in sunder, and whose trust is a spider’s web.” Frailty or futility seems to be indicated also in Isa 59:5, Isa 59:6: “They hatch adders’ eggs, and weave the spider’s web:... Their webs shall not become garments, neither shall they cover themselves with their works” “Spider’s web” is in Job 8:14 bēth ‛akkābhı̄sh, “spider’s house,” while in Isa 59:5 it is ḳūrē ‛akkābhı̄sh, קוּר, ḳūr, according to BDB, being “thread” or “film.”

Job 8:14 (b) It represents the sinner in his fruitless efforts to provide for himself a refuge from the wrath of GOD. (See also Isa 59:5).

Pro 30:28 (c) We may understand this to represent the seeking sinner who will not be denied the mercy of GOD. He continues to attend services, to ask questions and finally is saved.

Spider. Hundreds of different species of spiders are found in the Holy Land. A spider’s skill at spinning threads into a web is one of nature’s miracles. The fragile web of a spider is used to demonstrate the folly of placing confidence in something other than the stable, dependable God (Job 8:14).

Spiders trap their victims in their webs and dissolve them with pre-digestive juices so they can be eaten. Oil on the spider’s body keeps it from being entangled in its own web.