They invade like lumberjacks swinging their axes in a thick forest. ¹ 

And now ¹  they are tearing down ²  all its engravings ³  with axes ⁴  and crowbars. ⁵ 

Egypt will run away, hissing like a snake, ¹  as the enemy comes marching up in force. They will come against her with axes as if they were woodsmen chopping down trees.

So all Israel had to go down to the Philistines in order to get their plowshares, cutting instruments, axes, and sickles ¹  sharpened.

They charged ¹  two-thirds of a shekel ²  to sharpen plowshares and cutting instruments, and a third of a shekel ³  to sharpen picks and axes, and to set ox goads.

He removed the city’s residents and made them do hard labor with saws, iron picks, and axes. ¹  This was his policy ²  with all the Ammonite cities. Then David and all the army returned to Jerusalem.

He will direct the blows of his battering rams against your walls and tear down your towers with his weapons. ¹ 

The thickets of the forest will be chopped down with an ax, and mighty Lebanon will fall. ¹ 

He removed ¹  the people who were in it and made them do hard labor with saws, iron picks, and iron axes, putting them to work at the brick kiln. This was his policy ²  with all the Ammonite cities. Then David and all the army returned to Jerusalem. ³ 

As one of them was felling a log, the ax head ¹  dropped into the water. He shouted, “Oh no, ²  my master! It was borrowed!”

Even now the ax is laid at ¹  the root of the trees, and every tree that does not produce good fruit will be cut down and thrown into the fire.

Even now the ax is laid at the root of the trees, ¹  and every tree that does not produce good fruit will be ²  cut down and thrown into the fire.”

As the temple was being built, only stones shaped at the quarry ¹  were used; the sound of hammers, pickaxes, or any other iron tool was not heard at the temple while it was being built.

Suppose he goes with someone else ¹  to the forest to cut wood and when he raises the ax ²  to cut the tree, the ax head flies loose ³  from the handle and strikes ⁴  his fellow worker ⁵  so hard that he dies. The person responsible ⁶  may then flee to one of these cities to save himself. ⁷ 

In the cities of Manasseh, Ephraim, and Simeon, as far as Naphtali, and in the ruins ¹  around them,

For the religion ¹  of these people is worthless. They cut down a tree in the forest, and a craftsman makes it into an idol with his tools. ² 

If you besiege a city for a long time while attempting to capture it, ¹  you must not chop down its trees, ²  for you may eat fruit ³  from them and should not cut them down. A tree in the field is not human that you should besiege it! ⁴ 

Does an ax exalt itself over the one who wields it, or a saw magnify itself over the one who cuts with it? ¹  As if a scepter should brandish the one who raises it, or a staff should lift up what is not made of wood!

If an iron axhead ¹  is blunt and a workman ²  does not sharpen ³  its edge, ⁴  he must exert a great deal of effort; ⁵  so wisdom has the advantage of giving success.

“Babylon, ¹  you are my war club, ²  my weapon for battle. I used you to smash nations. ³  I used you to destroy kingdoms.