Abarim Publications' online Biblical Hebrew Dictionary
יקש קוש
Linguist have determined that there are two separate verbs יקש (yqs) and קוש (qws) and this may be true in theory, in practice the Bible writers would probably have understood these two to be one and the same verb, spelled two different ways — old fashioned and new.
יקש
The verb יקש (yaqosh) originally meant to lay a bait or lure but came to denote laying a snare to catch animals, and from there to "snare" a person with alluring enticements (1 Samuel 18:21, Psalm 18:5, Jeremiah 5:26). This verb's derivatives are:
- The masculine noun יקוש (yaqosh), meaning bait-layer, snarer or fowler (Hosea 9:8).
- The similar masculine noun יקוש (yaqush), also meaning bait-layer, snarer or fowler (Proverbs 6:5).
- The masculine noun מוקש (moqesh), meaning either bait (Amos 3:5) or snare (Exodus 10:7, 23:33).
קוש
The verb קוש (qush) also means to lay bait or lure, and is doubtlessly related to יקש (yaqosh). BDB Theological Dictionary even deems קוש (qush) the root of יקש (yaqosh). Our verb occurs only once in the Bible, in Isaiah 29:21, whereas the verb יקש (yqs) and its derivatives occur forty times.
The curious phenomenon, that a verb that happens only once spawns four separate names of six or seven men and one brook, but a verb that occurs forty times only produces one name, confirms that the names were invented long before the story was written. That may mean that the stories the way we have them were edited or retold long enough after the events for the language to have evolved. But on the other hand, in our day and age, names are also usually invented long ago.
Fuerst's Hebrew and Chaldee Lexicon to the Old Testament reports the origin of this verb to be bent, crooked, and hence a bow, to wind, interwoven, hence a snare, snared, to be caught.
קשת
The noun קשת (qeshet) means bow and is thought to derive from the previous. It's widely attested all over the Semitic language basin as it occurs in comparable forms in Assyrian, Ethiopian and Arabic. Here at Abarim Publications we suspect that this word may even have influenced the formation of the Greek word for bow, namely τοξος (toxos), as well as the Latin-origin noun κουστωδια (koustodia), guard or custodian, in the same way that a word for spear, curis, helped to form the word κυριος (kurios), sir or lord.
Our noun could describe the familiar weapon, which could either be a weapon of war (Joshua 24:12, 1 Samuel 18:4, Isaiah 41:2) or a tool for hunting (Genesis 27:3). The bow stood symbol for pent up tension between parties, whether in a negative or a positive way. Hence David's Song of the Bow laments the love he felt for Jonathan but also their military alliance (2 Samuel 1:18-27). God has a bow (Lamentations 2:4), and his most fundamental covenant with mankind is signified by his bow in the clouds (same word: Genesis 9:13).
- The noun קשת (qashat) means bowman (Genesis 21:20 and Jeremiah 4:29 only).