THE FULL ARTICLE — from the International Standard Bible Encyclopedia

The International Standard Bible Encyclopedia (1915), general editor James Orr — public domain, printed whole.

fur'-o (telem):

The word is translated "furrows" in Job 39:10; 31:38; Ps 65:10; Ho 10:4; 12:11 (Ps 65:10 the King James Version, "ridges"). In these passages the fields are pictured as they were in the springtime or late autumn. When the showers had softened the earth, the seed was sown and the soil turned over with the plow and left in furrows, not harrowed and pulverized as in our modern farming. The Syrian farmer today follows the custom of his ancient predecessors.

Another word, ma`anah, occurs in two passages, first in the figurative sense in Ps 129:3, and second in an obscure passage in 1Sa 14:14. Three other words, gedhudhah, `arughah, `ayin, translated "furrows" in the King James Version, are probably more properly rendered in the American Standard Revised Version "ridges" (Ps 65:10), "beds" (Eze 17:7,10), and "transgressions" (Ho 10:10).

See AGRICULTURE; PLOW.

James A. Patch