skrab ´' 50 : Occurs only in 1 Samuel 21:13 , as the translation of תּרת , tāwāh : "David ... feigned himself mad and scrabbled on the doors of the gate." "To scrabble" (modern English "scrawl") is here to make unmeaning marks; tāwāh means "to make a mark" from tāw , "a mark," especially as a cross (Ezekiel 9:4 ), a signature (Job 31:35 , see the Revised Version (British and American)), the name of the Hebrew letter ת originally made in the form of a cross; the Revised Version margin has "made marks"; but Septuagint has tumpanı́zō , "to beat as a drum," which the Vulgate, Ewald, Driver and others follow ("beat upon" or "drummed on the doors of the city," which seems more probable).
Source
- part_of
source-manifest/isbe— ISBE (PD)