The introduction, however, of the historical facts cannot be branded as irrelevant. They demonstrate a constant association for over two millenniums with Egypt, and the deep influence of Egyptian civilisation and methods of life on Jewish policy.
And yet, notwithstanding such intercourse and such cultural influence, we can nowhere in the literature of the Bible or of the Rabbis discern either a direct mention, or (as I hope to show) an implied allusion to the use of the Rod, which as a weapon both for market and sport from c. 2000 b.c. found favour in Egypt.[1006]
The same holds true of the Land of the Two Rivers; in no Assyrian sculpture, on no Assyrian seal, can we detect any delineation or any suggestion of angling, although instances of other kinds of fishing occur frequently.[1007]
In no book of the Old or of the New Testament can be found any direct mention of the Rod. In the Talmud—a vast work of teaching and discussion—the same silence prevails. The authoritative Talmudische Archäologie (by S. Krauss, 1910) gives us fishful places such as Lake Tiberias, and many points of ichthyic or piscatorial interest such as the hook, the line, salted fish, garum, etc., but contains no reference to the Rod.[1008] Mr. Breslar, it is true, has recently girded up his loins to establish that in the Bible and the Talmud can be found at any rate the implied use of the Rod, but to a practical angler quite unconvincingly.[1009]
To account for this absence of direct mention of the Rod in the Bible various reasons have been adduced.
The first: in the only two passages, Isaiah xix. 8, and Habakkuk i. 15, where the word “angle” occurs, and in Matthew xvii. 27, “cast a hook,” and in Amos iv. 2, as contended by Mr. Breslar, its use is certainly implied. The validity of this claim remains a question (A) for Hebrew scholars, and (B) for practical fishermen.
From the point of view of the latter, the “casting,” “taking,” etc., in the above passages can be and probably were accomplished by a hand-line (with or without a weight attached to insure greater length of throw) almost as easily and as effectually as if a Rod were employed. As a matter of fact, for taking good-sized fish some of our professional sea-fishermen prefer the hand-line to that of the Rod.
The words in Matthew xvii. 27, “go thou to the sea and cast a hook” do not either in the Greek or English strongly suggest, much less necessarily imply, a Rod. To a professional fisherman of the Sea of Tiberias like Peter, the more natural, probably the only known method of casting would be by a hand-line.
Turning now to the Hebrew passages, Isaiah xix. 8, “The fishers shall also lament, and all they that cast angle in the Nile (A.V., brooks) shall mourn;” Habakkuk i. 15, “He taketh up all of them with the angle, he catcheth them in his net, and gathereth them in his drag;” Job xli. 1, “Canst thou draw out leviathan with a fish-hook?” in all these we find the same Hebrew word ḥakkāh.
The R.V. in the first two renders it “angle,” and in Job “fish-hook;” in the Greek version ἄγκιστρον, which in the Septuagint is the usual and in the New Testament (Matt. xvii. 27) the only word for hook, occurs in all three passages.