As iron sharpens iron

[Moses Yoder]

That phrase "As iron sharpens iron" was written approximately 3000 years ago. A pastor that was counseling me during a rough patch used it frequently, from the book of Proverbs attributed to King Solomon, and I have since then been a little curios about it. Here is the whole verse; Proverbs 27:17 New King James Version (NKJV) 17 As iron sharpens iron, So a man sharpens the countenance of his friend. from BibleGateway.com This leads to curiosity about their sharpening techniques then and also now, especially as pertains to the sharpening steel. At the auction for us kids I bought my dad's sharpening steel which brings back many memories. It is labeled R Diek, made in Germany. A search on R Diek brings up nothing of value. What I am really kind of wondering about is the value of sharpening iron on iron. In the proverb I suppose "iron" would refer to all sorts of steel. My dad's steel seems to have longitudinal serrations in the steel, visible lines. I assume this steel would have to be harder than the knife; it has lasted my dad's lifetime and is seemingly untouched on the steel; the handle got soaked for a long period of time sometime and the finish is ruined on that side but otherwise the steel looks about like new. Kind of wondering what the mechanics are of using the steel on a knife. This is my first youtube video, I do not have editing capabilities yet so take it easy.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GWue0zcBfLM&feature=youtu.be

[george wilson]

So,what's the question? A knife steel(Probably labeled R. DICK) is as hard as a file,and is a file,in fact,with longitudinal teeth. I doubt seriously that they had them in biblical times. But,the bible has been translated a number of times. The one we use was translated in the 17th. C.. I don't know if they had knife steels at that time either. The Romans did have FILES made of steel . a file will sharpen iron,of course. This could be what the reference to iron sharpening iron is. Hardly anyone back then would have known what steel really was,as opposed to iron. The whole thing could just be a mis translation.

[Moses Yoder]

I just read the terms of service and did not find any rule violations based on the fact of not asking a clear question. In fact, it does not say anything at all about the purpose of Sawmill Creek being to learn something. Under the title "General Terms" it says this; "Sawmill Creek is an online community where woodworkers may come together to share and discuss a common interest." With that in mind, I propose sharpening to be a common interest in the hand tool forum, and the purpose of this discussion is to focus on sharpening iron with iron which apparently has been done for about 3000 years and is still going on today. I value your input and have learned a great deal from you.


So,what's the question? A knife steel(Probably labeled R. DICK) is as hard as a file,and is a file,in fact,with longitudinal teeth. I doubt seriously that they had them in biblical times. But,the bible has been translated a number of times. The one we use was translated in the 17th. C.. I don't know if they had knife steels at that time either. The Romans did have FILES made of steel at that time. a file will sharpen iron,of course. This could be what the reference to iron sharpening iron is. Hardly anyone back then would have known what steel really was,as opposed to iron. The whole thing could just be a mis translation.

[Andrew Hughes]

I use a steel to straighten out edges on my kitchen knives.I see chefs a lot on tv Using a steel the wrong way,At least I was taught to draw out the edge.
After the edge get toothy or flat I go out to the stones.I do think the steel helps keep the wire on the edge longer.As long as no one using the knife on the counter top.Most of my kitchen knives are Henckels.Or Wustoff .

[Malcolm Schweizer]

Good day Moses,

Funny you mention this, as my friend used this term with me yesterday. I was actaully planning on looking it up to see if it is a biblical reference. I was also thinking, "Does iron really sharpen iron, or does stone?" But I guess it would, especially back in Biblical times.

What you have there is a steel, which is actually not used to sharpen the knife, but rather to keep the edge straight and for lack of better words, dress the edge before and after use. It looks like a good one- very hefty.

[george wilson]

The steel does sharpen the edge. It is a specialized type of fine file,which does make very fine shavings as it is passed over the knife edge.

Iron does not sharpen iron that I know of. One has to be harder than the other,and have some means of removing a t least small amounts of metal. Hence,I GUESS the bible may refer to the use of a file to sharpen an iron tool.

[Ron Hock]

I've found that most steels are really just "vertical files" and that the teeth are way too coarse for my knives and my taste. I don't like how much knife they file away and I hate the ragged edge they leave. On our knives I use a steel that is smooth, like a burnisher for a scraper. The idea is to draw out the edge and refine it by pressing it along the steel burnisher. You can use your scraper burnisher but it may be a bit short to be very effective. I apply the edge to the steel at a steeper angle than Moses is using with his Dad's steel, and I press fairly hard. The speed is not important but I keep it moving. I hold the tip of the steel against a counter top to keep it steady and work the blade away from the handle, toward the tip (don't hit the couter!) The action is as if you were shaving shavings from the steel -- like cutting the meat for a gyro sandwich. This is almost all I ever do to keep my knives sharp. I rarely use abrasives on them at all. Frequent burnishing is all they need to be at their best.

[george wilson]

Did I offend you somehow? Not my intention. I just put a lot of effort into teaching you about brass casting. Then you just changed your mind. Maybe I'd be better off not answering your questions. I think it is most unusual to go read the terms of service over this.

[Joe Tilson]

An Iron with an edge can be sharpened somewhat(burnished) with a another iron piece. The symbolism here is as in friends discussing things together, much like we do here, we come away with a sharper mind. We keep each other sharp and wise. I know sometimes I come off as harsh. It is not intended, but some take it that way. Let's keep each other sharp, not aggravated.

[george wilson]

My mind is none too sharp after not sleeping all night from pain. I hate to lay there awake for 8 hours. Then,my little dog escapes and runs into my room at 2:00 A.M.,jumping into my bed,and jamming herself against me so I can't change positions(which I NEED to do).

[Joe Tilson]

George,
I will be having shoulder surgery July 25, because the pain is so bad I just can't stand it anymore. Can surely feel for you. Getting sleep doesn't come so easy these days. Also have a bad back, which doesn't help. Sorry you're not sleeping well. Your mind seems pretty sharp to me. Hang in there.

[Richard Wolgemuth]

While I am a woodworking rookie, I have learned a thing or two while working on two degrees, more or less in the field of biblical studies. There is an interesting passage in 1 Samuel which says that at that time there was "no blacksmith in the land of Israel". I.e. - the Israelites had no means of producing iron/steel tools (I will mention the 1 Samuel text would predate the Proverb by a couple hundred years). So the Israelites did what many of us would do: get your neighbor to do the job for you. The Israelite would go next door to the Philistines to buy their tools and have them sharpened. However, by the time this proverb was written the Israelites had already conquered the Philistines and likely learned the ways of the forge. I don't think it is too far of a stretch to imagine this bit of wisdom coming out of the experience of making ones own tools. Maybe no one cares,but I think forums are for sharing obscure bits of information, for whatever it may be worth.

[george wilson]

At the time,the Philistines were a very advanced and superior race. The had technology in advance of the Israelites,which included knowing how to work and make iron. They blended in with other cultures so easily that they were absorbed into them when they were conquered,which contributed to their lack of survival as a separate culture.

I just had a week of much less sleep from nursing my wife who had back surgery. Luckily she did not need a titanium implant like I have. I'm starting to need MORE,as my stenosis is coming back. I already had an implant several years ago. But,the vertebra above the implant does all the bending,and now I'm needing another implant on top of that one. I won't be able to get my shoes and socks on after that. Guess it'll be loafers eventually. I have had 14 surgeries by now.

[george wilson]

Iron could also "sharpen" iron by hammering it out into a sharper edge,the way scythes used to be sharpened. I don't know how far back that went. In the beginning,wheat was CUT with sharp blades .Later on it began to be SLASHED with less keen blades.

Hammering the edge sharp fell into the latter category.

[David Weaver]

There are still manufacturers making new peining jigs and anvils for scythes, and as far as I know, a couple of makers of scythe blades and snaths in western europe, and probably eastern europe. I believe there are still a few small subsistence farmers in former soviet areas, etc, who use scythes to mow.

There's a hobbyist movement for the stuff over here, too, but I've never actually seen anyone using one here - just videos on youtube that end up in my recommendation list after I view something woodworking or farming. Given the stuff I've seen, it does look like the peining is only to thin an edge, and then the peined edge stoned and maintained with a stone until it becomes too blunt and needs to be peined thin again.

[Larry McGarrah]

To my understanding a steel does not sharpen a knife. A whetstone sharpens a knife by putting a smooth edge on the blade. This is good for a straight in cutting motion like a plane and not always good for a knife. A steel in fact roughs up the smooth sharp edge of the knife producing small serrations on the edge much like small teeth on a hand saw. Since most knives are used with a sawing motion these teeth cut better than a smooth cutting edge. None of you would try to cut through a piece of wood using the spine of your hand saw. A sharp smooth edged knife will cut nicely but the fine serrations will make it cut better

[Brian Ashton]

I've never thought of that statement as being so hard to understand, for lack of a better word. If you rub any two pieces of identical material by each other they will eventually wear away, relative to the amount of contact time in a specific location and force. so if you rub a piece of iron blade that has a cross sectional width of say 1/4" across a 12" plate of iron of course the blade with eventually get sharper. On a molecular level you are removing molecules and because the blades has a substantially smaller surface area it will lose an equivalent amount of molecules... In other words it will wear down quicker. And after all what is sharpening, it's when you wear down the edge of a tool so that it produces a desired edge.

If you had the time you could sharpen a blade using only paper, simply because even though the steel is much harder and resilient it will still lose molecules as it is rubbed against the paper. It would take a great deal of time but the end result would be an incredibly sharp edge because the loss of molecules would be so slow and gentle it could quite conceivably produce an edge that was only a couple molecules across, considering the ultimate edge is 1 molecule in width.

[David Weaver]

To my understanding a steel does not sharpen a knife. A whetstone sharpens a knife by putting a smooth edge on the blade. This is good for a straight in cutting motion like a plane and not always good for a knife. A steel in fact roughs up the smooth sharp edge of the knife producing small serrations on the edge much like small teeth on a hand saw. Since most knives are used with a sawing motion these teeth cut better than a smooth cutting edge. None of you would try to cut through a piece of wood using the spine of your hand saw. A sharp smooth edged knife will cut nicely but the fine serrations will make it cut better

It depends. If the steel is a slotted steel, then its intention is as ron says, which is to be a poor man's hone and remove metal. I don't know how common those slotted steels would've been eons ago, but they are a horrible thing to have if someone can manage to use bench stones.

The polished steels do something different - they consolidate an edge that is of proper hardness to use them which is somewhere in the range of 57/58 or lower. You can literally use a fine india stone on something like a wusthof knife and then steel it on a smooth steel and have a very very good edge.

The serrations thing has been around a while, but butchers don't abide by it, nor do fish cutters. If an edge is polished well, it will absolutely cut better than an edge with serrations on meat and vegetables, and on a truly sharp and slightly angled knife like a japanese knife, it will cut bread better than a bread knife, too, with a polished edge. It's my opinion that a bread knife exists only to allow people to cut bread without having the ability to sharpen their chef's knife or parer. My chef's and paring knives cut bread better than any bread knife I've used, and they are both thin edges that are polished.

Edges at 60+ hardness will nick with a polished steel, and will also not strop as well as an edge that's 57/58 hardness.

A person using a polished steel needs to have backup abrasives, though, because edge damage on a german knife accumulates pretty quickly and sharpening will have to be done several times a year even on a properly used knife. A well cared-for japanese knife will need only to be sharpened probably about the same number of times, and very little sharpening each time - no steeling between. Damage from a ham-handed user can be catastrophic if they bang the edge into things, though, or try to scrape something hard with the knife.

[george wilson]

I haven't actually used a scythe,though we did have to make a bunch for the agricultural program in the museum. I'd much rather have to make a bunch of them than use them to make a living!!:)

[David Weaver]

The austrian types look relatively pleasant to use, you can still stand upright. The english types look like a self torture device.

The austrian scythe blades are cheap enough that if I had anywhere to use one, I'd buy one just for play. A peining block could be made pretty easily, and used with any moderately heavy polished hammer.

[paul cottingham]

My dad used a scythe on our farm to chop feed for our sheep. He sharpened it with an oil stone he never oiled. The blade and the stone were still going strong (although somewhat dished!) 25 years later.
now I wish I still had it to chop down dandelions and weeds in my backyard....

[paul cottingham]

[QUOTE=george wilson;2285879]So,what's the question? A knife steel(Probably labeled R. DICK) is as hard as a file,and is a file,in fact,with longitudinal teeth. I doubt seriously that they had them in biblical times. But,the bible has been translated a number of times. The one we use was translated in the 17th. C.. I don't know if they had knife steels at that time either. The Romans did have FILES made of steel . a file will sharpen iron,of course. This could be what the reference to iron sharpening iron is. Hardly anyone back then would have known what steel really was,as opposed to iron. The whole thing could just be a mis translation.[/QUOTE

My degree is in Roman history, with a specialization in Roman technology. The Romans never made super strong steel, I don't believe, nor would they have made particularly smooth steel, either. I don't believe they had the technology. In fact, steel was likely more of a happy accident. The Romans weren't particularly strong on scientific method.
I had never heard they made files, George. Learn something new every day.

[Moses Yoder]

Well, now I know more about steels and sharpening iron with iron than ever before. I cannot find any reference in the TOS to the idea that we are not allowed to quote books.

[george wilson]

I did not mean to say the Romans made super steels. Their steel was made by folding iron repeatedly in a charcoal file as far as I have been able to find out. It was a chancy business,heavily dependent upon personal skill. The Viking s had swords made from 1085 steel,which has been tested as such. It is still the same carbon content steel sold for making springs(which a sword needs to be). Some of their best swords were imported by trading from central Europe(I forget where offhand). They were not too far from the Roman period. The Romans of course had planes that were capable of planing wood(however inefficiently).

Even in the 18th. C.,steel making in England was pretty much an art. 19th. C.,too. Crucible steel was invented by Huntsman in that period. The rest was heavily casehardened steel rods welded together and called "shear steel." If it was folded again and re welded,a higher grade called "Double Shear Steel" was made. It was composed of hard and soft layers. Huntsman was a watch maker who was frustrated by springs made of shear steels,which broke or bent. He homogenized steel for the first time by cooking it in crucibles. This was still done until fairly recent times in England. If you see an old tool that says "Cast steel",it is crucible steel that was cast into a octagonal mold,then made into objects. Indeed ,the French sent Reamour,a wealthy nobleman who was interested in technical things,to spy on the English. They did not know how the English made steel. They relied upon natural deposits for their steel. I read Reamour's Memoirs years ago. A very interesting book. He never did actually find out for certain what the English did. But,he did figure it out on his own very accurately(though I don't recall if his methods were actually put into use in France. Reamour came up with a method for making "wrought iron" out of cast iron. He baked cast iron at high heat in an oven till the carbon was driven off. We call it malleable iron today. At that time,objects chiseled from wrought iron were highly valuable,often worth their weight in gold,because it was hard to do. He thought he had hit upon a gold mine of valuable products with that invention.

I am suspicious that the Ancient Greeks even had files. How did they manage to make the gears on the Antikithera mechanism without files? Or do other operations? Possibly with shaped slip stones? It would have been uphill all the way on an already difficult and highly ingenious mechanism. We have no idea what has been lost through time and wars,and corrosion.

It wasn't until about 1830 that much began to be understood about chemistry. And little was known by then.

The Romans also had nuts and bolts,too. This means they had to have the necessary tools to make threads and to thread internal threads too. This implies that steel of decent (usable)quality was made somehow. I'm sure it wasn't common,and was heavily dependent upon personal skill,empirical knowledge,and a lot of superstition thrown in ,as was English steel making even in the 18th. C.. They didn't really know what it was that made the steel hard. The stuff they threw in happily included carbonaceous material like wood. They threw in other stuff like urine of a red haired boy,urine of a wine drinking Friar,etc..

[Cody Kemble]

I just saw someone using a scythe the other day to trim longer grass by their mailbox.

[Kevin Godshall]

I'll throw my 2 cents in here for consideration:

I've worked over 15 years in high production meat processing work. I cut my teeth in a facility that dressed 630 hogs per hour. I am very familiar with sharpening knives and with using a steel. Here is a YouTube vid of Alton Brown demonstrating the "basics" of steeling a knife: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lRUYAgrsoLw There are many ways to hold a steel and get the same results (dependent upon environment, skill level, comfort, etc). Alton shows a way that keeps one from getting their thumb sliced off. (Watch Moses' vid, to see a thumb in the "danger zone" and how it could easily be cut.) Anyway, enough on that part of the subject......

I also have taught Sunday School, and occasionally fill pulpits as needed when pastors are away. Here is how I approach understanding this text:

In the original Hebrew language, as written in the book of Proverbs, the word "sharpen" (Strong's H2300), can mean "to sharpen" or "to keep keen".

In the second part of the text, the word "countenance" (Strong's H6440) literally means "face".

Therefore, a better translation of this text may literally be: As iron keeps iron keen, so a man keeps the face of his friend keen.

Thinking about this practically, when one is having a bad day, or things aren't going right, and you encounter a true friend, isn't that act enough to bring a smile to your face, or to change your mood from one of dismay and despair, to one of hope and comfort?

What I take away from this passage, is akin to being salt and light- Our lives should have an impact on those we come in contact with. As salt seasons and preserves, so our friendship should be so genuine and meaningful, that we have an immediate and positive on impact of those that we are privileged to journey with through this world.

[Dave Anderson NH]

Biblical references to woodworking and related subjects are certainly allowed since they present a historical perspective. This is no different than a reference to any other historical text or a video showing historically correct procedures. Equally allowed would be a reference to a Hindu , Muslim, or Buddhist quotation as long as it was germane to the topic. How often do we refer to the Zen of working with wood?

What is not allowed is discussion or argument about religion in general or any specific religion. With people of every ilk and persuasion at SMC this becomes very divisive and brings nothing but bad feelings. There are plenty of other places on the internet other than SMC to discuss, cogitate, or argue religious beliefs.

[David Weaver]

If anyone out there can find a smooth steel for their german or inexpensive kitchen knives, they'll find value in it (the thread), too.

I use the F.Dick packing house polished steel, which is the only inexpensive non-serrated steel I've ever found. it's close enough to polished that if you weren't satisfied with it as it comes, you could finish the job with a buffing wheel.

It allows you to get a shaving sharp edges off of something otherwise not very fine finishing (like a 1000 grit diamond stone, which is probably about the easiest thing to keep in the kitchen).

I don't sharpen any of my friends' faces, but i do sharpen their knives sometimes.

[george wilson]

Back in the 60's,when I taught shop a few years,I used a Proto screwdriver for a burnisher,having little money for equipment. My students learned to chisel cut sawmill bandsaw blades and make them into scrapers. I never saw students get so excited as they did oner the big fluffy shavings they were able to make with their scrapers.

They made the work benches,too. And,I can tell you,they did not deface them either,like ordinary students who get handed everything. They were very proud of those benches.

[Mel Fulks]

I've never seen a steel like you describe, David. Interesting. I once worked with a guy who used agate jewelers burnishers on his woodworking scrapers as well as gold leaf. Would an agate burnisher work as well on a kitchen knife as the steel ?

[Kevin Godshall]

I use the F.Dick packing house polished steel, which is the only inexpensive non-serrated steel I've ever found. it's close enough to polished that if you weren't satisfied with it as it comes, you could finish the job with a buffing wheel.

I switched over to an F. Dick Poliron when I made the switch from sharpening my knives on stones, to an abrasive flap wheel.

We used to buy the steels and then rub them down to whatever polish we liked on a red brick, sawing it back and forth until we got it where we liked it. Using a wheel could make the steel too hot, losing it's temper and causing it to rust.

[David Weaver]

Anyone with a hobbyist type buffer shouldn't have any problem with building up that much heat, though. You'd have to get the whole rod to 400 degrees or so in a spot, which is something you're very unlikely to do. Even if it's 300, there's no thin part to take too much heat, possibly the very tip? Even at that, the very tip doesn't get used, it's tapered away.

I do make an assumption, though, that someone would work the steel around on the buffing wheel and not hold a point of it against something for a minute or two and push pressure on it.

What level of polish do you find on the oval poliron type steels? The finish on the packing house steel is something that improves a 1000 grit stone a great deal, but it is not fully polished in a mirror sense.

(I didn't polish mine, it does well enough stock)

[Kevin Godshall]

The Poliron has almost a mirror finish to it. http://www.knifemerchant.com/product.asp?productID=1397 It is smooth-smooth and takes some getting used to. Even some seasoned meatcutters that I worked with, had trouble with continually "rolling their edges over" when trying to use it, and not being used to it.

The Dickoron steels always seemed to be a bit too coarse, and that is when we would start working them on the bricks. I've personally seen guys try to take the "short cut" approach and they ended up with rusty steels which equals "scrap".

We would rub them out a bit each night, and test them the next day. If they weren't quite "there" yet, we would rub some more. Eventually, you ended up with a steel hanging from your belt that you KNEW could keep your knife razor sharp all day long, even when gutting 300 pigs an hour ( I do not lie- 2 men would "open" the hogs (break aitch bones/slit bellies/pull intestinal tracts) and 2 men would pull guts (both red and white halves) with the line running @ 626 hogs per hour. ) Keeping a sharp knife wasn't a luxury, it was survival. (And those are 2 jobs that were easy on a knife edge- ask the guys who used to bone the headmeat.........)

EDIT: One last thing: The best steel that I learned on as a newbie, and the best steel I own that everyone wanted to buy off of me, was my F. Dick 2000 Flat Steel. Even after being out of the business for a few years and not having quite the "touch", this steel always produces results. Costs a bit more, but it saved my hide more than a few times. http://www.knifemerchant.com/product.asp?productID=1384&gclid=CI_cl-fQu78CFabm7AodvD8A8w

All done now. I promise.

[David Weaver]

I can't imagine that the people in control of the line dials would go any slower than they absolutely had to.

I never worked in a meat plant, but I worked on an assembly line in a cabinet factory. The line moved as fast as they could get it to go, and they often told us that we should be working 10% faster because the person who sold them the line told them it should be able to assemble and pack 70 cabinets an hour. When I started there, we were doing 55 (I worked there summers). When I left, we were doing 73 - it was pretty tough to keep up, and you didn't want to be the person hitting the emergency stop because you got behind at your station.

I'd rather assemble cabinets than gut pigs, though! I'm sure it was much easier.

[John Coloccia]

I believe the Philistines had primitive files, and that's almost certainly the kind of action the verse is referring to...probably to do some rough work, remove nicks/rust and things like that if I had to guess. It could also well be not necessarily a mistranslation as much as a misunderstanding, or simply a bit of poetic license, stemming from the fact that, as George said, the Philistines possessed the technology to do such things. The fact that they may not have used an actual piece of iron exactly to sharpen as we consider it is probably not as important as the idea the verse was trying to convey. Anyhow, my opinion is that it's probably a mixture of a misunderstanding of the technology, a bit of poetic license, and a bit of truth.

[Harold Burrell]

On more than one occasion in this thread there has been statements made to the possibility that here was some sort of mistranslation in the text of the verse referenced in the OP.

Unfortunately...try as I might...I cannot seem to come up with any way to refute that idea without it coming off as "religious".

However, if others here are allowed to question the authenticity of the text, I feel as though I would not be "crossing the line" if I tell you that the wording and translation are correct and reliable. :)

[Dave Anderson NH]

Harold, I think you misunderstand the message that folks are trying to get across. The text might be translated correctly, but it is quite likely that the translators were scholars. During much of the time that translations were made scholars were sheltered from those doing any type of manual labor and were unlikely to understand very much about any of the trades. Think of cloistered monks and illuminated texts. Alternately think of Diderot's encyclopedia and the huge number of technical errors in describing many of the trades and what they did.

[Harold Burrell]

Harold, I think you misunderstand the message that folks are trying to get across. The text might be translated correctly, but it is quite likely that the translators were scholars. During much of the time that translations were made scholars were sheltered from those doing any type of manual labor and were unlikely to understand very much about any of the trades. Think of cloistered monks and illuminated texts. Alternately think of Diderot's encyclopedia and the huge number of technical errors in describing many of the trades and what they did.

Oh...I apologize if my post was not clear. The translation is reliable, because the Hebrew text is clear. In other words, the Hebrew clearly reads "iron sharpens iron". Granted, the writer of Proverbs (Solomon) might not have been well learned in the art of sharpening...but he was anything but cloistered. :) He had grown up in a Warrior's household.

My point is, I think the text and it's history have merit. It is more likely that we are not totally familiar with the implements and methods to which he is referring...and less likely that there was some sort of error in the original -> transmission -> translation of the text.

I just find it interesting that we are so quick to question (and try to conform) one of the oldest written records of a sharpening method, simply because we don't think they had that technology. What do we base those assumptions on? How and why would we think that they did not have the stuff to do that...when we have a written, contemporary document that says otherwise?

Could it have been a technical error in describing a trade? Possibly. Then again, possibly not.

Here is another historical reference that was written a generation or so before the one in Proverbs:
1Sa 13:20-21
(20)
But all the Israelites went down to the Philistines, to sharpen every man his share, and his coulter, and his axe, and his mattock.
(21)
Yet they had a file for the mattocks, and for the coulters, and for the forks, and for the axes, and to sharpen the goads.

:)