Straw

Straw appears in scripture in two ordinary uses — feeding livestock and binding bricks — and once as the figure in a vision of restored peace.

Fodder for Animals

When Abraham's servant arrives at Bethuel's house, hospitality is extended to the camels first: "And the man came into the house, and he ungirded the camels. And he gave straw and fodder for the camels, and water to wash his feet and the feet of the men who were with him" (Gen 24:32). Straw is paired with fodder as the standard provision for travel-weary animals.

The same association underwrites Isaiah's picture of the holy mountain in the age to come. The wolf and lamb are pastured together, and the predator's diet is converted: "the lion will eat straw like the ox" (Isa 65:25). The image works because straw is precisely what an ox eats — the lion's appetite is reduced to ordinary herbivore fare, and the threat collapses with it. The verse closes: "They will not hurt nor destroy in all my holy mountain, says Yahweh."

Material for Bricks

In Egypt, straw is the binder mixed into mud bricks. Pharaoh orders it withheld from the Hebrew laborers as a tightening of the screw: "You⁺ will no more give the people straw to make bricks, as before: let them go and gather straw for themselves" (Ex 5:7). The quota stays the same; the supply line is cut. Gathering the straw becomes one more thing the workers must do without losing a brick from the daily count.