Toe

The toe appears in scripture in three distinct settings. It is the third point — after the right ear and the right thumb — at which blood and oil are applied in the priestly consecration and the leper's cleansing. It is what an enemy cuts off, in the Adoni-bezek narrative, to disable a captured king. It is the count that marks the polydactyl giant of Gath at twenty-four. And in Daniel's vision of the great image, it is the toes of feet part iron and part clay that carry the interpretation of a divided kingdom.

The Great Toe in Priestly Consecration

When Aaron and his sons are set apart, the blood of the consecration ram is laid at three points on the right side of the body — the tip of the ear, the thumb, and the great toe. The instruction at Sinai names all three: "Then you will kill the ram, and take of its blood, and put it on the tip of Aaron's and his sons' right ear, and on the thumb of their right hand, and on the great toe of their right foot, and sprinkle the blood on the altar round about" (Ex 29:20). The ordination at Leviticus 8 carries the rite out, on Aaron first: "And he slew it; and Moses took of its blood, and put it on the tip of Aaron's right ear, and on the thumb of his right hand, and on the great toe of his right foot" (Le 8:23). The same hand then turns to Aaron's sons: "And he brought Aaron's sons; and Moses put of the blood on the tip of their right ear, and on the thumb of their right hand, and on the great toe of their right foot: and Moses sprinkled the blood on the altar round about" (Le 8:24). The toe stands at the foot of the three points, and the rite is incomplete until the great toe is marked.

The Great Toe in the Cleansing of the Leper

The same three-point rite reappears in the law for the leper restored to the camp, but here the marked person is the cleansed one rather than the priest. Blood from the trespass-offering comes first: "and the priest will take of the blood of the trespass-offering, and the priest will put it on the tip of the right ear of him who is to be cleansed, and on the thumb of his right hand, and on the great toe of his right foot" (Le 14:14). Then oil is laid over the same blood: "and of the rest of the oil that is in his hand will the priest put on the tip of the right ear of him who is to be cleansed, and on the thumb of his right hand, and on the great toe of his right foot, on the blood of the trespass-offering" (Le 14:17).

The poorer leper, whose offering is reduced, receives the same treatment in full. Blood is applied: "And he will kill the lamb of the trespass-offering; and the priest will take of the blood of the trespass-offering, and put it on the tip of the right ear of him who is to be cleansed, and on the thumb of his right hand, and on the great toe of his right foot" (Le 14:25). Then the oil follows, laid over "the place of the blood of the trespass-offering" (Le 14:28). What was the priestly consecration mark in Leviticus 8 becomes, here, the cleansing mark — the same body, the same liquid, the same toe.

The Cut Toes of Adoni-bezek

In Judges, the toe enters narrative as the target of war-mutilation. The men of Judah and Simeon take Adoni-bezek the Canaanite king alive: "But Adoni-bezek fled; and they pursued after him, and caught him, and cut off his thumbs and his great toes" (Jud 1:6). The disabling is precise — the same two points the Levitical rite singles out for blood, removed together. Adoni-bezek himself reads the act as poetic recompense: "And Adoni-bezek said, Seventy kings, having their thumbs and their great toes cut off, gathered [their food] under my table: as I have done, so God has repaid me. And they brought him to Jerusalem, and he died there" (Jud 1:7). The cut toe disables a king for further war and reduces him to scavenging.

The Six Toes of the Giant of Gath

The toe is also a count. In the wars between David's men and the Philistines, a polydactyl champion is named at Gath: "And there was again war at Gath, where was a man of great stature, that had on every hand six fingers, and on every foot six toes, four and twenty in number; and he also was born to the giant" (2Sa 21:20). The Chronicler preserves the same notice: "And there was again war at Gath, where was a man of great stature, whose fingers and toes were four and twenty, six [on each hand], and six [on each foot]; and he also was born to the giant" (1Ch 20:6). Twenty-four digits, twelve of them toes, mark him as one more son of the giant of Gath in the same line as Goliath.

The Toes of Iron and Clay in Daniel's Image

Outside the consecration, cleansing, mutilation, and Gath-giant clusters, the toe surfaces in Daniel as the interpretive lower limit of Nebuchadnezzar's dream-image. The image's lower body is described first: "its legs of iron, its feet part of iron, and part of clay" (Da 2:33). When Daniel reads the dream, the toes carry the political weight: "And whereas you saw the feet and toes, part of potters' clay, and part of iron, it will be a divided kingdom; but there will be in it of the strength of the iron, since you saw the iron mixed with miry clay. And as the toes of the feet were part of iron, and part of clay, so the kingdom will be partly strong, and partly broken. And whereas you saw the iron mixed with miry clay, they will mingle themselves with the seed of men; but they will not stick one to another, even as iron does not mingle with clay" (Da 2:41-43). The toes are the figure of a divided kingdom that holds iron's strength and clay's brittleness in the same body without binding them together.