The biblical rod was a shepherd’s protective instrument, not a weapon

Evidence

Samuel Martin, whose 2006 book Thy Rod and Thy Staff They Comfort Me became an important reference in the evangelical reinterpretation debate, argued that the rod in Psalm 23 — “Thy rod and thy staff they comfort me” — was a shepherd’s instrument of guidance and protection rather than correction. The same instrument could not, in Martin’s reading, plausibly function as a tool of violence in one passage and of comfort in another unless we acknowledged that its function was protective throughout. — , The Rod and the Child, 8182

Categorization

• XREF: Connects to the ‘spare the rod’ hinge verse from location 8174; also echoes shepherd-imagery readings in broader pastoral literature.