מָלַץ

# מָלַץ (malats): A Rare Hebrew Word for Smoothing The Hebrew word *malats* (H4452) appears only once in the biblical text, making it one of the rarest verbs in Scripture. Its definition—"to smooth"—suggests a physical action involving the removal of roughness or irregularities from a surface. This single occurrence severely limits our ability to determine its precise applications or metaphorical uses within biblical literature. The extreme rarity of this term presents interpretive challenges. With only one attestation, we cannot establish patterns of usage, identify related meanings, or understand how biblical authors distinguished this verb from other words associated with smoothing or polishing. The word remains largely opaque regarding its historical frequency in spoken Hebrew or whether it was already becoming obsolete by the time the biblical texts were composed. For modern readers and scholars, *malats* represents a lexical gap—we know what it means conceptually, but we have minimal evidence of how it functioned in actual biblical discourse or what objects or contexts it typically described.