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by the skin of one's teeth

Barely; closely; by a narrow margin; with nothing to spare.
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“

I passed the test by the skin of my teeth.

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Submitted on September 01, 2009

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Nearby phrases

Some more phrases from our dictionary similar to by the skin of one's teeth

bury one's head in the sandchange one's mindbust one's asscaught with one's hand in the cookie jarby one's own handcash in one's chipscatch someone with one's hand in the co…caught with one's pants downbutton one's lipbust one's buttburn a hole in one's pocketburn one's fingerscatch one's deathBy the Skin of Your Teeth

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1 Comment
  • IzzyCohen
    IzzyCohen
    by/with the skin of my teeth.

    This idiom is in the bible at Job 19:20: וָא�
    תְמַלְּטָה, בְּעוֹר שִׁנָּי = and I escaped by the skin of my teeth.

    It means “barely, hardly, with difficulty” because B'3or SHinai (using 3 for the letter aiyin) is a near transliteration of the Hebrew word בְּקוֹשִׁי B'QoSHi at a time when the aiyin had a velar G/K sound. I do not know if this was an existing idiom that Job used or if his words were misunderstood during oral transmission before being written by a later scribe. 
    LikeReply1 year ago

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"by the skin of one's teeth." Phrases.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2024. Web. 22 Dec. 2024. <https://www.phrases.com/phrase/by-the-skin-of-ones-teeth_2729>.

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