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Selected Verse: Leviticus 11:13 - King James
Verse |
Translation |
Text |
Le 11:13 |
King James |
And these are they which ye shall have in abomination among the fowls; they shall not be eaten, they are an abomination: the eagle, and the ossifrage, and the ospray, |
Summary Of Commentaries Associated With The Selected Verse
A Commentary, Critical, Practical, and Explanatory on the Old and New Testaments, by Robert Jamieson, A.R. Fausset and David Brown [1882] |
these are they which ye shall have in abomination among the fowls--All birds of prey are particularly ranked in the class unclean; all those which feed on flesh and carrion. No less than twenty species of birds, all probably then known, are mentioned under this category, and the inference follows that all which are not mentioned were allowed; that is, fowls which subsist on vegetable substances. From our imperfect knowledge of the natural history of Palestine, Arabia, and the contiguous countries at that time, it is not easy to determine exactly what some of the prohibited birds were; although they must have been all well known among the people to whom these laws were given.
the ossifrage--Hebrew, "bone-breaker," rendered in the Septuagint "griffon," supposed to be the GypÅtos barbatus, the Lammer Geyer of the Swiss--a bird of the eagle or vulture species, inhabiting the highest mountain ranges in Western Asia as well as Europe. It pursues as its prey the chamois, ibex, or marmot, among rugged cliffs, till it drives them over a precipice--thus obtaining the name of "bone-breaker."
the ospray--the black eagle, among the smallest, but swiftest and strongest of its kind. |
Notes on the Bible, by Albert Barnes, [1834] |
As far as they can be identified, the birds here mentioned are such as live upon animal food. They were those which the Israelites might have been tempted to eat, either from their being easy to obtain, or from the example of other nations, and which served as types of the entire range of prohibited kinds.
Lev 11:13
The eagle - Rather, the great vulture, which the Egyptians are known to have ranked as the first among birds. Compare Sa2 1:23; Psa 103:5; Pro 23:5, etc.
The Ossifrage, or bone-breaker, was the lammer-geyer, and the "ospray" (a corruption of ossifrage) the sea-eagle.
Lev 11:14
The vulture - Rather, the (black) kite Isa 34:15 : "the kite," rather the red kite, remarkable for its piercing sight Job 28:7.
Lev 11:15
Every raven after his kind - i. e. the whole family of corvidae.
Lev 11:16
And the owl ... - Rather, "and the ostrich, and the owl, and the gull, and the hawk," etc.
Lev 11:18
The swan - More probably the ibis, the sacred bird of the Egyptians. "The gier eagle" is most likely the Egyptian vulture, a bird of unprepossessing appearance and disgusting habits, but fostered by the Egyptians as a useful scavenger.
Lev 11:19
The heron ... the lapwing - Rather, the great plover the hoopoe, so called from its peculiar cry. |
Commentary on the Old Testament, by Carl Friedrich Keil and Franz Delitzsch [1857-78] |
(cf. Deu 14:11-18). Of birds, twenty varieties are prohibited, including the bat, but without any common mark being given; though they consist almost exclusively of birds which live upon flesh or carrion, and are most of them natives of Western Asia.
(Note: The list is "hardly intended to be exhaustive, but simply mentions those which were eaten by others, and in relation to which, therefore, it was necessary that the Israelites should receive a special prohibition against eating them" (Knobel). Hence in Deuteronomy Moses added the ראה and enumerated twenty-one varieties; and on doubt, under other circumstances, he could have made the list still longer. In Deu 14:11 צפּור is used, as synonymous with עוף in Deu 14:20.)
The list commences with the eagle, as the king of the birds. Nesher embraces all the species of eagles proper. The idea that the eagle will not touch carrion is erroneous. According to the testimony of Arabian writers (Damiri in Bochart, ii. p. 577), and several naturalists who have travelled (e.g., Forskal. l.c. p. 12, and Seetzen, 1, p. 379), they will eat carrion if it is still fresh and not decomposed; so that the eating of carrion could very properly be attributed to them in such passages as Job 39:30; Pro 30:17, and Mat 24:28. But the bald-headedness mentioned in Mic 1:16 applies, not to the true eagle, but to the carrion-kite, which is reckoned, however, among the different species of eagles, as well as the bearded or golden vulture. The next in the list is peres, from paras = parash to break, ossifragus, i.e., wither the bearded or golden vulture, gypaetos barbatus, or more probably, as Schultz supposes, the sea-eagle, which may have been the species intended in the γρύψ = γρυπαίετος of the lxx and gryphus of the Vulgate, and to which the ancients seem sometimes to have applied the name ossifraga (Lucret. v. 1079). By the next, עזניּה, we are very probably to understand the bearded or golden vulture. For this word is no doubt connected with the Arabic word for beard, and therefore points to the golden vulture, which has a tuft of hair or feathers on the lower beak, and which might very well be associated with the eagles so far as the size is concerned, having wings that measure 10 feet from tip to tip. As it really belongs to the family of cultures, it forms a very fitting link of transition to the other species of vulture and falcon (Lev 11:14). דּאה (Deut. דּיּה, according to a change which is by no means rare when the aleph stands between two vowels: cf. דּואג in Sa1 21:8; Sa1 22:9, and דּויג in Sa1 22:18, Sa1 22:22), from דּאה to fly, is either the kite, or the glede, which is very common in Palestine (v. Schubert, Reise iii. p. 120), and lives on carrion. It is a gregarious bird (cf. Isa 34:15), which other birds of prey are not, and is used by many different tribes as food (Oedmann, iii. p. 120). The conjecture that the black glede-kite is meant, - a bird which is particularly common in the East, - and that the name is derived from דּאה to be dark, is overthrown by the use of the word למינהּ in Deuteronomy, which shows that דאה is intended to denote the whole genus. איּה, which is referred to in Job 28:7 as sharp-sighted, is either the falcon, several species of which are natives of Syria and Arabia, and which is noted for its keen sight and the rapidity of its flight, or according to the Vulgate, Schultz, etc., vultur, the true vulture (the lxx have Ἰκτίν, the kite, here, and γρύψ, the griffin, in Deut. and Job), of which there are three species in Palestine (Lynch, p. 229). In Deu 14:13 הראה is also mentioned, from ראה to see. Judging from the name, it was a keen-sighted bird, either a falcon or another species of vulture (Vulg. ixion). |
Explanatory Notes on the Whole Bible, by John Wesley [1754-65] |
Among the fowls - The true signification of the following Hebrew words is now lost, as the Jews at this day confess; which not falling out without God's singular providence may intimate the cessation of this law, the exact observation whereof since Christ came is become impossible. In general, this may be observed, that the fowls forbidden in diet, are all either ravenous and cruel, or such as delight in the night and darkness, or such as feed upon impure things; and so the signification of these prohibitions is manifest, to teach men to abominate all cruelty or oppression, and all works of darkness and filthiness. The ossifrage and the osprey - Two peculiar kinds of eagles, distinct from that which being the chief of its kind, is called by the name of the whole kind. |
Adam Clarke Commentary on the Whole Bible - Published 1810-1826 |
And these - among the fowls - the eagle - נשר nesher, from nashar, to lacerate, cut, or tear to pieces; hence the eagle, a most rapacious bird of prey, from its tearing the flesh of the animals it feeds on; and for this purpose birds of prey have, in general, strong, crooked talons and a hooked beak. The eagle is a cruel bird, exceedingly ravenous, and almost insatiable.
The ossifrage - Or bone-breaker, from os, a bone, and frango, I break, because it not only strips off the flesh, but breaks the bone in order to extract the marrow. In Hebrew it is called פרס peres, from paras, to break or divide in two, and probably signifies that species of the eagle anciently known by the name of ossifraga, and which we render ossifrage.
Ospray - עזניה ozniyah, from עזן azan, to be strong, vigorous; generally supposed to mean the black eagle, such as that described by Homer, Iliad. lib. xxi., ver. 252.
Αιετου οιματ' εχων μελανος, του θηρητηρος,
Ὁς θ' αμα καρτιστος τε και ωκιστος πετεηνων.
"Having the rapidity of the black eagle, that bird of prey, at once the swiftest and the strongest of the feathered race." Among the Greeks and Romans the eagle was held sacred, and is represented as carrying the thunderbolts of Jupiter. This occurs so frequently, and is so well known, that references are almost needless. See Scheuchzer. |
19 And the stork, the heron after her kind, and the lapwing, and the bat.
18 And the swan, and the pelican, and the gier eagle,
16 And the owl, and the night hawk, and the cuckow, and the hawk after his kind,
15 Every raven after his kind;
7 There is a path which no fowl knoweth, and which the vulture's eye hath not seen:
15 There shall the great owl make her nest, and lay, and hatch, and gather under her shadow: there shall the vultures also be gathered, every one with her mate.
14 And the vulture, and the kite after his kind;
5 Wilt thou set thine eyes upon that which is not? for riches certainly make themselves wings; they fly away as an eagle toward heaven.
5 Who satisfieth thy mouth with good things; so that thy youth is renewed like the eagle's.
23 Saul and Jonathan were lovely and pleasant in their lives, and in their death they were not divided: they were swifter than eagles, they were stronger than lions.
13 And these are they which ye shall have in abomination among the fowls; they shall not be eaten, they are an abomination: the eagle, and the ossifrage, and the ospray,
13 And the glede, and the kite, and the vulture after his kind,
7 There is a path which no fowl knoweth, and which the vulture's eye hath not seen:
15 There shall the great owl make her nest, and lay, and hatch, and gather under her shadow: there shall the vultures also be gathered, every one with her mate.
22 And David said unto Abiathar, I knew it that day, when Doeg the Edomite was there, that he would surely tell Saul: I have occasioned the death of all the persons of thy father's house.
18 And the king said to Doeg, Turn thou, and fall upon the priests. And Doeg the Edomite turned, and he fell upon the priests, and slew on that day fourscore and five persons that did wear a linen ephod.
9 Then answered Doeg the Edomite, which was set over the servants of Saul, and said, I saw the son of Jesse coming to Nob, to Ahimelech the son of Ahitub.
8 And David said unto Ahimelech, And is there not here under thine hand spear or sword? for I have neither brought my sword nor my weapons with me, because the king's business required haste.
14 And the vulture, and the kite after his kind;
16 Make thee bald, and poll thee for thy delicate children; enlarge thy baldness as the eagle; for they are gone into captivity from thee.
28 For wheresoever the carcase is, there will the eagles be gathered together.
17 The eye that mocketh at his father, and despiseth to obey his mother, the ravens of the valley shall pick it out, and the young eagles shall eat it.
30 Her young ones also suck up blood: and where the slain are, there is she.
20 But of all clean fowls ye may eat.
11 Of all clean birds ye shall eat.
11 Of all clean birds ye shall eat.
12 But these are they of which ye shall not eat: the eagle, and the ossifrage, and the ospray,
13 And the glede, and the kite, and the vulture after his kind,
14 And every raven after his kind,
15 And the owl, and the night hawk, and the cuckow, and the hawk after his kind,
16 The little owl, and the great owl, and the swan,
17 And the pelican, and the gier eagle, and the cormorant,
18 And the stork, and the heron after her kind, and the lapwing, and the bat.