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BEAR (dôb).—The Syrian bear (Ursus syriacus, Arab. [Note: Arabic.] dûbb) is still fairly common in Hermon and the Anti-Lebanon, and is occasionally found in the Lebanon and east of the Jordan; it is practically extinct in Palestine. It is smaller and of a lighter colour than the brown bear (Ursus arctos). It is a somewhat solitary animal, eating vegetables, fruit, and honey, but, when hungry, attacking sheep (1Sa_17:34-36) and occasionally, but very rarely, to-day at any rate, human beings (2Ki_2:24). The fierceness of a bear robbed of her whelps (2Sa_17:8, Pro_17:12, Hos_13:8) is well known. Next to the lion, the bear was considered the most dangerous of animals to encounter (Pro_28:15), and that it should be subdued was to be one of the wonders of the Messiah’s kingdom (Isa_11:7).
E. W. G. Masterman.