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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.com | DownloadPaul Kretzmann Commentary - Deuteronomy 14:1 - 14:21
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Of Unclean Beasts
v. 1. Ye are the children of the Lord, your God, and this relation toward the covenant God made them a people of property, of God's possession, a peculiar people; ye shall not cut yourselves, make incisions in the flesh, nor make any baldness between your eyes for the dead, as a sign of mourning, Lev_19:28.
v. 2. For thou art an holy people unto the Lord, thy God, and the Lord hath chosen thee to be a peculiar people unto Himself, above all the nations that are upon the earth. For this reason the entire life of the people was to be governed by the obedience, veneration, and childlike confidence which God expected of them and which was to show itself even in the matters of every-day life.
v. 3. Thou shalt not eat any abominable thing, namely, such things as He loathed because they offended His holiness. This section is mainly a repetition of Leviticus 11.
v. 4. These are the beasts which ye shall eat, which would not bring Levitical uncleanness upon them: the ox, the sheep, and the goat,
v. 5. the hart, the common deer of Palestine, and the roebuck, or antelope, and the fallow deer, a sort of mountain sheep, and the wild goat, a species of gazelle, and the pygarg, a small gazelle, and the wild ox, and the chamois, a species of deer of the mountains.
v. 6. And every beast that parteth the hoof, and cleaveth the cleft into two claws, distinct from the front to the rear, and cheweth the cud among the beasts, that ye shall eat, whether true ruminants or not.
v. 7. Nevertheless these ye shall not eat of them that chew the cud, or of them that divide the cloven hoof: as the camel, the rear of whose padded foot is an undivided, yielding ball, and the hare, and the coney, Lev_11:5-6 : for they chew the cud, make the movements characteristic of ruminating, but divide not the hoof; therefore they are unclean unto you.
v. 8. And the swine, because it divideth the hoof, yet cheweth not the cud, it is unclean unto you; ye shall not eat of their flesh nor touch their dead carcass, Lev_11:26-27.
v. 9. These ye shall eat of all that are in the waters: all that have fins and scales shall ye eat, such animals as are commonly regarded as true fish;
v. 10. and whatsoever hath not fins and scales ye may not eat; it is unclean unto you.
v. 11. of all clean birds ye shall eat.
v. 12. But these are they of which ye shall not eat: the eagle, and the ossifrage, and the osprey,
v. 13. and the glede, and the kite, and the vulture after his kind,
v. 14. and every raven after his kind,
v. 15. and the owl, or rather, the ostrich, and the night-hawk, and the cuckoo, a species of gull, and the hawk after his kind,
v. 16. the little owl, and the great owl, or the ibis, and the swan, or rather, a species of owl,
v. 17. and the pelican, and the gier eagle, and the cormorant,
v. 18. and the stork, and the heron after her kind, and the lapwing, and the bat. Cf Lev_11:13-19, The list includes such birds and flying animals, as either tear their prey to pieces or feed on carrion and offal.
v. 19. And every creeping thing that flieth, reptiles and insects, with the exception of the locusts mentioned Lev_11:21-22, is unclean unto you; they shall not be eaten.
v. 20. But of all clean fowls ye may eat.
v. 21. Ye shall not eat of anything that dieth of itself, a beast that dies of some sickness or accident; thou shalt give it unto the stranger that is in thy gates that he may eat it, he could use it for food, if he chose; or thou mayest sell it unto an alien, a person not a member of Israel; for thou art an holy people unto the Lord, thy God, wherefore they should abstain from all foods which the Lord loathed. Thou shalt not seethe a kid in his mother's milk, Exo_23:19; Exo_34:26. The distinction between foods is no longer a matter of God's command, Act_10:15, but His warning against every form of spiritual contamination is just as strict as ever, 1Th_4:4.