Bible Animals

Adder in Wikipedia

A poisonous snake of the genus Vipera. The word, unused in the D.V., stands in the A.V. for four different Hebrew names of serpents....

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Behemoth in Wikipedia

Behemoth, is generally translated by "great beasts"; in its wider signification it includes all mammals living on earth, but in the stricter sense is applied to domesticated quadrupeds at large. However in Job, xl, 10, where it is left untranslated and considered as a proper name, it indicates a particular animal. The description of this animal has...

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Coney in Wikipedia

Cherogrillus (Leviticus 11:5; Deuteronomy 14:7), a mere transliteration of the Greek name of the porcupine, corresponds to the Hebrew shãphãn, translated, Ps. ciii (Hebr., civ), 18, by irchin, and Prov., xxx, 26, by rabbit. As St. Jerome noticed it, the shãphãn is not the porcupine, but a very peculiar animal of about the same size, dwelling among ...

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Eagle in Wikipedia

Eagle. - So is generally rendered the Hebrew, néshér, but there is a doubt as to whether the eagle or some kind of vulture is intended. It seems even probable that the Hebrews did not distinguish very carefully these different large birds of prey, and that all are spoken of as though they were of one kind. Anyway, four species of eagles are known t...

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Flock in Wikipedia

Flock. - The flocks of Israel include generally both sheep and goats: "The sheep eat only the fine herbage, whereas the goats browse on what the sheep refuse. They pasture and travel together in parallel columns, but seldom intermingle more closely, and at night they always classify themselves. The goats are for the most part black, the sheep white...

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Sparrow Hawk in Wikipedia

Sparrow Hawk (falco nisus), one of the hawks of Israel, so common that it might be regarded, in reference to the Bible, as the hawk par excellence....

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Cuckoo in Wikipedia

Cuckoo, according to some, would be the bird called in Hebrew shâhâph (Leviticus 11:16; Deuteronomy 14:15), and there reckoned among the unclean birds. Two species, the cuculus canorus, and the oxylophus glandarius live in the Holy Land; however there is little probability that the cuckoo is intended in the mentioned passages, where we should perha...

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Asp in Wikipedia

Asp. - This word, which occurs eleven times in D.V., stands for four Hebrew names: (1) Péthén [Deut., xxxii, 33; Job, xx, 14, 16; Psalms., lvii (Hebr., lviii), 5; Isaiah, xi, 8]. From several allusions both to its deadly venom (Deuteronomy 32:33), and to its use by serpent-charmers [Ps., lvii (Hebr., lviii), 5, 6], it appears that the cobra (naja ...

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Birds in Wikipedia

Bird. - No other classification of birds than into clean and unclean is given. The Jews, before the Babylonian captivity, had no domestic fowls except pigeons . Although many birds are mentioned, there occur few allusions to their habits. Their instinct of migration, the snaring or netting them, and the caging of song birds are referred to. Bird, D...

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Elephant in Wikipedia

Elephant. - We learn from Assyrian inscriptions that before the Hebrews settled in Syria, there existed elephants in that country, and Tiglath-Pileser I tells us about his exploits in elephant hunting. We do not read, however, of elephants in the Bible until the Machabean times. True, III Kings speaks of ivory, or "elephants' teeth", as the Hebrew ...

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