Deuteronomy 14:1-29
1 Ye are the children of the LORD your God: ye shall not cut yourselves, nor make any baldness between your eyes for the dead.
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.
3 Thou shalt not eat any abominable thing.
4 These are the beasts which ye shall eat: the ox, the sheep, and the goat,
5 The hart, and the roebuck, and the fallow deer, and the wild goat, and the pygarg, and the wild ox, and the chamois.
6 And every beast that parteth the hoof, and cleaveth the cleft into two claws, and cheweth the cud among the beasts, that ye shall eat.
7 Nevertheless these ye shall not eat of them that chew the cud, or of them that divide the cloven hoof; as the camel, and the hare, and the coney: for they chew the cud, but divide not the hoof; therefore they are unclean unto you.
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 carcase.
9 These ye shall eat of all that are in the waters: all that have fins and scales shall ye eat:
10 And whatsoever hath not fins and scales ye may not eat; it is unclean unto you.
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.
19 And every creeping thing that flieth is unclean unto you: they shall not be eaten.
20 But of all clean fowls ye may eat.
21 Ye shall not eat of any thing that dieth of itself: thou shalt give it unto the stranger that is in thy gates, that he may eat it; or thou mayest sell it unto an alien: for thou art an holy people unto the LORD thy God. Thou shalt not seethe a kid in his mother's milk.
22 Thou shalt truly tithe all the increase of thy seed, that the field bringeth forth year by year.
23 And thou shalt eat before the LORD thy God, in the place which he shall choose to place his name there, the tithe of thy corn, of thy wine, and of thine oil, and the firstlings of thy herds and of thy flocks; that thou mayest learn to fear the LORD thy God always.
24 And if the way be too long for thee, so that thou art not able to carry it; or if the place be too far from thee, which the LORD thy God shall choose to set his name there, when the LORD thy God hath blessed thee:
25 Then shalt thou turn it into money, and bind up the money in thine hand, and shalt go unto the place which the LORD thy God shall choose:
26 And thou shalt bestow that money for whatsoever thy soul lusteth after, for oxen, or for sheep, or for wine, or for strong drink, or for whatsoever thy soul desireth:a and thou shalt eat there before the LORD thy God, and thou shalt rejoice, thou, and thine household,
27 And the Levite that is within thy gates; thou shalt not forsake him; for he hath no part nor inheritance with thee.
28 At the end of three years thou shalt bring forth all the tithe of thine increase the same year, and shalt lay it up within thy gates:
29 And the Levite, (because he hath no part nor inheritance with thee,) and the stranger, and the fatherless, and the widow, which are within thy gates, shall come, and shall eat and be satisfied; that the LORD thy God may bless thee in all the work of thine hand which thou doest.
Deuteronomy 14:1. Ye shall not cut yourselves for the dead. Jeremiah mentions the not paying these honours to the dead as a punishment: Jeremiah 16:6. It was once a general custom among the heathen, for the males and females to cut off their hair and bury it with a deceased father. The Israelites, it is evident, in adolatrous times, adopted almost every custom of the heathens. Hence, says the prophet, Jeremiah 48:37, when alluding to the destruction of his country by the Babylonians, “Every head shall be bald, and every beard clipped: upon all hands shall be cuttings, and upon the loins sackcloth.” The Arabs have long been noticed for cutting their flesh for the dead, and following the corpse with dreadful shrieks. The native Irish retain something of this custom still. About every two minutes, while following a corpse, the women raise a sudden and terrific yell; and in the intervals between the cries, they amuse themselves by looking at the shop- windows. The people of Otaheite carry these customs to great excess. See Wilson's Missionary Voyage.
Deuteronomy 14:5. The hart. Every species of the deer is implied. The wild ox is the buffalo, a native of all the continents. The pygarg is a species of the goat, but the chamois is difficult to ascertain. Bochart calls it the Rupicapra, or goat that skips on the rock, as a roe in the plains. It has a slender back, and upright horns, hooked at the end. Behind each ear there is a large orifice in the skin, the forehead is white, along the cheeks is a dusky bar, the rest of the body is of a deep brown colour. The tail is short, the hoofs are long and much divided. The difficulty of identifying what animal is here meant, arises from the Septuagint, and most other versions having rendered it the Camelopard. This latter animal has short straight horns covered with hair, in the forehead there is a tubercle about two inches high, resembling a third horn. The height from the crown of the head to the soles of the forefeet is usually seventeen feet, and from the top of the rump to the bottom of the hind feet only nine. The length of the body is seven, and from the withers to the loins only six feet. Pennant. Hence, as this is a scarce animal, the chamois seems more likely to be the true reading.
Deuteronomy 14:6. Cheweth the cud. Oxen, sheep, &c. for want of the upper fore- teeth, cannot perfect the mastication of their food, and the operation would keep them too long upon their feet. Hence the Creator has provided them with an upper stomach, that reposing on the grass they may chew their food small at ease.
Deuteronomy 14:13. The glede. See Leviticus 11. Though it is not possible to identify some species of the animals and fowls mentioned by Moses; yet no difficulty arises to the conscience of a Jew, for the genus or class is well understood.
Deuteronomy 14:19. Every creeping thing that flieth. The bat is here included, of which the English seems the smallest species. They bring forth young, and give suck like the mouse; but otherwise they approach the character of birds. They fly at night, when their enemies are asleep.
Deuteronomy 14:23. The tithe of thy corn. See on Deuteronomy 26:12.
REFLECTIONS.
The distinction between meats clean and unclean, seems to have existed from the first permission of man to eat flesh. Attention was paid to it when the animals were selected for the ark. Providence, ever watchful of human happiness, here prescribes the more wholesome animals for food. It is a fact sufficiently attested that scrophulous and other kindred diseases prevail chiefly in large towns and manufacturing districts, where there is a greater consumption of the less nutricious kinds of animal and vegetable food, than in more healthy parts of the country: and if providence have expressed its care over man in this way, let us assiduously seek for the soul the wholesome food of sound doctrine and evangelical truth, then shall we grow thereby to the health of everlasting life. For the kingdom of God is not in meats and drinks, but righteousness, peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost.