Skip to content
mannafest.faith

Leviticus 11:14

in Leviticus 11

the kite, any kind of falcon,

BSB

The same verse in ASV and KJV

ASV

and the kite, and the falcon after its kind,

KJV

And the vulture, and the kite after his kind;

This verse in Leviticus 11

Commentary

6 notes on this verse

A commentator

Clement of Alexandria

The Instructor Book 3 · Written before 215.

He adds too that they are not to eat "kite or mastophage or eagle," meaning "You shall not go near those who make their livelihood by plundering others." He says other similar things under some sort of allegory.

This site's exposition

which ye shall have in abomination among the fowls

on Leviticus 11:13-23

For the fowls the chapter drops the test and gives a bare list, twenty names and no criterion, so a reader learns which birds are excluded without learning what excludes them. Several of the names are argued over in translation, and the older English renderings of cuckow, swan and lapwing are read now as the gull, the water hen and the hoopoe. The Hebrew word covers winged creatures rather than a modern class, which is why the bat closes the list at verse 19. Verses 21 and 22 hold the one permission in the chapter granted out of an abominable class, four kinds of locust with legs above their feet to leap withal, and Mark 1:6 has John the Baptist living on them.

The record, by era

The Puritans and the Awakening1 voice

And the vulture, and the kite after his kind.

The Nineteenth Century3 voices

A commentator

Adam Clarke

1762–1832

Commentary on the Bible · Written before 1832.

The vulture - דאה daah, from the root to fly, and therefore more probably the kite or glede, from its remarkable property of gliding or sailing with expanded wings through the air. The דאה daah is a different bird from the דיה daiyah, which signifies the vulture. See Bochart, vol. iii., col. 195. The kite - איה aiyah, thought by some to be the vulture, by others the merlin. Parkhurst thinks it has its name from the root אוה avah, to covet, because of its rapaciousness; some contend that the kite is meant.

A commentator

Jamieson, Fausset & Brown

1802–1910

Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)

In Egypt and perhaps in the adjoining countries also, the kite and vulture are often seen together flying in company, or busily pursuing their foul but important office of devouring the carrion and relics of putrefying flesh, which might otherwise pollute the atmosphere. after his kind--that is, the prohibition against eating it extended to the whole species.

A commentator

Jamieson, Fausset & Brown

1802–1910

Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)

proposed

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.

How the passage was read

What the Jewish commentators add

On the verses either side of this one

Of all fowls [existent], only those mentioned expressly in this section and their species — such as those concerning which it says, after his kind, 208 Verse. or after her kind. Verse.
Ramban: Spain, 1194–1270 · Ramban on Leviticus 11:13:1, via Sefaria, Commentary on the Torah by Ramban (Nachmanides). Translated and annotated by Charles B. Chavel. New York, Shilo Pub. House, 1971-1976

This section is reception history: how the passage was read and kept in the Jewish tradition. Where a reading parts from an essential of the Christian faith, the section says so at that point.

Texts and citation data: Sefaria; each excerpt follows its version’s licence. 6 further sources are cited on this chapter that carry no English text this site may quote or only restate the verse.

The words behind it

5 Hebrew words

Every Hebrew word of this verse in the order it stands, with what it means and the door to its own study. The last column counts the times a word stands in the whole Bible: the rarer the word, the more the places it appears belong together.

  • וְאֶת־and <obj.>

    veetH85310935 times

  • הַ֨דָּאָ֔הthe black kite

    hadaahH1676

  • וְאֶת־and <obj.>

    veetH85310935 times

  • הָאַיָּ֖הthe hawk

    haaiyahH344

  • לְמִינָֽהּ׃to kind its

    leminahH432731 times

A shaded row is a word that stands 400 times or fewer in the Bible.

Where this verse is studied

About Leviticus

Moses and Aaron Appear before Pharaoh, Gustave Doré, 1866. Public domain.
Moses and Aaron Appear before Pharaoh, Gustave Doré, 1866. Public domain.

This page draws on Adam Clarke, Commentary on the Bible; Clement of Alexandria, The Instructor Book 3; Jamieson, Fausset & Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible; John Gill, Exposition of the Old Testament (1748-1763) and Keil and Delitzsch, Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament: The Pentateuch.