Isaiah 34:15

15 There the owl will make her nest and lay her eggs. She will hatch her young and cover them with her wings. And the buzzards will come, each one with its mate.

Isaiah 34:15 Meaning and Commentary

Isaiah 34:15

There shall the great owl make her nest
Jarchi, Kimchi, and Ben Melech, say that "kippoz" here is the same with "kippod", rendered "bittern" in ( Isaiah 34:11 ) but Aben Ezra takes them to be two different birds; it is hard to say what is designed by it. Bochart thinks that one kind of serpent is here meant, so called from its leaping up, and which may be said to make nests, lay eggs and hatch them, as follows:

and lay, and hatch, and gather under her shadow;
lay its eggs, sit upon them, and hatch them; or "break" them ^F21, that is, the eggs, by sitting on them, when the young ones spring out of them; and then being hatched, and running about, gather them under their wing, especially when in any danger:

there shall the vultures also be gathered, everyone with her mate;
which creatures usually gather together where dead carcasses lie.

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FOOTNOTES:

F21 (heqby) "et scindet", Pagninus, Montanus; "rumpet", Vatablus; "quumque eruperit", Junius & Tremellius, i.e. "pullities", so Ben Melech.

Isaiah 34:15 In-Context

13 Thorns will overrun its palaces; nettles and thistles will grow in its forts. The ruins will become a haunt for jackals and a home for owls.

14 Desert animals will mingle there with hyenas, their howls filling the night. Wild goats will bleat at one another among the ruins, and night creatures will come there to rest.

15 There the owl will make her nest and lay her eggs. She will hatch her young and cover them with her wings. And the buzzards will come, each one with its mate.

16 Search the book of the LORD, and see what he will do. Not one of these birds and animals will be missing, and none will lack a mate, for the LORD has promised this. His Spirit will make it all come true.

17 He has surveyed and divided the land and deeded it over to those creatures. They will possess it forever, from generation to generation.