Leviticus 11:31

31 These are vnclene to you amonge all that moue, and all that twych them when they be dead, shalbe vnclene vntyll the euen.

Leviticus 11:31 Meaning and Commentary

Leviticus 11:31

These are unclean to you of all that creep
Unfit for food, and not to be touched, at least when dead, as in the next clause, that is, these eight sorts of creeping things before mentioned, as the Targum of Jonathan expresses it, and these only, as Maimonides says {r}:

whosoever doth touch them when they are dead shall be unclean until
the even;
for touching them while alive did not defile, only when dead; and this the Jews interpret, while they are in the case in which they died, that is, while they are moist; for, as Ben Gersom says, if they are so dry, as that they cannot return to their moisture, they do not defile; for which reason, neither the bones, nor nails, nor nerves, nor skin of these creeping things, defile; but, they say ^F19, while the back bone is whole, and the bones cleave to it, then a creeping thing is reckoned moist, and while it is so it defiles.

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FOOTNOTES:

F18 Hilchot, Abot Hatumaot, c. 4. sect. 14.
F19 Maimon. & Bartenora in Misn. Niddah, c. 7. sect. 1.

Leviticus 11:31 In-Context

29 And these are also unclene to you amonge the thinges that crepe apon the erth: the wesell the mouse, the tode and all his kynde,

30 the hedgehogge, stellio, the licerte, the snayle and the moule.

31 These are vnclene to you amonge all that moue, and all that twych them when they be dead, shalbe vnclene vntyll the euen.

32 And what soeuer any of the dead carkesses of them fall apon, shalbe vnclene: what soeuer vessell of wodd it be, or rayment, or skynne, or bagge or what soeuer thinge it be that any worke is wroughte with all. And they shalbe plunged in the water and be vnclene vntill the eue, and then they shalbe clene agayne.

33 All maner of erthen vessell where in to any of them falleth, is vnclene with all that therein is: and ye shall breake it.