Leviticus 11:8

8 You are not to eat meat from these or touch their carcasses; they are unclean for you.

Leviticus 11:8 Meaning and Commentary

Leviticus 11:8

Of their flesh shall ye not eat
Meaning, not of swine only, but of the camel, coney, and hare:

and their carcass shall ye not touch;
which must not be understood of touching them in any sense; for then it would have been unlawful for a Jew to have rode upon a camel, or to take out and make use of hog's lard in medicine; but of touching them in order to kill them, and prepare them for food, and eat them; and indeed all unnecessary touching of them is forbidden, lest it should bring them to the eating of them; though perhaps it may chiefly respect the touching of them dead:

they [are] unclean to you:
one and all of them; for as this was said of each of them in particular, so now of all of them together; and which holds good of all wild creatures not named, to whom the description above belongs, and which used to be eaten by other nations; some of which were called Pamphagi, from eating all sorts, and others Agriophagi, from eating wild creatures, as lions, panthers, elephants {l}

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FOOTNOTES:

F12 Plin. l. 6. c. 30. Solinus, c. 43.

Leviticus 11:8 In-Context

6

7 while the pig is unclean for you, because, although it has a separate and completely divided hoof, it doesn't chew the cud.

8 You are not to eat meat from these or touch their carcasses; they are unclean for you.

9 "'Of all the things that live in the water, you may eat these: anything in the water that has fins and scales, whether in seas or in rivers -these you may eat.

10 But everything in the seas and rivers without both fins and scales, of all the small water-creatures and of all the living creatures in the water, is a detestable thing for you.