Leviticus 11:10

10 But anything that doesn't have fins and scales, whether in seas or streams, whether small creatures in the shallows or huge creatures in the deeps, you are to detest.

Leviticus 11:10 Meaning and Commentary

Leviticus 11:10

And all that have not fins nor scales in the seas, and in
the rivers
Such as eels, lampreys, &c.

of all that move in the waters, and of any living thing which [is]
in the waters;
the former of these are interpreted by Aben Ezra and Ben Gersom of little fishes that have but a small body, and such as are created out of the waters; and the latter, of such as are produced of a male and female; or, as Maimonides ^F18 explains it, the one signifies the lesser creatures, such as worms and horse leeches; the other greater ones, sea beasts, as sea dogs

they shall be an abomination to you;
not only unclean, and so unfit to eat, but to be had in abhorrence and detestation, as being exceeding disagreeable and unwholesome; and, as a learned man observes ^F19, to these prohibited in general belong all those animals in lakes, rivers, or seas, which are of a slow motion, and which, because of the slow motion of their bodies, do not so well digest their food; and for that may be compared with four footed beasts that have but one belly, and so unwholesome as they.

---

FOOTNOTES:

F18 Hilchot Maacolot Asuret, l. 1. c. 2. sect. 12.
F19 Scheuchzer. ut supra, (Physic. Sacr. vol. 2.) p. 287.

Leviticus 11:10 In-Context

8 You may not eat their meat nor touch their carcasses; they are unclean to you.

9 "Among the creatures that live in the water of the seas and streams, you may eat any that have fins and scales.

10 But anything that doesn't have fins and scales, whether in seas or streams, whether small creatures in the shallows or huge creatures in the deeps, you are to detest.

11 Yes, detest them. Don't eat their meat; detest their carcasses.

12 Anything living in the water that doesn't have fins and scales is detestable to you.