Ye shall therefore put difference between clean beasts and
unclean
The ten clean ones, as Aben Ezra observes, and all the rest that are unclean, according to the law before given, ( Leviticus 11:3-8 ) , by using the one for food, and not the other, and so the Targum of Jonathan, ye shall separate between the beast which is fit for food, and that which is not fit for food: and between unclean fowls and clean;
and which the same Targum interprets, what is unfit to eat and what is fit, even all that are particularly mentioned as unclean, and not fit for food, in ( Leviticus 11:13-19 ) and all the rest not excepted to as clean and fit for food, which was one way and means God made use of to separate them from other nations, and so preserve them from their idolatrous and evil works: and ye shall not make your souls abominable by beast, or by fowl, or
by any manner of living thing that creepeth on the ground;
that is, by eating them, contrary to the command of God, which would make them abominable in his sight; see ( Leviticus 11:43 ) ; every sin or transgression of this law being so to him: which I have separated from you as unclean;
which by law he had commanded them to abstain from the use of, as clean, and not fit to be eaten.