Deuteronomy 14:1-21 - Arthur Peake's Commentary on the Bible

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Bible Comments

Heathen customs to be avoided.

Deuteronomy 14:1 f. Heathen mourning rites.

Deuteronomy 14:1. cut yourselves: Leviticus 19:28 *, cf. Leviticus 21:5. baldness: the custom in mourning of shaving the hair between the eyes (i.e. on the top of the forehead). These are merely extreme forms of expressing grief; but most recent scholars regard them as survivals of acts of sacrifice, the blood and the hair being offered up to heathen deities or to dead but deified ancestors (p. 110). See Jeremiah 16:6, where both these customs are mentioned without censure.

Deuteronomy 14:3-20. Living creatures which may and which may not be eaten; see Leviticus 11:2-23 * (P), with which the present section agrees closely, and Introduction to that chapter; also pp. 82f. No earlier code mentions these laws, nor have they any logical connexion with the fundamental principle of D (one sanctuary) or with Josiah's reform (2 Kings 22 f.). The Bible does not explain the origin of the distinction between clean and unclean animals beyond tracing it to the Divine command (Leviticus 11:1 f.). Very many theories have been proposed: see the Bible Dictionaries.

Deuteronomy 14:21. What is forbidden to the Israelites (animals that have died of themselves and have, therefore, the blood in them, Deuteronomy 12:23-25) may yet be offered to the sojourner (see Deuteronomy 1:16 *) or sold to a foreigner because their religion allowed the consumption of such food. Thou shalt not seethe. milk: see Exodus 23:19 * (E).

Related Commentaries of Deuteronomy 14:1

Deuteronomy 14:1-21

1 Ye are the children of the LORD your God: ye shall not cut yourselves, nor make any baldness between your eyes for the dead.

2 For thou art an holy people unto the LORD thy God, and the LORD hath chosen thee to be a peculiar people unto himself, above all the nations that are upon the earth.

3 Thou shalt not eat any abominable thing.

4 These are the beasts which ye shall eat: the ox, the sheep, and the goat,

5 The hart, and the roebuck, and the fallow deer, and the wild goat, and the pygarg, and the wild ox, and the chamois.

6 And every beast that parteth the hoof, and cleaveth the cleft into two claws, and cheweth the cud among the beasts, that ye shall eat.

7 Nevertheless these ye shall not eat of them that chew the cud, or of them that divide the cloven hoof; as the camel, and the hare, and the coney: for they chew the cud, but divide not the hoof; therefore they are unclean unto you.

8 And the swine, because it divideth the hoof, yet cheweth not the cud, it is unclean unto you: ye shall not eat of their flesh, nor touch their dead carcase.

9 These ye shall eat of all that are in the waters: all that have fins and scales shall ye eat:

10 And whatsoever hath not fins and scales ye may not eat; it is unclean unto you.

11 Of all clean birds ye shall eat.

12 But these are they of which ye shall not eat: the eagle, and the ossifrage, and the ospray,

13 And the glede, and the kite, and the vulture after his kind,

14 And every raven after his kind,

15 And the owl, and the night hawk, and the cuckow, and the hawk after his kind,

16 The little owl, and the great owl, and the swan,

17 And the pelican, and the gier eagle, and the cormorant,

18 And the stork, and the heron after her kind, and the lapwing, and the bat.

19 And every creeping thing that flieth is unclean unto you: they shall not be eaten.

20 But of all clean fowls ye may eat.

21 Ye shall not eat of any thing that dieth of itself: thou shalt give it unto the stranger that is in thy gates, that he may eat it; or thou mayest sell it unto an alien: for thou art an holy people unto the LORD thy God. Thou shalt not seethe a kid in his mother's milk.