Bible animals : $b being a description of every living creature mentioned in the Scripture, from the ape to the coral.Wood, J. G. (John George)
Religion
Bible animals : $b being a description of every living creature mentioned in the Scripture, from the ape to the coral.
Wood, J. G. (John George)
Animals in the Bible; Nature in the Bible
As he traverses the streets, he finds that all the dogs are alike, and
that all are gaunt, hungry, half starved, savage, and cowardly, more
like wolves than dogs, and quite as ready as wolves to attack when
they fancy they can do so with safety. They prowl about the streets in
great numbers, living, as they best can, on any scraps of food that
they may happen to find. They have no particular masters, and no
particular homes. Charitable persons will sometimes feed them, but
will never make companions of them, feeling that the very contact of a
dog would be a pollution. They are certainly useful animals, because
they act as scavengers, and will eat almost any animal substance that
comes in their way.
The strangest part of their character is the organization which
prevails among them. By some extraordinary means they divide the town
into districts, and not one dog ever ventures out of that particular
district to which it is attached. The boundaries, although invisible,
are as effectual as the loftiest walls, and not even the daintiest
morsel will tempt a dog to pass the mysterious line which forms the
boundary of his district. Generally, these bands of dogs are so savage
that any one who is obliged to walk in a district where the dogs do
not know him is forced to carry a stout stick for his protection. Like
their European relatives, they have great dislike towards persons who
are dressed after a fashion to which they are unaccustomed, and
therefore are sure to harass any one who comes from Europe and wears
the costume of his own country. As is customary among animals which
unite themselves in troops, each band is under the command of a single
leader, whose position is recognised and his authority acknowledged by
all the members.
These peculiarities are to be seen almost exclusively in the dogs
which run wild about the towns, because there is abundant evidence in
the Scriptures that the animal was used in a partially domesticated
state, certainly for the protection of their herds, and possibly for
the guardianship of their houses. That the Dog was employed for the
first of these purposes is shown in Job xxx. 1: "But now they that are
younger than I have me in derision, whose fathers I would have
disdained to have set with the dogs of my flock." And that the animal
was used for the protection of houses is thought by some commentators
to be shown by the well-known passage in Is. lvi. 10: "His watchmen
are blind: they are all ignorant, they are all dumb dogs, they cannot
bark; sleeping, lying down, loving to slumber." Still, it is very
probable that in this passage the reference is not made to houses, but
to the flocks and herds which these watchmen ought to have guarded.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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