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
If we turn from the Old to the New Testament, we find the same
contemptuous feeling displayed towards the Dog. It is mentioned as an
intolerable aggravation of the sufferings endured by Lazarus the
beggar as he lay at the rich man's gate, that the dogs came and licked
his sores. In several passages, the word Dog is employed as a metaphor
for scoffers, or unclean persons, or sometimes for those who did not
belong to the Church, whether Jewish or Christian. In the Sermon on
the Mount our Lord himself uses this image, "Give not that which is
holy unto dogs" (Matt. vii. 6.) In the same book, chapter xv. 26,
Jesus employs the same metaphor when speaking to the Canaanitish woman
who had come to ask him to heal her daughter: "It is not meet to take
the children's bread and cast it to dogs." And that she understood the
meaning of the words is evident from her answer, in which faith and
humility are so admirably blended. Both St. Paul and St. John employ
the word Dog in the same sense. In his epistle to the Philippians,
chapter iii. 2, St. Paul writes, "Beware of dogs, beware of evil
workers." And in the Revelation, chapter xxii. 14, these words occur:
"Blessed are they that do his commandments, that they may have right
to the tree of life, and may enter in through the gates to the city;
for without are dogs, and sorcerers, and whoremongers, and murderers,
and idolaters, and whomsoever loveth and maketh a lie."
That the dogs of ancient times formed themselves into bands just as
they do at present is evident from many passages of Scripture, among
which may be mentioned those sentences from the Psalms, wherein David
is comparing the assaults of his enemies to the attacks of the dogs
which infested the city. "Thou hast brought me into the dust of death;
for dogs have compassed me, the assembly of the wicked have enclosed
me." This passage will be better appreciated when the reader has
perused the following extract from a recent work by Signor Pierotti.
After giving a general account of the Dogs of Palestine and their
customs, he proceeds as follows:--
"In Jerusalem, and in the other towns, the dogs have an organization
of their own. They are divided into families and districts, especially
in the night time, and no one of them ventures to quit his proper
quarter; for if he does, he is immediately attacked by all the
denizens of that into which he intrudes, and is driven back, with
several bites as a reminder. Therefore, when an European is walking
through Jerusalem by night, he is always followed by a number of
canine attendants, and greeted at every step with growls and howls.
These tokens of dislike, however, are not intended for him, but for
his followers, who are availing themselves of his escort to pass
unmolested from one quarter to another.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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