List of Animals in The Bible

Rabbit (Proverbs 30:26). — A mistranslation for coney or daman. See CHEROGRILLUS, (sup.).

Raven. — The Bible includes under this generic name a certain number of birds having more or less resemblance with the raven, such as the magpie, the jay, etc. The raven, eight species of which are found in Israel, is by far the most common of all the birds of that country, where it is with buzzards, vultures, dogs, jackals, and hyenas, an active scavenger. Its plumage is glossy black, and its habits are frequently alluded to in Bible, for instance feeding on carcasses, wandering for its precarious meals, picking out the eyes of the newly dropped or weakly animals, resorting to desolate places, etc. The raven, when no other food is nigh, not infrequently picks out grains freshly sown; hence its surname of seed-picker, spermologos, which, later on became a synonym for ragamuffin. This name, applied to St. Paul by his sceptical listeners of Athens, has become, through a mistranslation, "word-sower" in our Bibles (Acts 17:18).

Night Raven, the equivalent in Ps. ci (Hebr., cii), 7, of the Hebrew word translated in Lev., xi, 17, as screech owl, seems to mean the blue thrush (petrocynela cyanea), a well-known solitary bird of the country, which is fond of sitting alone on a roof or a rock.

Rhinoceros, Num., xxiii, 22, stands for Hebrew, re'em, and should consequently be rendered by aurochs.

Ringtail. — So D.V., Deut., xiv, 13, translates rã'ah, possibly substituted by a scribe's error for dã'ah, and very likely meaning the black kite (milvus migrans).

List of Animals in The Bible - R