Animals, Food, and Ritual Purity

1 And the Lord spoke with Moses and to Aaron, saying to them: 2 Speak with the children of Israel, saying: These are the animals which you may eat of all the beasts which are on the earth. 3 You may eat any animal among the cattle whose hoof is split completely and that chews the cud. 4 But you shall not eat these among the animals that chew the cud or have split hooves: the camel, because it chews the cud, but does not have a split hoof, it is unclean to you. 5 And the hyrax, because it chews the cud, but does not have a split hoof, is unclean to you. 6 And the hare, because it chews the cud, but does not have a split hoof, shall be unclean to you. 7 And the pig, because it has a completely split hoof but does not chew the cud, it shall be unclean to you. 8 You shall neither eat their flesh nor touch their carcasses; they are unclean to you. 9 Of everything in the waters, you may eat anything with fins and scales, whether in the seas or in the rivers. 10 But anything that does not have both fins and scales in the seas and in the rivers, including every such creeping creature of the waters, and every living animal in the waters, shall be to you an abomination. 11 They shall be an abomination to you; you shall not eat their meat, and you shall regard their carcasses as detestable; 12 anything that does not have both fins and scales in the waters is to be an abomination to you. 13 And you shall regard these as detestable among the birds; you shall not eat them, they are an abomination: the eagle, and the sea eagle, and the osprey,⁠a 14 and the kite, and the vulture, according to its kind; 15 and every raven according to its kind; 16 and the ostrich, and the night bird, and the gull, and the hawk, according to its kind; 17 and the owl, and the diving bird, and the ibis, 18 and the swan, and the green bird, and the stork, 19 and the magpie, according to its kind, and the mountain cock, and the bat. 20 Every winged thing that creeps or walks on four legs, is an abomination to you. 21 Yet you may eat these among the winged creeping creature that walks on four legs and has joints above its feet with which to leap on the ground. 22 You may eat these, the locust according to its kind, and the bald locust, and the serpent-killer according to its kind, and the grasshopper according to its kind; 23 but every other winged creeping creature having four feet is to be an abomination to you. 24 And by these you will be unclean; everyone who touches their carcasses shall be unclean until the evening. 25 And whoever carries a carcass of them, shall wash his clothes and be unclean until the evening; 26 every beast that splits the hoof, but does not have a fully split hoof, and that does not chew the cud, is to be unclean to you; whoever touches them shall be unclean. 27 And every animal that walks on its paws, of all beasts that walk on four legs, shall be unclean to you; whoever touches their carcasses shall be unclean until the evening. 28 And whoever carries their carcass shall wash his clothes and be unclean until the evening; to you they are unclean. 29 And these shall be unclean to you among the creeping creatures that move on the ground: the weasel, and the mouse, and the crocodile according to its kind, 30 and the field mouse, and the chameleon, and the newt, and the lizard, and the mole. 31 These are unclean to you of all that creep; everyone who touches them when they are dead shall be unclean until evening. 32 And anything on which one of them falls when dead shall be unclean; whether a vessel of wood, or clothing, or skin, or sack, anything used for work, must be put into water, and it shall be unclean until the evening, and must be purified. 33 If one of them falls into a clay pot, everything inside it is polluted, and you shall break the pot. 34 Any food for eating, on which water from such a vessel is poured, shall be unclean, and any drink in any such vessel shall be unclean. 35 And anything on which a part of their dead bodies may have fallen shall be unclean; oven or cooking pan, they shall be broken, they are unclean and shall be unclean to you. 36 Nevertheless, a spring or a pit where water collects, into which they may have fallen, shall be clean; but he who touches their dead bodies shall be unclean. 37 And if a part of their carcass falls on any seed intended for sowing, it is clean; 38 but if water is put on the seed, and a part of their carcass falls on it, it is unclean to you. 39 And if any animal from the cattle you may eat dies, whoever touches its carcass shall be unclean until the evening. 40 And he who eats from its carcass shall wash his clothes, and be unclean until the evening. And he who may carry its carcass shall wash his clothes, and be unclean until the evening. 41 And every creeping creature that moves on the ground is abominable, it shall not be eaten. 42 You shall not eat anything that moves on its belly, walks on four legs, or has many feet, among all the creeping creatures that move on the ground, for they are an abomination. 43 You shall not make yourselves abominable by any creeping creature that moves, nor make yourselves unclean, nor be polluted by them, so that you do not⁠b remain unclean because of them. 44 For I am the Lord your God; sanctify yourselves and be holy, for I am Holy; so that you do not contaminate your souls with any creeping creature that moves on the ground; 45 for I am the Lord who brought you up from the land of Egypt to be your God; and you shall be holy, for I am Holy. 46 This is the law of the cattle, and of the birds, and of every living animal that moves in the waters, and of every living thing that moves on the ground, 47 for making a distinction between the unclean and the clean, between the animal that may be eaten, and the animal that may not be eaten.