Milk IS used as a drink with meals (Gn 18', Ezk 25^), and so is coupled with Avine (Ca 5', Is 55J). When the pasturage is good, sweet milk is still handed round after an Arab meal. It is also offered as refreshment to travellers. Jael opened for Sisera a nod, or leathern bottle of milk (Jg 4'"), which Deborah ( Jg 5^) calls a sephel 'addirim, ' a cup of the nobles ' (EV a lordly dish). Goat's milk is spoken of as the staple drink of servants (Pr 27*") ; and, as the Hebrew children were mother- nursed, milk was their sole sustenance until they were weaned, hence the metaphorical sense of milk-feeding in 1 Co 3^, He 5'-. The comparison of the law to milk was used by the Jews ; thus Kimchi on Is 55' says, ' As milk feeds and nourishes a child, so the law feeds and nourishes the soul.' Milk mixed with flour or rice, and eaten with salad, or occasionally \vith meat, forms a large part of the food of the poor in Aleppo (Russell, i. 118) and elsewhere. Among some Jews milk is not eaten with meat, on account of their interpre- tation of Ex 23" (see above).
Butter (nxDH hem'dh, LXX ^oi'rTvpov) is used for cream and thick preparations of it, as well as for butter proper. In Is 7^ it probably means cream, and in Jg 5-* the milk which was called hdlab in Jg 4" is named hem'dh ; but it was liquid enough to be kept in a skin bottle, and was used to quench thirst. The ' butter ' of Gn 18' was probably soured milk, which is now much used in tne East, and called leben{ Burckhardt, Bedouins, i. 240). The process of churning is called po mif, or ' pressure,' m Pr 30". It is now performed by rocking a skin of milk upon the knees (Doughty, i. 221), or by beating with a stick a skin of milk hung up in a frame, or jerking a skin thus suspended to and fro (Robinson, i. 485). The milk used is that of •loats (Robinson, iii. 69) or cows (Dt 32") ; some forms of butter are semi-fluid, and hence the figura- tive language of Job 20" 29'. The amount of butter eaten by Arabs is large, when it can be ^irocured. Kitto says that all well-prepared Arab tood swims in it ; and Burckhardt describes the Arabs as taking a cupful of butter as breakfast in the morning (see Robinson, i. 449). Melted butter is used, poured over bread in a bowl, as a breakfast dish, and is called onmei (cf. Doughty, ii. 67 f., 208 r, 655 f.). Met.aphorically, the smoothness of hypocritical words is compared to butter (Ps 55^').
Cheese (i"ici hdriz) is mentioned as a delicacy sent by Jesse to the captain of the troop in which hia sons were (1 S 17"), the expression used there meaning ten slices of curd. The [n?^] slmphuh (pi. ehfiphOth) of 2 S 11^ was probably the feben, which here was made of cow s mUk. Cheese ia often made of the milk of the ewe or of the goat.
A third word, nj'jj gebindh, means a clot, and is compared (Job 10'") with the material out of which the body develops (cf. DJi gOlem of Ps 139").
The Arabs use dried milk, which they rub up with water when wanted (Doughty, i. 202) ; this they call mereesy. It is also mentioned by Burck- hardt (i. GO).
(4) Besides the three domestic groups, seven forms of large game were allowed to be eaten ; these were tne fallow deer, Dama vulgaris (Sjn, LXX ?\a0o5, the hart of RV and AV, as in Ps 42', La 1') ; the gazelle, Gazella dorcas ("55; zebt, LXX SopKis, AV roebuck, 2 S 2"), called by the Egyptians gahs, and often used as a sacrifice ; the wild cow antelope, Bubalus boselaphus (iiD^; yahmur, LXX Tuyapyos, Vulg. bubalus, AV fallow deer, RV roe- buck), called shes by the Egyptians.
These three were hunted (Dt 12'f- =», Pr 6"), and formed elements in Solomon's daily provision ( 1 K 4^). The other large game were : the ibex or wild goat, Capra beden, the n'eafuoi Egypt; the Sinaitic ibex is also called 'jy; ( Job 39', Ps 104"), hence the name of Heber's wife Jg 4"- " (ipx 'akk6, AV and RV wild goat) ; the addax, Aniilope addax ([WT dishdn, AV and RV ' pygarg,' the ancient Egyp- tian nudu), an antelope with lyrate horns and wOiite hinder part, not uncommon in some parts of West- em Asia, and found in Palestine ; tne oryx, Oryx beatrix (San tS6, LXX ipv^, AV wild ox, RV ante lope), a straight -horned antelope, extending in distribution from N. Africa to Persia ; the African form, called in Egyptian maud, diflers from the Asiatic in some respects, and is called 0. leucoryx ; it is very commonly represented as being sacrificed in Egyptian pictures ; and lastly, the kibisch or mouflon, Ovis traqelaphus ("itj zemer, LXX Ka/iijXo- irdpSaXts, AV and RV chamois). This is a mountain sheep which is found in Lebanon, Moab, and the Taurus, as well as in Corsica. Neither the chamois nor the girafi'e is a native of Palestine.
(c) The law of clean birds is one of exclusion. All carnivorous or predaceous birds and seabirds, together with the ostrich, raven, heron, and stork, are declared unclean, (jn the positive side, the birds named as articles of diet were six : (1) the pigeon (Columba livia, njV y6nAh, LXX TcpnTTepi) ; (2) the turtle dove (Turtur communis, I'm t6r, LXX rpvyuif). These two were the commonest birds used for food in Palestine, and the only ones admitted as sacrifices. (3) The partridge, of which two species are found in Palestine, Caccahis chukar, the large Indian partridge, and v4 mmoperdix Heyi, the small partridge of Judaea (1 S 26™). This bird is hunted, as it runs when pursued, and is slow to rise in flight (Robinson, iii. 403). Its nest is sought after on account of the eggs, which are favourite articles of food (Jer 17", Sir ll^). LXX renders it i/uKTiK6pa(, which is a kind of heron. The place- name Beth-hoglah means the house of the partridge. Partridges as food are represented on an Assyrian sculpture in the British Museum. (4) The quail {Cotumix communis, ij'f sildv, LXX dprvyoii-irrpa), which furnished meat to the Israelites in their wilderness journey (Ex 16"). These are commofc in Egypt, where they are salted and eaten raw (Herodotus, ii. 77). Tne quail annually migrates in immense bevies across the desert nearly along the line of the Israelites' march (Robinson, 1. 260). (5) Fatted fowl, which were prepared forSolomon's table (1 K 4^), are called on^-is. They were probably ducks or geese, so largely used in Egypt, whero