1 Kings 4:23

“Ten fat oxen, etc.] Such as were kept up in the stall and fatted: and twenty oxen out of the pastures; which were killed as they were taken from thence, and not put up to be fed: and an hundred sheep; out of the folds: beside harts, and roebucks, and fallow deer; which were clean creatures, according to the Levitical law, (<051405>Deuteronomy 14:5); these were hunted in fields, or taken out of the park, or were presents from other countries; so that here was plenty of beef, mutton, and venison: for the spiritual application of this to the antitypical Solomon, and his provisions, (see <402204> Matthew 22:4); and fatted fowl; such as we call capons f52; some Jewish writers f53, because of the…”

“Harts ... - The exact sorts of wild land animals here intended are very uncertain. Perhaps it would be best to translate “wild-goats, gazelles, and wild oxen,” which abounded in the wilder parts of Syria, from where Solomon would be supplied. (See 1 Kings 4:24.) (Yahmur, or the “roebuck,” gives its name to a valley in a wooded district, south of Carmel (Conder).) The use of game at the royal banquets of Assyria appears in the sculptures. return to 'Top of Page'”

“Fat - Fatted in stalls. Out of pastures - Well fleshed, tender and good, though not so fat as the former. 3 Kings (1 Kings) 4:24”

“Ten fat: Neh 5:17, Neh 5:18 harts: Dr. Shaw understands ayil as the name of the genus, including all the species of the deer kind, whether they are distinguished by round horns, as the stag, or by flat ones, as the fallow deer, or by the smallness of the branches, as the roe. roebucks: See note on Deu 15:22. fallowdeer: Yachmur, rendered bubalus by the Vulgate, probably the buffalo; and though "the flesh of a buffalo does not seem so well tasted as beef, being harder and more coarse," yet in our times, "persons of distinction, as well as the common people, and even the European merchants, eat a good deal of it, in the countries where that animal abounds." Niebuhr, Descrip. de l'Arab p. 146.…”