The first part in this series can be found here.
Leviticus 11:6 tells us that hares chew the cud. They do not. Animals that chew the cud are called ruminants. When they eat plant matter, it goes to their first stomach to soften, and then it’s regurgitated to their mouth. They spend time re-chewing it, and then it is swallowed and fully digested. Ruminants (cows, sheep, goats, etc.) are recognizable because their chewing of the cud is very obvious. Hares (rabbits) don’t chew the cud; however, their mouths do move frequently, so it’s possible to see why some people may have assumed that they do chew the cud. Of course, God would know they didn’t, and this is why the passage is problematic.
There have been some good attempts at explaining this. First of all, it has been suggested that even though God knew hares didn’t chew the cud, the Israelites probably didn’t. Since they would have seen the chewing motion of hares and assumed that they were cud-chewers, God simply used language that they would understand.
I actually think this explanation has some merit. However, God also knew that the Bible would be used by all people in all times. Therefore, he would have known that this passage could be problematic for modern people. So I don’t see why he couldn’t have said “appear to chew the cud,” or something like that in order to clarify things for both groups. Also, he could have taken it as an opportunity to educate them on the fact that hares don’t actually chew the cud, regardless of what their mouths look like.
Another explanation has been to point out that while rabbits aren’t ruminants, they do re-digest some of their food through the process of coprophagia. This process sounds pretty disgusting. Basically, it’s eating feces to gain additional nutrients. Hares don’t do this with their regular droppings, but with a special type of pellet that essentially consists of partially digested plant matter.
A problem with this theory is that hares don’t actually chew these pellets, they swallow them whole. Also, pigs are known to practice coprophagia as well, yet Leviticus 11:7 says, “And the pig, because it parts the hoof and is cloven-footed but does not chew the cud, is unclean to you” (emphasis mine). So it would appear that “chew the cud” does not include coprophagia.
Bottom line: the Bible claims that hares chew the cud, but we know they do not.
We’ll look at another contradiction in the next post.