(26) The conies are but a feeble folk, being only about as big as a rabbit, with nails instead of claws, and weak teeth. Its Hebrew name (sh?ph?n) signifies a "hider," from its habit of living in clefts of the rocks; its scientific name is Hyrax Syriacus. The translation "coney," i.e., rabbit, is a mistake. In general appearance it resembles a guinea-pig or marmot. Show Verse 26. - The conies are but a feeble folk. The term "coney" (cuniculus) is applied to the rabbit, but this is not the animal here intended; and indeed rabbits are not found in Palestine. The word shaphan designates the Hyrax Syriacus, called by some the rock badger (see Hatrt, 'Animals of the Bible,' pp. 64, etc.). The coney, says Dr. Geikie ('Holy Land and Bible,' 2:90), "abounds in the gorge of the Kedron, and along the foot of the mountains west of the Dead Sea. It is of the size of the rabbit, but belongs to a very different order of animals, being placed by naturalists between the hippopotamus and rhinoceros. Its soft fur is brownish-grey over the back, with long black hairs rising through this lighter coat, and is almost white on the stomach; the tail is very short. The Jews, who were not scientific, deceived by the motion of its jaws in eating, which is exactly like that of ruminant animals, fancied it chewed the cud, though it did not divide the hoof, and so they put its flesh amidst that which was forbidden. It lives in companies, and chooses a ready-made cleft in the rocks for its home, so that, though the conies are but a 'feeble folk,' their refuge in the rocks gives them a security beyond that of stronger creatures. They are, moreover, 'exceeding wise,' so that it is very hard to capture one. Indeed, they are said, on high authority, to have sentries regularly placed on the look out while the rest are feeding; a squeak from the watchman sufficing to send the flock scudding to their holes like rabbits. The coney is found in many parts of Palestine, from Lebanon to the Dead Sea." In the rocks. This fact is noticed in Psalm'civ. 18. The Septuagint calls them χοιρογρύλλιοι here and Psalm 104:18, also in Leviticus 11:6 and Deuteronomy 14:7. This notion of the animal as a kind of little pig is not more accurate than that of St. Jerome, who renders the term by lepusculus. Parallel Commentaries ... Hebrew the conies are not a
mighty species, yet they make their homes in the rocks; Jump to Previous Badgers Cliff Coneys Conies Crags Creatures Feeble Folk Home Homes House Houses Little Mighty Power Rock Rock-Badgers Rocks Shephanim Strong Jump to Next Badgers Cliff Coneys Conies Crags Creatures Feeble Folk Home Homes House Houses Little Mighty Power Rock Rock-Badgers Rocks Shephanim Strong Links Proverbs 30:26
NIV CONEY ko'-ni (shaphan (Leviticus 11:5; Deuteronomy 14:7; Psalms 104:18; Proverbs 30:26)): The word "coney" (formerly pronounced cooney) means "rabbit" (from Latin cuniculus). Shaphan is rendered in all four passages in the Septuagint choirogrullios, or "hedge-hog," but is now universally considered to refer to the Syrian hyrax, Procavia (or Hyrax) Syriaca, which in southern Palestine and Sinai is called in Arabic wabar, in northern Palestine and Syria Tabsun, and in southern Arabia shufun, which is etymologically closely akin to shaphan. The word "hyrax" (hurax) itself means "mouse" or "shrew-mouse" (compare Latin sorex), so that it seems to have been hard to find a name peculiar to this animal. In Leviticus 11:5 the Revised Version, margin, we find "rock badger," which is a translation of klip das, the rather inappropriate name given by the Boers to the Cape hyrax. The Syrian hyrax lives in Syria, Palestine and Arabia. A number of other species, including several that are arboreal, live in Africa. They are not found in other parts of the world. In size, teeth and habits the Syrian hyrax somewhat resembles the rabbit, though it is different in color, being reddish brown, and lacks the long hind legs of the rabbit. The similarity in dentition is confined to the large size of the front teeth and the presence of a large space between them and the back teeth. But whereas hares have a pair of front teeth on each jaw, the hyrax has one pair above and two below. These teeth differ also in structure from those of the hare and rabbit, not having the persistent pulp which enables the rabbit's front teeth to grow continually as they are worn away. They do not hide among herbage like hares, nor burrow like rabbits, but live in holes or clefts of the rock, frequently in the faces of steep cliffs. Neither the hyrax nor the hare is a ruminant, as seems to be implied in Leviticus 11:5 and Deuteronomy 14:7, but their manner of chewing their food may readily have led them to be thought to chew the cud. The hyrax has four toes in front and three behind (the same number as in the tapir and in some fossil members of the horse family), all furnished with nails that are almost like hoofs, except the inner hind toes, which have claws. The hyraxes constitute a family of ungulates and, in spite of their small size, have points of resemblance to elephants or rhinoceroses, but are not closely allied to these or to any other known animals. The camel, the coney and the hare are in the list of unclean animals because they "chew the cud but divide not the hoof," but all three of these are eaten by the Arabs. The illustration is from a photograph of a group of conies in the Syrian Protestant College at Beirut, prepared by Mr. Douglas Carruthers, who collected these specimens in a cliff in the neighborhood of Tyre. Specimens from the Dead Sea are redder than those from Syria. Alfred Ely Day What kind of animal is a hyrax?What is a hyrax? The hyrax is also called rock rabbit or dassie, is a small furry mammal. It looks like a robust, oversized guinea pig, or a rabbit with rounded ears and no tail. Hyraxes have stumpy toes with hoof-like nails; and four toes on each front foot and three on each back foot.
What are hyraxes related to?Rock hyraxes, also called rock dassies or rock rabbits, are small, stub-tailed, rabbit-like animals native to Africa. Though rock hyraxes resemble rodents, their closest living relatives are actually elephants and manatees. These social mammals primarily eat vegetation.
What is a Coney from the Bible?The cony of the Old World and of the Bible is an unrelated mammal, the hyrax (q.v.). A variety of whitefish (q.v.), sometimes called inconnu, or sheefish, is also called cony, as are certain varieties of sea bass (q.v.).
Why is a hyrax related to an elephant?The hyrax holds the unique honor of being the elephant's closest living relative — on land, that is. The elephant, hyrax and manatee all descend from a common hooved ancestor from the group of mammals known as tethytheria, who died out some 50 million years ago.
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What is a hyrax in the bible
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