תחש. This word in a plural form occurs, Exod. xxv, 5; xxvi, 14;
xxxv, 7, 23; xxxvi, 19; xxxix, 34; Num. iv, 6, 8, 10–12, 14, 25; Ezek.
xvi, 10; and is joined with ערת, skins used for the covering of the
tabernacle in the wilderness. The Jewish interpreters are agreed as to
its being some animal. Jarchi says it was a beast of many colours, which
no more exists. Kimchi holds the same opinion. Aben Ezra thinks it some
animal of the bovine kind, of whose skins shoes are made; alluding to
Ezek. xvi, 10. Most modern interpreters have taken it to be the badger,
and among these our English translators; but, in the first place, the
badger is not an inhabitant of Arabia; and there is nothing in its skin
peculiarly proper either for covering a tabernacle or making shoes.
Hasæus, Michaelis, and others, have laboured to prove that it is the
mermaid, or _homo marinus_, the _trichekus_ of Linnæus. Faber, Dathe,
and Rosenmuller, think that it is the seal, or sea calf, _vitulus
marinus_, the skin of which is both strong and pliable, and was
accounted by the ancients as a most proper outer covering for tents, and
was also made into shoes, as Rau has clearly shown. Niebuhr says, “A
merchant of Abushahr called _dahash_ that fish which the captains in
English vessels call porpoise, and the Germans, sea hog. In my voyage
from Maskat to Abushahr, I saw a prodigious quantity together near Ras
Mussendom, that were all going the same way, and seemed to swim with
great vehemence.” Bochart thinks that not an _animal_, but a _colour_,
was intended, Exodus xxv, 5; so that the covering of the tabernacle was
to be azure, or sky blue.
xxxv, 7, 23; xxxvi, 19; xxxix, 34; Num. iv, 6, 8, 10–12, 14, 25; Ezek.
xvi, 10; and is joined with ערת, skins used for the covering of the
tabernacle in the wilderness. The Jewish interpreters are agreed as to
its being some animal. Jarchi says it was a beast of many colours, which
no more exists. Kimchi holds the same opinion. Aben Ezra thinks it some
animal of the bovine kind, of whose skins shoes are made; alluding to
Ezek. xvi, 10. Most modern interpreters have taken it to be the badger,
and among these our English translators; but, in the first place, the
badger is not an inhabitant of Arabia; and there is nothing in its skin
peculiarly proper either for covering a tabernacle or making shoes.
Hasæus, Michaelis, and others, have laboured to prove that it is the
mermaid, or _homo marinus_, the _trichekus_ of Linnæus. Faber, Dathe,
and Rosenmuller, think that it is the seal, or sea calf, _vitulus
marinus_, the skin of which is both strong and pliable, and was
accounted by the ancients as a most proper outer covering for tents, and
was also made into shoes, as Rau has clearly shown. Niebuhr says, “A
merchant of Abushahr called _dahash_ that fish which the captains in
English vessels call porpoise, and the Germans, sea hog. In my voyage
from Maskat to Abushahr, I saw a prodigious quantity together near Ras
Mussendom, that were all going the same way, and seemed to swim with
great vehemence.” Bochart thinks that not an _animal_, but a _colour_,
was intended, Exodus xxv, 5; so that the covering of the tabernacle was
to be azure, or sky blue.