Deuteronomy 14:20

Summary

The verse instructs that any bird classified as tahor ("clean", H2889) may be eaten. It closes a section of dietary law by stating a general permission using the verb tokhelu ("you will eat", H0398) in the plural imperfect.

Key words

• kol ("every", H3605) — construct form meaning "every/all of," linking to the following noun to mean "every kind of bird."
• oph ("insect/bird", H5775) — masculine singular noun; here in construct with tahor, giving "clean bird/fowl."
• tahor ("clean", H2889) — masculine singular adjective modifying oph, marking the category as ritually permitted.
• tokhelu ("you will eat", H0398) — Qal imperfect, 2nd person masculine plural; expresses a general, ongoing/future permission addressed to the community as a whole, not a single individual.

What the text says

The Hebrew sentence is short and follows a construct chain: kol-oph tahor ("every clean bird") functions as the object placed before the verb tokhelu ("you will eat"). This word order — object first, verb second — is common in Hebrew legal or instructional style and gives emphasis to the category being addressed (the clean bird) before stating the action permitted. The plural form of the verb indicates the instruction is directed to the group collectively, consistent with the communal framing of the dietary rules in this chapter.

The construct relationship between oph ("bird") and tahor ("clean") does not use a separate word for "of" — the adjective directly qualifies the noun in the construct chain, a typical feature of Hebrew noun-adjective constructions where the adjective follows and agrees in gender and number with the noun it modifies.

Differences between versions

The Vulgate (VULCLEM) renders the verse more broadly as "Omne quod mundum est, comedite" ("Eat everything that is clean"), omitting the specific reference to birds found in the Hebrew oph ("bird", H5775). The Hebrew explicitly restricts the statement to birds, while the Vulgate generalizes it to "everything clean."

The LXX text supplied here (πᾶν θνησιμαῖον οὐ φάγῃ...) does not correspond to the content of the Hebrew verse; it discusses not eating carcasses and giving them to a foreigner, which matches the subject matter of a different verse (Deuteronomy 14:21) rather than the bird-eating permission stated in the Hebrew of 14:20. This mismatch reflects the data as provided, without further reconciliation.