Eagle

The eagle is named in the Law among the unclean birds and reappears across the writings and the prophets as a figure of swift descent, lofty nesting, parental care, and renewed vitality. Yahweh applies the image to himself in carrying Israel out of Egypt, and the prophets press it into oracles of judgment, captivity, and exile. Ezekiel, Daniel, and Revelation use the eagle in vision: a face on the living creatures, a winged lion among the world-empires, and the wings given to the woman in the wilderness.

Forbidden as Food

In the dietary code the eagle heads the list of detestable birds. Israel is told, "And these you⁺ will detest among the birds; they will not be eaten, they are detestable: the eagle, and the gier-eagle, and the osprey" (Le 11:13). Deuteronomy repeats the prohibition: "But these are those of which you⁺ will not eat: the eagle, and the gier-eagle, and the osprey" (De 14:12).

Swift Flight

The eagle's speed furnishes a stock comparison for sudden onset. Job describes life as fleeting, "They are passed away as the swift ships; As the eagle that swoops on the prey" (Job 9:26). The prophets fold the same image into oracles of invasion. Moses warns, "[The Speech of] Yahweh will bring a nation against you from afar, from the end of the earth, as the eagle flies; a nation whose tongue you will not understand" (De 28:49). Jeremiah pictures the invader the same way: "Look, he will come up as clouds, and his chariots [will be] as the whirlwind: his horses are swifter than eagles. Woe to us! For we are ruined" (Jer 4:13). Habakkuk describes the Chaldean cavalry: "their horsemen press proudly on: and they ride from afar; they fly as an eagle that hurries to devour" (Hab 1:8). Lamentations recalls the pursuers of Judah: "Our pursuers were swifter than the eagles of the heavens: They chased us on the mountains, they laid wait for us in the wilderness" (La 4:19). The same idiom is used of Saul and Jonathan in the elegy: "They were swifter than eagles, They were stronger than lions" (2 Sa 1:23). Proverbs sets the eagle's flight beside other things hard to track: "The way of an eagle in the air; The way of a serpent on a rock; The way of a ship in the midst of the sea; And the way of a [noble] man with a young woman" (Pr 30:19).

The Nest of the Eagle

Job is questioned out of the whirlwind about the eagle's nesting:

"Is it at your command that the eagle mounts up, And makes her nest on high? On the cliff she dwells, and makes her home, On the point of the cliff, and the stronghold. From there she spies out the prey; Her eyes watch it far off. Her young ones also suck up blood: And where the slain are, there she is" (Job 39:27-30).

Jeremiah turns the high nest into a figure of unreachable pride that will be reached: "though you should make your nest as high as the eagle, by [my Speech] I will bring you down from there, says Yahweh" (Jer 49:16). Obadiah uses the same image of Edom: "Though you mount on high as the eagle, and though your nest is set among the stars, [by my Speech] I will bring you down from there, says Yahweh" (Ob 1:4).

Yahweh Bearing Israel on Eagles' Wings

The exodus is summed up under the eagle figure when Yahweh speaks from Sinai: "You⁺ have seen what I did to the Egyptians, and how I bore you⁺ on eagles' wings, and brought you⁺ to myself" (Ex 19:4). The Song of Moses elaborates the same picture as the divine pattern of leadership:

"As an eagle that stirs up her nest, That hovers over her young, He spread abroad his wings, he took them, He bore them on his pinions" (De 32:11).

Renewed Vitality

The Psalter takes up the eagle's vigor as a figure of restored life: Yahweh "satisfies your desire with good things, [So that] your vitality is renewed like the eagle" (Ps 103:5). Isaiah extends the image to those who hope in Yahweh: "but those who wait for Yahweh will renew their strength; they will mount up with wings as eagles; they will run, and not be weary; they will walk, and not faint" (Is 40:31).

Wings of Riches and the Young Eagles

Proverbs warns that wealth has the same wings: "Will you set your eyes on that which is not? For [riches] certainly make themselves wings, Like an eagle that flies toward heaven" (Pr 23:5). The same book threatens the contemptuous son with the eagle's brood as carrion-feeders: "The eye that mocks at his father, And despises to obey his mother, The ravens of the valley will pick it out, And the young eagles will eat it" (Pr 30:17).

The Eagle in Prophetic Oracles

The prophets repeatedly cast the foreign invader as an eagle. Of Moab Yahweh says, "Look, he will fly as an eagle, and will spread out his wings against Moab" (Jer 48:40). Of Edom and its capital, "Look, he will come up and fly as the eagle, and spread out his wings against Bozrah" (Jer 49:22). Hosea sounds the alarm against the northern kingdom: "[Set] the trumpet to your mouth. As an eagle [he comes] against the house of Yahweh, because they have transgressed my covenant, and trespassed against my law" (Hos 8:1). Micah turns the image inward into mourning over deportation: "Make yourself bald, and cut off your hair for the sons of your delight: enlarge your baldness as the eagle; for they have gone into captivity from you" (Mic 1:16).

Ezekiel's Eagle Parable

Ezekiel is told to set out a parable: "Thus says the Sovereign Yahweh: A great eagle with great wings and long pinions, full of feathers, which had diverse colors, came to Lebanon, and took the top of the cedar" (Eze 17:3).

Symbolical: Living Creatures and World-Empires

The face of the eagle appears among the four faces of the living creatures by the river Chebar: "they had the face of man; and the four of them had the face of a lion on the right side; and the four of them had the face of an ox on the left side; the four of them had also the face of an eagle" (Eze 1:10). The vision recurs in the temple chapter: "the first face was the face of the cherub, and the second face was the face of man, and the third the face of a lion, and the fourth the face of an eagle" (Eze 10:14). Daniel sees the first beast among the world-empires "like a lion, and had eagle's wings: I looked until its wings were plucked, and it was lifted up from the earth, and made to stand on two feet as a man; and a man's heart was given to it" (Da 7:4). The same eagle-symbol marks the judgment on Nebuchadnezzar's pride, "until his hair was grown like eagles' [feathers], and his nails like birds' [claws]" (Da 4:33). In Revelation the fourth living creature "was like a flying eagle" (Re 4:7), and the woman in the wilderness is given "the two wings of the great eagle, that she might fly into the wilderness to her place, where she is nourished for a time, and times, and half a time, from the face of the serpent" (Re 12:14).