Lizard

The lizard is named in Scripture in two registers — once in the dietary law's list of unclean creeping things, and once in a wisdom proverb on the unexpected places small creatures reach.

Among the Unclean Creeping Things

The dietary regulations of Leviticus list the lizard family among the small creatures that defile by contact. The list opens at the weasel and mouse and continues through several distinct lizard kinds: "And these are unclean to you⁺ among the creeping things that creep on the earth: the weasel, and the mouse, and the great lizard after its kind, and the gecko, and the land-crocodile, and the lizard, and the sand-lizard, and the chameleon" (Lev 11:29-30). The catalog distinguishes several reptile species — the great lizard, the gecko, the land-crocodile, the lizard proper, the sand-lizard, the chameleon — and groups them all under the same ruling.

Among the Small Things That Reach Far

The wisdom of Agur catalogs four creatures that are "little upon the earth, but they are exceedingly wise" (the structure of Pr 30:24-28). The fourth is the lizard, named for the contrast between its smallness and its access: "The lizard, you can catch it with [your] hands, Yet she is in kings' palaces" (Prov 30:28). The proverb makes the lizard an emblem of small access where strength would not enter — easy to take in the hand, and yet found inside the rooms of kings.