Ornithology

I resemble a pelican of the wilderness; I have become like an owl of the ruins.  Psalm 102:6  NASB

Pelican/ owl – Why pelican?  Why owl?  First, let’s address the Christian mythology about the pelican.  It starts with Thomas Aquinas.

During the breeding season, the Dalmatian pelican’s pouch turns blood red, and the birds often press their bills against their chest to empty them of the water scooped up as they fish before allowing their young to reach into the pouch for food. This likely is the source of the myth that pelicans pluck feathers from their breast until they bleed and use the blood to feed their young. St. Thomas Aquinas referred to this belief in his hymn “Adoro te devote:”

“Lord Jesus, Good Pelican,

Wash my filthiness and clean me with your blood,

One drop of which can free

the entire world of all its sins.”[1]

As I mentioned, this is mythology.  It is particularly harmful mythology because the pelican is a non-kosher bird.  Applied to the Messiah, this imagery makes Yeshua non-Jewish (but that might have been the motivation), and totally unacceptable to any orthodox Jew.  So we can set this aside.  David didn’t think he was writing about “Lord Jesus, Good Pelican.”

Once we recognize that the pelican is a non-kosher bird, we immediately see that the owl is also non-kosher.  And then the metaphor falls into place.  “I feel rejected.  I feel unacceptable.  I feel no longer fit to be human.  I am an outsider, despoiled, not blessed.”

Notice the locations.  Wilderness, that is, מִדְבָּר midbâr.  A place devoid of human habitation.  A place where men cannot survive.  A place for beasts and scavenger birds.  Ruins, i.e., חָרְבָּה ḥorbâ.  Not “ruins,” but “waste or desolate places.”  A synonym for territory of beasts and creatures of darkness.  “I am not just non-kosher.  I am worse.  I live in the land of beasts.  I am no longer at home among people.”

I’m sorry, St. Thomas, but the Messiah is not a good pelican.  Pelicans and owls are signs of inhumanity, of the part of God’s creation where those in His image do not belong.

So now you have an interesting question to answer:  What bird are you?

Topical Index:  pelican, owl, non-kosher, wilderness, waste places, Psalm 102:6

[1] http://icatholic.org/article/consider-the-christian-symbolism-of-the-pelican-60311053