For every beast of the forest is mine, and the cattle upon a thousand hills.
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Augustine of Hippo
AD 430
17. "For mine are all the beasts of the wood" (ver. 10). Why should I ask of thee what I have made? Is it more thine, to whom I have given it to possess, than Mine, who have made it? "For mine are all the beasts of the wood." But perchance that Israel saith, The beasts are God's, those wild beasts which I enclose not in my pen, which I bind not to my stall; but this ox and sheep and he-goat-these are mine own. "Cattle on the mountain, and oxen." Mine are those which thou possessest not, Mine are these which thou possessest. For if thou art My servant, the whole of thy property is Mine. For it cannot be, that is the property of the master which the servant hath gotten to himself, and yet that not be the property of the Master which the Master Himself hath created for the servant. Therefore Mine are the beasts of the wood which thou hast not taken; Mine are also the cattle on the mountains which are thine, and the oxen which are at thy stall: all are Mine own, for I have created them.
Oxen. St. Jerome and Protestants, "the cattle upon a thousand hills. "But our version is very good, and adopted by the Syriac, Ferrand (Calmet)
Aleph means an ox as well as a thousand; and i may have been added to the preceding word, instead of u, at the beginning of this. (Berthier)
We find u here improperly in either, "beast. "(Houbigant)
No mention is made of fishes, because they were not used as victims. (Calmet)
