MOUSE

MOUSE (Heb. עַכְבָּר, akhbar), small rodent enumerated in the Bible with the rat and five reptiles ("creeping things"). It is so classified because as a result of its short legs its belly touches the ground as it walks. Isaiah (66:17) vehemently assails those who "eat swine's flesh, detestable things, and the mouse" at idolatrous ceremonies. The akhbar includes both the house mouse, Mus musculus, and the field mouse, Microtus guenthri, the latter wreaking havoc with crops. Their depredations can amount to a plague destroying substantial parts of the harvest. It was such a plague which visited the Philistines who captured the Ark of the Covenant of the Lord (I Sam. 6:4–11). They not only "marred the land" but also caused a plague of "emerods." It has been suggested that the latter reference is to a pestilence caused by the microbe, Pasteurella pestis, transmitted to man by rodent fleas. The symptoms are a swelling of the lymphatic glands especially in the groins, which was thought to be a form of hemorrhoids. Both house and field mice are frequently mentioned in the Mishnah and Talmud. The ancient view of the possibility of spontaneous generation finds expression in the statement that the mouse was formed from the earth (Ḥul. 9:6). A mean person was called "a mouse lying in his money" (Sanh. 29b). One who eats food which has been nibbled by mice was said to forget his learning (Hor. 13a).   -BIBLIOGRAPHY: Lewysohn, Zool, 105–7, 345; F.S. Bodenheimer, Animal and Man in Bible Lands (1960), 21–23, 46, 101, 110. ADD. BIBLIOGRAPHY: Feliks, Ha-Ẓome'aḥ, 261. (Jehuda Feliks)