What’s in a Word?

nature

lion

ארי · אריה · כפיר · לביא · ליש · שחל

Bottom line

All of these render lion in English, and Chazal count six or seven of them. The sources divide on what the set is, and the choice governs the translation. The sources of the first group seem to take all seven as the same animal, named for seven different attributes of it or human reactions to it (Sanhedrin 95a; Yalkut Shimoni). Others take them as stages of a lion's life, and differ among themselves: Radak's progression runs gur the nursing cub, then kfir, then aryeh, then lavi, then layish, each stage stronger than the last, and he does not say where shachal fits; the Vilna Gaon has three stages only, kfir, aryeh, shachal; Abarbanel flattens the set to two, gur and kfir young, aryeh, layish and lavi grown. A minority reads some of these words as other animals altogether. Our own default is Radak's progression: render gur "lion cub" and kfir "young lion," and never let plain "lion" cover two of these words in one pasuk.

Distinctions

the seven, and why each is so called

Rabbi Yochanan (Sanhedrin 95a): Tanach has six words for a lion, ari, kfir, lavi, layish, shachal, shachatz. Rabbi Levi (Yalkut Shimoni to Mishlei 20) adds a seventh, gur aryeh, and explains each; a like tradition is in Avos d'Rabbi Nasan, version 2, ch. 43.

  • Ari, because everyone fears it, and yirah has the same letters. Tikkunei Zohar 122a: aryeh rearranged is re'iyah, sight, the sense lions correspond to.
  • Kfir, because whoever sees a lion denies (kofer) his own life. Others read it from כ-פ-ר, to cover, as in the kapores over the Aron, for the mane that covers it.
  • Lavi, because a lion's roar seizes men's hearts (levavos). Rabbi Menachem Azariah of Fano: because it eats the heart (lev) of its prey first.
  • Layish, because its teeth knead (lash) a man's skin like dough.
  • Shachal, because men fall sick (choleh) from fear before it.
  • Shachatz, because its teeth are sharp as arrows (cheitz).
  • Gur, which Rabbi Chaim Palagi also reads as an expression of fear (Devarim 1:17; Iyov 19:29).

the words as stages of life

  • Rashi (to Yechezkel 19:5; Iyov 4:10): kfir a young but strong lion, shachal a middling one, ari a large one.
  • The Vilna Gaon disagrees. Three stages, each frightening for a different reason: young, its teeth frighten, and it is a kfir; older, its roar frightens, and it is an aryeh; older still, even its ordinary voice frightens, and it is a shachal. So for him kfir is the cub, ari the middle-aged lion, and shachal the old one.
  • The Baal HaTurim (to Bamidbar 24:9): a lavi is younger than an ari, without saying where it stands against shachal and kfir.
  • Radak (to Shoftim 14:5): the full progression is gur (the cub still nursing, Eichah 4:3), then kfir, then aryeh, then lavi, then layish, and the older it grows the stronger it gets. He too leaves shachal unplaced.
  • Abarbanel (to Shoftim 14:5) rejects so many stages: gur and kfir are synonyms for a young lion, and aryeh, layish and lavi synonyms for an older one.
  • The Vilna Gaon on the last pair, against Radak: a layish is a lioness that has not yet borne young, and a lavi one that has.

gur (גור)

Abarbanel (Mashmia Yeshua) cites Rabbi Yosef Ibn Kaspi: gur is allied to ger, a sojourner, because the cub's agility keeps it always on the move. Rashbam (to Bereishis 49:9): Yaakov compared Yehudah to a gur aryeh because a cub is faster and stronger than a grown lion.

kfir (כפיר)

Avos d'Rabbi Nasan: an adolescent lion, so called because he denies (kofer) his parents. Rabbi Yechiel Michel Stern: a kfir is less fierce than an aryeh, which is why Michah 5:7 has the kfir falling on sheep, domesticated and defenseless, while the aryeh takes the beasts of the forest; and Tehillim 104:21 has the kfir roaring to ask for its food, meaning it is still too young to hunt. Zohar (Terumah 143a): a kfir is a small, weak lion.

the minority: not lions at all

The Italian scholar Rabbi Yishaya of Trani (to Hoshea 13:8): lavi and laviyah are a different species from lions altogether, though he himself admits that shachal and shachatz are words for lion. Rabbi Pinchas Eliyahu Horowitz of Vilna, in his scientific almanac Sefer HaBris: shachal is a panther and layish a leopard, and he understood these not to be alternate words for "lion." Rabbi Shlomo Pappenheim similarly: namer, lavi and shachal are all words for a spotted leopard, or perhaps a tiger.

Rendering guidance

  • גור / גור אריה: "lion cub," or "a young lion" where the cub sense would read oddly. כפיר: "young lion." אריה / ארי: "lion." לביא: "lion," or "lioness" if following the Vilna Gaon. ליש: "old lion," or "lioness" on the same view. שחל and שחץ: "lion," with the reading you follow noted.
  • Trap: English "lion" covers all seven at once, and both of the famous pesukim put two of them in one clause. Bereishis 49:9 has gur aryeh, then aryeh, then lavi; Bamidbar 24:9 has ari and lavi. Render them with two distinct English words ("he crouches like a lion, like a great lion, who shall rouse him") or the parallel is lost.
  • Second trap: the two frameworks are not compatible. Chazal's derashos read all seven as one animal under seven names; Radak reads them as an aging sequence. Do not mix a derashah from the first into a translation built on the second.
  • Where a source is counting the names (Sanhedrin 95a, Yalkut Shimoni), the names must stay transliterated in the list, or the count cannot be seen.

Sources

Rabbi Reuven Chaim Klein, "Crouching Lion, Hidden Blessing," What's in a Word?, Ohr Somayach, 14 Teves 5779 (2018-12-22), https://articles.ohr.edu/articles/crouching-lion-hidden-blessing; raw text in sources/whats-in-a-word/raw/8039-crouching-lion-hidden-blessing.md. Primary loci cited: Bereishis 49:9; Bamidbar 24:9; Devarim 1:17; Shoftim 14:5; Yechezkel 19:5; Hoshea 13:8; Michah 5:7; Tehillim 104:21; Mishlei 20; Iyov 4:10, 19:29; Eichah 4:3; Sanhedrin 95a; Avos d'Rabbi Nasan version 2 ch. 43; Tikkunei Zohar 122a; Zohar Terumah 143a; Sefer HaBris; Mashmia Yeshua. The column prints the kfir-and-sheep verse as Michah 5:3; it is Michah 5:7 in Hebrew versification (5:8 in English), and the entry gives it there. The column closes by saying it must save the difference between aryeh and ari for another time.