Comparison of Humans to Animals in 2 Peter 2,10b-22 103 The author of 2 Peter describes irrational animals as begotten naturally for capture and corruption. This is not a common idea about animals, though it is not unparalleled. Aristotle argued that animals exist for the sake of humans (see Aristotle, Politics 1256B), meaning that they exist to be eaten as well as to provide service, clothes and tools. The Stoics held a similar view. According to Plutarch, the Stoics (he specifically mentions Chrysippus) maintain that the pig by nature (fuvsei) has come to be in order to be killed and eaten (Fragment 193). Richard Bauckham says the idea that certain animals were born to be slaughtered and eaten was common in the ancient world and cites three examples: Juvenal 1.141; Pliny, Hist. Nat. 8.81; and BM 85a (8). The first of these speaks of boars as an animal born for the sake of banquets (apros, animal propter convivia natum). The second says concerning rabbits that nature has generated fertile animals that are harmless and good to eat (natura innocua et esculenta animalia fecunda generavit). The third presents Rabbi Judah the Prince as telling a calf that was being taken to be slaughtered that the calf had been created for this. These passages certainly speak of animals as born to be slaughtered and eaten, and this is generally similar to what 2 Peter says. However, 2 Peter says specifically that animals are born for capture and corruption. “Capture” seems to imply that animals are born to be hunted, either by humans or by other animals. “Corruption” refers to disintegration that results either from being eaten or simply from decay (9). The author of 2 Peter seems most concerned to portray animals as mortal, destined for death and decay. This is similar in thought, but not language, to what is said in Ps 49,12.20 — “Mortals cannot abide in their pomp; they are like the animals that perish”. In the Greek translation of this psalm, though not in the Hebrew text, the animals are explicitly described as irrational (toi'" kthvnesin toi'" ajnohvtoi" — Ps 48,13.21). In Targum Neofiti 1 on Numbers, Balaam’s donkey refers to itself as an unclean beast that dies in this world and does not enter the world to come in contrasting itself to the children of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob (10). This is quite similar to the thought of 2 Peter though the targums do not explicitly refer to the donkey as irrational. Comparison of humans to irrational animals is fairly common and serves various purposes (11). Sometimes the point is simply that humans are unlike irrational animals because they are rational. Epictetus argues that rational and irrational animals have in common such things as eating, drinking, resting and sexual intercourse, but only rational animals have understanding (1.6.12-22; cf. 4.7.7). At other times the point is that humans are enough like irrational animals that behavior toward the latter should be a pattern for the way one (8) R.J. BAUCKHAM, Jude, 2 Peter (WBC 50; Waco, TX 1983) 263. (9) On this see T. CALLAN, “The Soteriology of the Second Letter of Peter”, Bib 82 (2001) 549-559, especially 550-552. (10) Targum Neofiti 1: Numbers translated, with Apparatus and Notes by M. MCNAMARA; Targum Pseudo-Jonathan: Numbers translated, with Notes by E.G. Clarke (Collegeville, MN 1995) 127. Cf. the similar statement in Targum Pseudo-Jonathan (254). (11) Of course, those who maintain that animals are rational frequently compare humans and animals, but they are not comparing humans to what they regard as irrational animals. Plutarch’s comparison of humans to pigs in Bruta animalia ratione uti is discussed below.