Lizard

Lizard appears in Scripture in the Mosaic purity laws governing unclean creeping things. Leviticus 11:30 lists the letaah (lizard) as one of the eight unclean reptiles—alongside the gecko, land crocodile, sand lizard, and chameleon—contact with whose carcass rendered a person ceremonially unclean until evening. The Authorized Version uses lizard for the Hebrew letaah, a word derived from a root meaning to hide, appropriate to the lizard's habit of concealing itself.

The identification of the specific reptiles in Leviticus 11:29–30 is uncertain, as the Hebrew terms do not map neatly onto modern zoological classification. Palestine hosts a diverse lizard fauna, including geckos, agamas, skinks, and monitor lizards, any of which might correspond to the listed terms. The general category of lizards (order Squamata) was included among the swarming things that defiled by touch under the Mosaic law, reflecting the Levitical system's concern with maintaining boundaries between the clean and unclean in daily Israelite life.