Then God said, “Let the waters swarm and abundantly produce living creatures, and let birds soar above the earth in the open expanse of the heavens.”

So the Lord God formed out of the ground every animal of the field and every bird of the air, and brought them to Adam to see what he would call them; and whatever the man called a living creature, that was its name.

And Noah built an altar to the Lord, and took of every [ceremonially] clean animal and of every clean bird and offered burnt offerings on the altar.

All flesh is not the same. There is one kind for humans, another for animals, another for birds, and another for fish.

You made him to have dominion over the works of Your hands;
You have put all things under his feet,

All sheep and oxen,
And also the beasts of the field,

The birds of the air, and the fish of the sea,
Whatever passes through the paths of the seas.

The fear and the terror of you shall be [instinctive] in every animal of the land and in every bird of the air; and together with everything that moves on the ground, and with all the fish of the sea; they are given into your hand.

“I know every bird of the mountains,
And everything that moves in the field is Mine.

You send springs into the valleys;
Their waters flow among the mountains.

They give drink to every beast of the field;
The wild donkeys quench their thirst there.

Beside them the birds of the heavens have their nests;
They lift up their voices and sing among the branches.

For life is more than food, and the body more than clothes. Consider the ravens, for they neither sow [seed] nor reap [the crop]; they have no storehouse or barn, and yet God feeds them. How much more valuable are you than the birds!

For every species of beasts and birds, of reptiles and sea creatures, is tamed and has been tamed by the human race.

‘The flowers appear on the earth once again;
The time for singing has come,
And the voice of the turtledove is heard in our land.

“Even the stork in the sky
Knows her seasons [of migration],
And the turtledove, the swallow and the crane
Observe the time of their return.
But My people do not know
The law of the Lord.

‘But if his offering to the Lord is a burnt offering of birds, then he shall bring turtledoves or young pigeons as his offering.

(as it is written in the Law of the Lord, “Every firstborn male that opens the womb shall be called holy [set apart and dedicated] to the Lord)”

and exchanged the glory and majesty and excellence of the immortal God for an image [worthless idols] in the shape of mortal man and birds and four-footed animals and reptiles.

Consider the ravens, for they neither sow [seed] nor reap [the crop]; they have no storehouse or barn, and yet God feeds them. How much more valuable are you than the birds!

Look at the birds of the air; they neither sow [seed] nor reap [the harvest] nor gather [the crops] into barns, and yet your heavenly Father keeps feeding them. Are you not worth much more than they?

“Who provides prey for the raven
When its young cry to God
And wander about without food?

He gives to the beast its food,
And to the young ravens that for which they cry.