I've noticed over the past couple of months people seem to think the 'unicorn' in the Bible was literally just that.To be honest I've met fellow Christians who seem to take the 'unicorn' literally.I was confused by this myself at first,but knew it couldn't literally mean the unicorn as we know it today so I did some research.
The earliest description of the Unicorn was given by the historian Ctesias in 400 B.C who traveled to Persia and India. who described the 'indian wild ass' with a body the size of a horse,white,purple head,blue eyes and cubit long horn on it's head.The people then believed that if you drank from the horn that you would be protected from stomach problems,epilepsy and poison.Aristotle loved the unicorn myth and was partly responsible for it becoming so popular in Greco-Roman.Later on a historian named Megasthenes mentioned another unicorn that resembled the Rhino.There are 5 kinds of white and black Rhinos and they have two horns except the Indian and Java rhino.The white Rhino is larger than all the other species of rhinos because it weighs 4,000 to 6,000 and has the height of 5 to 6 feet,however these white rhinos have a brownish tint to them.More than likely what he saw was the white Indian rhino.However Ctesias's description seems to be based off a mixture of the rhino,antelope and wild ass and was based off traveler's tales.
Passages in the old testament in Hebrew described a beast called Re'em which was described as strong and fast.This beast can be found nine times in the bible.However Re'em was translated to Unicorn in the King james Version.Re'em is translated over to wild ox in most modern versions of the bible today.In Deuteronomy 33:17 it implies that Re'em didn't have just one horn.
If you want to discover more just google it or there are plenty of books on it.You can find information on it if you're willing to look around and do the research.
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