Reference: Crane
American
In Isa 38:14; Jer 8:7, two birds are mentioned, the sus and the AGUR, the first rendered in our version crane, the second swallow. Bochart says the sus, or sis, is the swallow; the agur, the crane. The numidian crane, supposed to be referred to, is about three feet in length, is bluish-grey, with the cheeks, throat, breast, and tips of the long hinder feathers black, with a tuft of white feathers behind each eye. "Like a crane, or a swallow, so did I chatter:" there is peculiar force and beauty in the comparison here made between the dying believer and migratory birds about to take their departure to a distinct but more genial clime. They linger in the scenes which they have frequented, but instinct compels them to remove.
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Easton
(Isa 38:14; Jer 8:7). In both of these passages the Authorized Version has reversed the Hebrew order of the words. "Crane or swallow" should be "swallow or crane," as in the Revised Version. The rendering is there correct. The Hebrew for crane is 'agur, the Grus cincerea, a bird well known in Palestine. It is migratory, and is distinguished by its loud voice, its cry being hoarse and melancholy.
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Fausets
Isa 38:14, "like a crane or a swallow, so did I chatter" (rather "twitter"); rather "like a swallow or a crane": sus 'agur. A plaintive and migratory (Jer 8:7) bird is implied by sus; Italian zisilla, "swallow." Gesenius takes gahur as an epithet, "like the circling swallow." Thirteen manuscripts of Kennicott read isis for sus or sis; that goddess having been, according to Egyptian fable, changed into a swallow; a fable transferred to the Greek mythology, in the story of Procne.
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Morish
Two things are said of this bird in scripture: it chatters or makes a querulous noise, Isa 38:14; and it knows its time of migration. Jer 8:7. The common crane answers to both of these characteristics. In the above passages the swallow is mentioned after the crane, the Hebrew words being sis and agur; many hold that the translators have transposed the words, and that sis refers to the swallow, and agur to the crane. It is so translated by the Revisers and by Mr. Darby.
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Smith
Crane.
The crane (Grus cinerea) is a native of Europe and Asia. It stand about four feet high. Its color is ashen gray, with face and neck nearly black. It feeds on seeds, roots, insects and small quadrupeds. It retires in winter to the warmer climates.
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Watsons
CRANE. In Isa 38:14, and Jer 8:7, two birds are mentioned, the ??? and the ????. The first in our version is translated crane, and the second swallow; but Bochart exactly reverses them, and the reasons he adduces are incontrovertible. Aristophanes curiously observes, that "it is time to sow when the crane migrates clamouring into Africa; she also bids the mariner suspend his rudder and take his rest, and the mountaineer to provide himself with raiment;" and Hesiod, "When thou hearest the voice of the crane, clamouring annually from the clouds on high, recollect that this is the signal for ploughing, and indicates the approach of showery winter."
Where do the cranes or winding swallows go, Fearful of gathering winds and failing snow? Conscious of all the coming ills, they fly To milder regions and a southern sky. PRIOR.
The Prophet Jeremiah mentions this bird, thus intelligent of the seasons by an instinctive and invariable observation of their appointed times, as a circumstance of reproach to the chosen people of God, who, although taught by reason and religion, "know not the judgment of the Lord."