# Isaiah's peaceful animals and Chesterton's fierce lion

Commentary on Orthodoxy by G. K. Chesterton.

On [CH06.P027](https://glosses.org/orthodoxy/pg16769-r1/CH06.P027/#char=1381,1412): "the lion lay down with the lamb"

The familiar wording condenses Isaiah rather than quoting a verse exactly. In the King James Version, Isaiah 11:6 puts the wolf with the lamb and the leopard with the kid; the young lion appears with the calf and fatling. Verse 7 makes the lion eat straw, and verse 9 excludes hurting and destroying. Isaiah 65:25 repeats the wolf–lamb pairing and the lion's altered diet. The inspected witness is Project Gutenberg's KJV transcription, ebook 10, updated 2024; the translation first appeared in 1611. [Isaiah 11:6–9; 65:25](https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/10).

Chesterton's question therefore changes the emphasis of the prophecy. Isaiah's animals retain their identities while predation ceases; Chesterton asks whether the lion can retain its ‘royal ferocity’ alongside gentleness. His answer serves this chapter's account of opposed virtues preserved at full strength. It is an imaginative ethical appropriation, rather than a straightforward explanation of the prophetic scene: the biblical passage itself gives no warrant for continued violence against the lamb. The loose wording should not be used to identify a particular Bible translation as his source.

## Sources

- [The King James Version of the Bible](https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/10), Isaiah 11:6–9 and 65:25; Project Gutenberg ebook 10, updated October 29, 2024

Revision 1 · 2026-11-07 · https://glosses.org/a/a_ktyt2752/