SWINE (s win), (Heb. khaz-ter'; Gr. xotpos).
Egyptian pictures, the parable of the Prodigal Son, and Christ's miraculous cure of the demo niac, when he permitted swine to be possessed and destroyed by rushing over a precipice into the sea of Galilee, furnish ample proofs that dur ing the dominion of the Romans they were kept around the kingdom of Judah ; and the restrictive laws of Hyrcanus on this subject indicate that the Jews themselves were not altogether strangers to this unlawful practice (Matt viii :3o), nor were their ancestors (Is. lxvi:17). Commentators as cribe this abundance of swine to the numerous Pagan sacrifices of these animals in the temples: but we do not deem this to be a sufficiently cor rect view of the case, since hogs of every denomi nation were less used for that purpose than oxen, goats, and sheep. May it not be conjectured that in those days of a greatly condensed population the poor found in swine's flesh, and still more in the fat and lard, melted for culinary purposes, as it still is in every part of Pagan Africa, a most desirable aliment, still more acceptable than the salt fish imported from Sidon, to season their usual vegetable diet ? C. H. S.
Figurative. The term is used to denote a "fair woman without discretion" (Prov. xi:22).
To cast "pearls before swine" (Matt. vii :6), is not more vain and wasteful than to offer the words of truth and wisdom to those who are known to despise them, and who would only re turn the offer with insult and abuse.
"As if lie offered swine's blood" (Is. lxvi :3) is used of those who, in a thoughtless manner, and merely as an external act, offer sacrifices to God. Even though they offer sacrifices which are com manded, their worship is no more acceptable than if they offered that which was unclean.