Besides animals declared to be unclean, the Israel- ites were forbidden to use as food anj'thing which had been consecrated to idols (Exod. xxxiv, 15) ; animals which had died of disease or been torn b}' wild beasts (Exod. xxii, 31 ; Lev. xxii, 8 ; comp. Ezek. iv, 14), and certain parts of animals, viz. the blood (Lev. xxVii, 10; xix, 26 ; Deut. xii, 16-23), the fat covering the intes- tines, the kidney's, and the fat covering them, the fat of any part of the ox, or sheep, or goat, especially the fat tail of certain sheep (Exod. xxix, 13-22; Lev. iii, 4-9, 10 ; ix, 19). They were also forbidden to use any food or liquids occupying a vessel into which the dead bodj' of an}' unclean beast had fallen, as well as all food and liquids which had stood uncovered in the apartment of a dead or dying person (Numb, xix, 15). The eating of a kid boiled in the milk or fat of its mother was also prohibited (Exod. xxiii, 19; xxxiv, 20; Deut. xiv, 21). These restrictions rested chiefly, dout)tIess, on religious and theocratic grounds [see Fat], but for some of them reasons of a sanitary kind may also have existed. It belonged to the essence of the theocratic system that the people should be con- stantly surrounded by what reminded them of their separation to Jehovah, and the need of keeping them- selves free from all that would level or lower tiie dis- tinction between them and the nations around them. For this reason specific restrictions were laid upon their diet, which were not attended to by other na- tions, nor were always insisted on in the oase of stran- gers dwelling within their bounds (Deut. xiv, 21). This does not, however, preclude our admitting that reasons of a social or political kind may also have con- spired to render these restrictions desirable. In warm climates the importance of avoiding contagion render- ed the utmost caution necessary in handling whatever may have been exposed to the influence of a corpse ; and it is well known that the use of adipose matter in
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food requires, in such climates, to lie restricted within uarrow limits. The peculiar prohibition of a kid boil- ed in its mother's millc was ordained ])robably for the purpose of avoidinjj; conformity to some idolatrous usaye, or for the purpose generall}' of encouraging humane feelings on the part of the Israelites towards their domesticated animals (Spencer, De Legg. Ilehr. liituall. bk. ii, ch. viii ; Micliaelis, Mos. liccht, iv, 200). 4iee Cleax.
Subject to these restrictions, the Israelites were free to use for food all the produce of their fertile and favor- ed land. "Tliou shalt bestow thy money," said God to them, " i'ur wliatsoaver thy soul lustetli after, for oxen, or for sheep, or for wine, or for strong drinli, and tliou shalt eat thereof before the Lord tliy God, and tiiou slialt rejoice, thou and thy Iiousehold" (Deut. xiv, 20). In the enumeration of blessings conferred bj' God on Israel, we find " honey out of the rock, and oil out of the flinty rock, butter of kine, and milk of sheep, witli fat of lambs, and rams of the breed of Bashan, and goats, witli the fat of kidneys of wheat," specified as among his free gifts to his people (Deut. xxxii, 13, 14). Tliough allowed this wide range, however, of animal food, the Hebrews do not seem in ordinary life to have availed themselves of it. The usual food of the peo])le appears to have consisted of milk and its l^reparations, honey, bread, and vegetables of various sorts; and only at the royal table was animal food in daily use (1 Kings iv, 23 ; Neh. v, 18). The animals commonly used for food were calves (Gen. xviii, 7 ; 1 Sam. xxviii, 24 ; Amos vi, 4) : these were fattened for the purpose, and hence were caWcA fatlings, or fatted calves (/(oCTYOf (yirtvTug, Luke xv, 23; a it irrr a. Mutt. xxii, 4 j ; Itimbs, 2 Sam. xii, 4; Amos vi, 4) : sheep (1 Sam. xiv, 34 ; xxv, 18 ; 1 Kings iv, 23) ; oxen stall-fed, or from the pastures (1 Kings i, 9 ; iv, 23 ; 2 Chron. xviii, 2 ; Matt, xxii, 4) ; fat cuttle (X'i"i-2, a particular kind of the bovine genus peculiar to Bashan, supposed by some to be a species of buffalo or ure-ox, but not to be confounded with the fatling or fatted calf above mentioned, 2 Sam. vi, 13; 1 Kings i, 9; Amos v, 22 ; Ezek. xxxix, 18); Hds (1 Sam. xvi, 20); and various kin'ls of game, such as the ayil, tlie tsebi, and the yachmur (1 Kings v, 3 [iv, 23, A. V.]). The articles brought by Abigail to David were bread, sheep, parch- ed [roa'sted] corn, raisins, and figs (1 Sam. xxv, 18) ; j when Ziba met David on his flight from Absalom he brought to him bread, raisins, and summer fruits (2 Sam. xvi, 1) ; and the present of Barzillai to the king consisted of wheat, barlej', flour, roasted corn, beans, lentils, honey, butter, sheep, and cheese (2 Sam. xvii, 28). AVe nuiy presume from this that these formed '• the principal articles of food among the Jews at this ' time. Besides raisins or grapes driml in the sun, thej^ used grapes pressed into cakes (rT^''i"i'X) ; they had also fig-cakes (C'^bs'n). On special occasions they probably indulged in more costly viands ; in times of famine they resorted even to very vile food; in sea- sons of aflliction they abstained from all delicacies, and even sometimes from all food; and to prisoners the food allowed seems to have been onlj"^ bread and water (1 Kings xxii, 27; Jer. xxxvii, 21).