When people are asked to name the absolute most unkosher food, the response is generally “pork.” When Jews who are far removed from tradition keep one vestige of the dietary laws, it is often by abstaining from eating pig meat.
In his book A 3,000-Year History of Jews and the Pig, author Jordan D. Rosenblum shares more than two decades’ worth of research. He explains that at the beginning of the Second Temple period, in the Persian era of the 4th to 5th centuries BCE, pigs did not have a unique status; other non-kosher items were viewed as non-kosher as the pig. But by the time of the destruction of the Temple by the Romans in 70 CE, the pig was king of non-kosher and had taken on its role as uber non-kosher.
Rosenblum points out that great attention is given to pigs in martyrdom stories and forced ingestions. He suggests that the role the pig plays in the Second Temple martyrdom narrative is what led to its out-sized historical influence and to its becoming a metonym for non-kosher food, both within the Jewish narrative and the non-Jewish view.
As he demonstrates, pork has played a large role in crypto-Jewish history.
'Eat pig and live, abstain and die'
In the Hanukkah story, pig broth is sprinkled on Jewish holy books, and Jews are forced to ingest pig. They are essentially told: “Eat pig and live; abstain and die.” And they chose to die. (Interestingly, in recent years the Chinese have used similar tactics, forcing Muslim Uyghurs to eat pork.)
The martyrdom theory for “pig aversion” is reasonable; other suggestions for the unique Jewish antipathy toward pigs from among all non-kosher creatures have been suggested. The most well-known, based on a midrash and mentioned three times in Rosenblum’s book, is that of all non-kosher creatures, the pig is the only one that has the kosher sign of split hooves but does not chew its cud. It sticks out its feet and disingenuously “claims” to be kosher.
The pig, as stated in a 1995 Israeli court decision, became “the symbol of hypocrisy and evil.”
The diversity of pig-related stories that Rosenblum uncovered is astounding: Jews and pigs on playing cards; in George Orwell’s Animal Farm; in movies; in the story of a “Karl Marx” sandwich, the ham sandwich that baseball’s pitching legend Sandy Koufax ate the same week as he refused to pitch on Yom Kippur; the censoring of the word “pig” (from the Talmud to New York hassidic textbooks in 21st century); and even claims of pigs being “kosher slaughtered” by a ritual slaughterer.
There is also a trove of fascinating, lesser-known material from the early modern period.
Last remnant of observance
Refraining from eating pork seems to have been the last remnant of kosher observance for Jews who became less observant. In the mid-7th century, Visigoth kings forcibly converted Jews to Catholicism; in 654, a group of them wrote a letter to King Recceswinth that they were faithfully practicing Christianity but were unable to bring themselves to consume pork.
In English, there is the idiom “sweating like a pig.” But pigs don’t sweat; to cool down, they roll in cool mud and puddles. So where did the expression come from? It is actually derived from the iron smelting process in which hot iron is poured on sand, cools and solidifies, with the pieces resembling a sow and her piglets, hence termed “pig iron.” As the iron cools, the surrounding air reaches its dew point, and beads of moisture form on the surface of the “pigs.” “Sweating like a pig” indicates that the “pig” (i.e., iron) has cooled enough to be handled safely. But in common understanding, someone sweating profusely is likened to a pig.
The author deliberately left much of the scholarly material for the endnotes, thereby creating a readable book with a light, friendly style. While he is an expert in Hebrew, Talmud, and rabbinics, everything is translated and explained.
Small sections of the book can be unpleasant (and the author acknowledges they were difficult to write), such as the description of torture used on Jews during the Spanish Inquisition, and the many uses and depictions of the medieval Judensau, literally the “Jews’ sow,” grotesque and demeaning images of Jews and pigs in various representations and interactions.
However, the book also includes humorous anecdotes.
Hallmark of Judaism
After discussing the ubiquity of pork in the US military diet and the challenges faced by Jewish soldiers throughout the centuries, Rosenblum concludes: “It is telling that, yet again, the symbolic line in the sand – between inclusion and exclusion – was the pig and not other non-kosher foods.”
It is remarkable how, after writing an entire book whose thesis is that for millennia, abstention from pork was a hallmark of Judaism, Rosenblum can still write that when the Reform movement explicitly jettisoned that prohibition in 1885, “they were not saying no to Judaism; rather, they were saying no to one manifestation of Judaism and yes to another, new manifestation.” Truly an astonishing feat of cognitive gymnastics in order to avoid saying the obvious.
Rosenblum chose not to discuss Islam, but in his next edition he might include a modern tale regarding the extent to which aversion to pigs can lead.
While pigs may never fly, some traditional sources aver that, at some future date, pigs will become kosher. And while this book is about an item of food that Jews have assiduously avoided for 3,500 years, there is no reason to avoid the book. It is enjoyable, informative, and a pleasurable read.
The reviewer is a professor of neuroscience at Bar-Ilan University.
FORBIDDEN
A 3,000-YEAR HISTORY OF JEWS AND THE PIG
By Jordan D. Rosenblum
NYU Press
272 pages; $20