Hog Waste in Eastern North Carolina Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

Hog Waste in Eastern North Carolina - Essay Example It also says in Proverbs 11:22, "Like a gold ring in a swine's snout is a beautiful woman without discretion." The swine is just another animal with all the instincts and emotions of fear, anger, contentment or hunger. But the scriptures appear to depict the animal's dispositions that include habits other than just chewing cuds. The swine is known to eat more than cuds. They consume anything from garbage including dead animals and human waste. Thus, the swine is categorized with animals that are not "clean". They cannot be counted among animals like the sheep, goat, deer, and so on that consume only grass and herbs and are categorized as "clean" (Douglas S. Winnail). From the Christian perspectives, the hog is associated with meanness and laziness. The points expressed in the scriptures about the hog do little to dissociate it from such negative attributes. Once the hog has had its fill with food it normally resigned to a corner to slumber the rest of its time. God made all things wonderful and this includes the swine. The swine or hog is not meant for human consumption from its natural standpoint. In the present times, hog meat can be neutralized from the effects of salmonella through vaccinations (Jeffrey A. Husa et al). However, in the times when the Old Testament injunction for not eating the hog was made, the scriptures emphasized that as people of God to serve as a model for the nations around them, the Israelites were to abstain from hog meat for its specific dietary habits. The hog could eat anything. It was not restricted to chewing cuds alone. By the same argument, the hog could also do many things that did not make it an ideal choice for culinary purposes. The hog could grunt, struggle violently, bite, kick and heave. The hog did not observe the basic niceties when it was about to be killed. This contrasted with the disposition of animals like the sheep and goats that did not have to be trussed up when they were slaughtered. What does the theological tradition say about this problem (This will require doing library research in books on theological ethics Theological tradition is varied. There is no single view. Some theologians say that the law about not eating the hog does not apply now. They hold to the scriptures when Apostle Peter was famished and had a vision of "a great sheet let down by four corners upon the earth. In it were all kinds of animals and reptiles and birds of the air. And there came a voice to him, 'Rise, Peter; kill and eat.' But Peter said, 'No, Lord; for I have never eaten anything that is common or unclean'. And the voice came to him again a second time, 'What God has cleansed, you must not call common (or unclean)'" (Acts 10:11-15). There is yet another theological tradi