Swine
The swine — pig, sow, boar — runs through scripture as the marker of what Israel may not eat, what defiles a sanctuary, what wrecks a vineyard, and what a wasted son ends up shepherding when he has spent everything. The pig stands at the boundary between clean and unclean and so becomes a shorthand for ruin, idolatry, and the soul that has turned back from its washing.
Forbidden as food
The dietary law identifies swine by an exact anatomical mismatch. Cleft hoof without rumination places the animal outside the table.
"And the swine, because he parts the hoof, and is clovenfooted, but doesn't chew the cud, he is unclean to you⁺" (Lev 11:7).
Deuteronomy repeats the ruling and extends it from eating to even touching the carcass.
"And the swine, because he parts the hoof but chews not the cud, he is unclean to you⁺: of their flesh you⁺ will not eat, and their carcasses you⁺ will not touch" (Deut 14:8).
Eaten in defiance
When Isaiah indicts the people, he draws the picture of mourners and necromancers who have crossed every line at once — sitting among graves, lodging in secret places, eating exactly what Yahweh forbids.
"who sit among the graves, and lodge in the secret places; who eat swine's flesh, and broth of contaminated things is in their vessels" (Isa 65:4).
The closing chapter of the same book gathers swine's flesh, the detestable, and the mouse into a single judgment oracle: those who ritually purify themselves while eating these things will end together.
"Those who sanctify themselves and purify themselves [to go] to the gardens, behind one in the midst, eating swine's flesh, and the detestable, and the mouse, they will come to an end together, says Yahweh" (Isa 66:17).
Offered in defiance
Where swine's blood appears on the altar, it appears as the figure of an offering Yahweh refuses. In Isaiah's catalogue of unacceptable worship the legitimate sacrifice and the abomination collapse into the same sentence — to expose that, in the wicked offerer's hands, they have become the same act.
"He who kills an ox is as he who slays a man; he who sacrifices a lamb, as he who breaks a dog's neck; he who offers an oblation, [as he who offers] swine's blood; he who burns frankincense, as he who blesses an idol. Yes, they have chosen their own ways, and their soul delights in their detestable things" (Isa 66:3).
The Maccabean record sets out what such worship looked like in practice under foreign occupation: altars and idols within Israel, with the slaughter on them deliberately chosen for its uncleanness.
"And to build altars, and temples, and idols, and to sacrifice swine's flesh, and unclean beasts" (1Ma 1:47).
The next verse names the consequence: "And that they should leave their sons uncircumcised, and let their souls be defiled with all uncleannesses, and detestable things" (1Ma 1:48).
The wild boar
The Asaph psalm pictures Israel as a vine Yahweh transplanted from Egypt and then left exposed when judgment fell. The destroyer is the forest pig.
"The boar out of the forest ravages it, And the wild beasts of the field feed on it" (Ps 80:13).
A ring in a swine's snout
The proverb-form puts the swine to use as figure. Beauty in a body without judgment is gold ornamenting an animal that will only root it back into the mud.
"[As] a ring of gold in a swine's snout, [So is] a beautiful woman who is without discretion" (Prov 11:22).
What is holy and what is wisdom
The proverbs warn against spending correction on those who will not receive it. Reproof to a scoffer, instruction in the hearing of a fool, answers given to folly on its own terms — each rebounds on the giver and is, in effect, a holy thing thrown to the wrong audience.
"He who corrects a scoffer gets to himself reviling; And he who reproves a wicked man [gets] himself a blot" (Prov 9:7).
"Don't speak in the hearing of a fool; For he will despise the wisdom of your words" (Prov 23:9).
"Do not answer a fool according to his folly, Or else you will also be like him" (Prov 26:4).
"Understanding is a wellspring of life to him who has it; But the correction of fools is [their] folly" (Prov 16:22).
Sirach extends the same warning into the figure of walking with the animal itself. Travel with a fool, and even his self-shaking dirties the one beside him.
"Do not talk much with a foolish man, And do not go on the road with a pig, Beware of him lest you have trouble, And you become defiled when he shakes himself; Turn from him and you will find rest, And [so] you will not be wearied with his folly" (Sir 22:13).
The Gerasene swine
On the lake-crossing east, Jesus enters Gentile country.
"And they came to the other side of the sea, into the country of the Gerasenes" (Mark 5:1).
"And they arrived at the country of the Gerasenes, which is across from Galilee" (Luke 8:26).
It is a country where the unclean herd is at home. Mark has previously fixed the language of "unclean spirit" for the kind of being that recognizes Jesus and cries out against him (Mark 1:23), and at the tombs another such man comes out to meet him (Mark 5:2). On the slope above the water a great herd is being shepherded.
"Now there was there on the mountain side a great herd of swine being shepherded" (Mark 5:11).
The demons negotiate for the only place fit for them.
"And they implored him, saying, Send us into the swine, that we may enter into them" (Mark 5:12).
"And he gave them leave. And the unclean spirits came out, and entered into the swine: and the herd rushed down the steep into the sea, [in number] about two thousand; and they were drowned in the sea" (Mark 5:13).
"And those who shepherded them fled, and told it in the city, and in the country. And they came to see what it was that had come to pass" (Mark 5:14).
Luke tells the same scene with the same outcome.
"Now there was there a herd of many swine being shepherded on the mountain: and they entreated him that he would give them leave to enter into them. And he gave them leave" (Luke 8:32).
"And the demons came out from the man, and entered into the swine: and the herd rushed down the steep into the lake, and were drowned" (Luke 8:33).
The unclean spirit and the unclean animal are joined in one ruin.
The far country and the husks
In the parable, the younger son's collapse is mapped onto Israel's clearest food taboo. Having spent everything, he attaches himself to a foreign citizen who sends him to the very work the law has marked as the bottom.
"And he went and stuck [close] to one of the citizens of that country; and he sent him into his fields to shepherd swine" (Luke 15:15).
The hunger that follows is told in terms of the pigs' food.
"And he desired to have filled his belly with the pods that the swine ate: and no man gave to him" (Luke 15:16).
It is at that point — among the swine, longing for their food — that "he came to himself" and turned for home.
The sow returns
Peter closes the figure. The image is not of an animal that has never been clean, but of one that was washed and then went straight back to the mire. It is the deepest form of the warning: a soul that knew the way of righteousness and turned from the holy commandment.
"It has happened to them according to the true proverb, The dog turning to his own vomit again, and the sow that had washed to wallowing in the mire" (2Pet 2:22).