In preparing their victuals, the orientals are, from the extreme
scarcity of wood in many countries, reduced to use cow dung for fuel. At
Aleppo, the inhabitants use wood and charcoal in their rooms, but heat
their baths with cow dung, the parings of fruit, and other things of a
similar kind, which they employ people to gather for that purpose. In
Egypt, according to Pitts, the scarcity of wood is so great, that at
Cairo they commonly heat their ovens with horse or cow dung, or dirt of
the streets; what wood they have, being brought from the shores of the
Black Sea, and sold by weight. Chardin attests the same fact: “The
eastern people always used cow dung for baking, boiling a pot, and
dressing all kinds of victuals that are easily cooked, especially in
countries that have but little wood;” and Dr. Russel remarks, in a note,
that “the Arabs carefully collect the dung of the sheep and camel, as
well as that of the cow; and that the dung, offals, and other matters,
used in the bagnios, after having been new gathered in the streets, are
carried out of the city, and laid in great heaps to dry, where they
become very offensive. They are intolerably disagreeable, while drying,
in the town, adjoining to the bagnios; and are so at all times when it
rains, though they be stacked, pressed hard together, and thatched at
top.” These statements exhibit, in a very strong light, the extreme
misery of the Jews, who escaped from the devouring sword of
Nebuchadnezzar: “They that did feed delicately are desolate in the
streets; they that were brought up in scarlet embrace dunghills,” Lam.
iv, 5. To embrace dunghills, is a species of wretchedness, perhaps
unknown to us in the history of modern warfare; but it presents a
dreadful and appalling image, when the circumstances to which it alludes
are recollected. What can be imagined more distressing to those who
lived delicately, than to wander without food in the streets? What more
disgusting and terrible to those who had been clothed in rich and
splendid garments, than to be forced, by the destruction of their
palaces, to seek shelter among stacks of dung, the filth and stench of
which it is almost impossible to endure? The dunghill, it appears from
Holy Writ, is one of the common retreats of the mendicant. This imparts
great force and beauty to a passage in the song of Hannah: “He raiseth
up the poor out of the dust, and lifteth the beggar from the dunghill,
to set them among princes, and to make them inherit the throne of
glory,” 1 Sam. ii, 8. The change in the circumstances of that excellent
woman, she reckoned as great, (and it was to her as unexpected,) as the
elevation of a poor despised beggar from a nauseous and polluting
dunghill, rendered tenfold more fetid by the intense heat of an oriental
sun, to one of the highest and most splendid stations on earth.
2. Dung is used as fuel in the east only when wood cannot be had; for
the latter, and even any other combustible substance, is preferred when
it can be obtained. The inhabitants of Aleppo, according to Russel, use
thorns and fuel of a similar kind for those culinary purposes which
require haste, particularly for boiling, which seems to be the reason
that Solomon mentions the “crackling of thorns under a pot,” rather than
in any other way. The same allusion to the use of thorns for boiling
occurs in other parts of the sacred volume: thus, the Psalmist speaks of
the wicked, “Before your pots can feel the thorns, he shall take them
away as with a whirlwind, both living, and in his wrath.” The Jews are
sometimes compared in the prophets to “a brand plucked out of the
burning,” Amos iv, 11; Zech. iii, 2; a figure which Chardin considers as
referring to vine twigs, and other brushwood which the orientals
frequently use for fuel, and which, in a few minutes, must be consumed
if they are not snatched out of the fire; and not to those battens, or
large branches, which will lie a long time in the fire before they are
reduced to ashes. If this idea be correct, it displays in a stronger and
more lively manner the seasonable interposition of God’s mercy, than is
furnished by any other view of the phrase. The same remark applies to
the figure by which the Prophet Isaiah describes the sudden and complete
destruction of Rezin, and the son of Remaliah; only in this passage, the
firebrands are supposed to be smoking; that is, in the opinion of
Harmer, having the steam issuing with force from one end, in consequence
of the fire burning violently at the other. The words of the prophet
are: “Take heed and be quiet; fear not, neither be faint-hearted, for
the two tails of these smoking firebrands, for the fierce anger of Rezin
with Syria, and of the son of Remaliah,” Isaiah vii, 4. It is not easy
to conceive an image more striking than this; the remains of two small
twigs burning with violence at one end, as appears by the steaming of
the other, are soon reduced to ashes; so shall the kingdoms of Syria and
Israel sink into ruin and disappear.
3. The scarcity of fuel in the east obliges the inhabitants to use, by
turns, every kind of combustible matter. The withered stalks of herbs
and flowers, the tendrils of the vine, the small branches of myrtle,
rosemary, and other plants, are all used in heating their ovens and
bagnios. We can easily recognise this practice in these words of our
Lord: “Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they toil not,
neither do they spin: and yet I say unto you, that Solomon, in all his
glory, was not arrayed like one of these. Wherefore, if God so clothe
the grass of the field, which today is, and to-morrow is cast into the
oven, shall he not much more clothe you, O ye of little faith?” Matt.
vi, 28–30. The grass of the field, in this passage, evidently includes
the lilies of which our Lord had just been speaking, and, by
consequence, herbs in general; and in this extensive sense the word
χόρτος is not unfrequently taken. These beautiful productions of nature,
so richly arrayed, and so exquisitely perfumed, that the splendour even
of Solomon is not to be compared with theirs, shall soon wither and
decay, and be used as fuel to heat the oven and the bagnio. Has God so
adorned these flowers and plants of the field, which retain their beauty
and vigour but for a few days, and are then applied to some of the
meanest purposes of life; and will he not much more clothe you who are
the disciples of his own Son, who are capable of immortality, and
destined to the enjoyment of eternal happiness?
scarcity of wood in many countries, reduced to use cow dung for fuel. At
Aleppo, the inhabitants use wood and charcoal in their rooms, but heat
their baths with cow dung, the parings of fruit, and other things of a
similar kind, which they employ people to gather for that purpose. In
Egypt, according to Pitts, the scarcity of wood is so great, that at
Cairo they commonly heat their ovens with horse or cow dung, or dirt of
the streets; what wood they have, being brought from the shores of the
Black Sea, and sold by weight. Chardin attests the same fact: “The
eastern people always used cow dung for baking, boiling a pot, and
dressing all kinds of victuals that are easily cooked, especially in
countries that have but little wood;” and Dr. Russel remarks, in a note,
that “the Arabs carefully collect the dung of the sheep and camel, as
well as that of the cow; and that the dung, offals, and other matters,
used in the bagnios, after having been new gathered in the streets, are
carried out of the city, and laid in great heaps to dry, where they
become very offensive. They are intolerably disagreeable, while drying,
in the town, adjoining to the bagnios; and are so at all times when it
rains, though they be stacked, pressed hard together, and thatched at
top.” These statements exhibit, in a very strong light, the extreme
misery of the Jews, who escaped from the devouring sword of
Nebuchadnezzar: “They that did feed delicately are desolate in the
streets; they that were brought up in scarlet embrace dunghills,” Lam.
iv, 5. To embrace dunghills, is a species of wretchedness, perhaps
unknown to us in the history of modern warfare; but it presents a
dreadful and appalling image, when the circumstances to which it alludes
are recollected. What can be imagined more distressing to those who
lived delicately, than to wander without food in the streets? What more
disgusting and terrible to those who had been clothed in rich and
splendid garments, than to be forced, by the destruction of their
palaces, to seek shelter among stacks of dung, the filth and stench of
which it is almost impossible to endure? The dunghill, it appears from
Holy Writ, is one of the common retreats of the mendicant. This imparts
great force and beauty to a passage in the song of Hannah: “He raiseth
up the poor out of the dust, and lifteth the beggar from the dunghill,
to set them among princes, and to make them inherit the throne of
glory,” 1 Sam. ii, 8. The change in the circumstances of that excellent
woman, she reckoned as great, (and it was to her as unexpected,) as the
elevation of a poor despised beggar from a nauseous and polluting
dunghill, rendered tenfold more fetid by the intense heat of an oriental
sun, to one of the highest and most splendid stations on earth.
2. Dung is used as fuel in the east only when wood cannot be had; for
the latter, and even any other combustible substance, is preferred when
it can be obtained. The inhabitants of Aleppo, according to Russel, use
thorns and fuel of a similar kind for those culinary purposes which
require haste, particularly for boiling, which seems to be the reason
that Solomon mentions the “crackling of thorns under a pot,” rather than
in any other way. The same allusion to the use of thorns for boiling
occurs in other parts of the sacred volume: thus, the Psalmist speaks of
the wicked, “Before your pots can feel the thorns, he shall take them
away as with a whirlwind, both living, and in his wrath.” The Jews are
sometimes compared in the prophets to “a brand plucked out of the
burning,” Amos iv, 11; Zech. iii, 2; a figure which Chardin considers as
referring to vine twigs, and other brushwood which the orientals
frequently use for fuel, and which, in a few minutes, must be consumed
if they are not snatched out of the fire; and not to those battens, or
large branches, which will lie a long time in the fire before they are
reduced to ashes. If this idea be correct, it displays in a stronger and
more lively manner the seasonable interposition of God’s mercy, than is
furnished by any other view of the phrase. The same remark applies to
the figure by which the Prophet Isaiah describes the sudden and complete
destruction of Rezin, and the son of Remaliah; only in this passage, the
firebrands are supposed to be smoking; that is, in the opinion of
Harmer, having the steam issuing with force from one end, in consequence
of the fire burning violently at the other. The words of the prophet
are: “Take heed and be quiet; fear not, neither be faint-hearted, for
the two tails of these smoking firebrands, for the fierce anger of Rezin
with Syria, and of the son of Remaliah,” Isaiah vii, 4. It is not easy
to conceive an image more striking than this; the remains of two small
twigs burning with violence at one end, as appears by the steaming of
the other, are soon reduced to ashes; so shall the kingdoms of Syria and
Israel sink into ruin and disappear.
3. The scarcity of fuel in the east obliges the inhabitants to use, by
turns, every kind of combustible matter. The withered stalks of herbs
and flowers, the tendrils of the vine, the small branches of myrtle,
rosemary, and other plants, are all used in heating their ovens and
bagnios. We can easily recognise this practice in these words of our
Lord: “Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they toil not,
neither do they spin: and yet I say unto you, that Solomon, in all his
glory, was not arrayed like one of these. Wherefore, if God so clothe
the grass of the field, which today is, and to-morrow is cast into the
oven, shall he not much more clothe you, O ye of little faith?” Matt.
vi, 28–30. The grass of the field, in this passage, evidently includes
the lilies of which our Lord had just been speaking, and, by
consequence, herbs in general; and in this extensive sense the word
χόρτος is not unfrequently taken. These beautiful productions of nature,
so richly arrayed, and so exquisitely perfumed, that the splendour even
of Solomon is not to be compared with theirs, shall soon wither and
decay, and be used as fuel to heat the oven and the bagnio. Has God so
adorned these flowers and plants of the field, which retain their beauty
and vigour but for a few days, and are then applied to some of the
meanest purposes of life; and will he not much more clothe you who are
the disciples of his own Son, who are capable of immortality, and
destined to the enjoyment of eternal happiness?