Locust Bible and not only The theme of the invasion of locusts appear in Bible in the book of 'Exodus . More or less all we know the story. The wicked Pharaoh refuses to let Moses and his people from Egypt. The Lord, then as now, powerful sponsor of Israel, Egypt unleashes terrible reprisals change water into blood, frogs covers all of Egypt, the first free horrendous swarms of mosquitoes and then flies, kills livestock, covering men and animals of pustules and ulcers, unleashed hail ... But Pharaoh, firm, takes it hard. Some vague sign of remorse started to show only the eighth in front threat: the locusts, who, hungry, devour it all: "They covered the face of all the land and the land was darkened and ate all the grass of the country and all the fruits of the trees that the hail had left. Nothing remained in the trees and green grass fields all over the land of Egypt. "
The same theme is used in Prophets by Joel to announce the "Lord's Day," a terrible time in which God manifested his domination of the history and judge, in a manner so severe as right of all peoples, "Swarms of locusts, one after another / have destroyed the entire harvest. / What a swarm has left / has eaten the next. / Drunkards, wake up and cry / you drinkers of wine, shouted / because they never taste / wine New! / Swarms of locusts have invaded / our land / I am strong and you can not count. / They have teeth hard and resistant / like a lion. / They have destroyed our vineyards, / have reduced our fig trees / logs to undress, no bark / have abandoned the / only when the branches were now / become white. "
From Bible on, then, the locusts are processed in the image of the scourge of so much evil as devastating swarms. They represent either the historical invasions and the torment of demonic origin and is not a coincidence that against locusts was long practiced exorcism.
Chuang - Tzu (369-286 BC), the deepest thinker who has ever expressed the Chinese literature, plays the invasion of locusts as a result of cosmic disorder, which, are themselves the result of disturbances microcosmic. In ancient China, however, their proliferation was also read in a positive way and considered as a sign of fertility and offspring number, and benevolence of Heaven, and the pace of their jump was associated with seasonal fertility rites and rules of ' balance family and society.
Good, locusts!
" John was clothed with camel's hair with a leather belt on your hips, you ate locusts and wild honey." In Gospel of Mark (1.6) we read of the peculiar diet of John the Baptist. Food habit which confirms the images in some Mesopotamian bas-reliefs and some Egyptian wall paintings: that is, tables laden with skewer of locusts. And such insects as food also says in ' Old Testament, Leviticus in the book almost exclusively regulatory in nature. In its pages, the Lord said to Moses e ad Aronne le regole relative al puro e all’impuro in materia di alimentazione e quindi agli animali più o meno edibili: “ Sarà per voi in abominio anche ogni insetto alato, che cammina su quattro piedi. Però fra tutti gli insetti alati che camminano su quattro piedi, potrete mangiare quelli che hanno due zampe sopra i piedi, per saltare sulla terra. Perciò potrete mangiare i seguenti: ogni specie di cavalletta, ogni specie di locusta, ogni specie di acrìdi e ogni specie di grillo. Ogni altro insetto alato che ha quattro piedi lo terrete in abominio”, Levitico , 20,23.
Di locuste, poi, si nutrì senz’altro Sant'Antonio Abate, Egyptian hermit who lived between the third and fourth centuries. That food rich in protein and low in fat, it should be his spiritual health and the conquest of holiness, both on the physical if we have to give credit to his biographer, who wants him alive and active until the remarkable age of 105 years.
But the religious is permissible to eat locusts? The Jews, as we have seen, are allowed in this regard by the words of the Lord in Leviticus . And the Muslims as you adjust? E 'recent affair. In Egypt, in the face of obvious failure of government authorities to defeat il flagello millenario delle locuste, i capi religiosi hanno concesso l’autorizzazione a mangiarle: "Cibarsi di cavallette è lecito sul piano religioso. Anzi, è un dovere nazionale per aiutare il governo a lottare contro di esse." Così il capo del comitato delle Fatwa (avvisi religiosi) Abdel Hamid Al-Atrache si è rivolto agli egiziani per incoraggiarli a sbarazzarsi di un insetto che per l’ennesima volta ha invaso i campi dell'Egitto mettendo a repentaglio la produzione agricola del Paese. “Le cavallette sono pulite", quindi commestibili: una proposta sorprendente per il mondo islamico che non ha mancato di suscitare polemiche. La scrittrice Sakina Fouad, è rimasta esterrefatta: “gli egiziani non si sono mai fed on locusts "and said" the fatwa is a big disappointment. "A state of mind which also involved the government initiative in the fight against locusts. unforgiving, the Fouad, recounted an incident between the ridiculous and disconcerting. "During a press conference organized in connection with the Ministry of Agriculture, Minister Al-Leiss wanted to reassure the people of Egypt, arguing that the invasion of locusts had been rejected. But during his speech, a wave of these insects has invested the ministerial palace, prompting some bureaucrats to close the windows by invoking divine justice. "For the spin doctors who clearly are not lacking in that country, has proved convenient, then, blame the corruption of customs ... So, a reporter from the newspaper "Al Ahram", argued that the curse of locusts would have been caused by "a little videoclip religious. We have become a society full of God sins." Meanwhile, a year after another, the specter of famine shake the sleep of the Egyptians while the destruction of crops, prices of basic food products are growing by leaps and bounds. About the question of religious legitimacy seems to feed on locusts, however, that the practice - and hunger - is worth more than the grammar of religion. The populations of the entire African continent, in fact, for thousands of years to cope with the disaster invasions of locusts, they eat forever. Indeed, consider it a very attractive and the food prepared in various ways, fried, boiled, skewered and making a sort of pate . The Pananti tells Philip (1766 - 1837), writer of some renown Tuscan in his day: "The tyrant Mauri ... advantage of their misfortune and they go to beat the trees on which the locusts have laid; make them fall, they fill the sacks and the cook in boiling water, dry the fans on the roofs, and two or three months to make it their livelihood "( Adventures and observations on the coasts of Barbary ). And how shall taste the locust? Also on Pananti: "I've tasted fried in the pan, and cooked on the grill, are not bad; s'assomigliano a little to the anchovies, and even a little bit to the crab: they are rather unhealthy, but there is an addiction. "
A table with the Orthoptera
The last time the Europeans have fed Orthoptera was during the Napoleonic wars in the Netherlands: starved from the consequences of war's devastation inhabitants of Amsterdam and Ghent did not particularly careful in eating crickets and grasshoppers. This just yesterday. Today, while not appearing as a widespread practice, however, does not raise particular scandal found in some stores locusts ready for frying in a pan. Regarded as 'delicatessen' you can buy in packages of 50 grams, renamed bugs organic food. Rich in vitamins and protein, it appears that private wings, feet and going in the fire, really excellent showing on the palate, especially if accompanied by a glass of white wine. Moreover, their growth is non-polluting, production costs are much lower than those of cows and pigs and, according to a study by the University of Ghent, feeding on locusts would be the cure for hypertension. With these premises is not surprising, then, if you are already five in the Netherlands, restaurants specializing in "at the table with bugs" here, along with meatballs and ravioli filled with insect larvae can also taste grasshoppers and locusts spring rolls with chocolate icing. "And 'this is the future of our food," say the researchers with no particular concerns of the faculty of Entomology at Wageningen University, an institution, it seems, at the forefront of nutritional sciences.
The Year of the Locust
Annus horribilis , the 1542! What's more trouble caused by a terrible earthquake in Mugello and those induced by the permanent establishment of the Inquisition or the Holy Inquisition and the wars between the French and Imperial, deserves to be remembered locust infestation that hit parts of ' Europe and northern Italy. In that year they moved in swarms of locusts whose immense step lasted for days. When you were only away waste places, crops totally destroyed, ruin, famine and hunger for all. Ludovico Antonio Muratori writes: were winged, and larger than usual to see, because a long finger flying foreshadow the sun for the space of one or more miles, and went everywhere, made a net of all herbs and Ortaglio ... Then came the winter, they perished locusts, but infecting the air with their stench, and woe betide those who do not took care to bury them.
As a result of ruin, which also hit hard the Piedmont countryside, to Vercelli was a fact pointed out by several local historians for its singularity. In the summer, such was the desperation for the invasion of locusts, that the feeling of helplessness and frustration in the face of what was going on that the result was a demonstration of collective madness. The Diocesan Tribunal, in fact, found no better way to investigate a criminal case against these evil insects. The acts of that process right now have become unavailable and the historian Joseph Ferraris opines that may be "were made to disappear on purpose to steal from the Diocesan Chancery ridiculous ..."
narrates the historical John the Baptist Modena:
1542 tornorno others say the locusts grasshoppers et Piedmont in Vercelli, who rose from the ground when the sun obscured. They were coming in the eastern et daneggiorno breeze, Verona, Mantua, Lombardy, and others to lochia et Veneziano. In Vercelli there was made against a criminal trial in absentia et mentioned it assumed a prosecutor, and this process was done by the vicar of the bishop as they were sacrilegious locusts that ruined church property Furno et sentenced to Po et Sesia et anegarsi in other rivers and so it was done and I have seen the process notarized Giulio de Quinto Chancellor of the diocese. They say that the damage was only a mile of one hundred thousand crowns.
The Orthoptera, not at all intimidated by the harsh sentence issued by the court that the Vercelli condemned to death by drowning, did not scruple to return the following year and destroy, again, the same scattered . An anonymous chronicler ha lasciato annotato su un vecchio codice: Reverse sunt locuste de anno 1543 in mense agusti et steterunt per totum [...] et maximum damnum intulerunt seminatis...
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