Religious restrictions on the consumption of pork

Religious restrictions on the consumption of pork are a tradition in the Ancient Near East. Swine were prohibited in ancient Syria and Phoenicia, and the pig and its flesh represented a taboo observed, Strabo noted, at Comana in Pontus. A lost poem of Hermesianax, reported centuries later by the traveller Pausanias, reported an etiological myth of Attis destroyed by a supernatural boar to account for the fact that "in consequence of these events the Galatians who inhabit Pessinous do not touch pork".

Concerning Abrahamic religions, clear restrictions exist in Jewish dietary laws (Kashrut) and in Islamic dietary laws (Halal). Most Christian sects permit pork - justified by Peter's vision of a sheet with animals. However, Seventh-day Adventists consider pork taboo, along with other foods forbidden by Jewish law. The Ethiopian Orthodox Church does not permit pork consumption, while the Coptic Orthodox Church of Alexandria is divided on the subject.

The Torah (Pentateuch) contains passages in Leviticus that lists the animals that people are permitted to consume. It first notes what qualifies an animal that is absolutely permitted:

Any animal that has a cloven hoof that is completely split into double hooves, and which brings up its cud that one you may eat.

Animals that have cloven hooves and chew their cud are ruminants such as cows, sheep, and deer. This text does not specify every possible animal by name, only their behaviors.

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