C. Rationing During the Exile Dramatized (4:9-17)

The parable of eating rationed food which had been cooked on fire fueled by human dung symbolized both the privation and hunger brought on by lengthy siege and the humiliation of being exiled to an unclean land. There the exiles would have to eat nonkosher food in order to stay alive (Da 1:8-18). As terrible as that would be and was, they would suffer the even greater famine, as Amos had predicted for Israel, “not a famine of food or a thirst for water, but a famine of hearing the words of the Lord” (Am 8:11).