Famine famine, and extreme famine. The number of deaths determines the magnitude designation, with under 1000 fatalities defining a "minor famine" and a "catastrophic famine" resulting in over 1,000,000 deaths. Famine personified as an allegory is found in some cultures, e.g. one of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse in Christian tradition, the fear gorta of Irish folklore, or the Wendigo of Algonquian tradition. Famine A famine is a widespread scarcity of food, caused by several factors including war, inflation, crop failure, population imbalance, or government policies. This phenomenon is usually accompanied or followed by regional malnutrition, starvation, epidemic, and increased
Women in the Bible the salvation of Israel." The Hebrew Bible portrays women as victims as well as victors. For example, in Numbers 31, the Israelites slay the people of Midian, except for 32,000 virgin women who are kept as spoils of war. Frymer-Kensky says the Bible author uses vulnerable women symbolically "as images of an Israel that is also small and vulnerable..." She adds "This is not misogynist story-telling but something far more complex in which the treatment of women becomes the clue to the morality of the social order." Professor of Religion J. David Pleins says these tales are included by the