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
The Bible and violence of cruelty during war (e.g., the Ammonites “ripped open pregnant women in Gilead in order to enlarge their territory”; 1:13) and uses those war crimes of surrounding peoples to draw a parallel with Israel’s mistreatment of the poor, thus elevating economic injustice to the level of war crimes." (2:6–8). Other terms are: "ṣamat" (put an end to, exterminate...annihilate); "shamad" (destroy, exterminate); "nakah" (to strike fatally, kill, in manslaughter, murder...as retaliation ...in warfare, conquest...combat...attack, rout); "aqar" (pluck up, often in the violent sense); "qatsah" (to cut off, in a destructive sense); "shabat" (with zeker can refer to one's "memory" being "blotted