Bible Dictionary
Dung
Dung was used as manure and, where firewood was scarce, as fuel for heating and cooking. Scripture also uses it figuratively for rejection, worthlessness, and disgrace.
Definition
Dung is animal or other organic waste used as manure and, where wood was scarce, as fuel. It could be collected with street sweepings, stored outside city walls, and carried to fields or used for heating and baking.
Biblical Usage
Dung from sacrifices was burned outside the camp. Scripture also uses being cast out as dung as a figure for rejection, worthlessness, and disgrace.
Historical Background
In Syria, Arabia, and Egypt, cow and camel dung served as a substitute for firewood. Its even heat made it useful for ovens and baking cakes. Jerusalem’s refuse was collected near the dung gate and later removed to the fields.
Scripture References
Historical Bible Dictionaries
Easton's Bible Dictionary
(1.) Used as manure (Luke 13:8); collected outside the city walls (Neh. 2:13). Of sacrifices, burned outside the camp (Ex. 29:14; Lev. 4:11; 8:17; Num. 19:5). To be “cast out as dung,” a figurative expression (1 Kings 14:10; 2 Kings 9:37; Jer. 8:2; Ps. 18:42), meaning to be rejected as unprofitable. (2.) Used as fuel, a substitute for firewood, which was with difficulty procured in Syria, Arabia, and Egypt (Ezek. 4:12-15), where cows’ and camels’ dung is used to the present day for this purpose.
Smith's Bible Dictionary
The uses of dung were two-fold—as manure and as fuel. The manure consisted either of straw steeped in liquid manure, (Isaiah 25:10) or the sweepings, (Isaiah 5:25) of the streets and roads, which were carefully removed from about the houses, and collected in heaps outside the walls of the towns at fixed spots—hence the dung-gate at Jerusalem—and thence removed in due course to the fields. The difficulty of procuring fuel in Syria, Arabia and Egypt has made dung in all ages valuable as a substitute. It was probably used for heating ovens and for baking cakes, (Ezra 4:12,15) the equable heat which it produced adapting it pecularily for the latter operation. Cow’s and camels dung is still used for a similar purpose by the Bedouins.