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MOLECH

(Heb. mōleḵ)

A Canaanite-Israelite god (LXX Moloch). The longstanding response of fascination and horror stems from Molech’s presumed association with the ritualistic killing of human beings. The name is typically related to a tri-radical consonantal base m-l-k that frequently appears in the Hebrew Bible. While its various vocalizations indicate a particular semantic value associated with rulership (e.g., meleḵ, “ruler”; mĕlûḵâ, “royalty”), the form m-l-k has been interpreted in about eight instances as a reference to a chthonic or a netherworld deity and patron of human sacrifice: Molech “ruler (of the netherworld”; Lev. 18:21; 20:2-5; 1 Kgs. 11:7; 2 Kgs. 23:10; Jer. 32:35; Amos 5:26? [cf. LXX]). A number of scholars, while upholding Heb. m-l-k’s connection with human sacrifice in these texts, would interpret these references as a technical name for child sacrifice known from Punic sources: a “molk-sacrifice.” This is unlikely, however, as confirmed in the associated phrase “playing the harlot after Molech” (cf. Lev. 20:5; also Isa. 57:3). In its 40 or so other occurrences in the OT, the phrase “playing the harlot after. . .” refers to religious practices associated with illicit deities, their images, or numinous beings such as ghosts (e.g., the ʾōḇōṯ and the yiddĕʿōnîm). It never explicitly refers to the offering up of sacrifices. In Lev. 20:5 and elsewhere it would appear that a deity Molech is in view, rather than some technical term for sacrifice.

Recently scholars have attempted to exploit apparently relevant comparative Near Eastern data pertaining to a deity M-l-k (frequently vocalized as Malik, but nonetheless viewed as cognate to biblical Molech). Along these lines and of no little consequence is the ancient Near Eastern and biblical evidence attesting to the practice of human sacrifice more generally, irrespective of whether the sources explicitly relate said rituals to a deity M-l-k. Related references to the rite of human sacrifice underlying such biblical phrases as “the one who makes his son or daughter pass through the fire” and the “sacrifice of the firstborn to Yahweh” have been compared, contrasted, and equated with those mentioning Molech. There remains the added question of whether the ritual killing of humans was a crisis ritual or part of the sacrificial calendar. The evidence at hand suggests that human sacrifice could function in either, if not both, capacities.

The Deuteronomistic history, although critical of the practice of human sacrifice, preserves the memory of former Israelites and their neighbors who indeed ritually killed their children — Jephthah (Judg. 11:34-40); Hiel (Josh. 6:26; 1 Kgs. 16:34); Ahaz (2 Kgs. 16:3); and Manasseh (2 Kgs. 21:16). It further acknowledges the efficacious power of such a ritual as in the sacrifice of the Moabite prince offered up by his father. The performance of this ritual resulted in the wrath of the deity (Chemosh?), forcing the Israelites to retreat from Moab (2 Kgs. 3:27). It is not until much later during Josiah’s reform that the Topheth in the Hinnom Valley — where human sacrifice is portrayed as having taken place — was destroyed. Even then, the practice endured well beyond the late preexilic period in Judah (cf. Jer. 2:23; 7:31; 19:5-6, 11-14; 31:40; 32:35).

Human sacrifice as more generally referred to in the phrase, “the one who makes his son or daughter pass through the fire,” is frequently and exclusively attributed to Canaanite origins by some biblical writers (e.g., Deut. 12:31). Nonetheless, some form of human sacrifice was apparently part of the Yahwistic cult in preexilic (and perhaps exilic) times. Isa. 30:33 clearly connects Yahweh and human sacrifice at the Topheth (read Molech for meleḵ in v. 33b?); if no such connection was intended in this allusion to Assyria’s anticipated destruction, one would have expected some disclaimer to that effect. The “sacrifice of the firstborn to Yahweh” and the Molech sacrifice were probably closely related, if not one and the same cult. Although the former required that the firstborn sons be sacrificed to Yahweh while the latter listed as sacrifices children generally (of both sexes), the fact that daughters could legally substitute for sons as firstborn heirs favors the equation of these two cults (cf. Num. 27:1-8 and the texts from Emar and Nuzi regarding the legal substitution of daughters for sons within the context of inheritance). The two traditions might reflect the same cult but from complementary perspectives, one from the more particular and the other from the more general (or is one a subset of the other?). Therefore, texts that refer to the sacrifice of the firstborn to Yahweh (e.g., Gen. 22:1-14; Exod. 13:2, 12-13, 15; Mic. 6:6-7) can be related to the Molech cult. Molech’s associations with Baal (rather than Yahweh) in biblical traditions (cf. Jer. 2:23; 19:5; 32:35) are more likely part of the inventive Deuteronomistic rhetorical polemic to “Canaanize” what was formerly a non-Deuteronomistic, but Yahwistic, Israelite practice of human sacrifice.

As added confirmation of the endurance and pervasiveness of the practice, Ezekiel implies that Yahweh had commanded the Israelites to participate in the sacrifice of their firstborn (Ezek. 20:25-26), but qualifies this law as a form of punishment. Similarly, Exod. 22:29-30(MT 28-29) comprises an unqualified demand to make the firstborn sacrifice to Yahweh; the option to redeem the firstborn is not offered here as in later and Priestly texts. In the light of Jeremiah’s condemnation of the practice and Ezekiel’s recognition that Yahweh had once condoned the ritual killing of humans, it is self-evident that for many it was an acceptable form of Yahweh worship. Mic. 6:7 might imply that the most powerful sacrifice that could be offered to Yahweh was child sacrifice; he either endorses said practice or poses a rhetorically charged question eliciting an emphatic No!

Whether or not Yahweh and Molech are to be considered one and the same deity with respect to their roles in the cult of human sacrifice begs the question. Several relevant passages (e.g., Jer. 32:35; Ezek. 23:38-39; Lev. 20:3; Zeph. 1:5) indicate that the Molech cult was considered by some sectors of Israelite society as part of the Yahwistic cult. The location of the Molech cult in the nearby Hinnom Valley rather than in the Jerusalem temple precinct might be reflective of an intra-Israelite debate over its relative status within the Yahweh cult. It might well have been observed in the temple precinct in the days of Ahaz (Hezekiah?) and Manasseh, but then moved to the Hinnom Valley in the initial stages of Josiah’s reign and again thereafter (cf. Jer. 7:31-32; 19:5); note too that Hezekiah never concerns himself with outlawing the existent Molech cult (cf. 2 Kgs. 18:1-4). Furthermore, 2 Kgs. 16:3; 21:6 (cf. also a form of human sacrifice as practiced by the northern kings, 17:17) do not locate that cult at the Topheth. The lack of explicit mention of the Molech cult and the failure to attribute its establishment to Ahaz or Manasseh in Josiah’s defilement of the Topheth in 2 Kgs. 23:10 might be of no small consequence. The Molech cult as portrayed in Deuteronomistic and related traditions was probably not relegated to areas outside the temple precincts. Traditions like 2 Kgs. 21:3-6; 23:11-12 assume the worship of several Canaanite-Israelite deities as taking place within the Jerusalem temple precinct (e.g., Baal, Asherah, the host of heaven, and the solar deity), and the same might have applied in the case of Molech.

The lack of extrabiblical confirmation for the existence of a specifically chthonic or netherworld aspect of a deity M-l-k and for his status as patron of a cult of human sacrifice ought to elicit caution as regards a straightforward historical reading of the biblical portrayal of the Molech cult. Moreover, tensions evident in the biblical traditions regarding the nature and extent of human sacrifice suggest another instance wherein Deuteronomistic history employed a strategy of rhetorical polemic. By artificially attributing to Molech patronage over the cult of human sacrifice, the Deuteronomists sought to distance the practice from its origins in the Yahweh cult altogether. The rhetorical character of the Deuteronomistic portrayal finds its clearest confirmation in the fact that non-Deuteronomistic (and non-Priestly) biblical traditions do not distance human sacrifice from the cult of Yahweh (cf. texts preserving the sacrifice of the firstborn). If one grants that Molech was Yahweh’s chthonic aspect or an independent netherworld deity of the Yahwistic cult in late preexilic Judah, one would hardly expect the Deuteronomistic and Priestly traditions to acknowledge openly that reality. Rather, in line with the Deuteronomistic tendency to reduce the divine population of heaven (as regards a Yahwistic pantheon), a deity such as Molech — real or contrived — would be portrayed as a Canaanite deity and Israel’s adherence to his cult explained as the outgrowth of “syncretistic” tendencies (cf. the Deuteronomistic polemic against the goddess Asherah, known to be the consort of Yahweh in non-Deuteronomistic forms of Yahwism, but in Deuteronomistic circles identified as a Canaanite deity and wife of Baal).

Bibliography. J. Day, Molech: A God of Human Sacrifice in the Old Testament (Cambridge, 1989); G. C. Heider, The Cult of Molek. JSOTSup 43 (Sheffield, 1985); J. D. Levenson, The Death and Resurrection of the Beloved Son (New Haven, 1993); M. S. Smith, The Early History of God (San Francisco, 1990).

Brian B. Schmidt

Prayer Tents Bible References - Prayer Tents

MOLECH

Eerdmans Dictionary of the Bible (2000)