Molekh - Sacrificing One's Child

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1. The Abominations of their Fathers

   Part 2

   Dr. Tova Ganzel

   The act of offering children to Molekh and passing them through fire – was common among pagans and is echoed in the story of Akeidat Yitzhak. It led to a perception that such practices had Divine legitimacy. Yirmiyahu emphasizes, in each of the three verses where the burning of children by fire is mentioned, that the act violates God’s command; that such an idea never “came into God’s mind,” and that God would never mislead His people  this way. If indeed – as it appears from Yehezkel – the view prevailed among the people that this act was legitimate in God’s eyes, then it is clear why Yirmiyahu repeats over and over the prophetic message that there is no basis for it.

    

   According to Yehezkel’s prophecy, the future revival of the nation will not come because of the covenant of the forefathers – which is not mentioned here at all – nor as the result of the nation repenting. It is a “forced” redemption, motivated by the desecration of God’s Name inherent in the very fact of the nation’s exile. The nation should therefore be ashamed of its deeds because of the Divine motivation to restore them to their land. This redemption is “forced” upon the people, as it were, with no opportunity for them to exercise their free choice – perhaps even against their will. It is for this reason that the whole nation will not return.

2. Yehezkel’s Prophecy regarding Gog and Magog

   Part 2 - The Purification of the Land

   Dr. Tova Ganzel

   The corpses of the armies of Gog defile the land and must be buried in order to purify the land. However, the valley in which they are buried alludes to the valley of Ben Hinom, the valley in which children were sacrificed to Molekh. Thus, on a deeper level the prophet is hinting that the passing of children through fire - which had been common in the land - is what truly caused the land’s defilement. In addition to purifying the land from the casualties of war, this ceremony also purifies the land from the sins of the past.

   Although burying the dead bodies can stop those bodies from causing impurity, the burials cannot stop the graves from becoming a pilgrimage site. In these verses, the dead themselves become flesh for consumption. Those who consume them – the birds and the beast of the field – could have been sacrificed as offerings to the dead, while here the situation is reversed: they themselves eat the flesh and drink the blood of God’s enemies, thus ensuring that the graves do not become places of worship.

   Whereas in Yirmiyahu’s prophecy of destruction, the flesh of the sinners from the nation of Israel is eaten by the birds and the beasts of the field, in Yehezkel’s prophecy of revival it is God’s enemies who succumb to this fate.

3. Implications of the Akeida Part 7: Human Sacrifice

   Rabbi Ezra Bick | 34 minutes

   We will look at a midrash with a different approach to what we saw last time in the Sefat Emet. The midrash looks at a verse from the Book of Yirmiahu (Jeremiah), wherein the prophet castigates the people for offering human sacrifices. The midrash takes each word as an allusion to different parts of Tanakh where people find justification to offer human sacrifices.  

   Are there values so important that they would take precedence over everything else, even one’s family?  Or are there things in one’s personal life that are so valuable that you should never relinquish them? In the story of Akeidat Yitzhak, is the willingness to offer a human sacrifice demanded for the sake of God’s name?