Stupidest 'sin'

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Nor did I. I did actually point that out in my post.

Kevin Danaher's The Year in Ireland is fascinating on all these old customs.

Glad you mentioned this. Today's anti-abortionists sometimes make out that the Greeks were in favor of protecting unborn humans because the Hippocratic Oath makes the physician promise not to 'give a pessary to any woman for the purpose of procuring an abortion'. So if a man decided his family was already big enough (or, like Laius with Oedipus, he had a problem with what the oracle told him about his kid), out went baby on a hillside for the wolves - but if a woman didn't want another baby, she had no say in the matter. As at many times and places in human history, nothing to do with protecting the child and everything to do with controlling the woman. Off topic, but just sayin'.

Depends on the context. I'm not concerned with Irish customs, but rather pagan Canaanite customs. In the Bible, "passing through the fire" DID mean sacrificing a child through fire. It was, if I understand correctly, a metal hollow statue in which a fire was built. The infant would be placed in the hands of the god, whereupon the infant would be burned up.

Well, the idea of the Greeks abandoning babies is not the same as abortion or sacrifice. It's cruel, but it just means that the parent disavows any responsibility for the fait of the child by leaving that fate, for better or for worse, in the hands of the gods. If it is in the will of the gods for the baby to live, then the baby will live. If not, the baby dies.

I'm not saying that's right, either. But it isn't equivalent to abortion nor sacrifice. At least by putting a baby out, there was at least the chance a stranger might show pity and adopt the child. As to women's rights in ancient Greece: I don't know enough about Greek attitudes towards women in their culture. All I know is by the time of the first century A.D., they were given a certain amount of respect--probably based on ruling class or other socio-economic status. The inherent worth of all human beings was a value of the early Christian church, and wealthy/powerful women played a significant role in the founding of the church. So there had to have been some pre-Christian recognition of women's equality, even if their status was much, MUCH lower than it is today. All I can argue is the Biblical view and the contrast with established culture at the time. The corruption of wealth and political status in Greek and Roman society certainly afforded women with virtual free status certain privileges simply not otherwise available to the common (bond)women of the time.

Incidentally, once-upon-a-time I was immensely fascinated by ancient Greek myth and religion almost as much as I am my own religion now. I just recognized the difference between one and the other.

Were the Carthaginians really descendents of the Trojans, as Virgil might have us believe?

Not really. The Nazis were extensive record keepers. And I don't deny that there was some child sacrifice in Phoenician culture, but I do doubt that Roman accounts were accurate. There are numerous 'tophets' in the ruins (what little there are) of Punic Carthage and some of the amphorae have large amounts of children's bones. I think we can both (I hope) agree that Holocaust denialism is an abomination


I was being somewhat facetious with the Beck reference. Cato's ideas were hardly mainstream amongst Roman Plebians, who had little connection with the Patricians. Their understanding of Carthage was probably limited to bogeyman stories about Hannibal Barca. Additionally, though I understand the analogy you make between the Carthage/Rome situation and the US/USSR Cold War, I don't think it is apt for a few reasons; One being 2000 years gap in morality, and politics- Though it would seem by modern ethics to make sense to take over the greatest city, the Romans were not modern. Their view of Carthage was a formidable rival that must be destroyed utterly and resettled. If these ethics applied to the modern period, I can guarantee the US or the USSR would have annihilated each other utterly and then resettled the land, working hard to eliminate the others legacy. Such is the nature of antiquity



Honestly, nobody in the antiquity is white as snow. In fact, even to the modern period... I don't know if you are aware of Timē, but I assure even the much-vaunted Athenians followed this moral system

No, they were Phonenicans, hailing from modern Lebanon. In fact, the word Punic is derived from the Latin word for Phonecian.

-Bill, otherwise known as Kraichgauer

I think calling masturbateing a sin is nonsence. If any sin were to get my vote, it would be that one. Especially when people add thoughts that can't be helped into it.

Here is a list I have created from knowing my sister's church type.

-Chooseing to be a single female.
-Men haveing long hair, and women haveing short. (They get haircuts anyway.)
-Not going to church. (Of course, and to the point people guilt themselves while in the hospital? What the @#%)
-Females teaching or leading with men in the room.
-Men wearing earrings.
-Christmas is Pegan. Easter is not Godly enough, and too much about candy and play. Halloween is Satan worship day.
-Females wearing jeans instead of comfortable yet more formal wear.
-Being gay or lesbian oriented (of course )

Dare I ask which church body your sister belongs to?

-Bill, otherwise known as Kraichgauer

Was going to ask the same question, tho by reading the list I'll take an educated guess at being LDS (Mormon).

My guess would have been Jehovah's Witnesses, or Worldwide Church of God.

-Bill, otherwise known as Kraichgauer

Any sources for this idea? Is this method of sacrifice actually mentioned anywhere in the Old Testament, and if not, who first mentions it and where?

There has to be a missing section from the OT where it says, 'and the Lord demandeth a bowl of M & Ms inside the tabernacle, only with the brown ones all removed'.

EDIT: I'd like to add: poor, poor manatees. They are my favourite sea mammal! I didn't know they were at all found around the seas in the middle East...though I suppose they could be caught off the shores of West Africa: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Mapa_ ... hechus.png I don't think the Israelites travelled that far, however.

It was probably dugong, not manatee skin. Even so: poor, poor dugongs

If I believed in a deity, it would protect all the Sirenians.

AngelRho, thanks for the post.
Would I be right to say that, in your view, the construction of the Tabernacle was a demonstration of faith? The exacting, demanding process of construction was simply a tool to focus the thoughts and hearts of the Jewish people on God? It didn't really matter what the physical structure looked like, it was the PROCESS of building it that mattered?
Was the Tabernacle intended to be a once-off, or do you think God intended for many of them to eventually be built? If it was a one-time thing, and the specifics of its construction were arbitrary (I'm assuming a bit much here) then why record all the details for the ages? Or did the Jews not "get it"?

You're probably right about the M&Ms requirement. But the problem is that that only books that make it into the Bible must have certain qualifications: inerrant and God-inspired; received by God's people (Israelites/Jews); have some prophetic origin or, if we're talking NT, written by an apostle. The problem is that it would have been inspired by God but sadly only revealed to a prophet from, say, Moab. Hence why it never made the Bible.

The word that translates "manatee" could also be read as "dolphin." It's one of those things we can't really know with 100% certainty. As to how far the Israelites travelled--keep in mind that when they left Egypt and constructed the tabernacle, they took the best of Egypt with them. They may not have travelled far to get "exotic" animal skins, but they wouldn't have had to.

Check it out for yourself (sorry, I've been away this weekend and am very tired, so I'll do the lazy Wikipedia thing. You can cross-check with your Bible if you like):

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Molech#Biblical_texts

As to the details, the Bible presupposes that its readers understood what Molech worship was. "Pass through the fire" was understood to mean the act of giving an offering to Molech by burning it. When they mentioned that, that's exactly what they were talking about. You could read it somewhat more loosely as some kind of ritual walking on burning coals or some such, which in obeisance to a false god was still wrong and punishable by death. But, I mean, if that's all there was to it, it would hardly be worth mentioning. There is no reason to doubt the Biblical account.

Something that often happens is that cultures unfriendly to a Judeo-Christian worldview tend to overlook or dismiss some of the uglier points of history. Think of the connection between Rome and, say, the United States. We culturally tend to hold an anti-imperialist view that prefers to regard American-occupied regions as "victims" of American imperialism, that the people under American influence are really the good guys whose only fault is they can't defend themselves or repel the greater numbers of better trained and better equipped troops, etc. and etc. It's more convenient, I think, to paint Rome as the greedy expansionist bully on the playground and the Phoenicians were just unfortunate enough to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. Archeology is inconclusive, so whether Phoenicians were guilty of "detestable practices" remains for the surviving writings we had about them. The Bible is remarkably well-preserved and reliable on a number of issues. Roman writings also corroborate the Biblical viewpoint. It is highly likely that child sacrifice was a feature of Canaanite worship.