Moloch (; ''Mōleḵ'' or הַמֹּלֶךְ‎ ''hamMōleḵ''; grc, Μόλοχ, la, Moloch; also Molech or Molek) is a name or a term which appears in the

Hebrew Bible The Hebrew Bible or Tanakh (;"Tanach"
'' Leviticus. The

Bible The Bible (from Koine Greek , , 'the books') is a collection of religious texts or scriptures that are held to be sacred in Christianity, Judaism, Samaritanism, and many other religions. The Bible is an anthologya compilation of texts ...

strongly condemns practices which are associated with Moloch, practices which appear to have included child sacrifice. Traditionally, Moloch has been understood as referring to a Canaanite god. However, since 1935, scholars have debated whether or not the term refers to a type of sacrifice on the basis of a similar term, also spelled ''mlk'', which means "sacrifice" in the

Punic language The Punic language, also called Phoenicio-Punic or Carthaginian, is an extinct variety of the Phoenician language, a Canaanite language of the Northwest Semitic branch of the Semitic languages. An offshoot of the Phoenician language of coastal W ...

. This second position has grown increasingly popular, but it remains contested. Among proponents of this second position, controversy continues as to whether the sacrifices were offered to

Yahweh Yahweh *''Yahwe'', was the national god of ancient Israel and Judah. The origins of his worship reach at least to the early Iron Age, and likely to the Late Bronze Age if not somewhat earlier, and in the oldest biblical literature he poss ...

or another deity, and whether they were a native Israelite religious custom or a

Phoenicia Phoenicia () was an ancient thalassocratic civilization originating in the Levant region of the eastern Mediterranean, primarily located in modern Lebanon. The territory of the Phoenician city-states extended and shrank throughout their histor ...

n import. Since the medieval period, Moloch has often been portrayed as a bull-headed idol with outstretched hands over a fire; this depiction takes the brief mentions of Moloch in the Bible and combines them with various sources, including ancient accounts of Carthaginian child sacrifice and the legend of the Minotaur. "Moloch" has been figuratively used in reference to a person or a thing which demands or requires a very costly sacrifice. A god Moloch appears in various works of literature and film, such as John Milton's '' Paradise Lost'' (1667),

Gustave Flaubert Gustave Flaubert ( , , ; 12 December 1821 – 8 May 1880) was a French novelist. Highly influential, he has been considered the leading exponent of literary realism in his country. According to the literary theorist Kornelije Kvas, "in Flauber ...

's ''

Salammbô ''Salammbô'' (1862) is a historical novel by Gustave Flaubert. It is set in Carthage immediately before and during the Mercenary Revolt (241–237 BCE). Flaubert's principal source was Book I of the ''Histories'', written by the Greek hist ...

'' (1862),

Fritz Lang Friedrich Christian Anton Lang (; December 5, 1890 – August 2, 1976), known as Fritz Lang, was an Austrian film director, screenwriter, and producer who worked in Germany and later the United States.Obituary ''Variety'', August 4, 1976, p. 6 ...

's '' Metropolis (1927 film)'', and Allen Ginsberg's "

Howl Howl most often refers to: *Howling, an animal vocalization in many canine species *Howl (poem), a 1956 poem by Allen Ginsberg Howl may also refer to: Film * ''The Howl'', a 1970 Italian film * ''Howl'' (2010 film), a 2010 American arthouse b ...

" (1955).

Etymology

"Moloch" derives from a Latin transcription of the Greek Μόλοχ ''Mólokh'', itself a transcription of the original ''Mōleḵ''. The etymology of Moloch is uncertain: most scholars derive it from the root "to rule" but with the vowels of "shame" (first advanced by

Abraham Geiger Abraham Geiger (Hebrew: ''ʼAvrāhām Gayger''; 24 May 181023 October 1874) was a German rabbi and scholar, considered the founding father of Reform Judaism. Emphasizing Judaism's constant development along history and universalist traits, Geig ...

in 1857), much like '' Ashtoreth'', or as a ''qal'' participle from the same verb. R. M. Kerr criticizes both theories by noting that — ''Ashtoreth'' notwithstanding – the name of no other god appears to have been formed from a ''qal'' participle, and that Geiger's proposal is "an out-of-date theory which has never received any factual support". Paul Mosca similarly argued that "The theory that a form would immediately suggest to the reader or hearer the word (rather than or ) is the product of nineteenth century ingenuity, not of Massoretic or pre-Massoretic tendentiousness". Scholars who do not believe that Moloch represents a deity instead compare the name to inscriptions in the closely-related

where the word (''molk'' or ''mulk'') refers to a type of sacrifice, a connection first proposed by Otto Eissfeldt (1935). Eissfeldt himself, following Jean-Baptiste Chabot, connected Punic and ''Moloch'' to a

Syriac Syriac may refer to: *Syriac language, an ancient dialect of Middle Aramaic *Sureth, one of the modern dialects of Syriac spoken in the Nineveh Plains region * Syriac alphabet ** Syriac (Unicode block) ** Syriac Supplement * Neo-Aramaic languages a ...

verb meaning "to promise", a theory also supported as "the least problematic solution" by Heath Dewrell (2017). Scholars such as W. von Soden argue that the term is a nominalized causative form of the verb , meaning "to offer", "present", and thus means "the act of presenting" or "thing presented". Kerr instead derives both the Punic and Hebrew word from the verb , which he proposes meant "to own", "to possess" in

Proto-Semitic Proto-Semitic is the hypothetical reconstructed proto-language ancestral to the Semitic languages. There is no consensus regarding the location of the Proto-Semitic '' Urheimat''; scholars hypothesize that it may have originated in the Levant ( ...

, only later coming to mean "to rule"; the meaning of Moloch would thus originally have been "present", "gift", and later come to mean "sacrifice".

Biblical attestations

Foster Bible Pictures 0074-1 Offering to Molech

Masoretic text

The word ''Moloch'' occurs 8 times in the

Masoretic text The Masoretic Text (MT or 𝕸; he, נֻסָּח הַמָּסוֹרָה, Nūssāḥ Hammāsōrā, lit. 'Text of the Tradition') is the authoritative Hebrew and Aramaic text of the 24 books of the Hebrew Bible (Tanakh) in Rabbinic Judaism. ...

of the

Hebrew Bible The Hebrew Bible or Tanakh (;"Tanach"
'' Milcom Milcom or Milkom (Ammonite: 𐤌𐤋𐤊𐤌 *''Mīlkām''; Hebrew: or מַלְכָּם ) was the name of either the national god, or a popular god, of the Ammonites. He is attested in the Hebrew Bible and in archaeological finds from the forme ...

, the god of the

Ammon Ammon ( Ammonite: 𐤏𐤌𐤍 ''ʻAmān''; he, עַמּוֹן ''ʻAmmōn''; ar, عمّون, ʻAmmūn) was an ancient Semitic-speaking nation occupying the east of the Jordan River, between the torrent valleys of Arnon and Jabbok, in ...

ites. Five of the others are in Leviticus, with one in

2 Kings The Book of Kings (, '' Sēfer Məlāḵīm'') is a book in the Hebrew Bible, found as two books (1–2 Kings) in the Old Testament of the Christian Bible. It concludes the Deuteronomistic history, a history of Israel also including the book ...

and another in The Book of Jeremiah. Each mention of ''Moloch'' indicates the presence of the article , or "the", therefore reading "the Moloch". Likewise, when passages describe things coming or going "to Moloch", the prepositional

lamedh Lamedh or Lamed is the twelfth letter of the Semitic abjads, including Hebrew Lāmed , Aramaic Lāmadh , Syriac Lāmaḏ ܠ, Arabic , and Phoenician Lāmed . Its sound value is . The Phoenician letter gave rise to the Greek Lambda (Λ), Latin ...

is conjugated with a () to match the form of "...to ''the'' Moloch", as opposed to being conjugated with a (), which would afford the reading "...to Moloch". A is, however, present in 1 Kings 11:7, although this may be explained by the apparently erroneous substitution of ''Moloch'' for ''Milkom'' detailed above. All of these texts condemn Israelites who engage in practices associated with Moloch, and most associate Moloch with the use of children as offerings. The activity of causing children "to pass over the fire" is mentioned, without reference to Moloch, in numerous other verses of the bible, such as in Deuteronomy (Deuteronomy 12:31, 18:10), 2 Kings (2 Kings 16:3; 17:17; 17:31; 21:6), 2 Chronicles (2 Chronicles 28:3; 33:6), the Book of Jeremiah (Jeremiah 7:31, 19:5) and the Book of Ezekiel (Ezekiel 16:21; 20:26, 31; 23:37). Leviticus repeatedly forbids the practice of offering children to Moloch: The majority of the Leviticus references come from a single passage of four lines: In 2 Kings, Moloch is associated with the

tophet In the Hebrew Bible, Tophet or Topheth ( hbo, תֹּפֶת, Tōp̄eṯ; grc-gre, Ταφέθ, taphéth; la, Topheth) is a location in Jerusalem in the Valley of Hinnom (Gehenna), where worshipers engaged in a ritual involving "passing a child thro ...

in the valley of Gehenna when it is destroyed by king Josiah: Lastly, the prophet

Jeremiah Jeremiah, Modern: , Tiberian: ; el, Ἰερεμίας, Ieremíās; meaning " Yah shall raise" (c. 650 – c. 570 BC), also called Jeremias or the "weeping prophet", was one of the major prophets of the Hebrew Bible. According to Jewi ...

condemns practices associated with Moloch as showing infidelity to

: Given the name's similarity to the Hebrew word "king", scholars have also searched the Masoretic text to find instances of that may be mistakes for Moloch. Most scholars consider only one instance as likely a mistake, in Isaiah:

Septuagint and New Testament

The

Greek Greek may refer to: Greece Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe: *Greeks, an ethnic group. *Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family. **Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor ...

Septuagint The Greek Old Testament, or Septuagint (, ; from the la, septuaginta, lit=seventy; often abbreviated ''70''; in Roman numerals, LXX), is the earliest extant Greek translation of books from the Hebrew Bible. It includes several books beyond ...

translates the instances of Moloch in Leviticus as "ruler" (), and as "king" () at 1 Kings 11:7. It contains Moloch at 2 Kings 23:10 and Jeremiah 30:35. Additionally, the Septuagint uses the name Moloch in

Amos Amos or AMOS may refer to: Arts and entertainment * Amos Records, an independent record label established in Los Angeles, California, in 1968 * Amos (band), an American Christian rock band * ''Amos'' (album), an album by Michael Ray * ''Amos' ...

where it is not found in the Masoretic text: The Greek version with Moloch is quoted in the

New Testament The New Testament grc, Ἡ Καινὴ Διαθήκη, transl. ; la, Novum Testamentum. (NT) is the second division of the Christian biblical canon. It discusses the teachings and person of Jesus, as well as events in first-century Chri ...

and accounts for the one occurrence of Moloch there (

Acts The Acts of the Apostles ( grc-koi, Πράξεις Ἀποστόλων, ''Práxeis Apostólōn''; la, Actūs Apostolōrum) is the fifth book of the New Testament; it tells of the founding of the Christian Church and the spread of its message ...

7:43).

Theories

Moloch as a deity

Before 1935, all scholars held that Moloch was a pagan deity, to whom child sacrifice was offered at the Jerusalem

. The medieval

rabbi A rabbi () is a spiritual leader or religious teacher in Judaism. One becomes a rabbi by being ordained by another rabbi – known as ''semikha'' – following a course of study of Jewish history and texts such as the Talmud. The basic form of ...

nical tradition understood Moloch as closely related to other similarly named deities mentioned in the bible such as

Milcom Milcom or Milkom (Ammonite: 𐤌𐤋𐤊𐤌 *''Mīlkām''; Hebrew: or מַלְכָּם ) was the name of either the national god, or a popular god, of the Ammonites. He is attested in the Hebrew Bible and in archaeological finds from the forme ...

, Adrammelek, and Anammelech. The medieval rabbinical tradition also connected Moloch to reports of ancient Phoenician and Carthaginian child sacrifice; both of these rabbinical ideas were taken over by early modern scholarship. Some modern scholars have proposed that Moloch may be the same god as Milcom, Adad-Milki, or an epithet for

Baal Baal (), or Baal,; phn, , baʿl; hbo, , baʿal, ). ( ''baʿal'') was a title and honorific meaning "owner", "lord" in the Northwest Semitic languages spoken in the Levant during antiquity. From its use among people, it came to be applied t ...

. G. C. Heider and John Day connect Moloch with a deity ''Mlk'' attested at Ugarit and ''Malik'' attested in

Mesopotamia Mesopotamia ''Mesopotamíā''; ar, بِلَاد ٱلرَّافِدَيْن or ; syc, ܐܪܡ ܢܗܪ̈ܝܢ, or , ) is a historical region of Western Asia situated within the Tigris–Euphrates river system, in the northern part of the ...

and proposes that he was a god of the

underworld The underworld, also known as the netherworld or hell, is the supernatural world of the dead in various religious traditions and myths, located below the world of the living. Chthonic is the technical adjective for things of the underwor ...

, as in Mesopotamia ''Malik'' is twice equated with the underworld god Nergal. Day also notes that Isaiah seems to associate Moloch with

Sheol Sheol ( ; he, ''Šəʾōl'', Tiberian: ''Šŏʾōl'') in the Hebrew Bible is a place of still darkness which lies after death. Although not well defined in the Tanakh, Sheol in this view was a subterranean underworld where the souls of the ...

. The Ugaritic deity ''Mlk'' also appears to be associated with the underworld, and the similarly named Phoenician god Melqart (literally "king of the city") could have underworld associations if "city" is understood to mean "underworld", as proposed by William F. Albright. Heider also argued that there was also an Akkadian term referring to the shades of the dead. The notion that Moloch refers to a deity has been challenged for several reasons. Moloch is rarely mentioned in the Bible, is not mentioned at all outside of it, and connections to other deities with similar names are uncertain. Moreover, it is possible that some of the supposed deities named ''Mlk'' are epithets for another god, given that ''mlk'' can also mean "king". The Israelite rite conforms, on the other hand, to the Punic rite in that both involved the sacrifice of children. None of the proposed gods Moloch could be identified with is associated with human sacrifice, the god ''Mlk'' of Ugarit appears to have only received animal sacrifice, and the sacrifice is never offered to a god name ''Mlk'' but rather to another deity.

Moloch as a form of sacrifice

In 1935, Otto Eissfeldt proposed, on the basis of Punic inscriptions, that Moloch was a form of sacrifice rather than a deity. Punic inscriptions commonly associate the word with three other words: (lamb), (citizen) and (human being). and never occur in the same description and appear to be interchangeable. Other words that sometimes occur are (flesh). When put together with , these words indicate a "-sacrifice consisting of...". The Biblical term would thus be translated not as "to Moloch", as normally translated, but as "as a molk-sacrifice", a meaning consistent with uses of the Hebrew preposition elsewhere. Bennie Reynolds further argues that Jeremiah's use of ''Moloch'' in conjunction with

in Jer 32:25 is parallel to his use of "burnt offering" and Baal in Jeremiah 19:4–5. The view that Moloch refers to a type of sacrifice was challenged by John Day and George Heider in the 1980s. Day and Heider argued that it was unlikely that biblical commentators had misunderstood an earlier term for a sacrifice as a deity and that Leviticus 20:5's mention of "whoring after Moloch" necessarily implied that Moloch was a god. Day and Heider nevertheless accepted that ''mlk'' was a sacrificial term in Punic, but argue that it did not originate in Phoenicia and that it was not brought back to Phoenicia by the Punic diaspora. More recently, Anthony Frendo argues that the Hebrew equivalent to Punic (the root of Punic ) is the verb "to pass over"; in Frendo's view, this means that Hebrew Moloch is not derived from the same root as Punic . Since Day's and Heider's objections, a growing number of scholars has come to believe that Moloch refers to the ''mulk'' sacrifice rather than a deity.

Francesca Stavrakopoulou Francesca Stavrakopoulou (; born 3 October 1975) is a British biblical scholar and broadcaster. She is currently Professor of Hebrew Bible and Ancient Religion at the University of Exeter. The main focus of her research is on the Hebrew Bible, a ...

argues that "because both Heider and Day accept Eissfeldt's interpretation of Phoenician-Punic as a sacrificial term, their positions are at once compromised by the possibility that biblical could well function in a similar way as a technical term for a type of sacrifice". She further argues that "whoring after Moloch" does not need to imply a deity as refers to both the act of sacrificing and the thing sacrificed, allowing an interpretation of "whor ng after the mlk-offering". Heath Dewrell argues that the translation of Leviticus 20:5 in the

, which substitutes ''ἄρχοντας'' "princes" for ''Moloch'', implies that the biblical urtext did not include the phrase "whoring after Moloch". Bennie Reynolds further notes that at least one inscription from Tyre does appear to mention sacrifice (''RES'' 367); therefore Day and Heider are incorrect that the practice is unattested in Canaan (Phoenicia). Reynolds also argues for further parallels. Among scholars who deny the existence of a deity Moloch, debate remains as to whether the Israelite ''mlk'' sacrifices were offered to Yahweh or another deity. Armin Lange suggests that the Binding of Isaac represents a ''mlk''-sacrifice to Yahweh in which the child is finally substituted with a sheep, noting that Isaac was meant to be a burnt offering. This opinion is shared by Stavrakopoulou, who also points to the sacrifice of Jephthah of his daughter as a burnt offering. Frendo, while he argues that ''Moloch'' refers to a god, accepts Stavrakopoulou's argument that the sacrifices in the tophet were originally to Yahweh. Dewrell argues that although sacrifices were offered to Yahweh, they were distinct from other forms of human or child sacrifice found in the Bible (such as that of Jephthah) and were a foreign custom imported by the Israelites from the Phoenicians during the reign of

Ahaz Ahaz (; gr, Ἄχαζ, Ἀχάζ ''Akhaz''; la, Achaz) an abbreviation of Jehoahaz II (of Judah), "Yahweh has held" (; akk, 𒅀𒌑𒄩𒍣 ''Ya'úḫazi'' 'ia-ú-ḫa-zi'' Hayim Tadmor and Shigeo Yamada, ''The Royal Inscriptions of Tiglath ...

As a rite of passage

A minority of scholars, mainly scholars of

Punic The Punic people, or western Phoenicians, were a Semitic people in the Western Mediterranean who migrated from Tyre, Phoenicia to North Africa during the Early Iron Age. In modern scholarship, the term ''Punic'' – the Latin equivalent of t ...

studies, has argued that the ceremonies to Moloch are in fact a non-lethal dedication ceremony rather than a sacrifice. These theories are partially supported by commentary in the

Talmud The Talmud (; he, , Talmūḏ) is the central text of Rabbinic Judaism and the primary source of Jewish religious law ('' halakha'') and Jewish theology. Until the advent of modernity, in nearly all Jewish communities, the Talmud was the ce ...

and among early Jewish commentators of the Bible. Rejecting such arguments, Paolo Xella and Francesca Stavrakopoulou note that the Bible explicitly connects the ritual to Moloch at the tophet with the verbs indicating slaughter, killing in sacrifice, deities "eating" the children, and

holocaust The Holocaust, also known as the Shoah, was the genocide of European Jews during World War II. Between 1941 and 1945, Nazi Germany and its collaborators systematically murdered some six million Jews across German-occupied Europe; ...

. Xella also refers to Carthaginian and Phoenician child sacrifice found referenced in Greco-Roman sources.

Moloch in art and culture

Medieval and modern artistic depictions

Medieval and modern sources tend to portray Moloch as a bull-headed humanoid idol with arms outstretched over a fire, onto which the sacrificial child is placed. This portrayal can be traced back to medieval Jewish commentaries, which connected the biblical Moloch with depictions of Carthaginian sacrifice to Cronus ( Baal Hammon) found in sources such as

Diodorus Diodorus Siculus, or Diodorus of Sicily ( grc-gre, Διόδωρος ; 1st century BC), was an ancient Greek historian. He is known for writing the monumental universal history ''Bibliotheca historica'', in forty books, fifteen of which su ...

, with George Foote Moore suggesting that the bull's head may derive from the mythological Minotaur. John S. Rundin suggests that further sources for the image are the legend of

Talos In Greek mythology, Talos — also spelled Talus (; el, Τάλως, ''Tálōs'') or Talon (; el, Τάλων, ''Tálōn'') — was a giant automaton made of bronze to protect Europa in Crete from pirates and invaders. He circled the island's sh ...

and the brazen bull built for king Phalaris of the Greek city of Acragas on

Sicily (man) it, Siciliana (woman) , population_note = , population_blank1_title = , population_blank1 = , demographics_type1 = Ethnicity , demographics1_footnotes = , demographi ...

. He notes that both legends, as well as that of the Minotaur, have potential associations with Semitic child sacrifice.

In literature

Milton's ''Paradise Lost''

In John Milton's '' Paradise Lost'' (1667), Moloch is one of the greatest warriors of the

fallen angel In the Abrahamic religions, fallen angels are angels who were expelled from heaven. The literal term "fallen angel" never appears in any Abrahamic religious texts, but is used to describe angels cast out of heaven"Mehdi Azaiez, Gabriel Said ...

s, He is listed among the chief of Satan's angels in Book I, and is given a speech at the parliament of Hell in Book 2:43–105, where he argues for immediate warfare against God. He later becomes revered as a pagan god on Earth.

Flaubert's ''Salammbô''

's ''

'', a historical novel about

Carthage Carthage was the capital city of Ancient Carthage, on the eastern side of the Lake of Tunis in what is now Tunisia. Carthage was one of the most important trading hubs of the Ancient Mediterranean and one of the most affluent cities of the cla ...

published in 1862, included a version of the Carthaginian religion, including the god Moloch, whom he characterized as a god to whom the Carthaginians offered children. Flaubert described this Moloch mostly according to the Rabbinic descriptions, but with a few of his own additions. From chapter 7: Chapter 13 describes how, in desperate attempt to call down rain, the image of Moloch was brought to the center of Carthage, how the arms of the image were moved by the pulling of chains by the priests (apparently Flaubert's own invention), and then describes the sacrifices made to Moloch. First grain and animals of various kinds were placed in compartments within the statue (as in the Rabbinic account). Then the children were offered, at first a few, and then more and more.

Karel Čapek's ''War with the Newts''

Karel Čapek Karel Čapek (; 9 January 1890 – 25 December 1938) was a Czech writer, playwright and critic. He has become best known for his science fiction, including his novel '' War with the Newts'' (1936) and play '' R.U.R.'' (''Rossum's Universal ...

's ''

War with the Newts ''War with the Newts'' (''Válka s Mloky'' in the original Czech), also translated as ''Salamander Wars'', is a 1936 satirical science fiction novel by Czech author Karel Čapek. It concerns the discovery in the Pacific of a sea-dwelling race, ...

'' (1936), the

Newts A newt is a salamander in the subfamily Pleurodelinae. The terrestrial juvenile phase is called an eft. Unlike other members of the family Salamandridae, newts are semiaquatic, alternating between aquatic and terrestrial habitats. Not all aqua ...

counter Christian attempts at conversion by turning to a god of their own creation named Moloch:

Allen Ginsberg's "Howl"

In Allen Ginsberg's poem "

" (1955), Moloch is used as a metaphor for industrial civilization and for America more specifically. The word is repeated many times throughout

Part II Part Two, Part 2 or Part II may refer to: Films and television * "Part 2" (Twin Peaks), also known as "The Return, Part 2", the second episode of the third season of the TV series ''Twin Peaks'' Music * ''Part Two'' (Throbbing Gristle album), 200 ...

of the poem, and begins (as an exclamation of "Moloch!") all but the first and last five stanzas of the section.

As social or political allegory

Moloch is sometimes used to indicate something that demands immense sacrifice and subservience. Museo nazionale del Cinema - Cabiria (Turin) crop

Museo nazionale del Cinema - Cabiria (Turin) crop

Karl Marx Karl Heinrich Marx (; 5 May 1818 – 14 March 1883) was a German philosopher, economist, historian, sociologist, political theorist, journalist, critic of political economy, and socialist revolutionary. His best-known titles are the 1848 ...

referred to

money Money is any item or verifiable record that is generally accepted as payment for goods and services and repayment of debts, such as taxes, in a particular country or socio-economic context. The primary functions which distinguish money are as ...

as a Moloch in '' Capital'' and in ''

Grundrisse The ''Grundrisse der Kritik der Politischen Ökonomie'' (''Foundations of a Critique of Political Economy'') is an unfinished manuscript by the German philosopher Karl Marx. The series of seven notebooks was rough-drafted by Marx, chiefly for ...

''. * Anti-abortion advocates B. G. Jefferis and J. L. Nichols used the child sacrifice to Moloch as a metaphor for

abortion Abortion is the termination of a pregnancy by removal or expulsion of an embryo or fetus. An abortion that occurs without intervention is known as a miscarriage or "spontaneous abortion"; these occur in approximately 30% to 40% of pre ...

in an 1894 publication. *In

Bertrand Russell Bertrand Arthur William Russell, 3rd Earl Russell, (18 May 1872 – 2 February 1970) was a British mathematician, philosopher, logician, and public intellectual. He had a considerable influence on mathematics, logic, set theory, linguistics, ...

's ''A Free Man's Worship'' (1903), Moloch is used to describe a particularly savage brand of religion: *During the growth of vehicle ownership in the United States, the concern for automobile deaths prompted at least one editorial cartoonist to label the automobile "the Modern Moloch", viewing the car as a machine of death. *In letters of the

Munich Cosmic Circle The Munich Cosmic Circle was a group of writers and intellectuals in Munich, Germany at the turn of the 20th century, founded by esotericist Alfred Schuler (1865–1923), philosopher Ludwig Klages (1872–1956), and poet Karl Wolfskehl (1869–194 ...

the name Moloch was used to symbolize a Jewish God, hostile to life. *In ''The Gathering Storm'' (1948), the first volume of

Winston Churchill Sir Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill (30 November 187424 January 1965) was a British statesman, soldier, and writer who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom twice, from 1940 to 1945 during the Second World War, and again from ...

's history of

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...

, Churchill describes

Adolf Hitler Adolf Hitler (; 20 April 188930 April 1945) was an Austrian-born German politician who was dictator of Nazi Germany, Germany from 1933 until Death of Adolf Hitler, his death in 1945. Adolf Hitler's rise to power, He rose to power as the le ...

's triumph at the moment he finally achieved total power in 1933: * Garry Wills' article "Our Moloch" (2012) in ''

The New York Review of Books ''The New York Review of Books'' (or ''NYREV'' or ''NYRB'') is a semi-monthly magazine with articles on literature, culture, economics, science and current affairs. Published in New York City, it is inspired by the idea that the discussion of i ...

'' used Moloch as a metaphor for guns, to which "we sacrifice children".Wills, Garry. "Our Moloch". ''

''. December 15, 2012.

In film

* In

's 1927

silent film A silent film is a film with no synchronized Sound recording and reproduction, recorded sound (or more generally, no audible dialogue). Though silent films convey narrative and emotion visually, various plot elements (such as a setting or era) ...

Metropolis A metropolis () is a large city or conurbation which is a significant economic, political, and cultural center for a country or region, and an important hub for regional or international connections, commerce, and communications. A big ci ...

'', the industrial machinery of the factory is envisioned as a sacrificial temple to Moloch. * The 1963 Italian film '' Hercules vs. Moloch'' pits the mythological hero against the evil worshipers of Moloch.

References

Informational notes Citations

Sources

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

External links

HelgaSeeden, "A tophet in Tyre?" 1991.
from ''Bertyus'' 39 (American University of Beirut). {{Authority control Book of Leviticus Child sacrifice Deities in the Hebrew Bible Evil deities Horned deities Mythological bulls Phoenician mythology West Semitic gods Gehenna

Etymology

Biblical attestations

Masoretic text

Septuagint and New Testament

Theories

Moloch as a deity

Moloch as a form of sacrifice

As a rite of passage

Moloch in art and culture

Medieval and modern artistic depictions

In literature

Milton's ''Paradise Lost''

Flaubert's ''Salammbô''

Karel Čapek's ''War with the Newts''

Allen Ginsberg's "Howl"

As social or political allegory

In film

See also

References

Sources

External links