The Evangelical Universalist Forum

The Molech Mentality

The Valley of Hinnom (Gehenna) held terrible national memories for the Jewish people of what had taken place there during their early history in the land. This horror was one of the reasons, if not the reason that Gehenna was such an abomination to them.

This was the place where the terrible idol Molech had stood, the place where children were sacrificed to him. Molech the monster-god demanded that human beings be burnt alive to appease him - small children, who could have no choice in the matter. And no doubt his worshippers felt that as he was a god he had a right to do this.

For some centuries now, a malicious rumour has been spread about the real God, which says that He, too, has ordained that human beings be burnt alive. Those that teach this tell us that we should accept it without a murmur, because (they argue) God has every right to do this on account of being the biggest kid on the block. There is a big difference made, though, between the fiery torment suffered by the victims of Molech and that which God is said to inflict, and that is that the sufferings of those offered to Molech, however terrible, ended when they died of their injuries. The slander against God says that he will prolong the torments of his victims endlessly.

Some of those who argue in favour of eternal fiery torment say that they would calmly accept the fate of this “hell” for their parents, spouses, children, because, they say, it would be “the will of God”.

Curiously, this is *precisely *the response that was required of the parents of those sacrificed to Molech. The parents stood before the idol and offered their small child, who was held in the vice-like grip of the idol. This device was then turned so that the baby or toddler was gradually carried into the fire. As their child screamed in agony in the flames, the parents were required to stand completely unmoved. This was a demand that they kill in themselves every ounce of “emotionalism”. If the mother or father betrayed even the slightest feeling, the sacrifice would be unacceptable.

God called this practice an abomination in no uncertain terms[size=85]1[/size], and said that such a terrible thing had never entered his mind[size=85]2[/size]. He warns us not to engage in double-think about this, as do those who say God is good, and God is love, yet also that he will commit this ghastly brutality:

Woe to those who call evil good, and good evil;
Who put darkness for light, and light for darkness;
Who put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter!
(Isaiah 5:20)

If we pattern our image of God after Molech, we are engaging in idolatry. If we worship such a being we are not worshipping the Father of Jesus Christ, who experiences the fall of every sparrow. If we bow down to this image we are bowing to the image of the beast - the nastiest, most vicious beast imaginable, the lowest manifestation of animal nature. This image is not the image of God; this is not Jesus.

Jesus came to set free the captives, he came to heal the brokenhearted, to liberate the people who were damaged. Jesus had compassion. Jesus wept. Jesus, not Molech, is the exact image of God. Jesus took upon himself the increasing harm, degradation and corruption that has been passed down the generations, Jesus took into himself people’s diseases and let the goodness and life inside him flow out to others. I say again, Jesus is the exact image of God. Jesus did not mind being “emotional” … this is the real image of God. And God is LOVE. Real love, not just a word to sound good: real love does everything it can for the benefit, especially the long-term benefit, of the one who is loved.

Gehenna had that evil history, but that is not its final destiny. Gehenna was once a place of torment - very much against God’s wishes - and considered the worst place on earth, yet that whole area will be holy, we are told[size=85]3[/size].

Jesus’s crucifixion within sight of that place of terrible memories is in direct contrast to the Molech mentality. Instead of God getting satisfaction by burning us or our children, he loved the world so much that he gave his own son Jesus for our benefit.

[size=85]1 2 Kings 16:3, 2 Chronicles 33:6,
2 And they built the high places of Baal which are in the Valley of the Son of Hinnom, to cause their sons and their daughters to pass through the fire to Molech, which I did not command them, nor did it come into My mind that they should do this abomination, to cause Judah to sin. (Jeremiah 32:35)
3 Jeremiah 31:40[/size]

While I’m sympathetic to the comparison/contrast with Moloch (especially when the underlying rationale is to show off how great Moloch or God is compared to the rest of us), I think it’s unfair to skip over the other very big difference held by every Christian who believes in a variation of eternal conscious torment (or annihilation for that matter): the ones being punished are sinners.

This was not a rationale in the Moloch sacrifices; and relateldy, most people who hold to ECT don’t think children will suffer it. (Even Roman Catholics who accept limbo for unbaptized children regard it as being practically heaven with the one permanent defect of being unable to commune with God. Of course they also claim, rightly so, that every other good is ashes without communion with God, so the good itself becomes eternal conscious torment; but they kind of elide past that when reassuring themselves that the children, and some righteous unbelievers who happened never to become Christian, aren’t really suffering hell. :wink: )

It would be fairer to include those ultra-important factors in their belief, when you’re accusing them of Moloch worship. Even if that hampers your rhetorical point. (I don’t think it will completely eliminate your point; but if we aren’t going to be fair to our opponents then we’re the ones who are going to be in trouble with God, so it would be better to lose a rhetorical point, if it comes to that, than to be unfair ourselves.)

As I asked on another thread.

Jeremiah broke this jar in the valley of Hinnom, so it seems appropriate to ask what it means here.

The lynchpin of this piece is that “God called this practice an abomination in no uncertain terms, and said that such a terrible thing had never entered his mind” (2 Kings 16:3, 2 Chronicles 33:6, Jeremiah 32:35). He didn’t think, “It’s a great idea to do this to sinners, but not to innocent children.” It NEVER CAME INTO HIS MIND.

YHWH isn’t just a little bit better than Moloch and the other heathen gods - he is completely different.

And, if you want to be fair, I don’t call ECT believers Moloch-worshippers: it is just that I see a close resemblance with people who say they’re OK with others suffering this fate.

Michael,

Only God can make clay, and if He can make it, He can re-make it. However, it would take a while, unless He speeds up the process.

Jeremiah’s potter could not grind up the fired pot and turn it back into malleable clay. Clay is made of little wee platelet ‘sandwiches’ with kind of spongy caves as the filling – like bone. The platelets slide over one another when they’re moist (and preferably saturated), giving clay its plasticity. Otherwise it’s like working with sand. Organic matter helps, making the clay more slippery and less prone to crack as it’s worked.

However, even Jeremiah’s human potter could grind up the clay jar that was broken and incorporate its powder into a glaze or another clay body, to improve it by aerating it. This is called ‘grit’ or ‘grog’ and allows the clay to dry and fire without cracking, as well as helping to give it body and the ability to hold its shape. A clay body without grog is pretty much useless for making pots. You can use sand, but it isn’t as good. And fired ground up clay is often preferable for incorporating into glaze mixtures. If it hasn’t been fired, it shrinks more, which can make it hard to fit properly to the clay body.

(Yay! Someone asked a question about clay. :wink: )

Love, Cindy

Thank you Cindy.

I take it you’re saying that the chemical change that takes place when clay is baked in a kiln isn’t irreversible, and that given enough time (and the right conditions) even potsherds could return to clay.

Is that right?

One of the commentaries I read mentioned something about that, but compared the ground up potsherds to lessons and warnings to be incorperated into other lives.

Yeah . . . I figured you could make the metaphorical connections all right without me pointing them out – and I was right. :wink:

And yes, God could turn potsherds into clay again. Clay was originally granite and feldspar, mostly, and as it decayed and eroded and was washed away, it slowly, slowly became clay. Then I pop it into the kiln and get it hot enough to melt all those little particles back together – basically making my own composite metamorphic rock in the shape of a cup (or whatever I like) ( jennygulcharts.com ) Kind of like Pringles potato chips! :laughing:

Thank you Cindy.

Hi Jason

Not sure I’d agree with you there, mate - although I see why you are trying to cut the ECT believers some slack. (You always try and cut your opponents far more slack than they deserve, IMHO :smiley:.) If I read you right, you’re saying there is a big difference between actual worshippers of Moloch and folk with the ‘Moloch mentality’ (to use Ruth’s phrase), because the former accept CT (as opposed to ***ECT) for ‘innocent’ children, while the latter accept ***E**CT for ‘guilty’ sinners.

I have two problems with this:

  1. ***E***CT, as Ruth points out, by definition, never comes to an end - hence its proponents are actually embracing something far more cruel than child sacrifice.

  2. We are all guilty sinners. But some of us - so Christians believe - are saved by the grace of God (through no merit of our own). Hence if you are of an ECT mindset, you must believe that God has rescued us from our ‘rightful’ fate - ie ECT. Which means you are saying that God remains perfectly good and loving, despite having brought into being a creation in which some people end up in a state of ECT. And in my mind, that makes him no better than Moloch, when all’s said and done.

Which is what Ruth’s saying, I guess, and why most of us are Universalists! :smiley:

Great OP, Ruth.

Shalom

Johnny

I’m very much in favor of Cindy’s explanation about the fired clay, btw. :smiley:

So, if you say they pattern their image of God after Moloch, and are engaging in idolatry in doing so, and idolatrously worship such a being patterned after Moloch instead of worshiping the Father of Jesus Christ, bowing down to the image of the beast patterned after Moloch instead of after God or the image of God (Jesus not Moloch being the exact image of God)…

…how is that not calling ECT believers Moloch-worshipers? At what point in your description did you clarify that what they were doing was not Moloch-worship? What being were you saying they are idolatrously worshiping instead of Moloch and instead of the Father and/or or the Son, when you say the image they’re idolatously worshiping is patterned after Moloch instead of the Father and/or the Son? If “the beast” isn’t supposed to be Moloch they’re worshiping instead of God, then what is it? Better than Moloch? Worse than Moloch? On the same level as Moloch but not Moloch? (Did you mean Baal instead? Since you reference Jer 32:35, “And they built the high places of Baal that are in the valley of Ben-hinnom to cause their sons and their daughters to pass through [the fire] to Moloch, which I had not commanded them nor had it come up into My heart that they should do this abomination to cause Judah to sin.” Apparently Baal worship was directly connected to and maybe superior to Moloch worship at that time. Was Baal who you think ECT proponents are idolating with their Moloch mentality instead of Moloch? Or did you have a different idol in mind for their Moloch mentality?)

Except that innocent children were who the examples had in view, and which it never came into His mind about in those verses. That’s “this practice” which those places are specifically thinking about.

I agree, but those verses don’t really talk about Him being completely different in the way you’re aiming for.

I do like your reference to Jeremiah 31:40, though. :smiley: When ECT proponents talk about God punishing sinners in Ben-hinnom (for which there is a large amount of scriptural testimony–Jer 31:40 itself being one small example, by the way) instead of sacrificing innocent children to Himself in Ben-hinnom (which is what Jer 32:35 is against, among some other prophetic references), they tend to overlook that important further testimony (among some other things such as everyone being salted with the everlasting fire that burns in Ge-hinnom, salt being the best of things and leading to peace with one another when we have the salting of that fire in our hearts.)

I actually agree that they’re proposing something more cruel than CT for innocent children. I did say “I’m sympathetic to the comparison/contrast with Moloch (especially when the underlying rationale is to show off how great Moloch or God is compared to the rest of us)”.

I was only saying that the distinction that ECT proponents are actually working with should be kept in mind and not ignored for sake of making a rhetorical point. Few people think it’s appropriate to sacrifice babies like that (although God knows some abortion procedures are just as bad or maybe worse {sigh}), but most people agree in principle that impenitent sinners ought to be punished somehow.

Even ultra-universalists, who deny that God has any punishments coming for sinners per se at all, tend to ground this on a notion that God already ‘punished’ someone else for the sins of sinners, namely Jesus (so His wrath is already completely expended or whatever.)

That’s the principle ECT proponents are appealing to, that the impenitent guilty should be punished. And that is a big conceptual difference from sacrificing babies (regardless of whether original sin is factored in or what kind of original sin is being considered if so.) That’s a big conceptual difference from Moloch worship, too, consequently, even when a superior cruelty of ECT is involved.

The cruelty would be that God does not persist (Arminianism) or even intend at all (Calvinism) to act toward saving at least some sinners from their sins, so also from the consequences of their sins. The punishment of ECT is subsidary to that cruelty, thus becomes cruel consequently to that cruelty.

This is exactly why many (not all) Arminians (and I’ve even run across a few Calvinists who try to go this route) try to divorce the fate of ECT from active punishment by God, despite their scriptural justifications routinely connecting (what they consider to be) ECT to God’s active punishment of sinners. It isn’t cruelty from God if God tried His best and just failed because some sinners were too clever or strong for Him (and if God respected their free will so much that He decides to prevent them from having any freedom to choose otherwise anymore or lets them get themselves into that state against His will otherwise. :wink: )

That isn’t cruelty; but that’s impotence (or even insanity), and an impotence (or even insanity) attributed to God worse than Moloch or Baal! Which on the other hand is exactly why Calvinists and the other main type of Arminians reject such a notion.

The point about the real difference in cruelty can also be made by comparing with annihilationism (Arm or Calv soteriologies either one–usually Arm but I’ve been seeing more Calvs take it up in recent years, including a couple of very thoughtful ones here on the forum). Is God’s punishment of sinners cruel at all if He annihilates them instead of ECT?

Annis would strenuously say no! But I’d say yes, it’s still cruel, for the same underlying reason that ECT is cruel: because God chooses not to keep acting (or to act at all) toward saving those sinners from their sins. (Or else God escapes the cruelty by being impotent and/or insane again. :wink: )

It may not be quantitatively as cruel as ECT, but qualitatively it’s still just as cruel. It’s qualitatively a different kind of cruelty than that of Moloch worship, too, but that doesn’t mean I consider it any less cruel in itself.

The principle I won’t and can’t argue against however is that impenitent sinners do deserve punishment (a qualitatively very different principle from Moloch sacrificial children); and I know that this principle is recognized and being incorporated by ECT (and anni) proponents (whether Arm or Calv).

And since I believe that being fair to them is important, I keep that in mind. Also, it provides one (of many) lines of agreement from which constructive dialogue can proceed.

Whereas, accusing them of Moloch-or-might-as-well-be-Moloch idolatry in comparison with the sacrifice of children without accounting for the huge conceptual difference (impenitent sinners should be punished) ECT proponents are actually working on, is only going to lead them to say (very correctly) “But we aren’t talking about sacrificing innocent children to the glory of God, we’re talking about punishing impenitent sinners! Like God will do when He puts those bodies in Gehenna!”

Jason said:

I just want to add to your point, Jason. It’s not only that it’s cruel to those being annihilated but that it’s cruel to those who love them (or even those who would love them if given a chance), and most of all, it’s cruel to God, who created them, died for them, and presumably had a “wonderful plan for their lives.” It’s less bad than ECT, and that’s literally all you can say about this theory that’s even marginally positive.

If Arminian annihilation is true.

If Calv annihilation is true, God’s wonderful(ly cruel) plan for their life was for them to be annihilated for His glory instead of saved from their sins for His glory. :wink:

But yes it’s also cruel to the survivors either way–even if they’re expected to stop loving them compared to loving God.

:laughing: Oh yeah . . . I keep forgetting about those pesky Calvinists. The concept that God created certain people just for the questionable pleasure of watching them writhe in agony for all of eternity is so completely foreign to this Methodist-raised girl that it can’t seem to find a comfortable seat in my brain.

I’m with Ruth. Jesus reserves harsh words for the Pharisees. Christians need to come to grips with the abominable vision they(we) have propagated. It can’t really be softened, nor should it be.

I’m not actually against what Ruth said; but since you mentioned Jesus and the Pharisees, even in His “Greater Condemnations” before He left the Temple, He was amazingly fair and even complimentary to them, too, in that incident. They shouldn’t ignore the condemnations to focus on the things He said in their favor, but neither should we ignore the few (but important) things said in their favor in order to focus only on their condemnations.

Jesus managed to acknowledge two or three serious bits of credit to them during His ultimate denunciation of them. I believe we ought to look to do at least as much when we’re publicly denouncing people we think are rebel Pharisees or the equivalent thereof. (Assuming we think we’ve been given the prophetic and/or apostolic authority from Christ to publicly denounce other people so harshly.)