Robert, Restless and Always Reforming

Baal

Who are these idols Baal and Molech whom they sacrifice there children to? They are part of the pantheon of Canaanite religion that the Israelites had succumbed to. It was a semetic fertility cult in which they would worship and appease these God’s in order to obtain prosperity in the harvest.

Baal was the primary god of the Canaanite fertility cults. He was often depicted as a man with the head and horns of a bull, who carried a lightening bolt symbolizing destruction and fertility. Baal supposedly won his dominance by defeating other deities such as the god of the sea and the god of storms. The Canaanites believed that his victory over death was repeated each year when he returned from the underworld and brought rain to renew the earth’s fertility.

Because Hebrew culture believed the sea was evil and destructive, Baal’s promise to prevent storms and control the sea, as well as his apparent ability to produce plentiful harvests, made him attractive to the Israelites.

Baal worshipers tried to satisfy him by offering sacrifices, usually sheep and bulls. During times of crisis, however, Baal’s followers sacrificed their children, Usually the firstborn in order to gain personal prosperity (Isa. 57:5-7).

The other is Molech. It had the head of a calf, and was made of brass and it was hollow inside. There was a place in the side to make fire in it. When it got very hot the wicked people used to put the infant in its arm where it burned to death there. The priest would would put the child in the idol’s arms. Other men would are blowing trumphets and beating drums in worship and making great noise so not to hear the loud crys of the small child (Leviticus 18:21, Leviticus 20:2-5, 2 Kings 23:10, Jeremiah 32:35).

Israel had accepted the canaanite fertility cults and were wanting the blessing on there lands to have a productive and plentiful harvest. They turned to idols Instead of trusting and worshiping Yahweh for there dependance and provision. The sacrificing of the innocents showed there spritual temperature as america’s murder of the innocents shows our spritual temperature as a nation that is straying from the one true God. We are in strife concerning the state of the economy, jobs, terrorism, health reform, and Obama pleading for a blessing from God. Yet 1.5 million die in our abortion clinics each year in silence. We are nation that desires prosperity and children with teenage pregnancy are stumbling block to that. So abortion gets rid of what they call the problem. ”Like arrows in the hand of a warrior, so are the children of one’s youth. How blessed is the man whose quiver is full of them” -Psalm 127:4-