He saw additional revenue for the temple with a sect of women doing for themselves what the men had been doing alone. The husbands would have none of it, but the high priest of Moloch knew better. But the wives of the Molochites clamored for a god and for Moloch. Women were excluded from this sheer masculine world of Moloch and his tribe. There, in the heat of frenzy and stirred by wild music, they gashed their own bodies and ran about with blood streaming from their wounds, falling over each other as they did so. These were held at night in the depths of the forest. The eunuch priests constituted a caste or sect with their own rites of initiation. Within the temple, too, there were dogs trained for the same purpose and the coins received from the rental or sale of these animals, called the "price of a dog," went to the priests of Moloch. While the fair sex was excluded, sexual passion persisted and seemed all the more fired because of the absence of women and beautiful, beardless young men, their bodies soft and fragrant from the use of oils and perfumes, sold themselves to the adorers of their god, depositing on the altar of the idol the money thus earned. They came to serve this cruel, relentless god, as the priestesses paid homage to a goddess more loving and generous. When the signal was given, the eunuch priests of Moloch marched into the temple and about the radiant figure. One may have thrown his own cloak into the gaping mouth when he had nothing else to give. There may have been products of the soil, fruits of the farm, a calf or a sheep, even a cat or a dog. They danced about it, emitting terrific cries and, in frenzy, hurled whatever they had into the mouths of the fiery god. Moloch was the fire that does burn the bush and everything else he was the fire that devours.Īs the tongues of flame shot through the monstrous figure, the worshippers yelled for joy. Cold, cruel, and metallic Moloch had become incandescent, aflame with the fire of life. While they were on their way, a huge fire was being prepared in the pit of the furnace, and as they entered the temple, flames reflected through the bronze figure of the divinity.
Moloch the glutton would take no chances with his priests who might put away a sacrifice for themselves or share with him the fat of the land.Īs the sun was setting, the worshippers left their homes and wives, and, loaded with sacrifices, they betook themselves to the warm abode of their god. Whatever was fed to the god immediately landed in the fiery oven. The figure of Moloch was cast in bronze and merged with a large furnace that served as its pedestal. There were seven huge mouths to his belly, all appropriate receptacles for the offerings that might be brought to him. His arms he held outstretched as if he were forever demanding sacrifices. the god himself appearedīefore his worshippers-a colossal giant of a man with a bull's head and tremendous virile power. Like the modern industrial plant with its towering chimney rising to the clouds. It was an immense, low structure with an enormous figure of Moloch at its end. His temple was out in the open, far from city or village with their polished ways of living. If cannibals were looking for a god, none could please them so much as Moloch, and Moloch could wish himself no better class of worshipper. He wanted none of their weakness, gentleness, delicacy, or romanticism.
He had no women himself, nor did he wish his worshippers coming to his temple to trail their women along. Moloch was a fierce, self-satisfied, masculine god. He cared for neither the praise nor the glory that others might give him. He was not saving the world he was not serving mankind. There was no altruistic hypocrisy in his little divine circle. He bestowed his bounty upon mankind, but he wished a taste of all that he gave.
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