330. Human Sacrifices
The offering of human sacrifices is a very ancient custom, and was practiced at different times among many nations. Burder, in an elaborate note, (Oriental Literature, No. 570,) gives a long list of nations who offered human sacrifices. Among these are the Ethiopians, the Phenicians, the Scythians, the Egyptians, the Chinese, the Persians, the Indians, the Gauls, the Goths, the Carthaginians, the Britons, the Arabians, and the Romans. These sacrifices were offered in various ways. Some were slaughtered by the knife; some were drowned; some were burned; some were buried alive. In some instances, as in the case recorded in the text, parents sacrificed their own offspring. The idolatrous Israelites followed the example of their Phenician neighbors in this respect. See Jeremiah 19:66Therefore, behold, the days come, saith the Lord, that this place shall no more be called Tophet, nor The valley of the son of Hinnom, but The valley of slaughter. (Jeremiah 19:6). Allusion is made to this custom in Micah 6:77Will the Lord be pleased with thousands of rams, or with ten thousands of rivers of oil? shall I give my firstborn for my transgression, the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul? (Micah 6:7).
A few years since an inscription was discovered in Behistun, which, according to the rendering of Professor Grotefend of Hanover, contained an offer of Nebuchadnezzar to let his son be burned to death in order to ward off the affliction of Babylon (Savile’s Truth of the Bible, p. 281).