The prophet Ezekiel uttered a strange prophetic word condemning Israel’s practice of sacrificing their children:

³⁷ for they have committed adultery and blood is on their hands. They committed adultery with their idols; they even sacrificed their children, whom they bore to me, as food for them. (Ezekiel 23:37 NIV)

Ezekiel was referring to the worship of Molech, a god found among the Canaanites and Phoenicians. It went by different names — Molech, Kronos and Chemosh are a few. King Solomon in his downward spiral even set up an idol to these gods in a high place in Israel (1 Kings 11:7).

Leviticus 18:21 condemned the practice and gave more information:  “and thou shalt not let any of thy seed pass through the fire to Molech.”

Diodorus Siculus, an ancient Greek historian, reported it as an idol with arms sticking out in front at a bit of an angle. The families would place their child on the arms and the baby or infant would roll down into a fire inside the idol. The historian adds the grizzly description that during the sacrifice the family was not allowed to mourn their child’s death.

Jewish historians stated the idol was actually made of brass and the arms were already hot when the child was placed on it. They added the priests of Molech loudly beat drums so the parents would not hear the agonizing screams and regret what they had done.

But going back to Ezekiel’s condemnation we see an interesting statement. He said the sacrifice was done “as food for them.” The child sacrifice was looked upon as a form of nourishment for this particular god. Food does not make us super human, but it keeps up our strength.

Though these were idols the Bible was also very clear that there were evil or demonic spirits behind these ancient heathen gods (Deuteronomy 32:16-17), where grammatically it portrays demons and the foreign gods as the same.

Leviticus makes the same connection when it states: “They shall no longer sacrifice their sacrifices to the goat demons with which they play the harlot” (Leviticus 17:7 NASV).

Though the sacrifices could not nourish an idol made of stone or metal, did this horrendous practice in some way strengthen the evil spirits behind the idols?

I recently read a disturbing article on WND.com about Zachary King, a former Satanist who converted to Christ in 2008.

In the interview, he said he became involved in satanic practices as a young teen. In 1982, when he was 14, King was invited to a sex party with a bunch of other boys from the coven where they would have sex with a woman.

The purpose was to get this woman pregnant and then later she would abort the child. At that age, Zachary wasn’t exactly sure what an abortion was and needed to do a bit of research. When he discovered what the practice involved he asked his friends if what they were doing was legal.

He was told:

“As long as it’s inside the woman, it’s legal.”

He said that women in their group would purposefully get pregnant so they could abort the child as a form of satanic sacrifice. He said leaders of the group, at one point he was one, would go to the clinic and do incantations and rituals as the abortion took place.

He said:

“In satanism killing something or the death of something is the most effective way of getting a spell accomplished.”

Though it is impossible to verify if this is true, in the same article Alveda King, niece of Dr Martin Luther King Jr., said though not common she has heard similar stories from other women who had abortions and added “there was a witch in the hospital when my sixth baby was born.”

It is not certain how widespread this practice is and even if it is true, but if it is, this may reveal a heightening of spiritual warfare.

Source:

• Ex-satanist: Babies ritually aborted for devil: Wnd.com