MOLECH, molek, also called Motocu, COM, and (Zeph. i. 5) .1ALCIIANI. A heathen deity referred to in the Old Testament as 'the abomination of the Ammonites.' There appears, however, to he some confusion in the passages in which Moloch occurs between the national deity of the Ammonites and other gods, notably a Canaanitish sun-deity who also bore the name meld,: (king), which as a general designation might naturally be applied to various gods. The form ;Miceli is an intentional distortion of melek, introduced by Old Testament writers to avoid the pronunciation of a name which had associations distasteful to them. Most of the passages in which it occurs have reference to human sacri fice as forming an essential part of the cult of this deity, and particularly to child sacrifice or the sacrifice of the first-born, euphemistically re ferred to as 'passing through the tire' (Lev. xviii. 21; II. Kings xxiii. 10). We are told in I. Kings xi. 7 that Solomon erected a sanc tuary to MiIcom, the Ammonitish deity. on the Mount of Olives, which Josiah afterwards defiled (II. Kings xxiii. 13). It does not follow. how ever, that the sacrifice of children to AI°tech at Topheth (Gehenna, q.v.), referred to in II. Kings xxiii. I0; Jer. vii. 31, was identical with the Milcom cult. In II. Kings xvi. 3, child sac
rifice is said to have been borrowed from the Canaanites; and Jeremiah (six. 5) calls the deity to whom such offerings were made Baal. Hence it would appear that the rite in question has been wrongly connected with the Ammonitish cult, though it is not unlikely that on certain occasions children were sacrificed among the Ammonites as well as among the Moabites and Pho-nicians. The rite is forbidden in the Deu teronomic code (Dent. xviii. 10) and in the Code of Holiness (Lev. xviii. 21; xx. 2-6) ; and the testimony of Jeremiah. already quoted, and of Ezekiel (xvi. 20-21; xxiii. 37-39) is sufficient to prove that to a comparatively late period the barbarous rite survived among the Hebrews, though very possibly it was only a last resort. in time of great distress, to avert disaster or placate an angered divinity (ef. II. Kings iii. 27: see MEsitA). The details of the rites of Slolech and circumstances of his worship that are given are inventions of the rabbis. All that we from the Old Testament is that the victims were first slaughtered and then burned (Ezek. xvi. 20-21; xxiii. 39; Isa. lvii. 5). Con sult Baethgen, Bcitrogc znr .semitisebcn Relig ionsgesehiehte (Berlin, 1888).