Tofet

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As Tofet ( Hebrew תֹּפֶת, plur. Tephatim) designate certain places in the Tanakh , the Hebrew Bible , where the earlier Canaanites are said to have carried out religious child sacrifices .

In other passages in the Bible, the expression means “vomited”, “mocked”, “abomination” or “shame”. It appears in contexts that distinguish the Israelites' belief in YHWH from pre-Israelite cults. This gave rise to the research problem of whether such sacrifices were actually practiced in these cults and the early religion of Israel, if so by when and how widespread they were.

Linguistic origin

The etymological derivation and original meaning of the word are uncertain. The consonant sequence also appears in other Semitic languages ​​(phnitic: molk) with the likely meaning "saliva", "sputum". Some researchers see it as related to the Syriac - Aramaic תְּפָיָא ( tephaya , "cooking stove"). Then it originally meant "fireplace".

The masoretic vocalization is similar to that of words like boschet ("shame") and molech . This could express a contemptuous assessment.

Biblical context

The expression appears once in the Deuteronomistic History in connection with a cult reform of King Joschija (640 to 609 BC), who destroyed the remaining Canaanite places of worship or made them unusable ( 2 Kings 23.10  EU ):

"He also made the tofet in the valley of the sons of Hinnom unclean, so that no one would let his son or daughter go through the fire for Moloch ."

The phrase "going through the fire" is interpreted as ritual burning. It also appears in 2 Kings 17:17  EU in a summary listing of the idolatry of Israel along with other rejected rites from the Canaan, Assyrian and Babylonian religions . Israel's prophets warned Israel of the consequences of such idolatry . But kings and people continued to disobey God's commandments. That was inevitably followed by God's judgment of wrath over all Israel. Therefore first the northern kingdom of Israel (722 BC), later also the southern kingdom of Judah (586 BC) perished. In retrospect, the speech thus explains theologically what had occurred historically.

The prophet Jeremiah (627 to 585 BC) was one of the sharpest critics of the temple priests and the temple cult. In one of his judicial sermons against the people and their leaders, probably shortly before the Babylonian conquest of Jerusalem, it says ( Jer 7:31, 32  EU ):

“They also built the cult heights of Tofet in the Ben-Hinnom valley to burn their sons and daughters in fire, which I never commanded and which never crossed my mind.
Look, that is why days are coming - sayings of the Lord - when one will no longer talk about Tofet or the valley of Ben-Hinnom, but about the Mordtal and in Tofet one will bury the dead because there is no more room anywhere else. "

Another court sermon by Jeremiah was delivered in the Ben-Hinnom valley "at the entrance of the Shard Gate " ( Jer 19 : 3–13  EU ):

“Hear the word of the Lord, you kings and inhabitants of Jerusalem! Thus says the Lord of Armies, the God of Israel: See, I am bringing such disaster to this place that everyone who hears about it has ears ringing.
Because they have left me, alienated this place from me and sacrificed it to other gods, who were previously unknown to them, their fathers and the kings of Judah. They filled this place with the blood of innocents.
They built a cult height for the Baal in order to burn their sons in the fire as burnt offerings for the Baal, which I have never commanded or ordered and which has never occurred to me.
Look, that is why days will come - says the Lord - when this place will no longer be called Tofet or Tal Ben-Hinnom, but Mordtal.
Then I thwart the plans of Judah and Jerusalem in this place. I bring them down in the sight of their enemies by the sword and by the hand of those who seek their lives. I give their corpses to the birds of the sky and the animals of the field to eat. I make this city a place of horror and mockery; anyone who passes there will be horrified and scoff at all the blows that have struck them. I give them the flesh of their sons and daughters to eat; one will devour the flesh of the other in the trouble and distress with which their enemies and all who seek their lives oppress them. [...]
The dead will be buried in the Tofet, otherwise there is no place to bury them. This is how I will deal with this place - sayings of the Lord - and with its inhabitants, in order to make this city equal to Tofet. The houses of Jerusalem and the houses of the kings of Judah shall be unclean like the place of Tofet, all the houses on the roofs of which smoke offerings and drink offerings to other gods have been offered to the whole host of heaven. "

From this speech we can see that the Tofet was in one of the valleys on the outskirts of Jerusalem; mostly a gorge below the southeastern part of the city wall is assumed. According to Jeremiah, there used to be a place of sacrifice for the god Baal ; He did not name the god Moloch here (cf. Jer 32:35). He was evidently referring to a practice of human sacrifice that was originally foreign to the Israelites, but which they later adopted from other peoples in their own territory. Whether children were sacrificed to Baal at all, whether and when the Israelites imitated this and whether these child sacrifices were still practiced in Jeremiah's time is historically highly controversial and is often denied.

Because the speech presupposes that the place of the Tofet was already unclean at that time, i.e. unsuitable as a sacrificial place, as the rest of the city is announced. In addition, places of sacrifice for Baal were usually on hills, not in valleys. Based on notes from later sources, it is assumed that the valley in front of the city was a kind of rubbish dump, where meat scraps - perhaps also the bodies of those who were executed - were thrown. This is also indicated by the devouring of corpses by birds in the open air, which Jeremiah threatened the residents of Jerusalem as a future fate analogous to their wrongdoing. The cannibalism born of sheer famine - for example as a result of a long siege of the city - was the worst conceivable for the Israelites that could happen to them. Then Jeremiah's reference to Baal and the human sacrifices made to him would be understood as a summary and extreme exaggeration of his criticism of the adaptation to foreign cult practices, which led to disaster and were therefore retroactively rejected.

The Torah repeatedly forbids (whether before or after the prophetic criticism, is also controversial) all human sacrifices in Israel ( Ex 13.2.12f  EU ; 22.28f EU ; 34.19f EU ; Num 3.1ff  EU ; 18.15 EU ; Dtn 15.19  EU ) and threatens their exercise with the death penalty ( Lev 20.2  EU ) or exclusion from God's people ( Dtn 18.10  EU ). For they were regarded as the epitome of what was an “abomination” to the God of Israel and what evoked his judgment of wrath. Accordingly, the term tofet could later generally stand for despicable things. In this sense it says in Hi 17,6b  EU :

"To make fun of the people, he put me down, I became someone who was spit in the face."

The translation follows the Septuagint , which tofet reproduced here with gélos ("mockery").

Other places of worship in the Mediterranean

Votive stele in the Tofet in Carthage

Various Phoenician and Punic places of worship that have been found in the Mediterranean are also known as Tofet : in Carthage , in Sicily Mozia , in Sardinia Bithia (near Cape Spartivento), Nora , Monte Sirai , Tharros , possibly in Tire ( Lebanon ) or on one Trachy hill near the historic Sulci , today Sant'Antioco .

It is controversial whether all of these sites were used for child sacrifices or whether these were ritual child burials. The thesis that child sacrifice of the Phoenicians was a slanderous legend invented by the Greeks was advocated by Sabatino Moscati .

literature

  • Michaela Bauks: Child sacrifice as an ordination or gift offering. Comments on the "mlk" victim . In: Markus Witte; Johannes F. Diehl (Ed.): Israelites and Phoenicians. Their relationships in the mirror of archeology and literature of the Old Testament and its environment . Academic Press, Friborg 2008, ISBN 978-3-7278-1621-5 , pp. 233-251 (also with Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Göttingen 2008, ISBN 978-3-525-53036-8 ).
  • John Day: Molech. A god of human sacrifice in the Old Testament . Cambridge University Press, Cambridge 1989, ISBN 0-521-36474-4 (English).
  • Kersey Graves : Explanation of Hell, Hades, Tartarus, Infernus, Gehenna, and Tophet . In: The biography of Satan: or, A historical exposition of the devil and his fiery dominions . Book Tree, Escondido, CA, ISBN 1-885395-11-6 , pp. 116 (English, books.google.de ).
  • GC Heider: Molech . In: Pieter W. Van Der Horst, Karel Van Der Toorn, Bob Becking (Eds.): Dictionary of Deities and Demons in the Bible . 2nd, expanded and revised edition. Brill Academic Pub, Leiden / Boston / Cologne 1999, ISBN 90-04-11119-0 , p. 581-585 (English).
  • Glenn E. Markoe: The Phoenicians . Theiss, Stuttgart 2003, ISBN 3-8062-1816-1 (English: The Phoenicians . London 2000. Translated by Tanja Ohlsen).
  • Otto Kaiser: You should give me the firstborn of your sons. Considerations on Child Sacrifice in the Old Testament . In: Volkmar Fritz (ed.): From the present-day meaning of the Old Testament. Collected studies on hermeneutics and editorial history . Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Göttingen 1984, ISBN 3-525-58144-0 , p. 142-166 .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Glenn E. Markoe: The Phoenicians. Ancient peoples. Konrad Theiss, 2003, ISBN 3-8062-1816-1 , p. 134.
  2. ↑ Eduard König: Hebrew and Aramaic Dictionary for the Old Testament . Dietrich'sche Verlagsbuchhandlung, Leipzig 1922, p. 555 ( books.google.de ).
  3. ↑ L. Koehler, W. Baumgartner (Ed.): Hebrew and Aramaic Lexicon for the Old Testament . 3. Edition. tape 1 : Aleph-Ajin , volume 2 : Pe-Taw . Brill, Leiden / Boston 2004, ISBN 978-90-04-14037-0 , entry on Topheth (Hebrew, German, original title: The hebrew and aramaic lexicon of the old testament .).
  4. ↑ Thomas Knöppler: Menschenopfer II.2 .: The Moloch cult. In: Religion Past and Present. Volume 5, Mohr / Siebeck, 4th edition, Tübingen 2002, Sp. 1087 f.
  5. ^ Jewish Encyclopedia: Article "Tophet" (English).
  6. ↑ Christl M. Maier: Jeremiah as a teacher of the Torah. Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Göttingen 2002, ISBN 3-525-53880-4 , pp. 118-124 ( books.google.de ).
  7. ↑ Otto Eißfeldt: Job. Old Testament Handbook. Volume 17. Mohr Siebeck, Tübingen 1952, p. 40.
  8. ↑ Il tophet di Mozia at www.regione.sicilia.it (Italian)
  9. ↑ Helga Seden, A Tophet in Tire? In: BERYTUS. Volume 39, 1991 (English).
  10. ^ Sabatino Moscati : Il sacrificio punico dei fanciulli: Realtà o invenzione? In: Quaderni dell'Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei. 261, Rome 1987 (quoted from: Walter Burkert: Kulte des Altertums. Munich 1998, p. 71, fn. 76).