Comments You Won't Hear at the 12-14-03 WT Study (page 4)

Eyebrow2

I didn't consider Isaac, because this was apparantly ' a test'....

on the other things you mention, I did not look at it that way, as a sacrifice at all. very interesting...thanks for the info

stillajwexelder

By the way, women are not 50% of the general population. There are more women alive than men, although more men are born than women.

Faraon , actually I knew that but did not want to be pedantic. I think the old soviet union had the highest imbalance of males to females --seem to remember 977 males for every 1000 females. It just makes the point even more. My 2nd Cousin is professor of Genetics at a well known university and has written a book about it -- so yes I agree all your points are valid.

blondie

I

think the old soviet union had the highest imbalance of males to females

That was because they lost so many men in WW2.

As to human sacrifices, the Israelites did sacrifice their firstborn babies to Molech. While the research is interesting, I am not convinced that Jephthah's daughter was sacrificed literally. Since the Bible records the other human sacrifices with clarity, I am surprised the same clarity is not present in this case. I would have been a severe sacrfice for a woman of that time to not get married and have children. Women's self-worth was defined by their being wives and mothers. The thing to remember is that this was Jephthah's only child. So he had no grandchildren to carry on his name. I think he also was the firstborn and had received 2 parts of the family inheritance. He had no one to pass it on to. Think of the account of Ruth and Naomi, how desperately Naomi wanted a child to carry on the family name, that she encouraged her non-Jewish daughter-in-law to marry an older man she did not know. Think of the anguish of Rachel who was barren for so long. Or the tears of Hannah who prayed for a child only to give him to God for all his days. Oh yes, it was a sad day for Jephthah and his daughter. As to family and family lines, she was as good as dead.

Blondie

Faraon

Blondie,

First of all, I want to thank you and express to you my admiration for the weekly hard work that helps us realize how blind we were.

On the human sacrifice of Jephthah's daughter. It is clear to me that this was a burnt offering. Not whitewashed as many apologists want us to believe: that she became a sort of a nun. The proof is in Claudius Josephus, Antiquities of The Jews. Book V, Chapter 8, (should be 7, since there are two chapter eights in this web page.) paragraph 10

http://www.earlyjewishwritings.com/text/josephus/ant5.html

But as he came back, he fell into a calamity no way correspondent to the great actions he had done; for it was his daughter that came to meet him; she was also an only child and a virgin: upon this Jephtha heavily lamented the greatness of his affliction, and blamed his daughter for being so forward in meeting him, for he had vowed to sacrifice her to God. However, this action that was to befall her was not ungrateful to her, since she should die upon occasion of her father's victory, and the liberty of her fellow citizens: she only desired her father to give her leave, for two months, to bewail her youth with her fellow citizens; and then she agreed, that at the forementioned thee he might do with her according to his vow. Accordingly, when that time was over, he sacrificed his daughter as a burnt-offering

Faraon.

Comments You Won't Hear at the 12-14-03 WT Study

Eyebrow2

stillajwexelder

blondie

Faraon

blondie

seattleniceguy

blondie

Share this