Child Sacrifice

Passages: Judges 11; 1 Samuel 1; Genesis 22:1-18; John 3:16

In the first several books of the Old Testament, God repeatedly prohibits child sacrifice. In contrast to his pagan counterparts, God is a compassionate preserver of life. However, on a few occasions God allows, or even invites, people to give up their children.

Judges 11 tells the story of Jephthah, a mighty warrior who rescues Israel from the Ammonites. In the heat of battle, Jephthah vows that if God gives him success, he’ll sacrifice the first living thing he encounters when he returns to his homestead. Jephthah returns home successful. And in one of the Bible’s most cruelly ironic moments, Jephthah’s only daughter runs out to greet him. Jephthah has made a vow to God, and is duty-bound to keep it. It’s important to note that nowhere in this story does God invite the vow. It is made rashly. The subtle warning is not to make a promise to God that you’re unwilling or unable to keep.

The Book of 1 Samuel introduces us to a grief-stricken woman who wants nothing more than to have a child. In the throes of despair Hannah, like Jepthah, makes a vow to God. She promises that if God gives her a son, she will give the child up to serve at the temple. Sure enough, Hannah becomes pregnant. As soon as the promised child is weaned, she brings him to the temple to be raised by the priest. Like Jephthah, we can only imagine that Hannah is painfully torn at this point between clinging to the son that has been her heart’s desire, and making good her promise to the God who gave him.

Hannah’s journey to the temple is reminiscent of Abraham’s journey up Mt. Moriah. In Genesis 22 God gives Abraham an unthinkable command: to take his son Isaac – the son whom God promised to give – and sacrifice him at the top of a nearby mountain. As the story unfolds, God proves to be testing Abraham’s faith. It is never his intent for Abraham to kill his son. However, Abraham is given the same dilemma as Hannah: choosing the thing his heart desires most, or choosing obedience to God. As a shining example of faith, Abraham chooses the latter. The epitome of faith in God is truly wanting God more than anything else. The person of faith discovers, in the process, that God is gracious and compassionate, giving his children what they desire most.

At the center of our Scriptures is another story of a parent who gives up a child. It turns out that God doesn’t ask any of his children to do something he himself is unwilling to do. The only God-mandated child sacrifice in the Bible is God’s sacrifice of his own child. Jesus, the child in question, explains why and how God orchestrates this sacrifice in the most famous verse of the New Testament: John 3:16.

It is precisely because God establishes his unwavering and unshakable love for us that he is able to ask our wholehearted commitment in return. If we are to love God, we can only love him one way: all or nothing, the way he loves us.