sunday school (3)

Moloch

, signifies king. Moloch, Molech, Milcom, or Melchom, was a god of the Ammonites. The word Moloch signifies “king,” and Melchom signifies “their king.” Moses in several places forbids the Israelites, under the penalty of death, to dedicate their children to Moloch, by making them pass through the fire in honour of that god, Lev. 18:21; 20:2–5. God himself threatens to pour out his wrath against such offenders. There is great probability that the Hebrews were addicted to the worship of this deity, even before their coming out of Egypt; since the Prophet Amos, 5:26, and after him St. Stephen, reproach them with having carried in the wilderness the tabernacle of their god Moloch, Acts 7:43. Solomon built a temple to Moloch upon the Mount of Olives, 1 Kings 11:7; and Manasseh a long time after imitated his impiety, making his son pass through the fire in honour of Moloch, 2 Kings 21:3–6. It was chiefly in the valley of Tophet and Hinnom, east of Jerusalem, that this idolatrous worship was paid, Jer. 19:5, 6, &c. Some are of opinion that they contented themselves with making their children leap over a fire sacred to Moloch

Chiun

SAKKUTH AND KAIWAN (DEITIES) [Heb sikkût (סִכּוּת) and kiyyûn (כִּיּוּן)]. A name and epithet, respectively, of the planet Saturn (Amos 5:26). Because Saturn was the most distant of the planets known to the ancients, and hence the planet was the slowest and steadiest movement across the sky, it was described in Mesopotamia by the adjective kayamānu, meaning “the steady one.” Learned speculation enhanced Saturn’s connection with stability, justice, and truth such that it even became identified with the Sun, who was perceived to have the same qualities in Mesopotamian tradition (Parpola 1983:343). Since Akkadian m may appear as w in loanwords into Hebrew, the Akkadian consonants kymn would appear in Hebrew as kywn, as in fact occurs in Amos 5:26. Frequent references to kywn when the planets are invoked in Aramaic and Mandaean texts in the 1st millennium a.d. (Obermann 1940) affirms the longevity, popularity, and cross-cultural transfer of this title for Saturn.

Worship

Baker Encyclopedia of the Bible The End of Temple Worship

The OT sacrifices illustrate Jesus’ achievements in bringing peace between man and God (

John 4:20–24 “Our fathers worshipped in this mountain; and ye say, that in Jerusalem is the place where men ought to worship. Jesus saith unto her, Woman, believe me, the hour cometh, when ye shall neither in this mountain, nor yet at Jerusalem, worship the Father. Ye worship ye know not what: we know what we worship: for salvation is of the Jews. But the hour cometh, and now is, when the true worshippers shall worship the Father in spirit and in truth: for the Father seeketh such to worship him. God is a Spirit: and they that worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth.”

The Gospel of John A. Jesus and the Samaritans (4:1–42)

he now says, “the true worshipers will worship,” uniting Jew and Samaritan alike in common worship of “the Father” (that is, through ‘the Son

The Gospel of John A. Jesus and the Samaritans (4:1–42)

Worship “in Spirit and truth” does not necessarily mean non-liturgical or noninstitutional worship, nor does it favor “inward” individual worship over “outward” corporate worship. Rather, it is worship appropriate to the nature and character of God, and if God’s nature is revealed only in “God the One and Only, the One who is right beside the Father” (1:18), then such worship is impossible until “the One and Only” has come. Now that the Revealer is present in the person of Jesus, such worship can and will become reality

The Gospel of John A. Jesus and the Samaritans (4:1–42)

The pronouncement “God is Spirit” (v. 24) is a rare instance in which Jesus actually reveals something about God, and not just that he himself is the Revealer. What he reveals is not new (although it is never explicitly stated in the Hebrew Bible or LXX). To say “God is Spirit” is not so different from saying God is invisible (1:18; 6:46), incorruptible, not to be worshiped in the form of idols or images (

The Gospel of John A. Jesus and the Samaritans (4:1–42)

This new kind of worship is not something Jesus is urging on the

woman, as if to say, “This is the way I would like you to worship.”

The Gospel of John A. Jesus and the Samaritans (4:1–42)

It is not an option, but something that “must” occur