Moloch

[Et in Arcadia ego]

Just curious, what do you guys/gals have on this character?

Who, what, when?

I have my own understanding, but I'd like to correlate or compare it to other's.

edit: TO BE CLEAR I am inquiring as to Mediterranean ORIGINS of the cult and entity, NOT what came after, whether Bohemian Grove or Gaelic practice.

[marmot]

Moloch comes up a lot in the TaNaCh, the Old Testament. Worshipper's of Moloch would sacrifice their children to this diety or demon-god, have their children 'pass through the fire.'

Here's an article from the Jewish Encyclopedia on Moloch:
http://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/view.jsp?artid=718&letter=M

The radicals in the diety's name [M-L-CH] mean "king"

[Et in Arcadia ego]

So does the first appearance trace further than Babylon or does Moloch go back to Sumerian tradition?

[theeKultleeder]

I thought it was Alex Jones' pet owl...

[theeKultleeder]

You just have to hear the poet sing it to really get it, but here is Ginsberg:


II

What sphinx of cement and aluminium bashed open their skulls and ate up their brains and imagination?

Moloch! Solitude! Filth! Ugliness! Ashcans and unobtainable dollars! Children screaming under the stairways! Boys sobbing in armies! Old men weeping in the parks!

Moloch! Moloch! Nightmare of Moloch! Moloch the loveless! Mental Moloch! Moloch the heavy judger of men!

Moloch the incomprehensible prison! Moloch the crossbone soulless jailhouse and Congress of sorrows! Moloch whose buildings are judgement! Moloch the vast stone of war! Moloch the stunned governments!

Moloch whose mind is pure machinery! Moloch whose blood is running money! Moloch whose fingers are ten armies! Moloch whose breast is a cannibal dynamo! Moloch whose ear is a smoking tomb!

Moloch whose eyes are a thousand blind windows! Moloch whose skyscrapers stand in the long streets like endless Jehovas! Moloch whose factories dream and choke in the fog! Moloch whose smokestacks and antennae crown the cities!

Moloch whose love is endless oil and stone! Moloch whose soul is electricity and banks! Moloch whose poverty is the specter of genius! Moloch whose fate is a cloud of sexless hydrogen! Moloch whose name is the Mind!

Moloch in whom I sit lonely! Moloch in whom I dream angels! Crazy in Moloch! Cocksucker in Moloch! Lacklove and manless in Moloch!

Moloch who entered my soul early! Moloch in whom I am a consciousness without a body! Moloch who frightened me out of my natural ecstasy! Moloch whom I abandon! Wake up in Moloch! Light streaming out of the sky!

Moloch! Moloch! Robot apartments! invisable suburbs! skeleton treasuries! blind capitals! demonic industries! spectral nations! invincible madhouses! granite cocks! monstrous bombs!

They broke their backs lifting Moloch to Heaven! Pavements, trees, radios, tons! lifting the city to Heaven which exists and is everywhere about us!

Visions! omens! hallucinations! miracles! ecstacies! gone down the American river!

Dreams! adorations! illuminations! religions! the whole boatload of sensitive bullshit!

Breakthroughs! over the river! flips and crucifixions! gone down the flood! Highs! Epiphanies! Despairs! Ten years' animal screams and suicides! Minds! New loves! Mad generation! down on the rocks of Time!

Real holy laughter in the river! They saw it all! the wild eyes! the holy yells! They bade farewell! They jumped off the roof! to solitude! waving! carrying flowers! Down to the river! into the street!

http://www.wussu.com/poems/agh.htm



For the ADD:

Part II
Ginsberg says that Part II, in relation to Part I, "names the monster of mental consciousness that preys on the Lamb". Part II is a rant about the state of industrial civilization, characterized in the poem as 'Moloch'. Ginsberg was inspired to write Part II during a period of peyote-induced visionary consciousness in which he saw a hotel façade as a monstrous and horrible visage which he identified with that of Moloch. Moloch is the biblical idol in Leviticus to whom the Canaanites sacrificed children. Ginsberg intends that the characters he portrays in Part I be understood to have been sacrificed to this idol. Moloch is also the name of an industrial, demon-like figure in Fritz Lang's Metropolis, a film which Ginsberg credits with influencing "Howl, Part II" in his annotations for the poem (see especially Howl: Original Draft Facsimile, Transcript & Variant Versions). Most lines in this section contain the fixed base "Moloch". Ginsberg says of Part II, "Here the long line is used as a stanza form broken into exclamatory units punctuated by a base repetition, Moloch".[4][

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Howl#Part_II

[Brighid_Moon]

Pantheon Org.

Moloch
by Micha F. Lindemans

"King". The sun god of the Canaanites (Ammonites?) in old Palestine and sometimes associated with the Sumerian Baal, although Moloch (or Molekh) was entirely malevolent. In the 8th-6th century BCE, firstborn children were sacrificed to him by the Israelites in the Valleye of Hinnom, south-east of Jerusalem (see also Gehenna). These sacrifices to the sun god were made to renew the strength of the sun fire. This ritual was probably borrowed from surrounding nations, and was also popular in ancient Carthage.

Moloch was represented as a huge bronze statue with the head of a bull. The statue was hollow, and inside there burned a fire which colored the Moloch a glowing red. Children were placed on the hands of the statue. Through an ingenious system the hands were raised to the mouth (as if Moloch were eating) and the children fell into the fire where they were consumed by the flames. The people gathered before the Moloch were dancing on the sounds of flutes and tambourines to drown out the screams of the victims.

According to some sources, the Moloch in the Old Testament is not a god, but a specific form of sacrifice.

If I recall correctly, Moloch/Baal is also connected to Sutekh/Set of the Egyptians, and Typhon of the Greeks. Most of these destruction gods took their rounds in many different places and forms and are practically interchangable. (ps: also see Satan/Lucifer, et al.) Caananite Religion

At any rate, interesting side note that from that carny Anton LaVey, came the group "Temple of Set" (run by Lt. Col. Michael Aquino, and from gossip a cult at minimum accepted in the military), which is supposedly based on worship of Sutekh, and actually teaches an interesting theology on narcissism and secular humanism. So much for Satanists.

At any rate, Moloch is supposed to be who is worshipped at Bohemian Grove (not far from me, I really need to go investigate that place for myself some day) by the "power elite males" of our (and other) countries. There are pictures of the "owl god" carved in wood there, and some suspicious photos of what seem to be rituals. The history of the place goes back to (again, if I recall off hand) the early 1920s? Perhaps a bit before. It's a typical "Boys Club", but what goes on there is still up for debate, only because it's so protected, and because it's so secretive.

[Et in Arcadia ego]

Yeah, I know all about the B.G. thing. Sorry, I should have clarified I was after the origins of the entity. I'm trying to pin down where it originated and particulars of its cult. You hear references to immolating children, but I've also read about a Babylonian King immolating some Hebrew magicians for not giving up secrets to Hebrew magick that sounds more like a precursor of Minos' Iron Bull than Moloch worship.

Reliable info is scarce.

[theeKultleeder]

Temple of Set[/url]" (run by Lt. Col. Michael Aquino, and from gossip a cult at minimum accepted in the military), which is supposedly based on worship of Sutekh, and actually teaches an interesting theology on narcissism and secular humanism. So much for Satanists.

For sure. Isn't Satanism legally protected as a recognized religion?


I read the Satanic Bible as teenager and recognized right away it was worship of the ego - not much different from what people do, anyway.

Must've been all that damn Buddhism in my head.

[Et in Arcadia ego]

I read the Satanic Bible as teenager and recognized right away it was worship of the ego - not much different from what people do, anyway.

Yes, but this Satanic thinger adds a certain tax exemption for certain individuals.

[vanlose kid]

deleted

[vanlose kid]

deleted

[Brighid_Moon]

Sorry, I should have clarified I was after the origins of the entity. I'm trying to pin down where it originated and particulars of its cult. You hear references to immolating children, but I've also read about a Babylonian King immolating some Hebrew magicians for not giving up secrets to Hebrew magick that sounds more like a precursor of Minos' Iron Bull than Moloch worship.

Okay, awesome. Wasn't sure what you were exactly getting at. I'll see what I can't dig up that vanlose kid hasn't. That was some amazing information. I get so frustrated with jstor, and I think he just convinced me to actually join it!

For sure. Isn't Satanism legally protected as a recognized religion?

Anyone can get their "cult", "group" or "beliefs" under the sanction of Non-Profit Status (religious or otherwise) by falling under the right rules, filling out the correct paperwork and paying the correct fees.

Department of the Army, Handbook for Chaplains, Section on the Temple of Set

Yes, but this Satanic thinger adds a certain tax exemption for certain individuals.

LOL exactly!

I read the Satanic Bible as teenager and recognized right away it was worship of the ego - not much different from what people do, anyway.

I did too, when I was around 13-14. I think alot of kids do, rebelling or trying to find out who they are. While not being familiar with Budhism back then, the fact that LaVey actually sets out in his book and states that his beliefs were based on secular humanism was quite the clue to me. Aquino, imho, has only taken it to a new level is all.

After posting that last night I also just wished to emphasize that I'm only skeptical about the origins of the religions and possibly their founders (for many reasons). Within them I'm sure are good and horrible people and that the basis of all the controversy surrounding these religions is possibly based on some semblance of fact due to horrible people, not per-se the "religion" or spiritual aspects (when you're dealing with an entire group filled with narcissists, anything is possible). I'm a firm believer that humans make religion, and not the other way around, and attempt to separate "religion" from "spirituality" in my thought processes.

[Sepka]

http://www.rigorousintuition.ca/board/v ... php?t=4937 is an old thread that dealt with Moloch in some detail.

[theeKultleeder]

[sorry to hijack your thread, et!]

Secular humanism is a humanist philosophy that upholds reason, ethics, and justice, and specifically rejects the supernatural and the spiritual as warrants of moral reflection and decision-making. Like other types of humanism, secular humanism is a life stance focusing on the way human beings can lead good and happy lives. More specifically, secular humanism is a eupraxsophy, a non-religious life stance.

...

Secular humanism describes a world view with the following elements and principles:

Need to test beliefs - A conviction that dogmas, ideologies and traditions, whether religious, political or social, must be weighed and tested by each individual and not simply accepted on faith.

Reason, evidence, scientific method - Commitment to the use of critical reason, factual evidence, and scientific methods of inquiry, rather than faith and mysticism, in seeking solutions to human problems and answers to important human questions.

Fulfillment, growth, creativity - A primary concern with fulfillment, growth, and creativity for both the individual and humankind in general.

Search for truth - A constant search for objective truth, with the understanding that new knowledge and experience constantly alter our imperfect perception of it.

This life - A concern for this life and a commitment to making it meaningful through better understanding of ourselves, our history, our intellectual and artistic achievements, and the outlooks of those who differ from us.

Ethics - A search for viable individual, social and political principles of ethical conduct, judging them on their ability to enhance human well-being and individual responsibility.

Building a better world - A conviction that with reason, an open exchange of ideas, good will, and tolerance, progress can be made in building a better world for ourselves and our children.

...

Some criticize the philosophy of secular humanism because it offers no eternal truths nor a relationship with the divine.[9][10] They allege that a philosophy bereft of these beliefs[11] leaves humanity adrift in a foggy sea[12] of postmodern cynicism and anomie.[13] Humanists respond that such criticisms reflect a failure to look at the actual content of humanist philosophy, which far from being cynical and postmodern, is rooted in optimistic,[14][15] idealistic[16] attitudes that trace back to the Enlightenment,[17][18][19] or further, back to Pre-Socratic Greek philosophers and Chinese Confucianism.[2]
Opponents of humanism tend to define the term secular humanism differently. Some Christians often use the presence of a moral belief structure in secular humanism as evidence of a religion. This is rejected by secular humanists, who claim morality is not limited to religion.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Secular_humanism

[Et in Arcadia ego]

What does all that have to do with the origins of Moloch?