Christian Human Sacrifice

[Monk Of Reason]

A discussion happened a few years ago during a humanities class when we were talking about the difference between christianity and early (some not so early) pagan religions. A key point that was mentioned was the the ancient Pagan religions had several cases of human sacrifice.

In this discussion it was also mentioned that there was huge losses of life in the witch trials. Can the witch trials be thought of as Christian human sacrifice?

 

[gzusfrk]

A discussion happened a few years ago during a humanities class when we were talking about the difference between christianity and early (some not so early) pagan religions. A key point that was mentioned was the the ancient Pagan religions had several cases of human sacrifice.

In this discussion it was also mentioned that there was huge losses of life in the witch trials. Can the witch trials be thought of as Christian human sacrifice?

Yea, crazy Christians.

 

[Mister Emu]

Is Texas's death row human sacrifice?

 

[Shiranui117]

No. A human sacrifice is made as an offering to the gods, either as a form of worship or gaining favor. Witch trials were just ways of dealing with perceived heretics--i.e. criminals.

 

[Estro Felino]

A discussion happened a few years ago during a humanities class when we were talking about the difference between christianity and early (some not so early) pagan religions. A key point that was mentioned was the the ancient Pagan religions had several cases of human sacrifice.

In this discussion it was also mentioned that there was huge losses of life in the witch trials. Can the witch trials be thought of as Christian human sacrifice?

well...Carthaginians were the ones who sacrificed virgins to god Baal.

 

[Amechania]

Jesus is the human sacrifice for Christians. They participate in the sacrifice via the ritual of communion. For some this is something very real. For others it is purely symbolic. Jesus said as often as you do this remember me. So there is no specific frequency, neither any specific importance. It is what it is as he was what he was. All that matters is that you are who you are.

 

[angellous_evangellous]

A discussion happened a few years ago during a humanities class when we were talking about the difference between christianity and early (some not so early) pagan religions. A key point that was mentioned was the the ancient Pagan religions had several cases of human sacrifice.

In this discussion it was also mentioned that there was huge losses of life in the witch trials. Can the witch trials be thought of as Christian human sacrifice?

I don't think so.

I would want to know which pagan religions you were talking about -- I have the feeling that you would be reaching far into ancient history and comparing that to more modern history. There are very few pagan religions that actually practiced human sacrifice, and even less that are near contemporaries with the witch trials. In the South American religions that practiced it, human sacrifice was done to enemies and not members of the community. There was also a more direct relationship with the ritual and appeasement of the god -- in the witch trials, it was guided by fanatical fear and there was no comparable ritual and belief.

In Christianity, the closest the you get to human sacrifice is the celebration of the mass, where Christ is crucified.

 

[Pegg]

A discussion happened a few years ago during a humanities class when we were talking about the difference between christianity and early (some not so early) pagan religions. A key point that was mentioned was the the ancient Pagan religions had several cases of human sacrifice.

In this discussion it was also mentioned that there was huge losses of life in the witch trials. Can the witch trials be thought of as Christian human sacrifice?

of course not.

The witch trials had no basis in christian teachings...there is absolutely nothing in the NT which directs Christians to kill anyone or anything, witch or not.

 

[FunctionalAtheist]

of course not.

The witch trials had no basis in christian teachings...there is absolutely nothing in the NT which directs Christians to kill anyone or anything, witch or not.

While I agree that the which trials do not represent human sacrifice, they most certainly represent christian doctrine of the time.

 

[thau]

A discussion happened a few years ago during a humanities class when we were talking about the difference between christianity and early (some not so early) pagan religions. A key point that was mentioned was the the ancient Pagan religions had several cases of human sacrifice.

In this discussion it was also mentioned that there was huge losses of life in the witch trials. Can the witch trials be thought of as Christian human sacrifice?

The further we distance ourselves from times past, the more engrossing the stories grow.

Salon.com is no friend of Christian advocacy, yet, they do have integrity at times in dealing with that subject. In 2005 they published an article "Who burned the witches?" While it does not exonerate all Christian principles of the times, it does bring bearing on the main culprits. It would behoove any unbeliever so ready to speak with extraordinary zeal against all things Catholic and Christian to do his own honest research on this topic and related historical events before he goes to his judgment day confident with all his books and papers in hand.


http://www.salon.com/2005/02/01/witch_craze/

Who burned the witches? by laura miller
For years, feminist scholars have argued that witch hunts were inspired by a reactionary, misogynistic church.But new scholarship, like Lyndal Roper's "Witch Craze," reveals that the real villains were the neighbors.

Feb.1, 2005 | It's hard to imagine a more nightmarish experience than being at the center of a classic witch trial:accused of obscure misdeeds by your neighbors, defending yourself against the looking-glass-world logic of the authorities, suffering an escalating course of torture designed to "loosen your tongue" -- and at the end of it all,the gallows, the block or the stake. Witch hunts lie at the dark heart of Western culture, so much so that they've become synonymous with any kind of vicious, dogged and irrational persecution, from McCarthyism to the ritual child abuse panics of the 1980s.

No wonder the history of the original European witch hunts of the late 16th and early 17th centuries has become politicized. By the early 1900s, they were seen as outbreaks of hysteria fostered by a sinister and oppressive Catholic Church. Then, about 30 years ago, revisionist historians began to claim that the trials constituted a more systematic campaign by the patriarchal church to extinguish the remnants of goddess-worshiping pre-Christian religions by wiping out the people who preserved them: women, specifically folk healers and midwives. Both views are wrong, but as far as popular conception goes, the second has triumphed....

(the article goes on far longer)


ALSO:
An even more well researched article for those so inclined. In fact, there are now many more accredited historical research efforts that explain the issues of those days in far different terms than what "itching ears" have so wanted to hear for so long.

http://draeconin.com/database/witchhunt.htm

 

[Sleeppy]

Anything involving the killing of human beings is human sacrifice. If the sacrifice is not being offered to an external source, it's being offered to an internal source- usually both.

 

[ChristineES]

A discussion happened a few years ago during a humanities class when we were talking about the difference between christianity and early (some not so early) pagan religions. A key point that was mentioned was the the ancient Pagan religions had several cases of human sacrifice.

In this discussion it was also mentioned that there was huge losses of life in the witch trials. Can the witch trials be thought of as Christian human sacrifice?

No. Of course, they can't. They can't even be defended, at all, by Jesus teachings. It Jesus would not have approved of them, how can they even be considered Christian (I am talking about the actions not the people who did them)? It doesn't even matter that it was Christians who did these things. I am a Christian and I do a lot of things that wouldn't be considered "Christian" (not evil things, but...).

 

[Kilgore Trout]

Can the witch trials be thought of as Christian human sacrifice?

Not really. More like murder.

 

[George-ananda]

Can the witch trials be thought of as Christian human sacrifice?

No, a sacrifice is an offering to propitiate a deity.

 

[angellous_evangellous]

Anything involving the killing of human beings is human sacrifice. If the sacrifice is not being offered to an external source, it's being offered to an internal source- usually both.

Strange.

 

[George-ananda]

A discussion happened a few years ago during a humanities class when we were talking about the difference between christianity and early (some not so early) pagan religions. A key point that was mentioned was the the ancient Pagan religions had several cases of human sacrifice.

In this discussion it was also mentioned that there was huge losses of life in the witch trials. Can the witch trials be thought of as Christian human sacrifice?

Some people can't seem to bear hearing anything positive about Christianity. It's not fair.

 

[ChristineES]

Some people can't seem to bear hearing anything positive about Christianity. It's not fair.

To be fair, people in the past (and even some in the present) do things in Jesus' name that should have never have been done in Jesus' name at all. I really can't blame that some people do blame Christianity rather than the people who are guilty of doing these things; although Jesus would not have approved (if you go by His teachings) of these actions. I try to keep that in consideration. I hope that people will listen when I say that Christians aren't supposed to do those things (like what happened during the Witch Trials), although people don't always do that.

One thing that does get me, however, is those same people (well, not all of them) ignore the good things that people do in the name of their faith/religion (whatever the faith/religion is). And then it is not only limited to faith/religion but also to other organizations, as well.

 

[Monk Of Reason]

Some people can't seem to bear hearing anything positive about Christianity. It's not fair.

I brought this up as a discussion to see where it goes. I personally think it depends on the way you define sacrifice. I think on the one hand by your definition the crusades would have been far more likely to be human sacrifice as they killed men, women and children in order to obtain a holy land that they believed their god wanted them to do. There is all kinds of examples in the old testament of the Hebrew tribes killing because it was a commanded of them by god. In fact there was an instance with Saul where he did NOT kill and he was punished for it.

Just because it isn't a doctrine or a regular practice doesn't mean it wasn't a human sacrifice. And this isn't just to "bash on Christianity" but an attempt to give a common ground of sort in discussing the beliefs and what it has made people do and contrast it with other beliefs.

 

[George-ananda]

I think on the one hand by your definition the crusades would have been far more likely to be human sacrifice as they killed men, women and children in order to obtain a holy land that they believed their god wanted them to do.

Killing perceived enemies and perceived evil-doers is not sacrifice. Sacrifice is giving up something you want to a deity as an offering to propitiate the deity.

From Webster's:

Definition of SACRIFICE
1: an act of offering to a deity something precious; especially : the killing of a victim on an altar

 

[1137]

A discussion happened a few years ago during a humanities class when we were talking about the difference between christianity and early (some not so early) pagan religions. A key point that was mentioned was the the ancient Pagan religions had several cases of human sacrifice.

In this discussion it was also mentioned that there was huge losses of life in the witch trials. Can the witch trials be thought of as Christian human sacrifice?

I'd say it depends on your definition. Plain and simply human life was sacrificed, so yes. But human sacrifice tends to be ritualistic in nature where the individual is killed to appease gods or something else. The witch trials were murder, not ritual.