Sunday, January 26, 2014

"The truth is, I'm afraid, that they really weren't [like us]."



There's good archeological evidence that the Carthaginians really sacrificed their own children.

From The Guardian:
Just as ancient Greek and Roman propagandists insisted, the Carthaginians did kill their own infant children, burying them with sacrificed animals and ritual inscriptions in special cemeteries to give thanks for favours from the gods, according to a new study. 
"This is something dismissed as black propaganda because in modern times people just didn't want to believe it," said Josephine Quinn, a lecturer in ancient history at Oxford, who is behind the study, with international colleagues, of one of the most bitterly debated questions in classical archaeology
"But when you pull together all the evidence – archaeological, epigraphic and literary – it is overwhelming and, we believe, conclusive: they did kill their children, and on the evidence of the inscriptions, not just as an offering for future favours but fulfilling a promise that had already been made. 
"This was not a common event, and it must have been among an elite because cremation was very expensive, and so was the ritual of burial. It may even have been seen as a philanthropic act for the good of the whole community." 
Argument has raged on the subject since cemeteries known as tophets – after the biblical account of a place of sacrifice – were excavated in the early 20th century on the outskirts of Carthage in modern Tunisia, and then at other Carthaginian sites in Sicily and Sardinia. The graves held tiny cremated bones carefully packed into urns, buried under tombstones giving thanks to the gods...
Roman historian Diodorus and other ancient historians gave graphic accounts of Carthaginian child sacrifice: "There was in their city a bronze image of Cronus, extending its hands, palms up and sloping towards the ground, so that each of the children when placed thereon rolled down and fell into a sort of gaping pit filled with fire."
The archeologists noted that many of their colleagues had trouble believing that child sacrifice really happened:
Quinn said many of her academic colleagues were appalled by her conclusions. 
"The feeling that some ultimate taboo is being broken is very strong. It was striking how often colleagues, when they asked what I was working on, reacted in horror and said, 'Oh no, that's simply not possible, you must have got it wrong.'"
On a related topic, we recently passed the forty-first anniversary of Roe v. Wade. Fifty five million children have been aborted in our country since 1973. Four thousand children are aborted each day in America. Their bones can be found not in urns at archeological digs but in incinerated medical waste.

Nearly all of them are sacrificed to the idol of personal fulfillment.

Archeologist Quinn:
"We like to think that we're quite close to the ancient world, that they were really just like us – the truth is, I'm afraid, that they really weren't."
The Carthaginians were not like us.

They would be appalled by the callousness and scale of our child sacrifice.

11 comments:

  1. Yes, we kill our children by the boatload with no end in sight.

    Dr. Egnor, I had a chance to finally see that Ben Stein "Expelled" movie last night. I had no idea that you were actually IN it! You don't look the way I thought you looked.

    Nice movie. Evolution isn't a topic I gave much thought to until I started reading this blog.

    I just think that those who want to shut down debate are obviously not very confident about the merits of their argument. And then to hear some of the angry atheists speak, it merely confirmed that they have an agenda. Merely adhering to scientific principles is not enough to explain their emotional rancor. PZ Meyers and Richard Dawkins essentially admit that an atheist society is their long term goal. That's straight from the horse's mouth.

    TRISH

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    1. I saw that movie years ago when it came out in the theaters. A friend of mine who is more interested in the debate invited me. I didn't know who Egnor was at the time so I guess I missed his appearance.

      From what I remember, the Darwinists were a pretty intolerant bunch who entertained all sorts of theories that didn't have any evidence, but rejected the concept of God because, well, there's no evidence for that wacky concept. Ben Stein asked one guy how life began and he said, on a crystal.

      Of course! On a crystal. That doesn't answer how but where. It's like saying, how did life begin? In Wisconsin.

      Then Richard Dawkins goes on to explain that life on earth could have been designed, just not by God. It could have been designed however by a super-intelligent alien life form that likewise evolved Darwinianly, then designed us and seeded us here. Evidence for that theory is zero but Dawkins doesn't reject it.

      JQ

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    2. Darwin was a Freemason. You can't become a Freemason without believing in a creator. He believed in God, he just rejected him, and got others to reject him through his ideology.

      Delete
  2. TRISH said: "PZ Meyers and Richard Dawkins essentially admit that an atheist society is their long term goal."

    Much like in the 1850's in America where the likes of Abraham Lincoln saw that compromising with evil just wasn't working. Evil kept pushing for new grounds to flourish in.

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    1. All these years later and Democrats are still pretty enthused about enslaving people. Republicans too, I suppose. Slavery today is called nondiscrimination laws. They force business owners to serve people against their will, which is involuntary servitude by definition. Involuntary servitude is illegal under the thirteenth amendment to the Constitution.

      JQ

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  3. "They would be appalled by the callousness and scale of our child sacrifice."
    They sure would.

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  4. 'Their bones can be found not in urns at archeological digs but in incinerated medical waste.

    Nearly all of them are sacrificed to the idol of personal fulfillment.'

    'Personal fulfillment'?

    That's just unfair to corporate America.

    I'm new to this site so I don't know how this following issue was covered.
    So I would say though it is POSSIBLE you may have some minor victory regarding Pepsi....the processed cheese industry remains safe from your denying claws......


    '(Dave Bohon) A pro-life leader has won a victory in her efforts to convince soft-drink manufacturer PepsiCo to stop the use of aborted fetal cells in its research for enhancing the flavors of its products.

    Debi Vinnedge, executive director of Children of God for Life (COGFL), announced that in late April she had received a letter from Paul Boykas, PepsiCo’s vice president for Global Public Policy, confirming that the company will not allow the use of HEK-293 — a cell line derived from human embryonic kidney — in its partnership with Senomyx, the company with which it had inked a four-year, $30 million contract for flavor research.

    As reported last November by The New American, a PepsiCo shareholder had filed a resolution with the Securities and Exchange Commission in an effort halt the company from contracting with Senomyx, which, according to documents collected by Vinnedge, used cell lines derived from aborted babies in its process of producing artificial flavor enhancers.

    According to a report by LifeNews.com at the time, Pepsi had “ignored concerns and criticism from dozens of pro-life groups and tens of thousands of pro-life people who voiced their opposition to PepsiCo contracting with biotech company Senomyx even after it was found to be testing their food additives using fetal cells from abortions.” - See more at:

    http://govtslaves.info/pepsi-says-it-will-stop-the-use-of-aborted-fetal-cells-in-flavor-research/#sthash.r68YkCWX.dpuf'

    - See more at: http://govtslaves.info/pepsi-says-it-will-stop-the-use-of-aborted-fetal-cells-in-flavor-research/#sthash.yg51yvt8.dpuf

    It's a downright lie to suggest the unborn have no role in corporate America.

    'Personal fulfillment' is just a snide jibe at the freedom and happiness a better soft drink would bring to the world.

    Pepsi may 'man up' and face down the forces of repression. Failing that processed cheeses will continue to benefit from the removal of 'shame' from our happy experience of disposing of the unwanted.

    I suppose you would even stand in the way of that?

    You people make me sick.....and angry at your presumption. And probable hipocracy.

    Thank goodness now you have a President who is prepared to Do The Right Thing and use the law itself to prevent Catholic Medical Institutions standing in the way of freedom, dignity, happiness and ever improving processed cheeses.

    JR

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    1. JR, your last paragraph is brilliant. Just brilliant!

      Delete
  5. Anon:

    [What a vile, contemptible swamp of ignorance and ugliness your blog is.]

    You flatter me.

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  6. The bible says the Canaanities sacrificed their children. Sometimes the Hebrews when being bad. Carthage , which means NEW CITY, in canaanite language simply repeats this action.
    Indeed God may of allowed Rome to destroy them because of this evil.

    Its not the same as abortion today. Those old murderers knew they were killing babies.
    The pro-choice conviction says its NOT killing babies. Just pre baby fetus's.
    The abortion contention is a intellectual one and not a moral one for all or almost all.
    The pro-life sidec simply is more intelligent in its conclusion the fetus is a human before leaving mother and at conception. Also the soul is put in at conception.
    however the pro choice side has a problem with not defining when a kid has entered the prestige and rights os mankind.
    Roe said ONLY at birth.
    Thats stupid and will fail soon.

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  7. The only difference between a fetus and a child is location, nothing more.

    TRISH

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