Doesn’t seem too unreasonable. Identifying offerings to a god, vs regular burial or refuse disposal, is a pretty fundamental bit of Archeology (i.e. I;ve found this stuff thats been in the ground for 1000s of years, what is it?).
That wasn’t the only article on the matter, just the first one that came up. I’m totally not an archeologist but I’ve read pretty extensively on Carthage and the Punic wars (its a properly amazing story), and the evidence for it is fairly overwhelming.
The people who are still denying it are really grasping at straws IMO, and letting what they think should be the case get in the way of the evidence (which I kinda get, I mean the Romans were prejudiced stuck up jerks who wiped out a civilization, it would be more satisfying if the outlandish stories about how horrible the civilization they wiped out was turned out to be BS),
Yeah, but ‘they couldn’t have been dead prenatally because they’re offerings’ still doesn’t seem like a good argument. If they were dead prenatally (evidence seems to depend on what you think of the teeth) then they couldn’t have been live sacrifices. It needs to be argued from the teeth, not from the assumptions.
However, I’m not sure that any of this has anything to do with the question of the position (if any) of the early Christian Church about abortion. Lots of people find it abhorrent to kill a child after it’s born but acceptable to do so before birth, or at some stages or in some circumstances before birth – just about everybody in the modern pro-choice movement, for instance.
Eh, I’m not an expert. My impression is that the most recent books of the Bible were written very early in the Second Temple period, and that messianism appeared later in that period. But it’s certainly close enough that there might have been some overlap. Again, not an expert, but I don’t believe those books contain any explicit reference to a Messiah.
Yeah but the OP was answered a while back by @Bootb, and it is a least a little closer to the original question (which compares early Christian to Roman attitudes) than the tangent this is a tangent from. The OP was specifically not about what was in the Christian/Jewish canon, but about the believes of the early church.
The word “mashiach” does not mean “savior.” The notion of an innocent, divine or semi-divine being who will sacrifice himself to save us from the consequences of our own sins is a purely Christian concept that has no basis in Jewish thought. Unfortunately, this Christian concept has become so deeply ingrained in the English word “messiah” that this English word can no longer be used to refer to the Jewish concept. The word “mashiach” will be used throughout this page.
The mashiach will be a great political leader descended from King David (Jeremiah 23:5). The mashiach is often referred to as “mashiach ben David” (mashiach, son of David). He will be well-versed in Jewish law, and observant of its commandments (Isaiah 11:2-5). He will be a charismatic leader, inspiring others to follow his example. He will be a great military leader, who will win battles for Israel. He will be a great judge, who makes righteous decisions (Jeremiah 33:15). But above all, he will be a human being, not a god, demi-god or other supernatural being.
True; but that doesn’t change the point I was making. Members of the early church may well have deplored worshippers of Moloch for sacrificing children, but that wouldn’t in itself have necessarily meant they were opposed to abortion.
I actually started another thread on this very matter, the current archeological consensus is the earliest books were written between 700s and 500s BC (i.e. between time of the Homer and the Sappho in ancient Greek literature)
Since the accusation of some towards a woman having an abortion is they committed murder, You must have seen when Jesus has been quoted to have said murder is hatred in ones heart. So I have seen hatred towards women who had abortions, even towards those women who had nothing by love for their unborn child and love towards God, but yes there was hatred towards these women due to their choice to terminate their pregnancy.
Not that it’s relevant to early Christian attitudes re abortion, but:
Growing up, i was taught that the thing about sacrificing infants and children to Moloch was just propaganda. However, I’ve since seen more and more evidence that various groups around the world actually did sacrifice their children, and rather specific claims that groups the early Hebrews would have known did so, too. I haven’t kept up on the archeology (i am not an archeologist) but given that the bible says, “don’t do this” and that this is pretty commonly done, it seems more likely than not that someone was doing it.
Just noting that after the First Punic War, Carthage was as strong as ever, and only lost some territory.
After the Second Punic War, in which Carthage invaded and occupied most of Italy, and Rome came to the very brink of destruction, Roman peace terms with Carthage were exceptionally and remarkably lenient.
Carthage was allowed to be totally self-governing and free from restrictions with regard to its internal affairs, but not allowed to have an army or make alliances without Roman approval.
The terms were so lenient that Carthage was prosperous, thriving, and growing again in less than a decade. Carthage itself offered to pay off the war indemnity the Romans had imposed years early. (The Romans said it wasn’t necessary.)
By the time of the Third Punic War, Cartage was very wealthy, resurgent, trying to expand again and chafing at the military restrictions imposed by Rome. That was the war when Carthage was destroyed.
But it was soon rebuilt as a Roman city, and thrived for many centuries.
But it was a Roman city after that, the Carthaginian civilisation was completely wiped out. The only surviving relics of the Carthaginian language are from a comical character in a Roman play.
That said its not really a useful way to descibe them “as stuck up jerks” they were a civilization that glorified martial conquest. Their actions and beliefs were all filtered through that lens, just ours are through a modern liberal democratic lens. But still I get the impulse to not believe the Carthagian burned their own children alive, but the evidence showed it happen.
Also its not like the Romans thought the same way about human sacrifice that modern western societies do. They weren’t into it but it wasn’t an unimaginable horror (they did in fact carry it out on the odd occasion, e.g. during Hannible’s invasion). Generally for all the bad press it gets I find greco-roman descriptions of other cultures, even cultures they were at war with and considered “barbarian” fairly balanced considering when and where it was written. Victorian descriptions of other cultures I find far more jaundiced by cultural prejudice and the assumption that their is a sophisticated, cultured, intelligent white British race who are inherently superior to everyone else, most especially those how don’t look and sound European.
Punic language, identity, and culture persisted several centuries into Roman rule. Two third-century Roman emperors—Septimius Severus and his son and successor Caracalla—were of Punic descent. In the fourth century, Augustine of Hippo, himself of Berber heritage, noted that Punic was still spoken in the region by people who identified as Kn’nm, or “Chanani”, as the Carthaginians had called themselves. Settlements across North Africa, Sardinia, and Sicily continued to speak and write Punic, as evidenced by inscriptions on temples, tombs, public monuments, and artwork dating well after the Roman conquest. Punic names were still used until at least the fourth century, even by prominent denizens of Roman Africa, and some local officials in formerly Punic territories used the title.
Some Punic ideas and innovations survived Roman conquest and even became mainstream in Roman culture. Mago’s manual on farming and estate management was among the few Carthaginian texts to be spared from destruction, and was even translated into Greek and Latin by order of the Senate.
The city was destroyed, but that didn’t mean the population was destroyed. The state of Carthage was far larger than just the city.
Not a guess, that is absolutely the truth. Some vestiges survived the physical conquest, but only for a short while, the written Carthagian language did not survive. The only written passages that survive (the odd inscription here and there are not writings) is in the play Poenulus. A few people speaking a related language does mean the civilization survived (people still speak Incan and Aztec languages, but those civilizations were absolutely wipe out Spanish conquest)
Berber African culture of course is whole different thing, that absolutely survives to this day. They are not Phoenician (though living next to the Carthagians for so long were influenced by them). One of the critical factors in the defeat of Carthage in the second punic war was the defection of the Numidians (generally thought to be a Berber people), and their cavalry that had literally run rings around the romans, from Carthage to Rome.
Certainly the culture and language were eclipsed by Roman language and culture, but the language still survived for centuries, and the culture wasn’t wiped out.
The fact that the language and writings haven’t survived to our times probably has a lot more to do with the Vandal conquest of North Africa, and later the Muslim conquest of North Africa.
From the same article:
Aspects of Carthage’s political system persisted well into the Roman period, albeit to varying degrees and often in Romanized form. Sufetes are mentioned in inscriptions throughout the major settlements of Roman Sardinia, indicating the office was perhaps used by Punic descendants to resist both cultural and political assimilation with their Latin conquerors. As late as the mid second century AD, two sufetes wielded power in Bithia, a city in the Roman province of Sardinia and Corsica.[150]
The Romans seemed to have actively tolerated, if not adopted, Carthaginian offices and institutions. Official state terminology of the late Roman Republic and subsequent Empire repurposed the word sufet to refer to Roman-style local magistrates serving in Africa Proconsularis, which included Carthage and its core territories.[124] Sufetes are attested to have governed over forty post-Carthaginian towns and cities, including Althiburos, Calama, Capsa, Cirta, Gadiaufala, Gales, Limisa, Mactar, and Thugga.[151] Though many were former Carthaginian settlements, some had little to no Carthaginian influence; Volubilis, in modern-day Morocco, had been part of the Kingdom of Mauretania, which became a Roman client state after the fall of Carthage.[152] The use of sufetes persisted well into the late second century AD.[153]
Sufetes were prevalent even in interior regions of Roman Africa that had never been settled by Carthage. This suggests that, unlike the Punic community of Roman Sardinia, Punic settlers and refugees endeared themselves to Roman authorities by adopting a readily intelligible government.[153] Three sufetes serving simultaneously appear in first century AD records at Althiburos, Mactar, and Thugga, reflecting a choice to adopt Punic nomenclature for Romanized institutions without the actual, traditionally balanced magistracy.[153] In those cases, a third, non-annual position of tribal or communal chieftain marked an inflection point in the assimilation of external African groups into the Roman political fold.[151]
I guess another point for discussion, related to the OP - to what extent was physical abortion used, as opposed to herbs that may or may not have caused miscarriages? I would surmise that the state of the art for medical (surgical) intervention would be as bad or worse than back street abortions. At least modern quacks have the benefit of basic knowledge about surgical cleanliness and infections, and basic knowledge of what is necessary to properly remove a fetus (embryo, blastocyst). Early practitioners were probably no better informed and equipped than the desperate woman today with a coat hanger. Absent real, extensive, and disseminated medical information, most early abortionists would just be poking around in the dark, so to speak. (Literally - I imagine in the days before flashlights, there was a limit to how well one could position a large lit torch.)
As fo Carthage and baby-burning, take note from the follow-up of the Sodom and Gomorrah story - where Lot’s supposedly pure and innocent daughters take up with him when he’s overly drunk and proceed to have children with him. Their descendants are the Moabites and Ammonites. basically, the whole story is a way to get in a snide dig at the neighbouring tribes - “Our neighbours are the product of drunken incest by wanton women who came from a city that was heavily into forced buggery…” That seems to be the level of discourse in the early days.
I also found, to my surprise while doing my family tree, that my rural English ancestors seemed to manage to have no more than 2 or 3 children per family, typically. It only changed around 1800 when times got richer, that I more often see families of 5 , 7, 10 and also high infant mortality rates thanks to crowding from urbanization and the resulting urban sanitation problems. I suspect early man did not have a huge problem limiting birth rates when necessary - high birth rates generally more likely reflected the financial necessity of old age security and the confidence they could feed extra mouths.
Note that my Ovid quote in post #30 addressed this to some extent:
So probably most attempted “surgical” abortions were carried out by the pregnant woman herself, along the lines of modern “coat hanger” procedures, as you note.
I very much doubt that anyone ever thought it necessary (or possible) to try to light the affected area with a torch, though.
I assume, too, surgical abortion was not much discussed because typically a woman who was driven to dispose of an unwanted illicit fetus through a self-induced injury possible already was due for far stronger condemnation for the acts of fornication that led to pregnancy. She often failed to survive such an action, much like today. …patriarchal society and all that.