OPINION: Let's raise our voices and demand justice for children

I am going to tell you something that will not surprise or upset you: Child sacrifice is abhorrent.

I am going to tell you something else. This may surprise and upset you: Child sacrifice works.

If you have encountered Greek mythology, you know this already. In the chronicles of the Trojan War, we read that as the united forces of ancient Greece prepare to sail to Troy and rescue the kidnapped Queen Helen, favorable winds cease – and the thousand ships are stalled at the port of Aulis.

Why? Because the Greek commander Agamemnon has slaughtered a deer – an animal sacred to the goddess Artemis – and Artemis refuses to let the Greek campaign continue under his authority.

Agamemnon might admit wrongdoing and hold himself accountable for the misfortune that has befallen the people he leads. He might humble himself before Artemis and beg forgiveness for the killing. He might allow one of his fellow Greek kings to assume command of the fleet.

But Agamemnon is arrogant and brutal, flush with entitlement and power that he seeks to retain by any means. And he finds the means from an oracle: If Agamemnon will sacrifice his daughter Iphigenia, he can maintain his position as leader of the Greeks.

Agamemnon kills his daughter. And as the Greek forces besiege and annihilate the great city of Troy over the next ten years, Agamemnon continues to serve as their commander.

According to Greek mythology, Iphigenia learned of her father’s intention just before she was sacrificed. In her final hours, she begged her father to let her live.

Child sacrifice is abhorrent. Child sacrifice works.

It works again in the Bible, in the third chapter of the Second Book of Kings. Seizing upon the disorder that accompanies the death of a longtime Israelite leader, the king of Moab refuses to pay taxes and ignites a rebellion that threatens to destabilize the region. In response, three nations unite to restore lawfulness. The fight appears righteous and auspicious: The prophet Elisha has foreseen victory, the leader of Moab has been driven into his final walled city, and his swordsmen have failed to mount a counterattack.

It is time for the king of Moab to surrender, to negotiate, to behave with honor and to humble himself for the sake of his people. But the Moabite king seeks power by any means. And he finds the means in 2 Kings 3:27: “He took his first-born son . . . and offered him up on the wall as a sacrifice.”

The nearly triumphant armies surrounding the king recoil. In wrath, in disgust, in fear and in horror, they withdraw to the lands from which they had come. The king of the Moabites retains his power. The injustice he has perpetrated endures. The name of his child goes unrecorded.

We are not Agamemnon, and we are not the king of Moab. We have not taken up weapons in our own hands, and we have not felt the blood of children on our own fingers.

But we see our children sacrificed every day – because of gun violence, because of the color of their skin, because of their sexual or gender identity, because of the injustice and the inequity that lived in ancient times and that we allow to live today.

What if instead of begging for her life, Agamemnon’s daughter had demanded justice? What if instead of retreating before the ghastly sight of a slaughtered child, the warriors had fought on in his name?

What if we ask ourselves who is gaining power through the sacrifice of our children, and – instead of begging and retreating – demand justice? What if we fight together in the names of all those who have been slaughtered? What if we choose leaders who will protect and honor the smallest and most vulnerable among us?

For thousands of years, child sacrifice has worked. What if we decide it won’t work any more?

Elaine Rose Glickman is a rabbi in Sarasota. Her study of child sacrifice in biblical times and Greek mythology was further explored in “Isaac and Iphigenia,” published by CCAR Press in winter 2021.

This article originally appeared on Sarasota Herald-Tribune: We must stop sacrificing our children so we can stay silent