Leviticus 20:3
And I will set my face against that man, and will cut him off from among his people; because he hath given of his seed unto Molech, to defile my sanctuary, and to profane my holy name. And I will set my face against that man, and will cut him off from among his people; because he hath given of his seed unto Molech, to defile my sanctuary, and to profane my holy name.
God will turn his face against any man who gives his child to Molech and cut him off from his people, because the deed defiles his sanctuary and profanes his holy name. Molech worship was a cruel burning of children in the valley of Hinnom where parents were taught to stifle natural affection, belonging to the pagan abominations of the nations cast out before Israel after four hundred years of mercy until their iniquity was full. Child sacrifice is therefore an abomination and never a lawful offering to God, so Jephthah's daughter could not rightly have been offered as a burnt offering to the Lord. The cutting off was a punishment added for that people under the former dispensation and no part of the commandment itself, just as stoning for Sabbath-breaking was no part of the Sabbath law, so the seventh-day Sabbath remains binding now without stoning, as do the other commandments that then carried death. The warning is echoed in the Day of Atonement lesson that everyone without living connection with God will be cut off in the final judgment, and the command to put Molech worshipers to death, likely in Gehenna, proves Gehenna was a place of punishment by burning.
Words and Historical Setting
God sets his face against any man who gives his seed or child to Molech and cuts him off from among his people, because the act defiles his sanctuary and profanes his holy name. That offering of a child to Molech is idolatry carrying the penalty of being cut off from the people.
The sanctuary defiled by this act is the tabernacle, the building Moses erected in the wilderness of Sinai which God claimed as his dwelling-place where his service was performed during Israel's forty years of wandering and journeying. It is named as the sanctuary in this place among other places where that wilderness building is so called. It was erected 1490 years before Christ.
That building contained the ark of the covenant, the mercy-seat, and the glorious Shekinah, and formed the heart and center of Israel's religious worship under the typical system. While Israel was in the period of wandering it was made to be taken down and borne and erected again wherever the divine presence in the cloud by day and pillar of fire by night directed the camp to pitch. The Levites were consecrated to bear it and all its sacred vessels through the forty years in the wilderness.
The law belongs to the laws God gave to Israel in contrast to the customs of the nations he cast out of the Holy Land before Israel. Those nations had given themselves up to pagan abominations, with Satan ruling through the flesh. In mercy God had extended hope to them for four hundred years, sending his servants to sojourn among them to win them to the right way, but they filled up their cup with iniquity. The evils these Canaanite practices brought upon those who lived in Canaan show their effects, and their cruel rites including human sacrifice give justification for Israel's conquests. Blotting them from the earth was a blessing to future generations.
Molech worship was marked by cruelty in which parents were expected to watch their children burn without grief. That religion treated the abandonment of natural affection as virtue. The image of Molech was placed in Gehenna, the valley of Hinnom.
Teaching and Application
Giving a child to Molech defiles the sanctuary and profanes the holy name, so that God sets His face against the offender and cuts him off from His people. Child sacrifice is therefore an abomination and not a lawful offering to God. Jephthah's daughter could not properly have been offered as a burnt offering to the Lord.
Being cut off for giving seed to Molech was no part of the commandment itself but a punishment added afterward for that people in that place under the former dispensation. Stoning for Sabbath-breaking was likewise no part of the great Sabbath law itself. Keeping the seventh-day Sabbath now does not require stoning the transgressor, since the other commandments admitted to be still binding carried the same death penalty then. The book to which the warning belongs presents the exceeding sinfulness of sin through object lessons. Its warning that a person may be cut off from the people is echoed in the Day of Atonement lesson that anyone not in living connection with God is cut off, and that day is a type of the final judgment. God commanded the people of the land to destroy those who gave their children to Molech for defiling His sanctuary and profaning His holy name. That execution was probably carried out in Gehenna, the valley of Hinnom where the image of Molech was placed, which proves Gehenna was a place of punishment by burning.