goat-devil (Ellicott, ed., An Old Testament commentary, 1882, vol. 1)

Text: "And they shall no more offer their sacrifices unto devils, after whom they have gone a whoring. This shall be a statute for ever unto them throughout their generations." Leviticus 17:7

Quote:

   (7) And they shall no more offer their sacrifices unto devils.—The word (sēirim) here translated "devils," literally denotes hairy or shaggy goats, and then goat-like deities, or demons. The Egyptians, and other nations of antiquity, worshipped goats as gods. Not only wan there a celebrated temple in Thmuis, the capital of the Mendesian Nomos in Lower Egypt, dedicated to the goat-image Pan, whom they called Mendes, and worshipped as the oracle, and as the fertilising principle in nature, but they erected statues of him everywhere. Hence the Pan, Silenus, satyrs, fauns, and the woodland gods among the Greeks and Romans; and hence, too, the goat-like form of the devil, with a tail, horns, and cloven feet, which obtain in medieval Christianity, and which may still be seen in some European cities. The terror which tho devil, appearing in this Pan-like form, created among those who were thought to have seen him, has given rise to our expression panic. This is the form of idolatrous worship which the Jews brought with them from Egypt, and to which reference is continually made. (See Josh. xxiv. 14; Ezek. xx. 7, xxiii. 3, &c.; and especially 2 Chron. xi. 15.) [...]

Ellicott, Charles John, ed., An Old Testament commentary for English readers by various writers, London, Paris & New York: Cassell, Petter, Galpin & Co., 1882, vol. 1, p. 413.

Online Source: archive.org/details/oldtestamentcomm01elli

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