ABSTRACT
Most commonly, human sacrifices, and in general all such sacrifices as were not eaten, were burned; and this usage is found not only among the Hebrews and Phoenicians, with whom fire-sacrifices were common, but among the Arabs, who seem to have admitted the fireoffering in no other case. The sacrificial meal is confined to the parts of the flesh in which the sacred life is less intensely present. Or, finally, it is most seemly and most safe to withdraw the holiest things from man's use altogether, to pour out the whole blood at the altar, and to burn the fat. The Levitical sin-offering is only a special development of the old piacular holocaust, and thus the question at once suggests itself whether in its first origin the holocaust was a subtle way of conveying a gift of food to the god. In the more advanced rituals the use of fire corresponds with the conception of the gods.
