Goats and False Worship

Several passages in the Old Testament associate goats with false worship practices. In particular, Driver and Bodenheimer suggest that three passages forbidding boiling a kid in its mother’s milk may refer to ancient Canaanite religious practices (Exod 23:19; 34:26; Deut 14:21; Driver, Canaanite Myths and Legends, 539–40; Bodenheimer, Animal and Man in Bible Lands, 215). However, modern scholarship has increasingly challenged this interpretation. For example, Mealy suggests these passages contain a Hebrew figure of speech (Mealy, “You Shall Not Boil,” 35). Milgrom suggests the command is intended to prevent an inappropriate commingling of life and death (Milgrom, “You Shall Not Boil,” 48–49).

The Old Testament also contains apparent references to goat idols (שָׂעִיר, sa'ir; Lev 17:7; 2 Chr 11:15; Isa 13:21; 34:14). The Targumim depict these goat idols as demonic in nature (Gzella, Cosmic Battle and Political Conflict, 136–37). Many English translations have followed this interpretation, translating the Hebrew term שָׂעִיר (sa'ir) as “goat demons” (ESV, KJV, NASB). However, the exact meaning of this term is debated. M. V. Van Pelt and W. C. Kaiser Jr. contend that שָׂעִיר (sa'ir) refers to a demon that “exhibited the likeness of a goat and was closely associated with idolatry and the high places” (“שָׂעִיר, sa'ir,” NIDOTTE, 3:1260). On the other hand, R. Laird Harris argues that the word refers only to an idol that possessed the physical features of a goat (“שָׂעִיר, sa'ir,” TWOT, 2:881).