It has been shown by Professor Robertson Smith that the "unclean" animals of the Old Testament are these totems. "So I went in and saw, and behold every form of creeping things and abominable beasts and all the _idols of the house of Israel_ pourtrayed upon the wall round about." (Ezek. viii. 10.) This accounts for the hare being "abominable" in Israel, and the beetle edible. It was meritorious to eat the totems of one's foes, but the totems of friendly tribes, and one's own totems, were tabooed. The origin of these ideas is much debated. The custom is believed to be closely connected with marriage by capture. Female infanticide was prevalent, as women only attracted ravishers. The story of the sons of Benjamin capturing the daughters of Shiloh is a frequent sort of story in savage annals. (Judges xxi.) The sacrifice has puzzled the modern divine. It is urged that rites are necessary to religion, and that the sacrifice was an apparatus to train Israel to a deep sense of sin, and a necessity for a blood atonement. It is contended that it was merely a form, as only the useless portions of the carcase were given to Yahve. Those who talk like this libel the Jewish patriarchs. With savages the blood and the fat are considered the choicest morsels. To stone a poor Jew because he ate a little fat with his supper would have been infamous, if the whole affair was a harmless comedy. We have shown that the one thought of the Jew was a mighty terror, a Great Taboo. Starvation or rich harvests, victory or slavery, were due direct to Yahve; and the bloody sacrifice was the one and sole instrument by which he might be controlled. As late as Leviticus it was believed that the burnt-offering actually provided food and drink to the Maker of the universe. It is called the "food of God" (Levit. xxi. 8), a phrase softened into "bread of God" in our version, as the "Encyclopædia Britannica" (article "Bible") has shown. It was believed also that God specially loved the smell. (Levit. viii. 21.) More important still, as pointed out by Sir John Lubbock in his "Origin of Civilisation," p. 272, human sacrifices are expressly ordered in Leviticus (xxvii. 28, 29):-- "Notwithstanding, no devoted thing that a man shall devote unto the LORD, of all that he hath, _both of man and beast_, and of the field of his possession, shall be sold or redeemed: every devoted thing is most holy unto the LORD. "None devoted, which shall be devoted of men, shall be redeemed, but shall _surely be put to death_."