Note 382 — Chapter VI · THE ESTABLISHMENT OF THE MONARCHY

It has been assumed that ‘the women that assembled at the door of the tabernacle of the congregation’ (Exod. xxxviii. 8, 1 Sam. ii. 22) were religious prostitutes like the qedashoth in the Phœnician temples (see Deut. xxiii. 17, 18). But the fact that the intercourse of the sons of Eli with them was a sin in the eyes of both Yahveh and the people proves the contrary. Here, as in other cases, an old institution of Semitic religion was retained among the adherents of the Mosaic law, but it was deprived of its pagan and immoral characteristics.