Mount of Corruption

Biblical Text

The Mount of Corruption appears only once, in the account of King Josiah's reforms in 2 Kings 23. According to 2 Kings 23:13, Josiah defiled the high places (sites of sacrifice built on elevated ground) that were "before Jerusalem, which were on the right hand of the mount of corruption." Solomon had built these high places for Ashtoreth, the goddess of the Zidonians; Chemosh, the god of the Moabites; and Milcom, the god of the children of Ammon.

The original construction of these high places is recorded in 1 Kings 11:7. Under the influence of his foreign wives, Solomon built high places for Chemosh and Molech "in the hill that is before Jerusalem." This verse, however, does not use the name "Mount of Corruption."

Background

The Hebrew phrase is har hammashchit, which can be rendered "mountain of the destroyer" or "mountain of corruption." The King James Version translates it "mount of corruption."

The phrase "on the right hand" is generally understood to mean "to the south," reflecting the Hebrew practice of giving directions while facing east. "Before Jerusalem" is taken to refer to the area east of the city. Many scholars therefore locate the site on the southern part of the Mount of Olives, east of Jerusalem. Its exact location, however, has not been established.

The survival of high places built in Solomon's day for some three hundred years, until the time of Josiah, illustrates the problem of idolatry in Judah that the books of Kings repeatedly emphasize.

Significance in the Bible as a Whole

2 Kings 23 records how Josiah, after the Book of the Law was found in the temple, thoroughly eradicated idolatry throughout Judah. His defilement of the high places on the Mount of Corruption is read as a symbolic act that erased the traces of the apostasy that had persisted since Solomon.

In Jeremiah 51:25 the same Hebrew expression is applied to Babylon. The verse is a figurative declaration that God will judge Babylon, the "destroying mountain" that "destroyest all the earth." Here the expression is not an actual place name.

The name "Mount of Corruption" does not appear in the New Testament. The Mount of Olives itself, however, appears frequently in the New Testament as a place where Jesus taught and prayed.

Interpretations and Issues

• Origin of the name: Many hold that "Mount of Corruption" was not the mountain's original name but a label applied by the author of Kings to denounce a site of idolatry. Some scholars propose a wordplay hypothesis: that "Mount of Anointing" (har hammishchah), a name for the Mount of Olives, was mockingly altered into the similar-sounding "Mount of Corruption." This remains conjecture.
• Traditions of location: Later Christian tradition has called the southern summit of the Mount of Olives the "Mount of Offense" and identified it with this site. This name does not come from the biblical text but was applied later.
• Identity of the deities: 1 Kings 11:7 names the god of Ammon as Molech, while 2 Kings 23:13 names him Milcom. Some regard the two as the same god; others regard them as distinct deities.