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The Early History Of God
''The Early History of God: Yahweh and Other Deities in Ancient Israel'' is a book on the history of ancient Israelite religion by Mark S. Smith, Skirball Professor of Bible and Ancient Near Eastern Studies at New York University. The revised 2002 edition contains revisions to the original 1990 edition in light of intervening archaeological finds and studies. The history of the emergence of Judaism and monotheism has been the subject of study since at least the 19th century and Julius Wellhausen's '' Prolegomena to the History of Israel''; in the 20th century a work was William F. Albright's ''Yahweh and the Gods of Canaan'' (1968), which insisted on the essential otherness of Yahweh from the Canaanite gods from the very beginning of Israel's history. Smith and others believe that Israel and its religion emerged gradually from a West Semitic and Canaanite background. Summary Smith says that Israelite culture was largely Canaanite in origin, and that deities such as El, Baa ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Judaism
Judaism ( he, ''Yahăḏūṯ'') is an Abrahamic, monotheistic, and ethnic religion comprising the collective religious, cultural, and legal tradition and civilization of the Jewish people. It has its roots as an organized religion in the Middle East during the Bronze Age. Modern Judaism evolved from Yahwism, the religion of ancient Israel and Judah, by the late 6th century BCE, and is thus considered to be one of the oldest monotheistic religions. Judaism is considered by religious Jews to be the expression of the covenant that God established with the Israelites, their ancestors. It encompasses a wide body of texts, practices, theological positions, and forms of organization. The Torah, as it is commonly understood by Jews, is part of the larger text known as the ''Tanakh''. The ''Tanakh'' is also known to secular scholars of religion as the Hebrew Bible, and to Christians as the " Old Testament". The Torah's supplemental oral tradition is represented by later texts s ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Monolatry
Monolatry ( grc, μόνος, monos, single, and grc, λατρεία, latreia, worship, label=none) is the belief in the existence of many gods, but with the consistent worship of only one deity. The term ''monolatry'' was perhaps first used by Julius Wellhausen. Monolatry is distinguished from monotheism, which asserts the existence of only one god, and henotheism, a religious system in which the believer worships one god without denying that others may worship different gods with equal validity. Atenism The pharaoh Akhenaten, who was initially enthroned as Amenhotep IV, initially introduced Atenism in the fifth year (approximately 1348–1346 BCE) of his reign during the Eighteenth Dynasty of Egypt. He raised Aten, once a relatively obscure solar deity representing the disk of the Sun, to the status of supreme deity in ancient Egyptian religion. The fifth year of his reign marked the beginning of his construction of a new capital, ''Akhetaten'' (Horizon of the Aten), at t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Canaanite Religion
The Canaanite religion was the group of ancient Semitic religions practiced by the Canaanites living in the ancient Levant from at least the early Bronze Age through the first centuries AD. Canaanite religion was polytheistic and, in some cases, monolatristic. Beliefs Deities A group of deities in a four-tier hierarchy headed by El and Asherah were worshiped by the followers of the Canaanite religion; this is a detailed listing: * Aglibol, god of the moon and brother of Malakbel. Part of a trio of gods of Palmyra, Syria along with Bel and Yarhibol. Also part of another trio with Baalshamin and Malakbel. * Anat, virgin goddess of war and strife, sister and putative mate of Ba'al Hadad. * Arsay, goddess of the underworld, one of the three daughters of Ba'al Hadad. * Arsu, god of the evening star and twin brother of Azizos. * Ashtar-Chemosh, wife of Chemosh and goddess of the Moabites. * Asherah, queen consort of El (Ugaritic religion), Elkunirsa (Hittite religion), Yahweh ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
High Place
"High place", or "high places", (Hebrew במה ''bamah'' and plural במות ''bamot'' or ''bamoth'') in a biblical context always means "place(s) of worship". This rendering has etymological justification, as appears from the poetical use of the plural in such expressions as to ride, or stalk, or stand on the "high places" of the earth, the sea, the clouds, and from the corresponding usage in Assyrian; but it has been surmised that a semantic shift occurred because the places of worship were originally upon hilltops, or because the ''bamah'' was an artificial platform or mound, perhaps imitating the natural eminence which was the oldest holy place, but neither view is historically demonstrable. Many towns and villages in ancient Israel had their own places of sacrifice, commonly called ''bamot''. It has been suggested that the plural of the word referred to places of sacred prostitution and of pagan worship. Hebrew Bible From the Hebrew Bible and from existing remains a good ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Asherah Pole
An Asherah pole is a sacred tree or pole that stood near Canaanite religion, Canaanite religious locations to honor the Ugaritic mother goddess Asherah, consort of El (deity), El. The relation of the literary references to an ''asherah'' and archaeological finds of Judaean pillar-figurines has engendered a literature of debate. The asherim were also cult objects related to the worship of Asherah, the consort of either Ba'al or, as inscriptions from Kuntillet Ajrud, Kuntillet ‘Ajrud and Khirbet el-Qom attest, Yahweh, and thus objects of contention among competing cults. In translations of the Hebrew Bible that render the Hebrew ''asherim'' ( ''’ăšērīm'') or ''asheroth'' ( ''’ăšērōṯ'') into English as "Asherah poles", the insertion of "pole" begs the question by setting up unwarranted expectations for such a wooden object: "we are never told exactly what it was", observes John Day. The traditional interpretation of the Biblical text is that the Israelites imported pag ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Child Sacrifice
Child sacrifice is the ritualistic killing of children in order to please or appease a deity, supernatural beings, or sacred social order, tribal, group or national loyalties in order to achieve a desired result. As such, it is a form of human sacrifice. Child sacrifice is thought to be an extreme extension of the idea that the more important the object of sacrifice, the more devout the person giving it up is. The practice of child sacrifice in Europe and the Near East appears to have ended as a part of the religious transformations of late antiquity. Pre-Columbian cultures Archaeologists have found the remains of more than 140 children who were sacrificed in Peru's northern coastal region. Aztec culture Archeologists have found remains of 42 children. It is alleged that these remains were sacrificed to Tlaloc (and a few to Ehécatl, Quetzalcoatl and Huitzilopochtli) in the offerings of the Great Pyramid of Tenochtitlan by the Aztecs of pre-Columbian Mexico. In every ca ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Babylonian Captivity
The Babylonian captivity or Babylonian exile is the period in Jewish history during which a large number of Judeans from the ancient Kingdom of Judah were captives in Babylon, the capital city of the Neo-Babylonian Empire, following their defeat in the Jewish–Babylonian War and the destruction of Solomon's Temple in Jerusalem. The event is described in the Hebrew Bible, and its historicity is supported by archaeological and extra-biblical evidence. After the Battle of Carchemish in 605 BCE, the Babylonian king Nebuchadnezzar II besieged Jerusalem, which resulted in tribute being paid by the Judean king Jehoiakim. In the fourth year of Nebuchadnezzar II's reign, Jehoiakim refused to pay further tribute, which led to another siege of the city in Nebuchadnezzar II's seventh year (598/597 BCE) that culminated in the death of Jehoiakim and the exile to Babylonia of his successor Jeconiah, his court, and many others; Jeconiah's successor Zedekiah and others were exiled when Nebuch ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Storm God
A weather god or goddess, also frequently known as a storm god or goddess, is a deity in mythology associated with weather phenomena such as thunder, snow, lightning, rain, wind, storms, tornadoes, and hurricanes. Should they only be in charge of one feature of a storm, they will be called after that attribute, such as a rain god or a lightning/thunder god. This singular attribute might then be emphasized more than the generic, all-encompassing term "storm god", though with thunder/lightning gods, the two terms seem interchangeable. They feature commonly in polytheistic religions. Storm gods are most often conceived of as wielding thunder and/or lightning (some lightning gods' names actually mean "thunder", but since one cannot have thunder without lightning, they presumably wielded both). The ancients didn't seem to differentiate between the two, which is presumably why both the words "lightning bolt" and "thunderbolt" exist despite being synonyms. Of the examples currently liste ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
History Of Ancient Israel And Judah
The history of ancient Israel and Judah begins in the Southern Levant during the Late Bronze Age and Early Iron Age. "Israel" as a people or tribal confederation (see Israelites) appears for the first time in the Merneptah Stele, an inscription from ancient Egypt that dates to about 1208 BCE. According to modern archaeology, ancient Israelite culture developed as an outgrowth from the Canaanites. Two related Israelite polities known as the Kingdom of Israel and the Kingdom of Judah had emerged in the region by Iron Age II. According to the Hebrew Bible, a " United Monarchy" (consisting of Israel and Judah) existed as early as the 11th century BCE, under the reigns of Saul, David, and Solomon; the country later would have split into two separate kingdoms: Israel (containing the cities of Shechem and Samaria) in the north and Judah (containing Jerusalem and the Jewish Temple) in the south. The historicity of the United Monarchy is debated as there are no archaeological rema ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Teman (Edom)
Teman ( he, תימן), was the name of an Edomite clan and of its eponym, according to the Bible, and an ancient biblical town of Arabia Petraea. The term is also traditionally used in Biblical Hebrew as the synonym of the direction South and was applied to being used as the Hebrew name of Yemen (whose Arabic name is "Yaman") due to its location in the Southern end of the Arabian Peninsula, thus making Yemenite Jews being called "Temanim" in Hebrew. In the Book of Genesis, , the name Teman is referred to a son of Eliphaz, Esau's eldest son. Job's friend Eliphaz was a Temani (). Location According to ''bibleatlas.org'' and author W. Ewing, Teman or te'-man (תימן) means "on the right," i.e. "south" (Thaiman) and it is the name of a district and town in the land of Edom, named after Teman the grandson of Esau, the son of his firstborn, Eliphaz. A duke Teman is named among the chiefs or clans of Edom. He does not however appear first, in the place of the firstborn. Husham of the la ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Midian
Midian (; he, מִדְיָן ''Mīḏyān'' ; ar, مَدْيَن, Madyan; grc-gre, Μαδιάμ, ''Madiam'') is a geographical place mentioned in the Hebrew Bible and Quran. William G. Dever states that biblical Midian was in the "northwest Arabian Peninsula, on the east shore of the Gulf of Aqaba on the Red Sea", an area which he notes was "never extensively settled until the 8th–7th century B.C." According to the Book of Genesis, the Midianites were the descendants of Midian, who was a son of Abraham and his wife Keturah: "Abraham took a wife, and her name was Keturah. And she bare him Zimran, and Jokshan, and Medan, and Midian, and Ishbak, and Shuah" (Genesis 25:1–2, King James Version). Neither Midian's nor the Midianites' existence are attested in antiquity outside of Biblical sources. Land or tribal league? Some scholars have suggested that the name "Midian" does not refer to geographic places or to a specific tribe, but to a confederation or "league" of tribes br ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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