Succoth-benoth or Succoth Benoth ( he, סֻכּוֹת בְּנוֹת, ''Booths of Daughters'') was a
Babylonian deity, one of the
deities brought to the former kingdom of
Samaria
Samaria (; he, שֹׁמְרוֹן, translit=Šōmrōn, ar, السامرة, translit=as-Sāmirah) is the historic and biblical name used for the central region of Palestine, bordered by Judea to the south and Galilee to the north. The first ...
by the men of Babylon. In the ninth year of
Hoshea
Hoshea ( he, הוֹשֵׁעַ, ''Hōšēaʿ'', "salvation"; akk, 𒀀𒌑𒋛𒀪 ''A'úsiʾ'' 'a-ú-si-ʾ'' la, Osee) was the nineteenth and last king of the Israelite Kingdom of Israel and son of Elah (not the Israelite king Elah). Will ...
, "the king of Assyria took Samaria, and carried Israel away into Assyria, and placed them in Halah and in Habor by the river of Gozan, and in the cities of the Medes", resettling large numbers of population. (2 Kings 17:6)
The "men" from each of these five cities ("national groups" - NIV) made its own gods and set them up in the shrines of the land, mixing it with the worship of
Jehovah. "The men of Babylon made Succoth Benoth, the men of Cuthah made
Nergal, the men of Hamath made
Ashima
Ashima (; la, Asima) is an ancient Semitic goddess.
Ancient Middle East
Asima was a West Semitic goddess of fate related to the Akkadian goddess Shimti ("fate"), who was a goddess in her own right but also a title of other goddesses such as ...
, the
Avvites made
Nibhaz and Tartak, and the
Sepharvites ...
Adrammelech Adrammelech ( hbo, , ʾAḏrammeleḵ; grc-koi, Ἀδραμέλεχ ''Adramélekh'') is an ancient Semitic god mentioned briefly by name in the Book of Kings, where he is described as a god of "Sepharvaim". Sepharvaim (a word which is grammatic ...
and
Anamelech." (
2 Kings
The Book of Kings (, '' Sēfer Məlāḵīm'') is a book in the Hebrew Bible, found as two books (1–2 Kings) in the Old Testament of the Christian Bible. It concludes the Deuteronomistic history, a history of Israel also including the book ...
17:30-31) The Bible says that these deities were
idols, although the
Samaritans were not punished because they worshipped the
God of the Israelites as well. Like Ashima, the identity of Succoth-benoth is unknown. Hayim Tawil noted that ''Bànitu'' (
Akkadian: 𒁀𒉌𒌈 Ba.ni.TUM, "the creaturess") was an epithet of
Ishtar
Inanna, also sux, 𒀭𒊩𒌆𒀭𒈾, nin-an-na, label=none is an ancient Mesopotamian goddess of love, war, and fertility. She is also associated with beauty, sex, divine justice, and political power. She was originally worshiped in Su ...
in
Nineveh, and postulated the name "Succoth-benoth" was a Hebrew rendition of a Neo-Babylonian or Neo-Assyrian divine name meaning "the image of Bànitu".
[Hayim Tawil, ''An Akkadian Lexical Companion for Biblical Hebrew'', p. 462.]
According to
b. Sanhedrin
The Sanhedrin (Hebrew and Aramaic: סַנְהֶדְרִין; Greek: , ''synedrion'', 'sitting together,' hence ' assembly' or 'council') was an assembly of either 23 or 71 elders (known as "rabbis" after the destruction of the Second Temple), ...
, Succoth Benoth was a Hen; according to
y. Avoda Zara, a Hen and her Chicks; thus associating this god with the astrological constellation
Pleiades
The Pleiades (), also known as The Seven Sisters, Messier 45 and other names by different cultures, is an asterism and an open star cluster containing middle-aged, hot B-type stars in the north-west of the constellation Taurus. At a distance ...
. According to commentators, either ''sukkot'' is a foreign word for "hen" and the phrase means "hen of chicks" or the entire phrase is a foreign word for "hen".
Marcus Jastrow
Marcus Jastrow (June 5, 1829 – October 13, 1903) was a German-born American Talmudic scholar, most famously known for his authorship of the popular and comprehensive ''Dictionary of the Targumim, Talmud Babli, Talmud Yerushalmi and Midrashic L ...
proposed that the phrase is native to Hebrew and should be read "covering the young".
References
Deities in the Hebrew Bible
{{AncientNearEast-stub
Mesopotamian deities