Holds the First Commandment significant importance?
In Canaan, the land to which the Israelites were headed, there were deities like Baal (a storm and fertility god), Asherah (a mother goddess), Molech (to whom child sacrifices were made), and many others.
Existing Gods for Other Cultures: The other gods that are mentioned in the Bible, such as Baal, Asherah, and Molech, were indeed actively worshipped by the peoples surrounding the Israelites.
Are Judaism and Christianity henotheistic?
Other deities such as Baal and Asherah are mentioned in the Bible.
In both the Hebrew Bible (Tanakh) and the Old Testament, deities like Baal, Asherah, Molech, and others are mentioned, especially in relation to the neighboring cultures of Israel, such as the Canaanites and Phoenicians.
Thus, the mentions of gods like Baal and Asherah in the Bible highlight the challenges faced by Israel to remain monotheistic amidst surrounding polytheistic cultures.
While other gods like Baal and Asherah are mentioned, they are depicted as false idols, and their worship is condemned.
For instance, in Judaism and Christianity, the gods like Baal, Asherah, and others are mentioned not because they are believed to exist in reality, but rather because people worship them as false idols.
In the Bible, the mention of gods like Baal or Asherah is not a recognition of their reality or validity as gods.
The Bible refers to gods like Baal, Asherah, and Molech because the Israelites were part of a world in which these deities were widely worshiped by neighboring cultures.
By naming gods like Baal and Asherah and describing their worship negatively, the texts of the Bible reinforce their status as false and powerless in contrast to Yahweh, who is portrayed as supreme and the only true God.
Imagine a community surrounded by neighbors who worship Baal, Asherah, and other deities.
Mount Zaphon
This passage reflects a polemic against the kings of Babylon or Assyria, who arrogantly seek to usurp divine status, as only deities were said to dwell upon sacred mountains like Zaphon.
The Bronze Age in Europe
I argue from these facts, not that the worship of Baal came to Ireland and Norway from Assyria or Arabia, but that the same great parent-race which carried the knowledge of Baal to the Mediterranean brought it also to the western coasts of Europe, and with the adoration of Baal they imported also the implements of bronze now found in such abundance in those regions.
The Origin of Our Alphabet
It cannot be the Chinese alphabet, which has more signs than words; it cannot be the cuneiform alphabet of Assyria, with its seven hundred arrow-shaped characters,
American Evidences of Intercourse with Europe Or Atlantis
They forcibly recall to mind the same worship in Assyria."
The Indentity of the Civilizations of the Old World and the New
The pyramids of Egypt, Assyria, and Phœnicia had their duplicates in Mexico and Central America.
The American nations also had this art in common with Egypt, Phœnicia, and Assyria.
Not only infant baptism by water was found both in the old Babylonian religion and among the Mexicans, but an offering of cakes, which is recorded by the prophet Jeremiah as part of the worship of the Babylonian goddess-mother, "the Queen of Heaven," was also found in the ritual of the Aztecs.
Civilization an Inheritance
What king of Assyria, or Greece, or Rome, or even of these modern nations, has ever devoted himself to the study of medicine and the writing of medical books for the benefit of mankind?
When we consider the resemblance of the civilizations of the Mediterranean nations to one another, no man is silly enough to pretend that Rome, Greece, Egypt, Assyria, Phœnicia, each spontaneously and separately invented the arts, sciences, habits, and opinions in which they agreed; but we proceed to trace out the thread of descent or connection from one to another.
Paul Wallis: Was the Human Race Engineered by Extraterrestrials?
Paul Wallis begins by explaining that biblical stories are restatements of ancient narratives from Sumer, Babylonia, Akkadia, and Assyria.
Selestor’s Men of Atlantis
And she—the beautiful, the fond, the happy at the last, bore sons and daughters to her loved lord, and did become ancestress of that great race which called Assyria home.
Osiris, old and doting, sent his ships afar to bring to him a daughter of that land which since that day Assyria claimed; the race which first inhabited had passed ere I had seen the light—a fairer race than mine whose origin none knew—a subtle race who sold as slaves their kindred, drank of blood and tilled no soil.
Assyria, and of the son who might have reigned.
He later waged upon the land called Assyria bitter
The Story of Atlantis
Their rites of sun and fire worship closely resembled those of the early Kelts of Britain and Ireland, and like the latter they claimed to be the "children of the sun." An ark or argha was one of the universal sacred symbols which we find alike in India, Chaldea, Assyria, Egypt, Greece and amongst the Keltic peoples.
Canaanites
Gods: Baal, El, Asherah
2 Kings 18:14 – "And Hezekiah king of Judah sent to the king of Assyria at Lachish, saying, 'I have done wrong; withdraw from me.
2 Kings 23:29 – "In his days Pharaoh Neco king of Egypt went up to the king of Assyria to the river Euphrates.
The Aryan and Japhetic Colonies
Rawlinson informs us that even Aryan roots are mingled with Presemitic in some of the old inscriptions of Assyria.
Chronological Nations and Tribes
Gods: Baal, El, Asherah
Elamites: An ancient civilization located east of Mesopotamia, often at odds with Assyria and Babylon.
The origin of Nimrod
From that land, he went to Assyria, where he built Nineveh, Rehoboth Ir, Calah, and Resen, which is between Nineveh and Calah—which is the great city."
Nimrod as a Historical Figure: The third approach seeks to identify Nimrod with historical figures, including Sargon of Akkad, the first of Assyria, or even Egyptian pharaohs like Nemrutash or Aramaean rulers like Ben-Hadad.
Nimrod's rule over Assyria reflects the long-standing cultural superiority of Babylonia over Assyria, pointing to a period before 2000 BC under the Akkadian or Ur III dynasties, or around 610 to 539 BC during the Neo-Babylonian Chaldean rule.
Assyria also plays a role in the biblical depiction of Nimrod, particularly during the Neo-Assyrian period from the 9th to 7th centuries BC when Assyria dominated Babylonia.
This connection is evident in Micah's identification of the land of Nimrod with Assyria.
Specifically, in 2 Kings 19:37 and Isaiah 37:38, King Sennacherib of Assyria is said to have been assassinated by his sons Adrammelech and Sharezer in the temple of Nisroch, which is likely a scribal error for Nimrod.
Ninas, the legendary founder of Nineveh, the ancient capital of Assyria, remains an enigmatic figure.
The decipherment of a vast quantity of cuneiform texts has allowed modern Assyriologists to piece together a more accurate history of Sumer, Akkad, Babylonia, Assyria, and Chaldea.
Ninas is not attested in any of the extensive king lists compiled by the Mesopotamians themselves, nor mentioned in any Mesopotamian literature, and it is possible that this Hellenic creation was inspired by the deeds of one or more real kings of Assyria or Assyro-Babylonian mythology, just like Nimrod.
In these legends, Ninus and Nimrod were both ancient kings of Mesopotamia, ruling over Assyria and Babylonia and linked to the establishment of Nineveh.
In contrast, Genesis portrays Nimrod as a Babylonian king who holds authority over both Babylon and Assyria.
To sum it up, Ninus and Nimrod represent competing traditions aiming to establish the pedigree of Assyria and Babylon.
While Ninus is a legendary figure asserting the primacy of Assyria with Nineveh as its initial stronghold, the Genesis account aligns entirely with Berossus by attributing Babylon as the first established city.
Similarly, Nimrod is portrayed as a powerful ruler who establishes dominion over Babylon and Assyria.
Yahweh was replaced by a human king
Wallis gives an example of this obscuration, describing a Harvest Festival in the 7th century BCE at Tel Arad, where people honored the Queen of Heaven, Asherah.
This practice, he argues, was part of the Judaism of that time, which involved multiple temples, high priests, and deities, including Asherah.
Wallis points out that the memory of Asherah and other deities was systematically erased by the redactors of the Bible.
They added negative glosses and comments to stories involving Asherah, such as when Solomon built a temple to her, to make her seem less favorable compared to Yahweh.
In this doorway, a being appears, identified as Asherah.
Wallis interprets this as a portal through which Asherah, an advanced being, entered the world.
Wallis recounts how, in the 7th century BCE, there was a concerted effort to eradicate the worship of Asherah and other deities.
Atlantis in the Old Testament
Wealthy Nations: Isaiah prophesies against various powerful and wealthy nations, including Babylon, Assyria, Egypt, and Tyre.
Inanna and Enmerkar
The divine queen of heaven and earth, the lady of all the lands, Inanna, the exalted mistress, made known her grandeur to the world.
Inanna, the exalted mistress, the queen of heaven and earth, instructed Enmerkar on what to do."
Lines 96-100: "Inanna, the queen of heaven and earth, looked upon Uruk with favor.
Jerusalem
In the Hebrew Bible, particularly in the book of Isaiah, Jerusalem is personified as a female figure, embodying many of the nurturing, protective, and ordering aspects that were traditionally associated with goddesses like Asherah.
Analysis:In this passage, Jerusalem is depicted as a mother who nourishes and comforts her children, a role strongly associated with the nurturing and fertility aspects of Asherah.
The nurturing qualities traditionally attributed to Asherah seem to be reinterpreted here through the personification of Jerusalem.
Analysis:Here, Jerusalem is portrayed as a wife, emphasizing her role in a covenant relationship with God, akin to the protective and covenantal aspects associated with Asherah.
The covenantal language and the depiction of God as a husband provide a framework within which the protective and nurturing roles of Asherah might be reinterpreted.
This reflects the ordering function traditionally associated with female deities like Asherah, who were believed to maintain social and cosmic balance.
The unity and stability of Jerusalem as a city that "is bound firmly together" mirrors the order and structure that Asherah, as a goddess, would have upheld.
Analysis:The comfort provided by Jerusalem is likened to that of a mother, again drawing on the maternal, nurturing qualities associated with Asherah.
This maternal comfort offered by Jerusalem can be seen as a reimagining of Asherah’s role in providing protection and solace to her followers, but now attributed to the personified city within a monotheistic context.
The Bible and Atlantis
Verse: "He will stretch out his hand against the north and destroy Assyria, leaving Nineveh utterly desolate and dry as the desert.
The Deluge of the Chaldeans
These three copies were, by order of the King of Assyria, Asshurbanabal, made in the eighth century B.C., from a very ancient specimen in the sacerdotal library of the town of Uruk, founded by the monarchs of the first Chaldean empire.
August 2024 Update
“In that day the Lord will reach out his hand a second time to reclaim the surviving remnant of his people from Assyria, from Lower Egypt, from Upper Egypt, from Cush, from Elam, from Babylonia, from Hamath and from the islands of the Mediterranean.”
The Baal Cycle Goddess Asherah
12 Adityas in Hindu Mythology
Aditi is considered the mother of the gods, and the Adityas are among her most significant offspring.
See also Asherah, mother of the gods
Oannes from Mesopotamian
This collection includes various texts from Assyria and Babylon that describe mythological figures and sages.
Iraq Museum, Baghdad: Located in the heart of Mesopotamia, the Iraq Museum houses numerous artifacts and texts from ancient Sumer, Akkad, Assyria, and Babylon, many of which relate to their mythology and historical traditions.
The Baal Cycle
Asherah (Atirat): El’s wife, known as the queen mother of the gods, associated with the sea.
The Role of Asherah: Asherah, El's consort, assists in securing Baal's palace.
El and Asherah discuss who should replace Baal as king.
Asherah suggests appointing someone who understands the flow of sap, a metaphor for someone wise or capable of bringing fertility.
Asherah proposes Athtar, a crony of Baal, as the new king.
Upon Baal's return, he defeats the sons of Asherah, his rivals, and restores fertility by overcoming Mot's scorching heat, symbolizing the end of the dry season and the return of the rains.
YHWH: A New Order
Beside him was Asherah, the nurturing mother goddess, the source of life and fertility.
With Baal defeated, YHWH turned his gaze to the realms of El and Asherah.
Asherah, the mother goddess, wept for her lost children and the changing times, her influence waning as YHWH's power grew.