Who or What Was Yahweh’s Asherah?
Startling new inscriptions from two different sites reopen the debate about the meaning of asherah
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Footnotes
In Hebrew, the name consists of the four letters YHWH, yod, he, waw, he, and is known as the Tetragrammaton. In many English translations of the Bible, YHWH is translated LORD. Elohim, by contrast, is translated as the generic name God; YHWH, however, is the name of Israel’s God. No one is sure how these four Hebrew letters were pronounced (in Biblical Hebrew, the vowels are not generally indicated), but by scholarly convention, the name is vocalized as Yahweh.
This has been confirmed by two other epigraphists, J. R. Engle, Pillar Figurines of Iron Age Israel and Ashérah-Ashérim, Diss. 1979 (Ann Arbor, 1981), p. 82, and K. Jaros
See “An Appreciation of Claude Frederic-Armand Schaeffer-Forrer (1898–1982),” BAR 09:05, by James M. Robinson; “The Tablets from Ugarit and Their Importance for Biblical Studies,” BAR 09:05, by Peter C. Craigie; and “The Last Days of Ugarit,” BAR 09:05, by Claude F. A. Schaeffer, translated by Michael D. Coogan.
The Ugaritic t (th) is equivalent to the Hebrew s (sh), and the Ugaritic feminine ending –t is equivalent to the Hebrew –h.
As in ’dnb‘l, “Adonibaal,” ‘zrb‘l, “Azorbaal,”/“Azdrubal,” b‘lhn’ “Baalhano.” F. L. Benz, Personal Names in the Phoenician and Punic Inscriptions (Rome, 1972), pp. 280, 288–290.
See the Ugaritic goddesses “Qudshu” (qds, etyrnologically “sanctuary”) and “Athirat” (atrt, etymologically “[holy] place”) and the Aramaic god “Bethel” (byt-’l, etymologically “house of god,” “temple”).
Endnotes
W. G. Dever, “Iron Age Epigraphic Material from the Area of Khirbet el-Kom,” Hebrew Union College Annual 40/41 (1969–1970), pp. 139–204.
A. Lemaire, “Les inscriptions de Khirbet el-Qom et l’asherah de YHWH,” Revue Biblique 84 (1977), pp. 595–608.
See also Ze’ev Meshel, Kuntillet ‘Ajrud, A Religious Centre from the Time of the Judaean Monarchy on the Border of Sinai, Israel Museum Catalog 175 (Jerusalem, 1978).
Cf. J. Naveh, “Graffiti and Dedications,” Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research 235 (1979), pp. 27–30; J. R. Engle, Pillar Figurines of Iron Age Israel and Ashérah-Ashérim, Diss. 1979 (Ann Arbor, 1981); M. Weinfeld, “A Sacred Site of the Monarchic Period,” Shnaton 4 (1980), pp. 280–284 (Hebrew); D. A. Chase, “A Note on an Inscription from Kuntillet ‘Ajrud,” Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research 246 (1982), pp. 63–67; J. A. Emerton, “New Light on Israelite Religion The Implications of the Inscriptions from Kuntillat ‘Ajrud,” Zeitschrift für die alttestamentliche Wissenschaft 94 (1982), p. 220; P. J. King, “The Contribution of Archaeology to Biblical Studies,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly 45 (1983), pp. 1–16, especially 12–13; A. Lemaire, “Abécédaires et exercices d’écolier en épigraphie nord-ouest sémitique,” Journal Asiatique (1978), p. 221–235; id., Les écoles et la formation de la Bible dans l’ancien Israel (Orbis biblicus et orientalis [a series]) 39 (Fribourg, 1981), pp. 25–32.
A. Lemaire, “Date et origine des inscriptions hébräiques et phéniciennes de Kuntillet ‘Ajrud,” to be published in Studi Epigrafici e Linguistici 1, 1984.
Cf. R. Patai, “The Goddess Asherah,” Journal of Near Eastern Studies 24 (1965), pp. 37–52; id., The Hebrew Goddess (1967), pp. 29–52.
J. B. Pritchard, Palestinian Figurines in Relation to Certain Goddesses Known through Literature (American Oriental Series 24: London, 1943); K. M. Kenyon, Jerusalem (London, 1967), pp. 101–103; T. A. Holland, “A Study of Palestinian Iron Age Baked Clay Figurines … ”, Levant 9 (1977), pp. 121–155.
Pirhiya Beck, “The Drawings from Horvat Teiman (Kuntillet ‘Ajrud),” Tel Aviv 9 (1982), pp. 29–31.
None of the references proposed by J. R. Engle (Pillar Figurines) is certain; more probably, each one is to be explained otherwise; cf., for instance, Z. Zevit, Israel Exploration Journal 27 (1977), p. 115.
Sfiré I B 11, ’s
Pyrgi 1, 1, ’s
E. Lipinski, “The Goddess Atirat in Ancient Arabia, in Babylon and in Ugarit,” Orientalia Lovaniensia Periodica 3 (1972), pp. 101–119.
W. L. Reed, The Nature and Function of the Asherah in Israelite Religion According to Literary and Archaeological Evidence, Diss. 1942 (Ann Arbor, 1982); T. Yamashita, The Goddess Asherah, Diss. 1963 (Ann Arbor, 1982); A. L. Perlman, Asherah and Astarte in the Old Testament and Ugaritic Literatures, Diss. 1978 (Ann Arbor, 1979).