Context Clues – Polytheism Pt. 12

Well here we are: part 12 of the polytheism context clue!

I applaud you for toughing it out with me on this journey through one of the many context clues we could examine so as to better understand the world view and beliefs of the ancient Israelites.

Today, we finally wrap up this little series. I hope it’s been both beneficial and interesting to you. Let us begin with a brief summary of our journey before finishing with a few final thoughts and applications.

We started this series with the observation that we sometimes come across odd passages in the Scriptures. In some cases these are amusing passages – stories or images that just don’t make sense, but sometimes the passages can be disturbing or even theologically problematic, such as the “conquest narrative” outlined in Joshua and surrounding works. We then drew an obvious conclusion that as with most conundrums, a challenging passage can benefit from the exploration of its context.

Many folks make a mistake when they think about context, pigeonholing the entire thing into a small box of a single subcategory. There are many types and forms of context (cultural, historical, geographic, literary, textual, functional, relational, and so on), and each one of these can help us to better understand a given text, situation, or conversation. While there are a myriad of context clues we could study so as to better understand the Scriptures, we can’t address every context clue in just a few short blog posts, so we selected the context clue of polytheism to focus on for this series. Our goal was to develop a clear understanding of Biblical and historical polytheism in order to peel back some of the troublesome layers of ancient Israel’s history and literature.

We began with a brief observation about historical polytheism: when people think of polytheism, they often take the literal definition (“many gods”) and then picture something like the Greek pantheon as a model for all polytheistic worldviews. But some of these worldviews ascribe a hierarchy to their pantheon wherein certain gods are considered to be stronger or weaker, and worthy of more or less veneration than others. Other worldviews consider their deities to be roughly equivalent and worthy of equal veneration. 

But when we approach the Bible, and specifically the Old Testament, we find at least two forms of what I call Biblical polytheism. The first is the polytheism that kept getting the Israelites into trouble – worshipping other gods, serving idols, forgetting the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. I call this “Biblical polytheism” simply because it appears in the Bible. 

It is very plain and obvious that the Israelites were never called or encouraged to worship any god besides God. The same is true for us in the Church. We cannot serve two masters, and we should love the Lord, our God with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength. We are never to divide our worship with anyone or anything apart from God. That much is obvious. So why did the Israelites struggle so much with this obvious, straight-forward command?

We took a brief look at the history and geography of Abraham and his descendants (the Israelites) as they began in Ur, moved to Canaan, moved to Egypt, fled from Egypt into the wilderness, and then moved back to Canaan. They were surrounded on all sides by polytheistic nations and cultures for several millennia before the New Testament came around, and they continued to be surrounded by polytheism even still.

We took a brief look at a few of the more popular/common deities from within a few of the major, influential people groups surrounding Israel throughout their history: the Egyptians, Canaanites, Hivites, Jebusites, Philistines, Moabites, Sepharvites, Amonites, Cuthites, Avvites, Arameans, Hittites, Assyrians, Babylonians, Sumerians, Persians, Greeks and Romans.

From here, we began to acknowledge a few curious commonalities between the different pantheons, such as the fact that almost every culture had one or more gods dedicated to fertility, harvest, and rainfall. Similarly, almost every culture had one or more gods dedicated to war, violence, chaos, and conquest. The list goes on. 

Every one of these cultures and people groups had a prescribed set of rules, rites, and rituals for how to properly worship each god in their pantheon. Care to worship your god of the harvest? Perhaps you should offer some of your harvest as an offering – as a way of saying “thanks!” Care to worship your god of war? Perhaps you should go out and slaughter something or someone, or a whole bunch of someones. Then you can write songs and make declarations about the blood-thirstiness and power of your war god.

From there, we moved on to a powerful observation from the ancient near-eastern scholar, John Walton: “Like everyone else in the ancient world, the Israelites believed that everything that happened and everything that existed found its ultimate cause in deity.”

Good harvest this year? God did it. Drought this year? God did it. We developed a new form of literature, or a new musical instrument? God did it. We slaughtered a bunch of men, women, and children? God did it.

This ancient view is simultaneously puerile and sagacious. It is puerile, or foolish, given the many insights we have learned through our development of the physical sciences. God has ordered creation so as to be self-sustaining, providing rain and sunshine, fertilizer and so on, but it is the responsibility of the farmer to partner in the work of tilling the fields, planting the seeds, cultivating the plants and harvesting the rewards in due time. Without the farmer’s work, there would probably be no harvest. So also, in the case of combat and war, it’s usually the stronger force with the better fighters and the superior equipment who wins. 

The ancient view, however, is incredibly sagacious, or wise and insightful, in the sense that it addresses the nearly infinite realms and unseen forces which, by definition, fall outside of the realm of the physical sciences. If I may be so bold, I think too many of us in the modern age have made an idol out of the physical sciences, and that which is “provable,” or “data-driven.” But that’s a point for another time.

From there, we began to draw some connections, realizing that Israel had been heavily influenced by the cultures and customs of the world around them. These cultures and customs undoubtedly penetrated into the Israelites’ own customs and practices. But to what extent?

We paused at this point to address a common objection (or obsession, as the case may be), which I generally refer to as Reductionism – reducing complex thoughts and ideas for the sake of simplicity, but at the cost of accuracy and truthfulness. The objection often goes something like this: “If a given culture or text presented an idea first, that means every other culture and people group who ever came up with a similar idea must have borrowed it from this original source, right?”

We took a brief, introductory look into the opening pages of Walton’s book, Ancient Near Eastern Thought and the Old Testament: Introducing the Conceptual World of the Hebrew Bible. We looked at a simple list of “filters” we should apply any time we’re engaging in the act of comparative studies (of ancient cultures). The simple truth of it is that some of the Bible, or at least a good deal of the Israelites’ habitual patterns, were probably absorbed or “borrowed” from the cultures, people groups, and texts around them. However, on the flip side of this simple truth, we also acknowledged that the subject matter borrowed in this way was probably not so great a quantity as some people would have us believe. (If you’re curious about this point, I encourage you to go back to part 6, or pick up a copy of Walton’s book and read it through).

Acknowledging that this could be a challenging observation for some people to accept, we offered a working “rule of thumb” by which to discern the authentic words of God from the borrowed ideas of the surrounding pagan nations: if an OT passage looks and sounds like Jesus (as revealed in the NT), there’s a good chance it’s an accurate picture of God, or an accurate transcription of something he instructed the Israelites to do. If an OT passage looks and sounds like the polytheistic beliefs and practices of the pagan nations surrounding Israel, there’s a good chance it’s not God, or not an accurate transcription of something God told the Israelites to do.

Having dealt with this objection, we returned to the final exploration of the first form of Biblical polytheism, and looked at a few case studies which showed the absolute centrality of deity in these ancient cultures. Many people were named so as to ascribe honor to a particular god or gods. We also looked at 15 different instances where the Israelites worshipped Canaanite gods (as listed in 2 Kings).

Adding this list of gods to the many gods listed in parts 3 and 4, we acknowledged the “elephant in the room.” It can be a dizzying and daunting task to consider all of these factors! 

But I’m convinced it’s worth the effort. 

When we take the time to consider and appreciate the “commonplace” world of the ancient Israelites, we can begin to make more sense of the “troublesome” passages we find in the OT. For example, did God ever really command the Israelites to murder and genocide the Canaanites? Probably not. The Israelites were simply following the forms and traditions of the cultures and pantheons surrounding them – attributing their violence as a command from God if they won, and attributing their losses to the anger and wrath, or punishment of God. Again, these are very common beliefs and assumptions within the polytheistic religions of the people historically surrounding Israel. When we add this to the myriad of OT passages explicitly forbidding violence and genocide (and hence, revealing the heart of God to be consistent with the heart of Jesus as seen in the NT), it seems obvious. 

Having resolved these issues, we finally dove into the second form of Biblical polytheism. It is this second form which evaluates and informs our understanding of the unseen realms. It focuses on the role(s) of angels, demons, powers, principalities, rulers of darkness, spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places (Eph. 6:12), and so on.

We took a moment to acknowledge that we are living in the 21st century, and most of us are not Palestinian Israelites. Ergo, we mustn’t make the silly mistake of thinking our modern English translations of the Bible are telling us the whole story (you might be surprised how many people believe this exact thing!). The Bible wasn’t originally written in 21st century English, but rather in ancient Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek. Why does that matter? It matters because our languages use different words to describe different things, and in the case of ancient Hebrew (and to a lesser extent, ancient Greek), they had far fewer words to work with than we do now. It’s not an exact metric, but as a general rule of thumb, ancient Hebrew had about one word to every hundred words of ours in the modern English.

That means that while we might have a dozen, or even a hundred similar words to a describe a thing, oftentimes there would be one or maybe two words in Hebrew, which could mean all of those different things.

When it comes to certain words like “spirit,” “ghost,” “god,” or “angel,” we have to understand that these words meant many different things in Hebrew. For instance, the OT word for “spirit” is most often “ruach.” But ruach also means “wind,” “breath,” “exhalation,” or figuratively “life,” “anger,” or “unsubstantiality.” However, it can also refer to a region of the sky, and it can resemble the spirit of a rational being. More generically, it can refer to air, courage, vanity, cool, or even a tempest. From there, we can move into some of the variants and implied meanings, but I’ll spare us that exercise for now. Each one of our sample words listed above (spirit, ghost, god, angel) are similarly complex and expansive.

Open ancient manuscript titled Ancient Etymology in museum display case

We then made a reference to Bullinger’s brilliant work, Figures of Speech Used in the Bible, and made the simple (but frustrating) observation that a great portion of the Biblical text is not literal, but in fact figurative. 

This observation wasn’t raised so as to overwhelm us, nor to discourage any of us from reading and studying the Word of God. On the contrary, the hope was that this simple understanding would help to foster a greater appreciation for the original text and language of the Bible – to inspire within us a greater depth of understanding, and a greater desire to rebel against over-simplification and reductionistic theology.

We then began applying these principles to various word studies, looking at the words used in Hebrew and Greek for the many English words we use to talk about God, the gods, angels, demons, spirits, ghosts, powers, principalities, unseen forces, and the like. In simple terms, the ancient Israelites (as well as us) were polytheistic in this second sense, which is to say that they (and us) believed in the existence of supernatural forces. Because of their original languages, the words we think of as polytheistic (namely “gods” or “demigods”) didn’t necessarily mean the same thing to the Biblical authors, or to the Israelites in general. So also, many of us refer to entities like “demons” or “devils,” but neither of these words show up in the OT Hebrew. It turns out that these entities we refer to as “demons” or “devils” would most accurately translate into the Hebrew word(s) for “god(s)” or “spirit(s)” or something else. 

In short, while the first form of Biblical polytheism refers to the times when the ancient Israelites worshipped false gods, the second form of Biblical polytheism simply acknowledges the existence of supernatural, non-material beings. (Feel free to conduct your own language survey if you would like to know more about the linguistic differences between modern English and the original languages of the Biblical texts)

We finally spent a couple of weeks observing some examples of the words and names the Israelites used to refer to some of these unseen forces. We also looked at a few case studies revealing curious observations about the nature of the unseen realms. 

Home office with large window, built-in bookshelves filled with books, desktop computer, and armchair.

Several years ago, I posted a blog entitled “Practical Polytheists,” where I gave a few examples of the ways in which we often worship false gods in practice, even if not in name. This is referring to the first form of Biblical polytheism – the form we ought to avoid. Here’s an excerpt:

Many, if not most, people today are what I would describe as practical polytheists.  Oh sure, we’ve gotten away from giving proper names to our modern idols, but they’re effectively the same gods the Israelites flirted with throughout the Old Testament.

Adrammelech was the Sepharvite god of war and love (see 2 Kings 17:31).  Nebo, after whom was named a mountain and several towns (see 1 Chronicles 5:8), was the god of wisdom, literature and the arts.  Ashtoreth, also referred to as Astarte or Ishtar, was the Sidonian goddess of sex and fertility (see 2 Kings 23:13).  And of course Jesus addressed the worship of Mammon in the gospels.  Mammon seems to be an Aramaic rendering of the Roman god, Pluto, or the Greek god Plutus, and represents greed and dishonest gain.

So maybe you don’t worship Adrammelech, but do you crave violence, war or the power to control?  Do you worship key relationships in your life, making them the chief focus of your attention?

Maybe you don’t worship Nebo, but do you worship knowledge, progress or artistic expression?

And maybe you don’t worship Mammon, but do you crave what others have?  Do you worship the idea of financial abundance, thinking that if you can just “get enough” and “have enough” that life will be all good?

As is often the case, when we “peel back a layer” of Scripture or history, we realize that we’re not so very different from those old superstitious simpletons after all. And so it is that the guidance and wisdom God gave to them also applies to us, to neglect our idols in favor of God, who is all-in-all, and who is life abundant. Our fulfillment is not found in obtaining this or that, nor in achieving this or that, but rather in discovering the One who made us, and walking each day, each moment beside Him. 

And so here we find ourselves at the end of this little survey on the Polytheism Context Clue. What words do I offer as we close this series? Two things.

First, mere belief in the existence of God does you no good, just as the mere belief in the existence of other unseen gods/forces/angels/demons/powers/principalities does you no bad. Consider the reminder of James 2:19. “You believe in God? Great! So do the demons, and they at least have the decency to shudder.” (paraphrased) There is, however, a significant difference between believing in God, and worshipping Him wholeheartedly. In the same way, there’s a difference between believing in the powers/principalities/etc and worshipping them. The second form of Biblical polytheism acknowledges existence, but the first form bows down and worships. And that can look like any idol you can think of: comfort, ease, knowledge, status, friends, relationships, accomplishments, doubts, fears, etc.

That brings me to my second, and final, thought, which is an ancient, and beautiful charge from Joshua at the end of his life to the Israelites. The words are exceptionally timely and relevant to each one of us today: “Choose this day whom you will serve.” (Josh. 24:15b) Today is “this day,” and tomorrow, when it arrives, will be “this day.” It is a constant, eternal reminder for us to choose each day, each moment, whom we will serve. I would encourage each of us to adopt Joshua’s pledge: “As for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.” (Josh. 24:15e)

Context Clues – Polytheism Pt. 11

Old library interior with wooden shelves filled with ancient books, scrolls on a desk, an open book, and a quill pen with ink

I finished the previous post with a bold claim.

I suggested that, ‘yes,’ the Israelites were polytheists in a sense. I further went on to explain why I think we’re all equally polytheistic in the same way. Feel free to go back and give part 10 a read so as to refresh yourself on the context and explanation of my claims.

We ended the post by substituting the word ‘god’ with the words/concepts from Paul’s epistle to the churches in Ephesus. “For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers/principalities (ar-khay), against the powers (exsousia), against the rulers of the darkness in this world/age (kosmokrator ho skotos toutou aion/eon), and against the spiritual (pnuematikos) forces/wickedness (poneria) in the high/heavenly places (epouranios).” 

Now of course Paul’s letter was written in Greek, so we have to do a bit of translating (see parts 8 & 9 again) in order to see the corollaries in Hebrew, but this gives us a strong vocabulary to work with in our conversations regarding Biblical polytheism.

Here’s a fun example. Did you know that pre-Islamic Arabian and ancient Middle-Eastern folklore – which heavily involved nomadic tribes like the Midianites (Moses’ in-laws) – teemed with beliefs about invisible spirits and demons? The desert wilderness was considered to be the domain of the Jinn (nature spirits born of smokeless fire) and malevolent entities. These spirits were thought to possess people, cause disease, and inhabit desolate or impure places, forcing desert travelers to employ protective customs. 

This simple insight helps to explain the actions of Zipporah (Moses’ wife, and the daughter of Jethro, the Midianite priest) in Exodus 4:25. She was acting out the “protective custom” for dealing with malevolent Jinn, as explained to her by her priestly father. This also explains one of Israel’s biggest reasons for being reluctant to leave Egypt in the first place. Not only was Moses trying to take them away from the land protected by Ra and Horus to wander into Set’s domain (which also happened to be the domain of the Jinn), but they would have to cross the Red Sea – the domain of the Canaanite god, Yam (or “Rahab,” if you prefer), or the Babylonian equivalent, Tiamat.

Frankly, it’s a bit of a miracle that the Israelites ever left Egypt! Sure their lives sucked. They were slaves, and third-class citizens, but… going into the desert? The wilderness? Having to cross the chaotic sea first to even get there? What insanity! 

I think this is one of the most significant reasons for the ten plagues in Egypt. They weren’t only about convincing the Pharaoh that the Lord is God (although that was certainly a part of it). I think the bigger part was about convincing the Israelites that the Lord is God. If He could overpower the “substantial might of the Egyptian pantheon,” He might just be able to travail over Yam and Tiamat, and then He might just be able to protect them from the demons and Jinn of the wilderness. Who knows? He might even be able to travail against the local gods of the Hittites, Amorites, Jebusites, Hivvites, Sepharvites, Canaanites, and all the others.

This is an interesting observation by itself, but it also provides us with a secondary insight: the ancient Israelites (along with everyone else) believed in the regional/geographical reign of certain deities and spirits. We see this clearly in the examples above. The Jinn, along with other invisible spirits and demons (and Set, if you’re Egyptian) ruled in the wilderness and deserts. Yam and Tiamat reigned in the oceans, and were described as beings of incredible chaos and destruction. If you wanted to avoid these destructive gods, you should avoid the places where they live and reign and cause chaos.

This belief is prevalent across many ancient writings, and we see it in the Scriptures as well. Take Daniel 10, for example. Daniel had seen a vision of “great conflict” (v. 1) which caused him to mourn (and presumably pray, as was his custom – see Daniel 6) for three entire weeks (v. 2). Finally, he was greeted by an angel. As the angel speaks, we see a strange revelation in verses 12 and 13:

Then he [the angel] said to me, “Do not be afraid, Daniel, for from the first day that you set your heart on understanding this and on humbling yourself before your God, your words were heard, and I have come in response to your words. But the prince of the kingdom of Persia was opposing me for twenty-one days; then behold, Michael, one of the chief princes, came to help me, for I had been left there with the kings of Persia.

This is strange to us if we don’t think about it. But if we do think about it, a lot of things begin to fall into place. The angel here in Daniel 10 was being “physically restrained,” or whatever the closest spiritual equivalent is to that. Why wasn’t the angel simply “ported” to Daniel immediately? Why is it described like he had to go on a journey to reach Daniel?

Perhaps because he did.

We know precious little about how the spiritual realm actually works, so who’s to say it doesn’t have a physical component like our material world does? In fact, some of the leading theories regarding eternity (that is the Biblical term for the spiritual realm, by the way – it’s not just another word for “forever”) view it as something like an “overlapping dimension” of our reality. In other words, our physical/material dimensions of reality are shared with the “unseen” dimensions of reality – such as the spiritual realm (or “heaven,” if you prefer). This makes a lot more sense when we consider the Biblical passages on the subject, as well as the classical pagan views of the afterlife, but that’s a tangent for another day.

Alright, all of this “Old Testament hoodoo-ism” might be freaking you out a bit, so let’s take a look at a New Testament example of the same principle. Matthew, Mark, and Luke all record the events of Jesus and His disciples traveling to the shore of the Gerasenes, where they were met with a man possessed by an entire legion of demons! Luke adds a few interesting details in his account. 

“What business do we have with each other, Jesus, Son of the Most High God? I beg You, do not torment me…” They [Legion] were imploring Him not to command them to go away into the abyss… the demons implored Him to permit them to enter the [nearby] swine. And He gave them permission. (selections from Luke 8:26-33)

Did you catch it? The demons didn’t want to be sent “away.” They would rather drown with the pigs in their home country than be sent away to the abyss. What a strange insight. So where does that leave us?

In a world of pantheons and regional gods, we begin to see a different picture emerging about how the spiritual realm actually works. According to the widespread traditions of the ancient people, and the reinforced examples we find in the Scriptures themselves, the ancient model(s) of Biblical polytheism look quite different than we might have supposed. Not only that, but our increased understanding of the ancient Israelites’ world view has made a significant impact on the way we, ourselves view God, and the gods.

I hope you’ll join us next week as we bring this series to a close with a brief summary and a few take-home applications.

Context Clues – Polytheism Pt 10

Okay, so were the ancient Israelites polytheists or not?

What a wonderfully direct and pointed question. The answer, as you might have suspected, is much less direct and pointed: it depends. What do we mean when we use the word ‘polytheist?’ 

If you’ve been following along in the series, you’ll know that I’ve been focusing on two forms of Biblical polytheism, and if you haven’t been following the series, I’d suggest going back and reading the earlier parts – they really do build upon each other.

So why would I say that it depends what we mean by the word ‘polytheist?’ It’s a rather straightforward question, right? The answer should be a straightforward ‘yes’ or ‘no,’ so what’s the complication?

One of the complications is that there are multiple types of logic in the world, many of which are regularly employed by ourselves and others. Some have posited just two forms of logic, but there are more, and logic itself is one of the contributing factors to our world view lens (the way in which an individual views the world and everything in it).

I don’t want to go too deep on this tangent, but a brief illustration might be helpful to our present conversation, so I’ll emphasize two of the most well-known types of logic. In layman’s terms, the first view is the one we talk about the most in our modern Western culture, and that is the “either/or” school of logic. In more academic terms, this references the four fundamental laws of logic built on the foundational principle of non-contradiction. Either a statement is true, or it is false.

The second type of logic I want to mention is the “both/and” school of logic. In layman’s terms, this refers to the occasions when a statement is both true and false. This type of logic is sometimes assumed to be an Eastern concept, but that’s not accurate. Both forms of logic (the either/or and the both/and) are regularly employed across all people groups, times, and cultures. That’s as far as I’ll tread down this particular rabbit hole for now. If you’re interested in learning more about the different types of logic, look it up – do a research project. Nobody’s stopping you.

Okay, so back to our first question: were the ancient Israelites polytheists or not? I dare say the correct answer is both ‘yes’ and ‘no.’ (Do you like how I’ve employed the second form of logic here?) Our immediate follow up question, then, is: “what do you mean?”

Let’s start with the Shema in Deuteronomy 6:4,5. 

Hear, O Israel! The Lord is our God, the Lord is one! You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might.

When Israel was at their best, I believe they were mostly (or completely) worshipping the Lord alone, above all other gods. So in that sense, ‘no,’ the Israelites weren’t polytheists – they weren’t sharing their worship with other gods; they weren’t viewing other gods as equals to Yehovah. (And as we’ve mentioned before, there were quite a few times when they ran off after other gods, as well).

However, the way the ancient Israelites viewed things like gods, spirits, angels, demons, powers, principalities, and other spiritual forces was much more similar to the way everyone else in the ancient world thought about these things. Namely, the existence of numerous gods (spirits, powers, principalities, etc.) was never in question. Everyone believed in a rich and expansive spiritual realm – a place where the gods (etc.) lived and reigned in force. At certain times and occasions and places, one or more of the “gods” would act upon the physical world in a way that was (usually) consistent with their nature. And if you want a brief refresher on the “nature” of some of the gods in the pantheons surrounding ancient Israel, go back and look at parts 3 & 4 in this series.

Old library interior with wooden shelves filled with ancient books, scrolls on a desk, an open book, and a quill pen with ink

To quote John Walton once more: “Like everyone else in the ancient world, the Israelites believed that everything that happened and everything that existed found its ultimate cause in deity.”

So in that sense, ‘yes,’ the Israelites were polytheists. And if I can be so bold as to offer a controversial statement, I think that we are all polytheists in the same way.

Before you start hurling stones at me, let’s swap out the word ‘god’ with something else. I know the word ‘god’ can be a bit of a trigger word for modern Christians. As you’ll remember from parts 8 & 9 in this series (go back and check them out if you like), the Hebrew words for ‘god’ and ‘spirit’ mean a whole lot of different things because their language had so many fewer words than modern English does, and they had to accomplish much more with each word.

For our sakes, let’s substitute the word ‘god’ with the words/concepts from Paul’s epistle to the churches in Ephesus. “For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers/principalities (ar-khay), against the powers (exsousia), against the rulers of the darkness in this world/age (kosmokrator ho skotos toutou aion/eon), and against the spiritual (pnuematikos) forces/wickedness (poneria) in the high/heavenly places (epouranios).” 

Now of course Paul’s letter was written in Greek, so we have to do a bit of translating (see parts 8 & 9 again) in order to see the corollaries in Hebrew, but this gives us a strong vocabulary to work with in our conversation regarding Biblical polytheism.

For the sake of time, I’ll wrap up this week’s post here. Next week, we’ll take a look at a few practical examples of how this second form of Biblical polytheism functions in action. I hope to see you then!

Context Clues – Polytheism Pt 9

Do you believe in ghosts?

What about angels? Demons? Spirits? Gods?

Last week, we took a moment to remember that the Bible was first written in a time that is not our own, in a place that is not our own, to a people and culture who are not our own. That means that any of us who read the Bible in English, or any other language apart from the original Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek, are in great danger of misunderstanding the depth of meaning used in the original Biblical texts. This misunderstanding, if left unchecked, can result in a myriad of dreadful misinterpretations of Scripture, and a whole category of poor theology I refer to as Reductionism (reducing complex thoughts and ideas for the sake of simplicity, but at the cost of accuracy and truthfulness).

The reason we study context in all its various forms is that it helps us to peel back the many dreadful layers of misunderstanding which naturally occur whenever we read the Bible through a translation.

Which translation is the best? NASB? KJV? ESV? NIV? NLT? Living Letters? Amplified? Message? Passion? Are you ready for this? They’re all good, but they’re also all bad.

Why? Because they are translations, and not the original text. As you’ll remember from the previous post in this series, modern English (by some estimations) has nearly 100-times as many words as the ancient Hebrew language. And while this rule of thumb is not exact, it can be a helpful illustration to consider that each word of the OT means approximately 100 different things in the modern English language. That makes it quite the impossible task for Bible translators to know for certain how best to translate the various passages of Scripture. Some default to a more literal translation, which has its merits and faults, and others prefer a more figurative translation, which has its merits and faults. Still others prefer to blend the literal and figurative translations, which has its merits and its faults.

So we have to ask ourselves, is this a lost cause – trying to translate the Bible into other languages? Not necessarily. Through a comprehensive study of the various forms of context (literary, geographic, chronological, cultural, textual, relational, functional) we can begin to translate the words with greater confidence. It is worth mentioning, however, that every time we approach the Scriptures, whether for the purposes of translation, or devotional reading, or even study, we must approach the Scriptures with a humble and contrite spirit. The fact of the matter is that we will probably never fully know every nook and cranny of the Scriptures and their complete meanings, so humility is the only reasonable approach. From the freshly born-again Christian to the wisened Bible scholar, we’re all equally wise to approach our infinite God in light of the knowledge that we are finite. That means we will never fully understand His infinity. For my part, I find this to be remarkably encouraging. It lifts the weight of the universe off of my shoulders. Hopefully you feel the same way.

Okay, let’s get back to the opening questions, but we’ll frame them a little differently. Did the ancient Israelites believe in ghosts? What about angels? Demons? Spirits? Gods?

If you answered ‘yes’ to all of the above, I would like to reward you with a gold star. Sadly, there’s no room left in the budget, so I’m afraid you’ll have to provide your own gold star.

“But how can this be?” you might ask. “Didn’t the Israelites believe that there is only one God?”

Well, yes and no.

Yes in the sense you’re probably thinking. The Israelites did believe that Yehovah (Yahweh) was and is the One true God of Creation. A quick look at Deut. 6:5 makes this apparent. But of course, they struggled with fidelity to the One true God, and often ran off to worship idols and pagan gods.

However, “no” in the sense that “god” didn’t mean the same thing to the ancient Israelites as it does to us. 

Open ancient manuscript titled Ancient Etymology in museum display case

The word most commonly translated as “god” in the OT is the Hebrew word “Elohim,” which is the plural form of “Eloah,” or if you prefer the Arabic variant, “Allah.” It is often used in the short form, “El,” which is a word signifying strength, as in “El-Shaddai” (God-Almighty). The etymology is uncertain, but it is generally agreed that the primary idea is one of strength, or power of effect. The plural form of Elohim doesn’t refer to the trinity of persons within the Godhead, but rather to the fullness of divine strength, or the sum of the powers displayed by God.

However, the word “Elohim” was also used as a term of reverence for a local magistrate. Other times, it was used as a superlative, referring to angels, gods, goddesses, and even great and mighty people. 

You may be further interested to learn that there is no Hebrew word for demons or devils in the OT, although there is considerable mention of them in the NT (which was primarily written in Greek). The adversarial forces of darkness in the OT were normally referred to by their occupational titles, such as the destroyer (“Shawkath”), or the adversary (“Satan”). In most of the other occurrences, demons and devils are simply referred to as spirits (“Ruach”), or perhaps “unclean spirits” as in Zech. 13:2 (“Toomaw Ruach”).

You may remember from last week that ruach also means “wind,” “breath,” “exhalation,” or figuratively “life,” “anger,” or “unsubstantiality.” However, it can also refer to a region of the sky, and it can resemble the spirit of a rational being. More generically, it can refer to air, courage, vanity, cool, or even a tempest. And the list goes on from there.

When we consider this list, we can appreciate a few of the possible applications of the word “ruach.” In some cases, this may be referring to a spirit of anger, or a spirit of the air. Other times, it refers to a spirit of courage or vanity.

With so many possible applications for Biblical words like “god” and “spirit,” we’re beginning to appreciate how each of the related concepts (angels, demons, powers, principalities, etc.) holds a myriad of similar possible applications. 

Next week, we’ll look at a few more of these applications and apply some of the names the Israelites likely ascribed to these various spirits, gods, and unseen forces in an attempt to better “understand” and relate to the world they lived in.

Context Clues – Polytheism Pt 8

Do you believe in ghosts?

What an interesting question. It’s one we can answer in a number of different ways, and whatever answer we provide will offer an insight into the way we think and view the world.

How would I answer the question? I would respond as I often do, by saying: “It depends.” What do we mean by the word “ghost?” For some people, a ghost is defined as the wandering soul of a deceased person. For others, a ghost is simply a spirit, or a spiritual entity. Depending how deeply you wish to delve into this or that folklore, this or that mythology, you’ll come across a wide variety of ideas on the subject – many of which contradict each other. 

Are ghosts good? Evil? Friendly? Antagonistic? Tricksters? Misunderstood? Happy? Sad? Many different ideas exist about them, and these ideas often come from a particular religion or world view.

We’re in a series on the polytheism context clue. We’ve taken some time to look at a few of the major pantheons worshipped by the various people groups surrounding ancient Israel. That first form of “Biblical polytheism” simply means that it appears in the Bible. Feel free to go back and review some of the earlier posts in this series if you’d like to know more about that.

A reasonable question then is whether there are any additional forms of Biblical polytheism, and if so, what do they look like? In my opinion, there is indeed a second form of Biblical polytheism, and it is this second form which evaluates and informs our understanding of the unseen realms. It focuses on the role(s) of angels, demons, powers, principalities, rulers of darkness, spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places (Eph. 6:12), and so on.

One of the great blunders in modern theology comes about when we forget that the Bible wasn’t originally written in 21st century English, but rather in ancient Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek. Why does that matter? It matters because our languages use different words to describe different things, and in the case of ancient Hebrew (and to a lesser extent, ancient Greek), they had far fewer words to work with than we do now. For example, ancient Hebrew had somewhere around 6,500 words (estimates vary). Ancient Greek had quite a few more, ranging around 100,000 – 200,000 words depending on your sources and estimates. Modern English, by comparison is estimated to have between 250,000 and 1,000,000 words, although only about 170,000 are in common use according to the Oxford English Dictionary.

The reason I mention this is to draw attention to the fact that the ancient Hebrew (the primary language of the OT) had far fewer words to work with than modern English. That means that while we might have a dozen, or even a hundred similar words to a describe a thing, oftentimes there would be one or maybe two words in Hebrew, which could mean all of those different things.

Ghost holding a cat stuck on a tree branch in a park

When it comes to certain words like “spirit,” “ghost,” “god,” or “angel,” we have to understand that these words meant many different things in Hebrew. For instance, the OT word for “spirit” is most often “ruach.” But ruach also means “wind,” “breath,” “exhalation,” or figuratively “life,” “anger,” or “unsubstantiality.” However, it can also refer to a region of the sky, and it can resemble the spirit of a rational being. More generically, it can refer to air, courage, vanity, cool, or even a tempest. From there, we can move into some of the variants and implied meanings, but I’ll spare us that exercise for now. Each one of our sample words listed above (spirit, ghost, god, angel) are similarly complex and expansive.

Okay, so what’s the point in emphasizing the differences between our languages? What an excellent question – I’m so glad you asked!

Most of us read a translation of the Bible rather than reading the original Hebrew and Greek. Like a cargo ship stopping off at various ports to load and unload cargo, every language acquires and offloads a multitude of nuances, meanings, implications, and context clues over time. This can be a frustrating revelation for those of us who prefer the use of literal definitions of words as our baseline for Biblical study. Much of the literature contained within the Bible is simply not literal, and even the passages which are more literal tend to carry a myriad of social, cultural, and historical nuances.

I’ll use a lighthearted modern example to illustrate. In English, the word “sick” literally refers to an affliction or ailment disrupting the normative, good health of an individual. However, it’s not quite as simple as it sounds, right? We can be literally referring to a physical sickness, or a mental sickness, or, depending on your belief system, even a spiritual sickness. In addition to all of this, “sick” started to be used as a non-literal slang term a few decades back, and rather than the term meaning something bad (as sickness is generally considered to be), it began to be used as a colloquial term meaning something good. Over the past thirty years or so, I’ve watched this slang term grow and morph to adopt many additional meanings and nuances. 

Here’s the point: other languages do the same thing. (I know, shocking!). In fact, E. W. Bullinger took it upon himself about a century ago to compile a modest summary of the Figures of Speech used in the Bible, identifying over 400 unique figures of speech used both in modern English and in ancient languages. He then included a sample list of different verses throughout the Bible which employ the various figures of speech. (If you’re interested in learning more about this topic, check out Figures of Speech Used in the Bible, by E. W. Bullinger). Again, this can be disheartening for those of us who prefer a chiefly literal approach to Scripture, as we must acknowledge that a great portion of the Biblical text is not literal, but in fact figurative.

Now I don’t bring this up to overwhelm us, nor to discourage any of us from reading and studying the Word of God. On the contrary, my hope is that this simple understanding will help to foster a greater appreciation for the original text and language of the Bible – to inspire within us a greater depth of understanding, and a greater desire to rebel against over-simplification or reductionistic theology.

So let’s tie this back into our original question: Do you believe in ghosts? Well, it depends. What do we mean by the word “ghost?” What did the ancient Israelites believe about ghosts? What did the Egyptians believe? Or the Babylonians? Or the Canaanites? What did Jesus’ own disciples believe about ghosts? And just as interesting, where did these ideas come from?

I hope you’ll join us next time as we continue to peel back some of the layers surrounding these questions, as we further unpack the second form of Biblical polytheism.

Context Clues – Polytheism Pt 7

Welcome to part 7 of our exploration into the polytheism context clue. Part 6 was a little scholarly and dense, so let’s take a brief step back as we complete our precursory examination of the first form of Biblical polytheism. We will then move on to the second form in next week’s post.

As a reminder/refresher from part 2 of this series, there are at least two forms of Biblical polytheism. The first is the polytheism that kept getting the Israelites into trouble – worshipping other gods, serving idols, forgetting the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. I call this “Biblical polytheism” simply because it appears in the Bible.

The second form of Biblical polytheism evaluates and informs our understanding of the unseen realms, and specifically the role of angels, demons, powers, principalities, rulers of darkness, spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places (Eph. 6:12), and so on. But again, we’ll address this second form next week.

So today, let’s conclude our assessment of the first form by illustrating John Walton’s observation once more. After that, we’ll conclude with a small list of some of the pagan gods the Israelites worshipped as idols (as recorded in the Bible).

John Walton observed that “Like everyone else in the ancient world, the Israelites believed that everything that happened and everything that existed found its ultimate cause in deity.”

Because of this, religion was a central component of every major empire, kingdom, nation and tribe. One of the ways we see this reinforced in scripture is in the naming conventions employed by each people group. Very often, and especially when influential kings and leaders were involved, people were named with a particular designation to honor their god (or one of their gods). For example, consider the Babylonian kings Nabopolassar and Nebuchadnezzar whose names both start with “Nebo,” as in the god of writing, literacy, and wisdom. There’s also Belshazzar (in Daniel 5) whose name begins with “Bel,” the head of the Babylonian pantheon.

Consider Ashurbanipal, the last “great” king of the Assyrians. What does his name start with? “Ashur,” the supreme god of the Assyrians. Or look at Sennacherib, whose name starts with “Sin,” the Assyrian moon god.

Thutmose, the Egyptian Pharaoh was named for Thoth, the Egyptian god of wisdom and literature, and Amenhotep was named for Amun (sorry, I didn’t include this one in our lists).

Cozy bookstore with bookshelves, reading chairs, and people browsing and reading books

Now if you’ve been around the church for a while, or if you’ve ever read the OT, you’re probably not surprised that the Israelites did the very same thing. Their names almost always held significant meaning, and many times they were directly related to God. Take my namesake, for example: Joel (Jo-el). “Jo” is the English equivalent of “Yo” in Hebrew, and is a shortened version of “Yehovah,” most commonly referred to as “the Lord” in the scriptures. The Israelites wouldn’t use God’s proper name (usually) out of reverence (“Yohd-vev-ha-vev” – or “Yahweh”) so they would either use “Yehovah” to refer to the Lord, or the more generic term “Elohim” to refer to “God” (or a godlike entity). The shortened form of “Elohim” is “El,” like the Canaanite god. So when we fuse these two things together, my name means “The Lord is God.”

Here’s a fun exercise to further illustrate this point. In the book of Daniel, we see four young Israelites taken into captivity, who were then brought to Babylon and instructed/indoctrinated in the ways, language and cultural customs of the Babylonians. During this process, the commander of the officials assigned new names to each of them. 

Daniel, whose name means “Judge of God,” was given the Babylonian name Belteshazzar, which means “Bel’s prince.” Hananiah (“God is gracious”) received the name Shadrach (“Under the command of Aku” – another Babylonian god). Mishael (“Who is like God?”) received Meshach (“Who is like Aku?”). And Azariah (“God is my helper”) received Abednego (“Servant of Nebo”).

Hopefully these few examples help us to better appreciate the centrality of deity and religion within these ancient cultures. Coincidentally, we do the same thing today, although we give our gods different names, and are less obvious about including them in our naming conventions. But I digress.

Let’s finish our exploration of the first form of Biblical polytheism with a few scriptural references you can look up (if you’re so inclined). I’ll only include a short list of the pagan gods worshipped by Israel in 2 Kings (for simplicity’s sake). You can find many more references throughout the OT:

  1. Baal-zebub (2 Kings 1:2)
  2. Baal (2 Kings 3:2)
  3. Rimmon (2 Kings 5:18)
  4. Asherah (2 Kings 13:6)
  5. Ashima (2 Kings 17:30)
  6. Nergal (2 Kings 17:30)
  7. Succoth-Benoth (2 Kings 17:30)
  8. Adrammelech (2 Kings 17:31)
  9. Anammelech (2 Kings 17:31)
  10. Nibhaz (2 Kings 17:31)
  11. Tartak (2 Kings 17:31)
  12. Nisroch (2 Kings 19:37)
  13. Molech (2 Kings 23:10)
  14. Ashtoreth (2 Kings 23:13)
  15. Chemosh (2 Kings 23:13)
Ancient Egyptian scribe kneeling with large to-do list in temple office

Phew. Lot’s of lists, and lots of gods! 

I know it can be a dizzying and daunting task to consider all of these factors, but I’m convinced it’s worth the effort. When we take the time to consider and appreciate the “commonplace” world of the ancient Israelites, we can begin to make more sense of the “troublesome” passages we find in the OT. For example, did God ever really command the Israelites to murder and genocide the Canaanites? Probably not. The Israelites were simply following the forms and traditions of the cultures and pantheons surrounding them – attributing their violence as a command from God if they won, and attributing their losses to the anger and wrath, or punishment of God. Again, these are very common beliefs and assumptions within the polytheistic religions of the people historically surrounding Israel. When we add this to the myriad of OT passages explicitly forbidding violence and genocide (and hence, revealing the heart of God to be consistent with the heart of Jesus as seen in the NT), it seems obvious. I recognize this is an over-simplified response to the question, and some people might disagree.

That’s fine. It’s just an example and a practical way for us to apply some of the contextual insights we’ve been exploring around the subject of Biblical polytheism. 

And with that, I think we can finally “close the page” on the first form of Biblical polytheism. Now, let’s take a look at the second form!

Context Clues – Polytheism Pt 6

Yes, you found me out. This was originally an idea for an essay, which I’ve taken and broken down into smaller, blog-sized morsels. Hopefully you’ve been enjoying this series? Feel free to leave a comment, like and/or subscribe. You’ll find links to all of these things at the bottom of each post, along with an option to donate, and a few links to recent posts. 

Here is part 6 of our exploration into the polytheism context clue. If you’re joining us for the first time, I’d suggest going back and reading the earlier parts of this series in order to better understand today’s post.

We’ve compiled some short lists of the culturally significant pantheons of the nations, tribes, ethnic groups and kingdoms surrounding the ancient Israelites, and we’ve briefly identified a few commonalities between these different religions so as to appreciate the theological landscape surrounding the ancient Israelites a little bit better.

I made a reference to John Walton in the previous post, citing his observation that “Like everyone else in the ancient world, the Israelites believed that everything that happened and everything that existed found its ultimate cause in deity.”

But where did this belief come from? 

There are several ways we could answer this question, but I think at least a part (maybe a large part) of the answer comes down the cultural beliefs and values of the world around them. In other words, Israel was heavily influenced by the religions and theology of the empires, kingdoms, nations and tribes surrounding them, and this influence undoubtedly penetrated into their own customs and practices. But to what extent?

To address this question, I’m going to reference John Walton once more. Mr. Walton is a Ph.D. and Old Testament scholar, who has written and contributed to several scholarly resources, such as the IVP Bible Background Commentary: Old Testament, and of particular interest to today’s discussion, Ancient Near Eastern Thought and the Old Testament: Introducing the Conceptual World of the Hebrew Bible. This is an excellent book in my opinion, and one I would heartily recommend with one disclaimer: Mr. Walton writes at a scholarly level, and this book is essentially formatted like a doctoral dissertation. With that being said, it is also packed with fantastic information regarding the literature, religions and people of the ancient near east.

In the opening chapter of the book, Walton introduces the concept of “comparative studies,” which I will over-simplify as “the process of comparing similar or contemporary cultures in order to learn more about one or both cultures.” At the end of the chapter, he outlines an excellent list of ten principles of comparative study, which I will list below. Bear these principles in mind any time you compare two groups/cultures, such as the Israelites and the Canaanites, or any of the other groups whose pantheons we’ve been exploring in this series.

  1. Both similarities and differences must be considered.
  2. Similarities may suggest a common cultural heritage or cognitive environment rather than borrowing.
  3. It is not uncommon to find similarities at the surface but differences at the conceptual level, and vice-versa.
  4. All elements must be understood in their own context as accurately as possible before cross-cultural comparisons are made (i.e., careful background study must precede comparative study).
  5. Proximity in time, geography, and spheres of cultural contact all increase the possibility of interaction leading to influence.
  6. A case for literary borrowing requires identification of likely channels of transmission.
  7. The significance of differences between two pieces of literature is minimized if the works are not the same genre.
  8. Similar functions may be performed by different genres in different cultures.
  9. When literary or cultural elements are borrowed they may in turn be transformed into something quite different by those who borrowed them.
  10. A single culture will rarely be monolithic, either in contemporary cross-section or in consideration of a passage of time.

I suspect this book was written in part to answer the over-enthusiastic reductionists who claim that primacy in chronology equates to primacy in authority (in the case of religious texts), and that all subsequent texts are merely variations on the primary (first) source. If you or someone you know ascribes to such a view, I recommend reading Walton’s book in its entirety.

Cup of coffee with latte art, croissant, and pastry on a wooden table with a small potted plant

For the purposes of our theme in this series, however, I think these ten principles create an excellent filter by which to effectively answer our earlier question: how heavily/directly were the Israelites influenced by the surrounding people and cultures of the day? To borrow terminology from Walton, how much was borrowed, and how much was coincidental based on a common cultural heritage or cognitive environment? 

As we filter our question through the ten principles (especially number 4), hopefully you’ll begin to appreciate the enormity of our task. In an earlier post I mentioned that questions like these deserve hundreds, if not thousands, of hours of research in order to answer them effectively. With that in mind, I hope you’ll accept a simple answer to our question: “I’m not sure.” 

Even without access to the Bible, it would be a reasonable conclusion to make that the Israelites were not monolithic. In other words, they were influenced by the surrounding cultures. And as it just so happens, we do have the Bible, and we do see plenty of examples of the Israelites borrowing cultural practices and superstitions from the surrounding nations. However, Walton also offers the following assurance: “Just as it would be foolish to think that all Europeans share the same culture, it would be a mistake to suppose that Babylonians, Hittites, Egyptians, Israelites, and Sumerians all shared the same culture.”

In other words, every people group has their own unique culture comprised of several (or many) unique factors. 

This tension between the assimilated ideologies and practices of the polytheistic nations surrounding Israel and the one true God who was trying to build a genuine relationship with His chosen people helps to explain a lot of the confusing and seemingly contradictory passages in the Old Testament. 

So where does that leave us? Are there any actionable insights we can offer at this time? Of course! As a general rule, if an OT passage looks and sounds like Jesus (revealed in the NT), there’s a good chance that it’s an accurate picture of God, or an accurate transcription of something he instructed the Israelites to do. If an OT passage looks and sounds like the polytheistic beliefs and practices of the pagan nations surrounding Israel, there’s a good chance it’s not God, or not an accurate transcription of something God told the Israelites to do.

Alright, now that we’ve cleared that all up, let’s take a final assessment of the first form of Biblical polytheism, and then move on to the second.

Context Clues – Polytheism Pt 5

Yes, that right. This is part 5 of the polytheism context clue. If you’re joining us for the first time, you may be terribly confused. I suggest going back to read parts 1, 2, 3 & 4 first. It will make a lot more sense of today’s discussion.

In the previous posts, we’ve compiled a few short lists of the culturally significant pantheons of the nations, tribes, ethnic groups and kingdoms surrounding the Israelites, both during their centuries in Egypt and Canaan, but also during their centuries of captivity under the Assyrians, Babylonians, Persians, Greeks, and Romans. Using these lists, we can begin explore some of the commonalities between these different religions and appreciate the theological landscape of the ancient Israelites a little better.

Sadly, I’ll only be able to make a single observation before having to go on an adjacent tangent. You’ll see what I mean in a moment.

First observation: each pantheon consists of gods who are believed to rule over specific things, and one of the proper ways to worship each of these gods was to acknowledge their blessing (when things went well) or the withholding of their blessing (when things went poorly). Worshippers would pray to the gods for blessings, believing their own successes and failures to then be the result of the petitioners’ quality and ability to please the god in question.

For example, say I’m a farmer and my livelihood depends on a good harvest this year. I might pray to Isis or Bastet if I’m Egyptian; Asherah, Baal, Astarte, or Dagon if I’m Canaanite; Tartak if I’m Avvite; Tarhun, Telepinu, or Shaushka if I’m Hittite; Ishtar, Adad, or Ninurta if I’m Assyrian; Ishtar or Adad if I’m Babylonian; Anahita or Tishtrya if I’m Persian; or Demeter or Ceres if I’m Greek or Roman.

If it’s a bumper-crop at this year’s harvest, I thank the appropriate god (see above) and show my thanks by offering back to them a certain percentage of my harvest. If I harvested grain, I would offer some grain. If I harvested oil, I would offer some oil. And so on.

Now let’s consider a different scenario. Let’s say I’m a king (or equivalent leader of my people), and I’m going into battle with another army (or family/whatever). I might want to petition for the favor of my war god, be it Anat, Adrammelech, Arinna, Shaushka, Jarri, Ishtar, Ninurta, Nergal, Verethragna, Athena, Minerva, Ares, or Mars. 

As in our example above, I would show appropriate thanksgiving to my god (if our battle was victorious). Our people would write stories and sing songs about our war god, making sure to emphasize how much greater and more powerful they are than the war gods of our opponents. The war gods love blood and gore and conquest – a battlefield filled with the corpses of our enemies makes them happy. They drink the blood of our enemies and eat their flesh. (It’s a bit gruesome for us in our twenty-first century context, but for them, this was normal). We would know that our gods had blessed, and even commanded this bloodshed because they blessed us with the victory.

But if we lost (and any of us survived), it’s nothing but woes and lamentations. Surely our gods didn’t want us to go into battle. Perhaps we did something wrong and they withheld their blessing when we needed it most.

Here comes the kicker. To quote John Walton, “Like everyone else in the ancient world, the Israelites believed that everything that happened and everything that existed found its ultimate cause in deity.”

Good harvest this year? God did it. Drought this year? God did it. We developed a new form of literature, or a new musical instrument? God did it. We slaughtered a bunch of men, women, and children? God did it.

This is jarring to us because it’s not the way we think or live (for the most part) in the modern day. The reality of these things is that God has ordered creation so as to self-sustain, providing rain and sunshine, fertilizer and so on, but it is the farmer who partners in the work of tilling the fields, planting the seeds, cultivating the plants and harvesting the rewards in due time. And in the case of “glorious” victory in combat, it might just be the case that the stronger force with the better fighters and superior equipment often wins. (I know, it’s mind-blowing, right?)

Are there ever exceptions? Undoubtedly. But no system of belief should be based on the occasional exception. The exception is not the rule, and the rule is not the exception. 

What am I suggesting? I’m suggesting that Israel, like every other nation and tribe around them, thought the supernatural forces (God, the gods, spirits, angels/demons) were causing, controlling, and determining every detail of every person’s life (and indeed, all of creation).

That’s one of the reasons they struggled so much in their attempts to understand God. They followed the “usual” customs of sacrifices and offerings (Raising livestock? Sacrifice some of those suckers. Growing wheat? Offer some of that to God.), but God doesn’t delight in the blood of animals (Is. 1:11; Hos. 6:6) or other physical offerings. He’s NOT like these other “gods.”

The other gods demand bloodshed and strange ritual worship and burnt offerings, and a hundred other things. But God is not like them. The other gods are derived from human imagination and take on the pettiness and vanity of mankind. But God is not like them. The other gods are pantheons, who really aren’t that jealous of each other, and don’t mind you worshipping other gods at the same time. But God is not like them.

Israel had been heavily influenced by the cultures and customs of the world around them, and it undoubtedly penetrated into their own customs and practices. But to what extent?

This is where we must pause in order to explore an incredibly relevant question: how much was Israel influenced by the world around them, and what impact does that have on us today? 

We’ll explore this question in the next post!

Context Clues – Polytheism Pt 4

Welcome to part 4 of the polytheism context clue. If you’re just joining us, we’ve been exploring the idea that developing a clear understanding of Biblical and historical polytheism will help us to peel back some of the troublesome layers of ancient Israel’s history and literature. I would suggest going back to read parts 1, 2 & 3 in preparation for this post.

Last week, we began to explore a few of the culturally significant pantheons of the nations, tribes, ethnic groups and kingdoms surrounding the Israelites during their centuries of time in Egypt, and later Canaan. Today, we will conduct a similar exploration of the culturally significant pantheons of the conquering kingdoms and empires of Israel’s captivity: the Assyrians, Babylonians, Persians, Greeks, and Romans. Here we go!

Assyria: In their early history, Assyrians placed a heavy emphasis on local deities (patron gods of various cities, for example), but they also absorbed a lot of deities from other people groups, such as the Canaanites and the Hittites. As the Assyrian empire expanded, they heavily adopted Sumerian and Babylonian gods, elevating them alongside their own most venerable deities. As a result, this list below will include many cross-overs with the other lists.

  1. Ashur/Assur – the supreme god of the Assyrians. He was worshipped as the lord of the whole heavens.
  2. Mullissu – the wife of Ashur. She was a major mother goddess.
  3. Ishtar – goddess of war, love, and fertility. She was crucial to the Assyrian identity and was often invoked by kings in battle.
  4. Nabu/Nebo – the god of wisdom, writing, and literacy. He was the son of Marduk (the Babylonian god), but held a very high status in the Assyrian pantheon.
  5. Sin (or Nanna) – the god of the moon, astronomy, and time.
  6. Shamash (or Utu) – the sun god responsible for justice, law, and truth.
  7. Adad (or Ramman) – the storm and rain god, crucial for agriculture, but also feared for destruction.
  8. Ninurta (or Ninip) – a major god of war, hunting, and farming.
  9. Nergal – god of death, plague, and the Underworld. Nergal was also associated with war.

Babylon: similar to Assyria, the Babylonian pantheon also included older Sumerian-derived gods, but retained their own unique creation myth (Enuma Elish) and pantheon. Here’s a condensed list of some of the popular/well-known Babylonian deities:

  1. Marduk (or Bel) – the patron god of Babylon, he was elevated to the head of the pantheon for defeating Tiamat. He is often depicted as the creator of humanity and the champion of order.
  2. Ishtar (or Inanna) – the goddess of sexual love, fertility, and war.
  3. Ea (or Enki) – the god of wisdom, magic, and sweet waters. He was often depicted as a clever protector of humanity.
  4. Nabu/Nebo – the son of Marduk and the patron of writing, literacy, and wisdom.
  5. Shamash (or Utu) – the sun god responsible for justice, law, and truth.
  6. Sin (or Nanna) – the god of the moon, astronomy, and time.
  7. Nergal – god of death, plague, and the Underworld. Nergal was also associated with war.
  8. Adad (or Ishkur) – the storm god, responsible for thunder, lightning, and rain.
  9. Tiamat – the primordial goddess of the salt sea, who represents chaos, and was defeated by Marduk in the creation epic (Enuma Elish).

Persia: their pantheon is found primarily in Zoroastrian and earlier Iranian traditions. On the surface level, the Persian pantheon seems to revolve around a dualistic struggle between good and evil, but contrary to some classifications, their pantheon fully qualifies them as a polytheistic religion. Here are a few of the popular/well-known Persian deities:

  1. Ahura Mazda– the supreme god of wisdom and the sky. The creator of the universe, Ahura Mazda represents truth and light.
  2. Angra Mainyu (or Ahriman) – the destructive spirit, embodying chaos, lies, and evil.
  3. Mithra (or Mihr) – god of light, covenant, contract, and the rising sun.
  4. Anahita – the goddess of fertility, healing, wisdom, and water.
  5. Atar – the son of Ahura Mazda, and the personification of divine fire. A crucial element in rituals.
  6. Verethragna (or Bahram) – the warrior god of victory, who aids the righteous in their battle against evil.
  7. Tishtrya – a deity associated with rain, agriculture, and fertility, often battling drought.
  8. Rashnu – a divine judge who determines the fate of souls after death.
  9. Vayu-Vata – The deity of the wind and atmosphere.

Greece/Rome: the major Roman deities were heavily influenced by Greek mythology, and revolved around the twelve olympians (Greek) or the Consentes Dii (Roman). While there are variations and nuance between the two, they’re similar enough that for this post, I’ll treat them as the same, placing the Greek name first and the Roman name second. As always, feel free to conduct additional research of your own. This is not a comprehensive list, simply a useful starting point:

  1. Zeus (Jupiter) – king of the gods, sky, lightning (and thunder), and justice.
  2. Hera (Juno) – queen of the gods, wife of Zeus, and goddess of marriage, childbirth, women, and family.
  3. Poseidon (Neptune) – god of the sea, earthquakes, and horses.
  4. Athena (Minerva) – the goddess of wisdom, handicraft, and strategic war.
  5. Apollo (Apollo) – the god of music, poetry, prophecy, light, and the sun.
  6. Artemis (Diana) – the goddess of the hunt, wilderness, and the moon.
  7. Aphrodite (Venus) – the goddess of love, beauty, and desire.
  8. Hermes (Mercury) – messenger of the gods, god of commerce, thieves, and travelers.
  9. Ares (Mars) – god of war, violence, and bloodshed.
  10. Hephaestus (Vulcan) – god of fire, metallurgy, and craftsmanship.
  11. Demeter (Ceres) – goddess of agriculture, harvest, and fertility.
  12. Hestia/Dionysus (only Greek) – Hestia was the goddess of hearth and home; she was replaced as an olympian by Dionysus, the god of wine and theater.
  13. Janus (only Roman) – god of beginnings, endings, transitions, and doorways.
  14. Hades (Pluto) – king of the Underworld and ruler of the dead; brother to Zeus and Poseidon.

You’ll notice I’ve made no mention of the Eastern pantheons in these lists, nor of the Norse pantheon, or even of the various African pantheons (apart from Egypt). There are two reasons for these omissions: 1) the omitted people groups and pantheons weren’t as directly influential in shaping Israel’s culture and beliefs in the same way the ones we’ve listed were, and 2) these lists are already long enough to prove my original points regarding Israel’s exposure to various polytheistic religions, and the inevitable influence that prolonged proximity with (and assimilation of) these religious constructions will have had on the nation of Israel.

Now that we have a modest collection of lists to work with, we can begin to explore some of the commonalities between these different religions and appreciate the theological landscape of the ancient Israelites a little better.

Context Clues – Polytheism Pt 3

The Egyptian Sun God "Ra"

Welcome to part 3 of the polytheism context clue. If you’re just joining us, we’ve been exploring the claim that developing a clear understanding of Biblical and historical polytheism will help us to peel back some of the troublesome layers of ancient Israel’s history and literature. I would suggest going back to read parts 1 & 2 so as to understand the premise and tone.

With no further adieu let’s take a brief, high-level, look at some of the major national and cultural pantheons that surrounded and saturated ancient Israel.

Egypt: had a long list of deities in their pantheon, and the list of the most popular deities shifted throughout their history, depending on whether it was during the old kingdom, new kingdom, or some other era. Here are some of their most popular/well-known deities:

  1. Ra – the supreme sun god, considered the creator and the first pharaoh. He was central to Egyptian cosmology, traveling across the sky daily.
  2. Osiris – lord of the Underworld and judge of the dead. He represents death, resurrection, and fertility. He was crucial to the belief in the afterlife.
  3. Isis – goddess of magic, motherhood and fertility. She was the wife of Osiris and the mother of Horus.
  4. Horus – falcon-headed god of sky and light. He represented the living Pharaoh, and kingship, fighting against the forces of chaos.
  5. Anubis – jackal-headed god of embalming, and the guardian of the dead. He guided souls to the afterlife and oversaw the weighing of the heart.
  6. Set (Seth) – god of chaos, storms, and the desert. While a rival to Horus and Osiris, he was necessary for balance.
  7. Thoth – god of wisdom, writing, hieroglyphs, and science. Often depicted with an Ibis head, he was the scribe of the gods.
  8. Hathor – goddess of love, beauty, music, and drunkenness, often represented as a cow or a woman with cow ears.
  9. Bastet – cat-headed goddess of the home, fertility, and protection.
  10. Ptah – patron god of craftsmen, architects, and other creative trades.
  11. Ma’at – goddess of truth, balance, and cosmic order, essential for maintaining the universe.
El, the "father of gods"

Canaan: was a melting-pot region of many ethnic people groups, families, tribes and kingdoms. These include many of the groups frequently listed in the Bible (Hivites, Jebusites, Philistines, Moabites, Sepharvites, and so on). Most of these shared a dominant pantheon, although many of the individual groups had either additional gods, or else held a set of deities in higher veneration than others. Here’s a condensed list of some of the popular/well-known Canaanite deities (which we know about thanks to the Ugaritic texts):

  1. El (or Ilu) – the elderly, wise, “gray-beard” supreme head of the pantheon, known as the creator and father of gods and humankind.
  2. Asherah (or Athirat) – wife of El and the mother of many deities, often associated with fertility, trees and sacred poles.
  3. Baal (or Hadad) – the popular storm god (“Lord of the Land”) who brought rain and fertility. He was often portrayed as a warrior battling chaos.
  4. Anat – the sister-consort of Baal, a fierce war goddess and protector who often displayed violent power.
  5. Astarte – a fertility and war goddess
  6. Mot – the god of death, drought, and sterility, representing the desert, Mot was considered the enemy of Baal.
  7. Yam (or Nahar) – the god of sea and chaos, defeated by Baal in a battle for sovereignty.
  8. Resheph – the god of plague, pestilence, and healing.
  9. Shapshu – the sun goddess who served as a mediator between gods, sometimes known as Shamosh (or Chemosh) in other Canaanite regions.
  10. Dagon – a fertility and vegetation god associated with agriculture.
Baal, the storm god

In addition to this list, there are a few other “honorable mentions” that show up in the Bible. A few of these include:

  1. Adrammelech – Sepharvite god of war and love.
  2. Anammelech – Sepharvite god demanding child sacrifice
  3. Molech (or Moloch) – national god of the Amonites and Moabites, whose worship involved human (often child) sacrifice.
  4. Nergal – the Cuthite god of death and the Underworld.
  5. Rimmon – god of Aram responsible for thunder, lightning and rain.
  6. Tartak – the Avvite god(des) of fertility.
Tarhun (Hittite supreme king of the gods)
Tarhun (Hittite supreme king of the gods)

Hittite: while many of the smaller tribes, nations, clans and kingdoms share a central pantheon, others had a full pantheon of their own, such as the Hittites.

  1. Tarhun/Tarhunnara – the supreme king of the gods, ruler of heaven, thunder, and lightning. He is often depicted as holding a lightning bolt and axes, ensuring agricultural fertility and maintaining order
  2. Arinna/Arinniti/Istanu – the principal consort of Tarhun. As the supreme solar deity, she governed sovereignty, justice, and the protection of the Hittite empire.
  3. Telepinu – son of Tarhun and Arinna, and god of fertility.
  4. Inara – daughter of Tarhun, and the goddess of wild animals and the steppe.
  5. Hannahannah – a creator goddess and advisor to the other gods.
  6. Kumarbi (or A’as) – father of the gods, who was overthrown by Tarhun.
  7. Shaushka (or Ishtar) – goddess of love, war, and fertility.
  8. Jarri – a plague god, sometimes associated with military destruction and warfare.

I’ve left a lot off of these lists, as you may have noticed. My hope is not to provide you with a comprehensive list of the deities and pantheons worshipped in and around the lands of Egypt and Canaan, but rather to give a brief sampling so as to show what the dominant cultural views and traditions were which surrounded the nation of Israel during its time in these lands. We’ll continue this exploration in the next post by looking at some of the significant pantheons surrounding Israel (and Judah) during their various seasons of captivity. Most of these cultures were also influencing the Israelites much earlier, but the effect was amplified in captivity.

As you begin to review these lists, I’d encourage you to look for commonalities and trends. For instance, what similarities do you find between the Egyptian gods, Ra and Set, and the Canaanite gods, El and Yam? What similarities do you find between the types of domains represented in each pantheon? (For example: fertility, love, war, storms, chaos, etc.)

I hope you’ll join us for the next part as we explore some of the major deities of the Assyrians, Babylonians, Persians, Greeks and Romans. From there, we’ll begin to explore some of the implications surrounding Israel’s prolonged proximity to, and assimilation of, these polytheistic beliefs.