The Canaanite religion was the group of
ancient Semitic religions practiced by the
Canaanites living in the ancient
Levant from at least the early
Bronze Age to the first centuries CE. Canaanite religion was
polytheistic and, in some cases,
monolatristic. It was influenced by neighboring cultures, particularly ancient
Egyptian and
Mesopotamian religious practices. The pantheon was headed by the god
El and his consort
Asherah, with other significant deities including
Baal,
Anat,
Astarte, and
Mot.
Canaanite religious practices included
animal sacrifice,
veneration of the dead, and the worship of deities through
shrines and
sacred groves. The religion also featured a complex
mythology, including stories of divine battles and cycles of death and rebirth. Archaeological evidence, particularly from sites like
Ugarit, and literary sources, including the
Ugaritic texts and the
Hebrew Bible, have provided most of the current knowledge about Canaanite religion. The religion had a significant influence on neighboring cultures and later religious traditions, including
ancient Israelite religion and
Phoenician religion.
Canaanites believed that following physical death, the npš (usually translated as "
soul") departed from the body to the land of
Mot (Death). Bodies were buried with
grave goods, and offerings of food and drink were made to the dead to ensure that they would not trouble the living. Dead relatives were venerated and sometimes asked for help.[1][2]
According to the pantheon, known in Ugarit as 'ilhm (
Elohim) or the children of
El, supposedly obtained by Philo of Byblos from
Sanchuniathon of Berythus (
Beirut) the creator was known as Elion, who was the father of the divinities, and in the Greek sources he was married to Beruth (Beirut meaning 'the city'). This marriage of the divinity with the city would seem to have Biblical parallels too with the stories of the link between
Melqart and
Tyre;
Chemosh and
Moab;
Tanit and
Baal Hammon in
Carthage,
Yah and
Jerusalem.
The union of El Elyon and his consort Asherah would be representation of primordial Cronos and Rhea in Greek mythology or Roman Saturnus and Ops.
In Canaanite
mythology there were twin mountains Targhizizi and Tharumagi which hold the firmament up above the earth-circling ocean, thereby bounding the earth.
W. F. Albright, for example, says that
El Shaddai is a derivation of a Semitic stem that appears in the Akkadian shadû ('mountain') and shaddā'û or shaddû'a ('mountain-dweller'), one of the names of Amurru. Philo of Byblos states that Atlas was one of the Elohim, which would clearly fit into the story of El Shaddai as "God of the Mountain(s)". Harriet Lutzky has presented evidence that Shaddai was an attribute of a Semitic goddess, linking the epithet with Hebrew šad, 'breast', as "the one of the Breast". The idea of two mountains being associated here as the breasts of the Earth, fits into the Canaanite mythology quite well. The ideas of pairs of mountains seem to be quite common in Canaanite mythology. The late period of this cosmology makes it difficult to tell what influences (Roman, Greek, or Hebrew) may have informed Philo's writings.
In the
Baal Cycle, Ba'al Hadad is challenged by and defeats Yam, using two magical weapons (called "Driver" and "Chaser") made for him by
Kothar-wa-Khasis. Afterward, with the help of Athirat and Anat, Ba'al persuades El to allow him a palace. El approves, and the palace is built by Kothar-wa-Khasis. After the palace is constructed, Ba'al gives forth a thunderous roar out of the palace window and challenges Mot. Mot enters through the window and swallows Ba'al, sending him to the Underworld. With no one to give rain, there is a terrible drought in Ba'al's absence. The other deities, especially El and Anat, are distraught that Ba'al had been taken to the Underworld. Anat goes to the Underworld, attacks Mot with a knife, grinds him up into pieces, and scatters him far and wide. With Mot defeated, Ba'al is able to return and refresh the Earth with rain.[3]
A group of
deities in a four-tier hierarchy headed by
El and
Asherah[a][b] were worshipped by the followers of the Canaanite religion; this is a detailed listing:[6]
Aglibol, god of the moon and brother of Malakbel. Part of a trio of gods of Palmyra, Syria, along with Bel and Yarhibol. Also part of another trio with Baalshamin and Malakbel.
Anat, virgin goddess of war and strife, sister and putative mate of
Baʿal Hadad.
Arsay, goddess of the underworld, one of the three daughters of Ba'al Hadad.
Arsu, god of the evening star and twin brother of Azizos.
Hadad, often known as Baʿal "Lord", god of storms, thunder, lightning and air. King of the gods. Uses the weapons Driver and Chaser in battle. Often referred to as
Baalshamin.[9]
Ba'al Hermon, titular local deity of Mount Hermon.
Baalshamin also called Baal Shamem and Baal Shamaim, supreme sky god of Palmyra, Syria whose temple was destroyed on 23 August 2015 by
ISIL. His attributes were the eagle and the lightning bolt. Part of trinity of deities along with Aglibol and Malakbel.[10]
Baal-zephon or Baalzephon, properly Baʿal Zaphon or Ṣaphon. Alternate form of Baal Hadad as lord of Mount Zaphon.
Bel, or Bol,[11] was the chief god of Palmyra, Syria whose temple was destroyed on August 30, 2015, by ISIL.[12]
Gupan and Ugar, messenger gods of the weather god Baal, who always appear as a pair.
Haurun, an underworld god, co-ruler of the underworld, twin brother of Melqart, a son of Mot.
Bethoron in Israel, takes its name from Horon.[citation needed]
Ishat, goddess of fire, wife of Moloch. She was slain by
Anat.[14][15][16]
Kotharat, seven goddesses of marriage and pregnancy
Kothar-wa-Khasis, the skilled god of craftsmanship, created Yagrush and Aymur (Driver and Chaser) the weapons used by the god Ba'al Hadad.
Lotan, the twisting, seven-headed serpent ally of Yam.
Malakbel, god of the sun, vegetation, welfare, angel of Bel and brother of Agilbol. Part of a trinity of deities in Palmyra, Syria along with Aglibol and Baalshamin.
Manuzi, god of weather and husband of Liluri. Bulls were sacrificed to both of them.
Melqart, "king of the city", god of Tyre, the underworld and cycle of vegetation in
Tyre, co-ruler of the underworld, twin brother of Horon and son of Mot.
Shachar and
Shalim, twin mountain gods of dawn and dusk, respectively. Shalim was linked to the netherworld via the evening star and associated with peace[20]
Shapash, also transliterated Shapshu, goddess of the sun; sometimes equated with the
Mesopotamian sun god
Shamash,[17](p418) whose gender is disputed. Some authorities consider Shamash a goddess.[21]
Sydyk, the god of righteousness or justice, sometimes twinned with
Misor, and linked to the planet Jupiter[22][23]
Tallai, the goddess of winter, snow, cold and dew, one of the three daughters of Ba'al Hadad.[24]
Yarhibol, solar god and "lord of the spring". Part of a trinity of co-supreme gods of Palmyra, Syria along with Aglibol and Bel.
Yarikh, god of the moon and husband of Nikkal. The city of
Jericho was likely his cultic center.
Practices
Religious practices
Archaeological investigations at the site of
Tell es-Safi have found the remains of donkeys, as well as some sheep and goats in Early Bronze Age layers, dating to 4,900 years ago which were imported from Egypt in order to be sacrificed. One of the sacrificial animals, a complete donkey, was found beneath the foundations of a building, leading to speculation this was a 'foundation deposit' placed before the building of a residential house.[29]
It is considered virtually impossible to reconstruct a clear picture of Canaanite religious practices. Although child sacrifice by the Canaanites was known to surrounding peoples, there is no reference to it in ancient Phoenician or Classical texts. According to K.L. Noll, under the duress of military crisis, human sacrifice was offered to the divine patron of a besieged city, as well as the sacrifice of prisoners of war to the victorious god.[30] The biblical representation of Canaanite religion is always negative.[31] Ronald Hendel believes the Israelites disparaged the Canaanite religion because they wanted to disassociate themselves from their Canaanite ancestors and form a new national identity.[32]
Canaanite religious practice had a high regard for the duty of children to care for their parents, with sons being held responsible for burying them, and arranging for the maintenance of their tombs.[33]
Canaanite deities such as Baal were represented by figures which were placed in shrines, often on hilltops, or 'high places' surrounded by groves of trees, such as is condemned in the Hebrew Bible, in Hosea (v 13a) which would probably hold the Asherah pole, and standing stones or pillars.[34]
Funerary rites
Funerary rites held an important role in Canaanite religion and included rituals to honor the deceased and to feed the "npš" (the origin of the Hebrew word ״נפש״ and usually translated as soul) as it moved on to Mot, the land of death. Rituals to honor the deceased included offerings of
incense,
libations,
music, the singing of devotional songs, and sometimes trance rituals, oracles, and necromancy.
Excavations in
Tel Megiddo have offered greater insight into Canaanite funerary practices. A large number of wine vessels have been found in the graves there, as well as vessels of beeswax, animal fat, olive oil, resin, and even vanilla. These
grave goods may have been used as part of a funerary feast, as offerings to the dead, or both. Additionally, evidence of
opium use was found at "a Late Bronze Age site in the southern Levant". The presence of grave goods may suggest similarities between Canaanite practices and the
Ancient Egyptian custom of providing the deceased with supplies for the afterlife.[35]
The Levant region was inhabited by people who themselves referred to the land as 'ca-na-na-um' as early as the mid-second millennium BC.[36] There are a number of possible
etymologies for the word referred. The etymology of "Canaan" is unknown.
While "Phoenician" and "Canaanite" refer to the same culture, archaeologists and historians commonly refer to the
Bronze Age, pre-1200 BC Levantines as Canaanites; and their
Iron Age descendants, particularly those living on the coast, as Phoenicians. More recently, the term Canaanite has been used for the secondary Iron Age states of the interior (including the
Philistines and the states of
Israel and
Judah)[e][f][37]
that were not ruled by
Arameans — a separate and closely related ethnic group.[39][full citation needed] The DNA of the modern Arab and Jewish people matches the DNA of the ancient Canaanites.[40]
Influences
Canaanite religion was strongly influenced by their more powerful and populous neighbors, and shows clear influence of
Mesopotamian and
Egyptian religious practices. Like other people of the Ancient Near East Canaanite religious beliefs were
polytheistic, with families typically focusing on
veneration of the dead in the form of household gods and goddesses, the
Elohim, while acknowledging the existence of other deities such as
Baal and
El,
Mot,
Qos, Asherah and Astarte. Kings also played an important religious role and in certain ceremonies, such as the hieros gamos of the
New Year, may have been revered as gods. "At the center of Canaanite religion was royal concern for religious and political legitimacy and the imposition of a divinely ordained legal structure, as well as peasant emphasis on fertility of the crops, flocks, and humans."[41][42]
Robert G. Boling argues that there was no "local pantheon" in Canaan. Instead, the Canaanites selectively worshipped the "most important and interesting deities" from their neighbors, gave them multiple names and omitted their geographic origins. Like language, their gods also varied over time. Boling finds this unsurprising because Canaan was a land bridge between Asia and Africa, where cross-cultural exchange was frequent.[43]
Punic religion in the western Mediterranean was a direct continuation of the
Phoenician variety of the
polytheistic ancient Canaanite religion. However, significant local differences developed over the centuries following the foundation of
Carthage and other
Punic communities elsewhere in
North Africa, southern Spain,
Sardinia, western
Sicily, and
Malta from the ninth century BC onward. After the conquest of these regions by the
Roman Republic in the third and second centuries BC, Punic religious practices continued, surviving until the fourth century AD in some cases.
Hellenistic period
Throughout the
Hellenistic period, in the non-
Jewish parts of Canaan,
Greek religion grew alongside pre-existing Canaanite traditions rather than replacing them. From the ancient Canaanite practice of outdoor worship, the Greek custom of worshipping
Zeus on a simple altar atop
Mount Ida or
Olympus cannot have appeared all that odd. The new masters conferred Greek names on the ancient Canaanite deities.[44]
Canaanite religion was influenced by its peripheral position, intermediary between Egypt and Mesopotamia, whose religions had a growing impact upon Canaanite religion. For example, during the
Hyksos period, when chariot-mounted maryannu ruled in Egypt, at their capital city of
Avaris, Baal became associated with the Egyptian god
Set, and was considered identical; particularly with Set in his form as Sutekh. Iconographically henceforth, Baal was shown wearing the crown of
Lower Egypt and shown in the Egyptian-like stance, one foot set before the other. Similarly
Athirat (known by her later Hebrew name Asherah),
Athtart (known by her later Greek name Astarte), and
Anat henceforth were portrayed wearing
Hathor-like Egyptian wigs.
From the other direction,
Jean Bottéro has suggested that Ya of
Ebla (a possible precursor of
Yam) was equated with the
Mesopotamian god
Ea during the
Akkadian Empire. In the Middle and Late Bronze Age, there are also strong
Hurrian and
Mitannite influences upon the Canaanite religion. The Hurrian goddess
Hebat was worshiped in
Jerusalem, and
Baal was closely considered equivalent to the Hurrian storm god
Teshub and the
Hittite storm god,
Tarhunt. Canaanite divinities seem to have been almost identical in form and function to the neighboring
Arameans to the east, and Baal Hadad and El can be distinguished amongst earlier
Amorites, who at the end of the Early
Bronze Age invaded
Mesopotamia.
Until
Claude F. A. Schaefer began excavating in 1929 at Ras Shamra in northern
Syria (the site historically known as
Ugarit), and the discovery of its Bronze Age archive of
clay tablets written in an
alphabetical cuneiform,[47] modern scholars knew little about Canaanite religion, as few records have survived.
Papyrus seems to have been the preferred writing medium, but whereas in Egypt papyrus may survive centuries in the extremely dry climate, Canaanite records have simply decayed in the humid
Mediterranean climate.[48] As a result, the accounts contained within the
Bible represented almost the only sources of information on ancient Canaanite religion. This record was supplemented by a few secondary and tertiary Greek sources: (
Lucian's On the Syrian Goddess, fragments of the Phoenician History of Philo of Byblos, and the writings of
Damascius). More recently, detailed study of the Ugaritic material, of other inscriptions from the Levant and also of the
Ebla archive from Tel Mardikh, excavated in 1960 by a joint Italo-Syrian team, have cast more light on the early Canaanite religion.[48][49]
According to The Encyclopedia of Religion, the Ugarit texts represent one part of a larger religion that was based on the religious teachings of Babylon. The Canaanite scribes who produced the Baal texts were also trained to write in Babylonian cuneiform, including Sumerian and Akkadian texts of every genre.[50]
Archaeological excavations in the last few decades have unearthed more about the religion of the ancient Canaanites.[39] The excavation of the city of
Ras Shamra (1928 onwards) and the discovery of its Bronze Age archive of clay-tablet
alphabeticcuneiform texts provided a wealth of new information. Detailed study of the Ugaritic material, of other inscriptions from the Levant and also of the
Ebla archive from Tel Mardikh, excavated in 1960 by a joint Italo-Syrian team, have cast more light on the early Canaanite religion.[citation needed]
Footnotes
^"Handy (1994:176,177) describes the four hierarchical levels in Syro-Palestinian mythology. The first level consists of the deity El (or his equivalents) and Asherah. The second level consists of the active deities or patron gods, for example Baal, and the third, the artisan gods, for example Kothar-wa-Khasis. The lowest level consists of the messenger gods, who have no independent volition, which Handy equates with the "angels" of the Bible."[4]
^Per the Syro-Palestinian perception of the cosmos, the fourfold hierarchy of the divine realm may be diagrammed as follows: Authoritative Deities: El; Active Deities: Baal; Artisan Deities: Kothar; Messenger Deities: gpn w ugr[5]
^[Deuteronomy 32:8–9] suggests that
Yahweh, originally a warrior-god from Sinai / Paran / Edom / Teiman, was known separately from
El at an early point in early Israel.[13]
Mark S. Smith sees the conflation of El and Yahweh as part of the process which he describes as "convergence" in the period of the
Judges and the early monarchy. Convergence saw the coalescence of the qualities of other deities, and even the deities themselves, into Yahweh.[51] Thus El became identified as a name of Yahweh, while Asherah ceased to be a distinct goddess. And the attributes of El, Asherah, and Baal (notably, for Baal, his identification as a storm-god) were assimilated into Yahweh.
Some of the idiosyncratic aspects of Yahweh are described by Smith as "differentiation" in the period from the 9th century BC through to the
Exile. Differentiation identified and rejected certain Canaanite features i.e. Baal, child sacrifice, the asherah, worship of the sun and moon, and the cults of the "high places".[52]
^
Ancient Israel and Judah were not "communities of faith" as distinct from any of their neighbours, all of whom had their own deities also. We cannot know in much detail what the religions of these ancient societies were, but the books of Judges and Kings and the archaeological evidence all agree that much religious practice in these two kingdoms largely conformed to local patterns ("worshipping the Baals").[37]
^
The Bible, I think, is neither historical nor historiographical, but a secondary collection of tradition.[38]
References
^Segal, Alan F. Life after death: a history of the afterlife in the religions of the West
^"Athirat". 23 December 2020. Retrieved 26 December 2020.
^Guisepi, Robert.
"Canaanite culture and religion". history-world.org. Archived from the original on 8 August 2017. Retrieved 26 December 2020.{{
cite web}}: CS1 maint: unfit URL (
link)
^"Dig sites, Levant southern". fas.harvard.edu. The Shelby White & Leon Levy Program. Harvard University. Archived from
the original on 29 March 2014. Retrieved 1 October 2014.
^Moscati, Sabatino. The Face of the Ancient Orient, 2001.
^Albright, William Foxwell (2018). Yahweh and the Gods of Canaan: A Historical Analysis of Two Contrasting Faiths (1st ed.). Eisenbrauns.
ISBN978-0931464010.
^Halpern-Zylberstein, Marie-Christine (1990), Finkelstein, Louis; Davies, W. D. (eds.),
"The archeology of Hellenistic Palestine", The Cambridge History of Judaism: Volume 2: The Hellenistic Age, The Cambridge History of Judaism, vol. 2, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, p. 28,
ISBN978-0-521-21929-7, retrieved 19 March 2023