We’re continuing our discussion about Israelite/Canaanite religion with TikTok star Dan McClellan. Did Israel worship Baal? Is it true God had a wife? When did Israel become monotheistic? (Later than you think!) We’ll also talk about God’s consort. Was her name Asherah? Check out our conversation…
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Data Over Dogma
GT 00:23 Do you have a newsletter or something? I probably should mention that you are a podcaster, too. Right?
Dan 00:28 I just started up a podcast. My partner and I recorded our first episode on Thursday, so that we’re hoping to launch the first week of March, and it will be called the Data Over Dogma podcast. But I don’t have a newsletter yet. I should, though. I have a nice email list that I use to let people know about the online classes that I’m teaching.
GT 00:52 What’s the name of your podcast?
Dan 00:53 So, Data Over Dogma is a bit of a motto that my channel has had for a long time.
GT 00:57 Yeah. And you’re a TikTok star.
Dan 01:00 I claim to be a TikTok star. That’s where I got my start with all of this. I noticed…
GT 01:09 I have to tell you, I’ve had a lot of listeners say, “You need to get Dan McClellan on.”
Dan 01:17 Well, I appreciate those listeners. And I’m glad we were finally able to get together now. And yeah, TikTok has been a fascinating experience. I noticed that there were people sharing a lot of videos on or related to the Bible and religion in the ancient world. And it didn’t seem to me that there was anybody who was really in charge of what was going on with it. So, I got a TikTok account and met a bunch of wonderful people and a lot of folks who are doing their best to stem the tide of misinformation that’s being spread on social media. And I thought I could add my voice to that, bring some credentials to this battle against the spread of misinformation about the study of the Bible and religion. And it’s been a fun experience. Again, I’ve met a bunch of wonderful people. And yeah, there is a ton of work to do. I’m still trying to post on TikTok every day, at least once.
GT 02:17 I can’t keep that up. I’m actually on TikTok, but I’ve posted about two videos. Yeah, I don’t do it every day. I should get in the habit, I guess.
Dan 02:27 Well, there are a lot of folks who just lurk. And that’s fine. I’m sure a lot of the people I interact with on a daily basis, I think if I look them up, either they’re private, or they don’t have any videos, because they’re just there to comment and interact. But it’s a great community. And yeah, I’ve expanded out to sharing those videos on Instagram and Twitter. And now I have a YouTube channel, as well, where I’m trying to share this stuff. So, it’s been a great experience. And, hopefully, there’s a lot more to come. I should mention that, as a result of this, I’ve had a number of people who, over the last, almost two years have said, “Oh, you should do online classes.” So, I started doing online classes. A bunch of people said, “You should write a book.” I was like, “I wrote a book.” It’s open access, you can read it for free. But actually, I am working on a trade volume now. So, a book for a popular audience that will talk about the development of the God of the Bible, as the different authors elaborated on and innovated on how they thought about God over time. So that’ll be fun.
Gods of Israel/Canaan
GT 03:38 Cool. So, jumping back to Abraham for a second. Would it be safe to say that Abraham was like–I don’t know if I should say, the God of Israel, because Israel was his son, right? Because he wouldn’t have said the God of Israel, but my God, Elohim, or Adonai. I guess you say Adonai more than Elohim. Right?
Dan 03:58 Yeah. So Adonai is the substitution I use for the tetragrammaton YHWH, and that would be the personal name of the God of Israel.
GT 04:07 Okay.
Dan 04:08 And now Elohim is just the generic Hebrew word for God. And so that can function as a title or as a generic noun.
GT 04:16 Okay. So, Abraham’s God, can we say was Yahweh? He was like the head God and all those other Moabite gods and everybody else and his father’s gods were just knuckleheads.
Dan 04:27 Well, when we look in Genesis, and at Abraham’s interactions with God, it seems that the concept of God there, was more of an ancestral patriarchal deity, and fits a lot more comfortably in the divine profile of the Canaanite Deity, El. So, when we look in Exodus 6:3, when God introduces themselves to Moses for the second time, they say, “I appeared to your fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac to Jacob, as El Shaddai. By my name, Adonai, I was not known to them, which is a peculiar statement because we can look through the Book of Genesis, and we can see Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob all calling on the name Adonai. But when you look in the Book of Abraham, excuse me. That’s one of the problems of being a Mormon that kind of stuff comes up. When you look in the Book of Genesis, there’s not a single personal name with a Yahwistic theophoric element. So, a theophoric element is a part of the name that either has a version of God’s name in it, or the word God. So, my name is Daniel, which means “God is my judge.” So el, the last two letters, are the Hebrew word for God. And so that’s the theophoric element. And all over the Hebrew Bible, you have names that have Yahwistic theophoric elements. So, names that begin with Jo, or end in iah, or end in jah, Elijah, Hezekiah, Jehoshaphat, Yehoshua, Joshua. All these names have Yahwistic theophoric elements, and those predominate throughout the Hebrew Bible. There’s not a single one in the Book of Genesis. All the names are el-based or have other theophoric elements in them. And so, it seems that the earliest versions of the stories of Abraham and Isaac and Jacob were either before the introduction of Adonai as the God of Israel or were circulating within a group that may not have viewed Adonai as the God of Israel. And so, the earliest stories of Abraham, Adonai was probably not Abraham’s God. It was probably El, who was a broader divine profile that was associated with other Canaanite societies as well.
GT 06:55 Because this is what I want to get into. It seems like there were a lot of Canaanite deities. Right? You had El. You had Yahweh. You had Moloch. You had Ba’al. You had Asherah. That’s five. That’s pretty good. How many more were there?
Dan 07:11 Oh, well, you can look in the Ugaritic literature, and you can find dozens and dozens of divine names. So, El, Ba’al is another good one, Asherah. You have Mot who is the god of death. You had Yam who’s the God of the river, or the sea, all kinds of different deities. And some of these are national deities for other nations. And some of them were just a part of the mythology or the Pantheon in Ugarit. Adonai is not known in any Pantheon outside of Israel.
GT 07:48 Well, it brings up another question. Can we say that the Phoenicians and the Canaanites and the Israelites are basically kind of the same people?
Dan 08:05 They’re very similar. So, Canaanite is a very generic title that comes from the Bible. And it’s basically the way that this little nation, surrounded by all these other nations lumped everybody else together. You’re all Canaanites, even though…
GT 08:24 So that would be kind of the area of modern-day Israel? Because we call that the Land of Canaan. Right?
Dan 08:29 Yeah. And so that’s a biblical designation, but anciently, no one would have said, “Oh, I’m a Canaanite.” They would have said, “I’m a Phoenician. I’m a Moabite. I’m an Edomite. I’m an Amorite,” all of these other things.
GT 08:43 Because what I understand about the Phoenician–Empire isn’t really the right word. But it spanned from Lebanon, Syria, all the way down Israel. Did it skip over Egypt and was along North Africa?
Dan 09:01 So the there was Punic/Phoenician societies in Northern Africa, as well, but this is a later…
GT 09:09 Were they Semitic speaking?
Dan 09:11 This was later, yes.
GT 09:13 This was later.
Dan 09:14 Yeah, a lot of that is around the middle to the late first millennium B.C.E.
GT 09:21 So, Phoenicia, Canaan started in the Israel, Syria, Lebanon area.
Dan 09:28 Yeah.
GT 09:29 And then [they] spread to North Africa later?
Dan 09:32 Yeah. And a lot of that has to do with their economics and their trade and things like that and the use of the Phoenician language to facilitate a lot of that.
GT 09:42 The Phoenician language, was it kind of like Aramaic or Hebrew?
Dan 09:46 It was closer to Hebrew than to Aramaic. And so, the Phoenician alphabet is the alphabet that was adopted in and around the land that we would call Canaan. So, that’s why Hebrew has adopted the Phoenician alphabet. But Israel really seems to have been, basically, formed from Canaanite societies. So, most scholars would say that Israel is just one of the Canaanite nations, but a nation that decided to self-identify as distinct from all the other nations and to then try to “other” all the nations in this process of distinguishing themselves. There’s a term that some scholars use, schismogenesis, which is a reference to the use of differences, like identifying, picking out a difference between some societies, and then making that an identity marker, and focusing on that as a way to distinguish yourself from another society. So, there are ways that things like pork consumption, circumcision and worshipping specific deities became identity markers in the later periods. Because this was what helped us say, “This is what we do. That’s what those other guys do.”
Dan 11:14 So, Israel definitely developed out of Canaanite nations, which is why El was likely the main deity of the patriarchs. And then you have this other deity, Adonai, who comes in and seems to adopt a storm deity profile. And this is why there was so much friction between Adonai and Ba’al, because Ba’al is the storm deity in Canaan. And then you have this other deity who comes in who does the same stuff. And so, they’re both trying to fill the same role in the same space. And so, they’re going to come into conflict with each other. And this is reflected in the contest between Elijah and the priests of Ba’al, where they’re trying to see who is HA Elohim? Who is the deity? And their contest is who can send down fire from heaven and light the sacrificial altars, which is, basically, who’s in charge of lightning? Who can send down a lightning bolt to set all this stuff on fire?
GT 12:15 That makes a lot more sense.
Dan 12:16 And so that’s what the storm deity is supposed to be able to do. And Ba’al is unable to do it. But Adonai is successful. And so the people cry out, “Adonai, Hu Ha Elohim, Hu Ha Elohim.” So, Adonai, he’s the God. He’s the God. But you have some other places, particularly in the Psalms, where they’re praising Adonai, but in terms that sounds suspiciously like Ba’al. So, Psalm 29, you have the seven-fold repetition of praise of the voice of Adonai. The imagery has to do with thunder and lightning, and powerful rains and things like that. But it mentioned some place names, and all the place names are Lebanon, Phoenicia, up north, which is not Israel’s territory, but was Ba’al’s territory. And so, a lot of scholars would argue that this was originally a hymn to Ba’al that was just appropriated by Adonai. And maybe, we don’t have an original copy. So, we don’t know. But it could have been as simple as just replacing the name. In fact, we do have another indication that that happened. Isaiah 27:1, there’s this statement that Adonai will defeat the twisting serpent, the wriggling serpent, the dragon that is in the sea, I think is how it ends in Isaiah 27:1. But this is about Leviathan. But if you go 500-600 years before Isaiah, the Ugaritic literature, there’s a part of one text that praises Ba’al as the one who defeated Leviathan, the wriggling serpent, the twisting serpent, the dragon with seven heads. And so, it’s word for word, using the exact same imagery and the same praise that is attributed to Ba’al in the Ugaritic literature from 1300-1200. And it’s attributed to Adonai 500-600 years later, in Isaiah 27:1. So, there are definitely examples of praise for Ba’al that was appropriated by people who wanted to praise Adonai as the storm deity. But there’s no place where El is a problem, where Adonai is in conflict with El because that identity has just been fully appropriated.
GT 14:32 So, let me make sure I understand it. Adonai is another name for Yahweh?
Dan 14:36 Yes. So that’s the substitution that I use in place of pronouncing the name, just because. That’s the standard academic pronunciation (the one that you use,) but on my channel, I’ve had a number of folks who follow my channel who are Jewish, who said…
GT 14:55 They would prefer you not to say that.
Dan 14:57 They would prefer I not say that. So, I’ve committed to not using that pronunciation when I’m producing content for general consumption. But when I’m in academic contexts, I will use the other. I know that’s a little confusing for people. So, one of my pinned videos on my Tik Tok account is, “This is why I say this.”
GT 15:18 Okay. Okay, I just wanted to make sure because I’m not used to using Adonai all the time. But now that I have it, I think I have it.
From Many to One God
GT 15:26 Okay, so I know there is an upcoming article in The Interpreter that I think is fascinating. I’m trying to time the release of [the interview] with when it’s going to be released. So, I don’t want to give away too much information, but I want to give a little bit of information about it. And basically, the thesis–and there’s going to be another video coming up that I’ve already recorded, but I can’t release yet. And the theory is [that] when King Josiah came to power, the Israelites were very much into idol worship. And then we have King Josiah with the Josiahn reforms. And he’s like, “No, we’re going to merge–I would say El and Yahweh, or El and Adonai, and make them one God, and we’re going to become monotheists.” And that’s kind of where the book of Deuteronomy comes in. Right?
GT 16:42 That is where most scholars agree the Book of Deuteronomy originates, is under Josiahnic reforms.
GT 16:47 And so, the theory is that Lehi was rebelling against the Josiahn reforms and that’s why he left Jerusalem.
Dan 16:55 Interesting.
GT 16:56 So that’s a preview coming up in The Interpreter. I don’t know exactly when, but it’s coming up. And I have an interview that him, and I’m going to hopefully time with them. So, what do you [think?] I mean, this is a first blush for you, that theory. I mean, do you agree that up until Josiah there was a lot of idol worship going on?
Dan 17:21 So, I think that prior to Josiah, nobody had an issue with that. There were temples all over Israel.
GT 17:30 For Asherah and Ba’al and everybody.
Dan 17:31 Asherah, Ba’al, whatever. Now there were, certain priesthoods were like, “Hey, you should come over and worship at our place, and not those other guys.” So, I’m sure there was that, but there are no data that indicates there was any institutionalized, centralized prohibition on worshipping Asherah or worshipping other deities. And when we get to Hezekiah, who’s a few generations before Josiah, Hezekiah causes problems with Assyria, and ticks off Sennacherib. And Sennacherib comes and invades. This is just before 700 B.C.E. He comes through, destroys a bunch of cities in the north, comes down and destroys Lachish and memorializes this back in Nineveh. There are these wall reliefs depicting…
GT 18:29 Nineveh is modern day Mosul, Iraq. Right?
Dan 18:32 It’s around there. Yeah. But he commemorates the destruction of Lachish in these bas reliefs that shows them beheading people and flaying people and driving other people off in exile. But Sennacherib was unable to take Jerusalem. In his own text he says, “I trapped Hezekiah in his city like a bird in a cage.” But he ultimately leaves without taking the city of Jerusalem. And so, Hezekiah is successful in throwing off this vassalage. He no longer has to pay the tribute.
GT 19:06 And that’s the lost ten tribes, essentially.
Dan 19:08 That happened a little bit earlier, that was around 722 BCE. But a very similar thing is going on. Sennacherib destroys all the land, except for Jerusalem. All the temples, all the cult sites are gone. And now everybody has to go to Jerusalem, if they want to worship Adonai in a temple, which is what I call de facto cult centralization. So now because you don’t have any other temples, you’re forced to go to Jerusalem. And this temple that I mentioned earlier, in Arad, that we uncovered in the 1960s, the dating of its destruction or its end seems to coincide with Sennacherib’s invasion. And so some people looked at this and said, “Oh, this was Hezekiah shutting everything down as part of Hezekiah reforms, getting rid of all the high places and all that stuff. But archaeologists noted nothing’s really destroyed. The temple seems to have been quietly decommissioned and just buried under six feet of earth. And so other scholars now argue that it sounds like Hezekiah was trying to hide it. He was just saying, “Shut everything down. We’re going to cover it up. We’re going to hide it, so it doesn’t get destroyed by the Assyrians.” [The Assyrians] do their scorched earth thing where everything goes.
GT 20:30 Kind of like when Brigham Young covered up the Salt Lake Temple foundation.
Dan 20:33 Exactly, and the hope would be that they go restore the temple later on, but they never did, which is why we find all this stuff that’s still in perfect condition. So, the standing stone, the incense altars, normally you would break that into pieces, but it was just laid on its side. And so, it seems like worship was going on all over the place. Sennacherib comes through creates this de facto cult centralization. And then you’ve got some other kings who are probably trying to restore the way things were before, until we get to Josiah, who seems to decide, “You know what? I like the way this is with everybody having to come to Jerusalem, with my temple getting all of the money and all the resources and having all the power, with my priesthood having all the control.”
Dan 21:20 And so what a coincidence that he finds the Book of the Law that says everybody has to come to Jerusalem. You can’t go anywhere else. Everybody has to use the Levitical priesthood. You can’t use any other priesthood. Everybody has to come here. And so, I would argue that this was Josiah saying, “You know what? We’re not going to go back to the way we did things before. We’re going to do this new thing, where it’s just Jerusalem.
GT 21:46 So, Josiah was just taking all of Hezekiah’s reforms, or no?
Dan 21:52 Well, the reforms are the later authors looking back and saying, “This is what happened.”
GT 21:58 This is what Hezekiah was really doing.
Dan 22:00 Yeah, yeah. Hezekiah was shutting everything down, because he was righteous, except he didn’t take care of everything. But then Josiah was the most righteous and Josiah took care of everything. And so, most of the histories that we have in the Bible, in Kings and Samuel, those are written hundreds of years later, but they’re looking back, and they’re writing that history in a way that serves the interests of [the king.] Josiah says, “Oh, we found the earlier law.”
Dan 22:26 So now when we’re looking back on the way they did things earlier, which was not following this law that they suddenly discovered, they have to go, “Oh, they were breaking the law. And so now they’re all apostates. The people who did it earlier were all apostates. And now we’ve restored the way it was always supposed to be.” When, in reality, Josiah was probably just trying to keep things the way they were when he was in power. And so that’s what I argue is responsible for the vilification, the demonization of Asherah for all of the stuff that followed after, that demonized using divine images and things like that, using other temples and things like that.
GT 23:11 Could we say that Josiah is the author of monotheism?
Dan 23:17 There have been people who’ve made that argument. I would say, probably not the author of monotheism, but probably the person who started the ball rolling, that ultimately snowballed into what, many centuries later, would become monotheism. Because creating that cult centralization and some people call it mono-YAHWEH-ism. There’s just one place where Adonai can be worshipped. And there’s only one deity that you’re supposed to worship. So that probably starts the ball rolling on the negotiations that would later end up with this philosophical notion of only one God existing, and all other beings being subordinate to, being derived from the only true deity. But yeah, I think that that doesn’t take place until well after the Bible’s done.
GT 24:09 Oh, I thought you were going to say Deutero-Isaiah.
Dan 24:12 No, I would argue that Deutero-Isaiah is not monotheistic. That’s the whole Oakland/LA/Las Vegas Raiders rhetoric, that the author of Deutero-Isaiah is saying, “Oh, they’re not really deities, but in a rhetorical way, saying the only one that really matters is the God of Israel.
GT 24:36 I’m glad you’re a sports fan, because I get that. We don’t talk to nearly enough historians who are sports fans.
Dan 24:42 Oh, they’re out there.
GT 24:43 (Chuckling) You, me, Trevan and Stephen Harper. I think that’s about it.
Dan 24:48 I haven’t talked to Steven about sports.
GT 24:50 Stephen’s a big sports fan, big time.
Dan 24:52 Good to know.
{End of Part 2}
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