Remerciez-le!

Remerciez @Admin pour avoir partagé cet document gratuitement, de la manière la plus simple, en partageant sur les réseaux sociaux.

1 The Fertility Pair Ba‘al and ‘Anat in the Ugaritic Texts1 THOMAS HENTRICH Fac

1 The Fertility Pair Ba‘al and ‘Anat in the Ugaritic Texts1 THOMAS HENTRICH Faculté de théologie Université de Montréal C.P. 6128, succ. Centre-ville Montréal (Québec) Canada H3C 3J7 hentrict@magellan.umontreal.ca Cet article présente un aperçu du panthéon de la religion ougaritique, dont les textes mythologiques restent toujours les meilleurs témoins de la religion cananéenne ancienne. Nous nous concentrerons surtout sur l'interaction des dieux. ‘El et ‘Ašerah sont considérés comme les dieux suprêmes, dieu-père et déesse-mère. Ils ont créé tous les autres dieux, qui luttent entre eux pour la royauté et la suprématie. D'abord, le dieu Ba’al vainc Yam, le dieu du chaos et de la mer, afin d'établir l'ordre sur terre. Avant qu'il puisse revendiquer le premier rang parmi les dieux, ce qui lui vaudrait un palais, Ba’al est battu par Môt, le dieu de la mort. Après une période d'incertitude, Môt est battu lui aussi, cette fois-ci par la déesse ‘Anat, la soeur de Ba’al, qui réclame un palais pour son frère. Môt n'accepte pas et essaie de battre Ba’al encore une fois; les deux se livrent à perpétuité un combat sans issue. Ba’al et ‘Anat s'imposent comme représentants de la fertilité du pays et maintiennent la vie, malgré la menace constante de Môt, le représentant de la mort. 2 THE FERTILITY PAIR BA’AL AND ‘ANAT IN THE UGARITIC TEXTS INTRODUCTION The ambiguity between a polytheistic assembly of gods and a monotheistic god has always been at the centre of Ancient Near Eastern religious imagination and for a long time the Hebrew Bible was the only literary source existing. Since the beginning of the 20th century, excavations at Ugarit (Ras Shamra), Byblos, Hazor or Mari have shed a new light on the ancient oriental religions. The assembly of gods in the myths of the Northwest- Semitic people proved to be a complex system of gods and goddesses with each of them having their respective place and function. This system was based on a cosmic fertility cycle around the gods ‘El and Ba’al, the goddesses ‘Atirat (‘Ashera), ‘Anat and ‘Attart (‘Astart) and other gods like Môt, Yam or Kôtar. The following article examines the interaction between the deities during the Ba’al-cycle and attempts a theological interpretation. THE UGARITIC PANTHEON: TWO CONTRASTING INTERPRETATIONS Over the years, there have been many discussions and speculations about the relationships among these deities.2 Most of the interpretations were based on either one of the two different models presented below, explaining the divine interaction in the Ugaritic pantheon. One model was based on an internal conflict among the deities, while the second one sought to integrate the various gods and goddesses with their functions. Ulf Oldenburg3 assumed two divine families in the Ugaritic pantheon that are constantly battling each other over who will be the reigning royal family (Oldenburg 1969: 101-163, see also Table 1). The divine complex « ‘El and his family » (Oldenburg 1969: 15-45) is opposed to the system « Ba’al with his allies » (Ibid., 46-100). His argumentation is based on the fact that in some Ugaritic texts, Ba’al is not named as son of ‘El, but as son of Dagân, in his opinion a fertility god who found his way into the Sumero-Akkadian pantheon via the Amorites and Babylon. (Ibid., 46-48) According to Oldenburg, ‘El deserves the title of Supreme God of Ugarit (Ibid., 16) as universal creator and father of the original pantheon, though his physical weakness causes the other gods to rebel against him and Ba’al to contest his royal status. ‘El accepts this challenge to his leadership without much opposition. (Ibid., 23.25f.) After Ba_al's initial victory over Yam, ‘Atirat switches her allegiance to Ba’al’s camp and accepts him as the new King. Oldenburg claimed that in the end, ‘El tries one last time to regain his family’s leadership role: He succeeds in luring Ba’al into the fringes of the desert where Ba’al is killed by the devouring monsters in the burning heat. (Ibid., 141f. with reference to UM 75). With this in mind, Oldenburg separated Ba’al’s fight with Môt from the general conflict about the kingship and dated this incident into a later timeframe when ‘El has reconciled again with Ba’al. (Ibid., 142). Regarding the relationships among the gods and goddesses in Ba’al’s clan, some inconsistencies remain: Except for the presumption that ‘Anat is Ba’al’s sister and Ba’al is Dagân’s son, nothing more is said about the « genetic » origin of the allies ‘Anat, Špš and Kôtar than that they were of foreign origin. Oldenburg regarded ‘El’s overthrow by Ba’al as the beginning of a religious revolution during the second millennium B.C., which slowly advanced from Ugarit in the North to Canaan in the South, ending in the defeat of Ba’al by the Israelite YHWH, who was identified with the creator god ‘El (Ibid., 183f.). In cases of compromised textual material, Oldenburg in his argumentation often referred to Phoenician, Hittite and Greek mythology (Ibid., 122)4 where the respective father god is dethroned and emasculated as well.5 This influence might explain his dualistic view of the Ugaritic assembly of gods. Conrad E. L’Heureux was one of the first to refute the theory of a divided divine assembly (L'Heureux 1979: 4-28) and to establish Ba’al as a deity introduced by the Amorites. In his opinion, Ba’al represented a city society based on a royal system and he was in no way opposed to the more traditional pantheon which ‘El presided over. In fact, the city system complemented the more ancient divine assembly and was easily integrated into it (Ibid., 4. 104-107.). E. Theodore Mullen went a bit further in the ╔═══════╗ ┌───────┐ ┌────────┐ ║ ‘ El ╟──┬─┤’Atirat│ │ Dagân │ ╚═══════╝ │ └───────┘ └───┬────┘ ┌───────┼──────┐ against │ ┌──┴──┐ ┌──┴──┐ ┌─┴────┐ ╔════╧═══╗ ┌─────┐ │Yamm │ │ Môt │ │’Attar│ ║ Ba_al ╟─┤’Anat│ └─────┘ └─────┘ └──────┘ ╚════════╝ └─────┘ | | ┌──────┐ ┌─────┐ │ Špš │ │Kôtar│ └──────┘ └─────┘ Table 1: The Ugaritic assembly of gods according to U. Oldenburg 3 THE FERTILITY PAIR BA’AL AND ‘ANAT IN THE UGARITIC TEXTS same direction with his examination of the Ugaritic divine assembly. Based on his judgment that ‘El and Ba’al do neither oppose nor battle each other (Mullen 1980: 109f.), he advocated an integrative model of the Ugaritic divine assembly (Table 2), which will be the base for the following analysis. We will discuss each of the gods and goddesses in their respective interaction with the other deities of the pantheon as they appear as a part of the entire Ugaritic Ba’al- cycle (Ibid., 9-110). ----------- ┌───────┐ ┌──────┐ | Dagân6 | │’Atirat├───┬──┤ ‘El │ ----------- └───────┘ │ └──────┘ | │ | │ |┌──────┬────────┬────────┼───────┬─────────┬───────┐ |│ │ │ │ │ │ │ |│ │ │ │ │ │ │ |│ ┌──┴───┐ │ ┌──┴───┐ │ ┌───┴───┐ │ |│ │’Anat │ │ │ Môt │ │ │ Kôtar │ │ |│ └──────┘ │ └──────┘ │ └───────┘ │ ┌───┴────┐ ┌───┴───┐ ┌───┴────┐ ┌─────┴┐ │ Ba’al │ │ Yam │ │ _Attar │ │Šapšu │ └────────┘ └───────┘ └────────┘ └──────┘ Table 2: The Ugaritic assembly of gods according to E. T. Mullen ‘ATIRAT/’ASHERA AND ‘EL: THE GOD AND GODDESS OF CREATION In Ugarit, ‘Atirat and ‘El represent the supreme deities responsible for the entire creation. With the exception of Ba’al, every god and goddess of the pantheon is their descendant. There are slight differences between the two deities expressed in the titles that they were given. While ‘Atirat is worshipped explicitly as qaniyatu ‘ilīma (Mullen 1980: 18), bearer of gods, ‘El’s title is the more extensive baniyu binwati (Ibid., 13.), creator of all creation. He is considered the creator and as ‘abu banu ‘ili fathered all deities (Ibid., 15). As the supreme divine authority, he decrees the position and role of each of the other deities. Without his consent, neither the crowning of a king of all gods nor the construction of a palace could take place, which will be of some importance in the presumed conflict with Ba’al. ‘El stands above all other gods and goddesses. He remains the supreme instance concerning matters of other gods, even though ‘Anat's behavior towards him, concerning the question of the palace for Ba’al after his victory over Yam, was interpreted differently by some scholars to demonstrate ‘El’s weakness.7 The mythological origin of ‘El situates him in the transition from the ancient theogonical deities with divine pairs like Ουραvός (heaven = father) and Γη (earth = mother) to the cosmogonical deities who are themselves procreating other gods. According to the Phoenician mythology, Kronos (= ‘El) overcomes his father Uranos, emasculates him and attains thus the highest position of the divine hierarchy. Maybe those different character traits in the Phoenician und Ugaritic mythologies are suggesting a parallel development of the relationships of Kronos/Uranos and Ba’al/’El. The Phoenician Kronos is portrayed as very militaristic, while in Ugarit, he is enthroned almost apatheticly above the activities of the other deities (Mullen 1980: 32f.). Mullen counters here correctly that his wars belong to the myths of theogony-- the myths about the olden gods,...who stand behind the pantheon. ‘El does uploads/Litterature/ the-fertility-pair-ba-al-and-anat-in-the.pdf