Second in rank to Ashur during the most glorious part of Assyrian history stands the great goddess Ishtar. That the Assyrian Ishtar is identical with the great goddess of the Babylonian pantheon is beyond reasonable doubt. She approaches closest to Nanâ,—the Ishtar of Erech; but just as we found the Babylonian Ishtar appearing under various names and forms, so there are no less than three Ishtars in Assyria, distinguished in the texts as Ishtar of Nineveh, Ishtar of Arbela, and Ishtar who presides over the temple known as Kidmuru and who for that reason is generally called 'the queen of Kidmuru.' The seat of the latter was in Nineveh, as was of course also the seat of Ishtar of Nineveh. The third Ishtar had her cult at Arbela,[245] a town lying to the east of Calah about midway between the upper and lower Zab. It is not easy to determine which of these three Ishtars is the oldest. The Assyrians themselves seem to have been aware of the Babylonian origin of Ishtar, for Tiglathpileser I. is at pains to emphasize that the temple he builds to Ishtar in his capital is dedicated to the 'Assyrian Ishtar.'[246] This being the oldest mention of Ishtar in Assyrian texts, we are perhaps warranted in concluding that the cult of the goddess was transferred with the seat of government to Nineveh. This would not necessarily make Ishtar of Nineveh the oldest of the three, but accounts for the higher rank that was accorded to her, as against the other two. Ishtar of Arbela and the queen of Kidmuru do not make their appearance so far as the historical texts are concerned till the time of Esarhaddon (681, B.C.)—a comparatively late date. Tiele[247] suggests that Arbela became the seat of a school of prophets in the service of Ishtar. The curious name of the place, the 'four-god' city, certainly speaks in favor of supposing Arbela to have been a great religious center, but until excavations shall have been conducted on the modern site of the town, the problems connected with the worship of Ishtar of Arbela cannot be solved. It is quite possible, if not probable, that the three Ishtars are each of independent origin. The 'queen of Kidmuru,' indeed, I venture to think, is the indigenous Ishtar of Nineveh, who is obliged to yield her place to the so-called 'Assyrian Ishtar' upon the transfer of the capitol of Assyria to Nineveh, and henceforth is known by one of her epithets to distinguish her from her formidable rival. The cult of Ishtar at Arbela is probably, too, of ancient date; but special circumstances that escape us appear to have led to a revival of interest in their cults during the period when Assyria reached the zenith of her power. The important point for us to bear in mind is that no essential distinctions between these three Ishtars were made by the Assyrians. Their traits and epithets are similar, and for all practical purposes we have only one Ishtar in the northern empire. Next to Ashur, or rather by the side of Ashur, Ishtar was invoked as the great goddess of battle and war. This trait, however, was not given to her by the Assyrians. Hammurabi views the goddess in this light,[248] and in the Izdubar or Gilgamesh epic, as already pointed out, she appears at times in the rôle of a violent destroyer. The warlike phase of the goddess's nature is largely accentuated in the Assyrian pantheon and dwelt upon to the exclusion of that softer and milder side which we have seen characterized her as 'the mother of mankind.' Her rôle as the goddess of war grows in prominence as the Assyrian rulers proceed in their triumphal careers. Ashurrishishi (c. 1150 B.C.) invokes her simply as the superior goddess, but for Tiglathpileser I. and from his days on, she is primarily the lady of war, who arranges the order of battle and encourages her favorites to fight. She appears in dreams at critical moments, and whispers words of cheer to King Ashurbanabal. When danger threatens, it is to her that the great king spreads his hands in prayer. She is not merely the goddess of the kings, but of the people as well. The latter are instructed to honor her. No deity approaches her in splendor. As Ashur rules the Igigi, so Ishtar is declared to be 'mighty over the Anunnaki.' Her commands are not to be opposed. Her appearance is that of a being clothed with fiery flames, and streams of fire are sent down by her upon the enemies of Ashurbanabal—a description that expresses admirably the conception formed by the Assyrians of a genuine goddess of war. Like Ashur, she is given a supreme rank among the gods. Shalmaneser II. calls her the first-born of heaven and earth, and for Tiglathpileser I., she is the first among the gods. Her milder attributes as the gracious mother of creation, the giver of plenty, and the hearer of the supplications of the sinner, so prominent in the religious literature,[249] are not dwelt upon in the historical texts. Still, an element of love also enters into the relationship with her subjects. Ashurnasirbal (885-860 B.C.) speaks of her as the lady who 'loves him and his priesthood.' Sennacherib similarly associates Ishtar with Ashur as the lover of his priesthood. As a goddess of war she is of course 'perfect in courage,' as Shalmaneser II. declares. Temples are erected to her in the city of Ashur, in Nineveh and Arbela. Ashurbanabal distinguishes carefully between the two Ishtars,—the one of Nineveh and the one of Arbela; and, strange enough, while terming Nineveh the favorite city of Ishtar, he seems to give the preference to Ishtar of Arbela. It is to the latter[250] that when hard pressed by the Elamites he addresses his prayer, calling her 'the lady of Arbela'; and it is this Ishtar who appears to the royal troops in a dream. The month of Ab—the fifth month of the Babylonian calendar—is sacred to Ishtar. Ashurbanabal proceeds to Arbela for the purpose of worshipping her during this sacred period. Something must have occurred during his reign, to bring the goddess of Arbela into such remarkable prominence, but even Ashurbanabal does not go so far as to place Ishtar of Arbela before Ishtar of Nineveh, when enumerating the gods of the pantheon. One point still remains to be mentioned before passing on. Ashurbanabal calls Ishtar—he is speaking of Ishtar of Nineveh—the wife of Bel.[251] Now Ishtar never appears in this capacity in the Babylonian inscriptions. If there is one goddess with whom she has nothing in common, it is Belit of Nippur. To account for this curious statement on the part of the Assyrian scribes, it is only necessary to bear in mind that the name Belit signifies 'lady,' and Ishtar is constantly spoken of as the Belit or lady of battle. Much the same train of thought that led to regarding Bel in the sense of 'lord,' merely as a title of Marduk, gave rise to the use of 'Belit,' as the title of the great 'lady' of the Assyrian pantheon.[252] From this it is but a small—but of course erroneous—step, to speak of Belit-Ishtar as the consort of Bel. Whether the error is due only to the scribe, or whether it actually made its way into the Assyrian system of theology, it is difficult to say. Probably the former; for the distinguishing feature of both the Babylonian and the Assyrian Ishtar is her independent position. Though at times brought into close association with Ashur, she is not regarded as the mere consort of any god—no mere reflection of a male deity, but ruling in her own right on a perfect par with the great gods of the pantheon. She is coequal in rank and dignity with Ashur. Her name becomes synonymous with goddess, as Marduk becomes the synonym for god. The female deities both native and foreign come to be regarded as so many forms of Ishtar. In a certain sense Ishtar is the only real goddess of the later Assyrian pantheon, the only one taking an active part in the religious and political life of the people. At the same time it is to be noted that by the side of the Assyrian Ishtar, the Babylonian Ishtar, especially the one associated with Erech (or Warka) is also worshipped by the monarchs of the north. Esarhaddon devotes himself to the improvement of the old temple at Erech, and Ashurbanabal prides himself upon having rescued out of the hands of the Elamites a statue of Ishtar or Nanâ of Erech that had been captured 1635 years previous.[253]
Anu.
Reference has already been made to the antiquity of the Anu cult in Assyria, and that prior to the time that the city of Ashur assumes the rôle of mistress of the northern district, Anu stood at the head of the pantheon, just as theoretically he continued to occupy this place in the pantheon of the south. What is especially important, he had a temple in the very city of Ashur, whose patron god succeeded in usurping the place of the old 'god of heaven.' The character of Anu in the north differs in no way from the traits assigned to him in the south. He is the king of the Igigi and Anunnaki, that is, of all the heavenly and earthly spirits, and he is this by virtue of being the supreme god of heaven. His cult, however, appears to have suffered through the overshadowing supremacy of Ashur. Even in his old temple at Ashur, which Tiglathpileser I. on the occasion of his rebuilding it, tells us was founded 641 years before this restoration,[254] he is no longer accorded sole homage. Ramman, the god of thunder and of storms, because correlated to Anu, is placed by the side of the latter and permitted to share the honors with Anu.[255] Anu survives in the Assyrian as in the Babylonian pantheon by virtue of being a member of the theological triad, composed as we have seen of Anu, Bel, and Ea. Tiglathpileser I. still invokes Anu as a deity of practical importance. He associates him with Ramman and Ishtar as the great gods of the city of Ashur or with Ramman alone, but beyond an incidental mention by Ashurnasirbal, who in a long list of gods at the beginning of his annals emphasizes the fact of his being the favorite of Anu, he appears only in combination with Bel and Ea. The same degree of reverence, however, was shown to the old triad in Assyria as in Babylonia. The three gods are asked not to listen to the prayers of the one who destroys the monuments set up by the kings. Sargon tells us that it is Anu, Bel, and Ea who fix the names of the months,[256] and this same king when he comes to assign names to the eight gates of his great palace, does not forget to include Anu in the list of deities,[257] describing him as the god who blesses his handiwork.
Dagan.
Coequal in antiquity with the cult of Anu in Assyria is that of Dagan. Although occurring in Babylonia as early as the days of Hammurabi, and indeed earlier,[258] it would appear that his worship was imported from the north into the south.[259] At all events, it is in the north that the cult of Dagan rises to prominence. The name of the god appears as an element in the name of Ishme-Dagan (the father of Samsi-Ramman II.),[260] whose date may be fixed at the close of the nineteenth century B.C. The form Dagan is interesting as being almost identical with the name of the chief god of the Philistines, Dagon,[261] who is mentioned in the Book of Judges. The resemblance can hardly be entirely accidental. From other sources we know that Dagan was worshipped in Palestine as early as the fourteenth or fifteenth century, and the form Dagan, if derived from Dag, contains an afformative element which stamps the word as non-Assyrian. The proposition has much in its favor which regards Dagan as a god whose worship was introduced into Assyria at a very early period through the influence of Aramaean hordes, who continue throughout Assyrian history to skirt the eastern shores of the Tigris. Once introduced, however, into Assyria, Dagan assumes a different form from the one that he receives among the Philistines. To the latter he is the god of agriculture, while in Assyria he rises to the rank of second in the pantheon, and becomes the associate of Anu. The latter's dominion being the heavens, Dagan is conceived as the god of earth. Hence, there results the fusion with the Babylonian Bel, which has already been noted,[262] and it is due to this fusion that Dagan disappears almost entirely from the Assyrian pantheon. Ashurnasirbal invokes Dagan with Anu. Two centuries later, Sargon, whose scribes, as Jensen has noticed, manifest an 'archaeological' fondness for the earlier deities, repeats the phrase of Ashurnasirbal, and also calls his subjects 'troops of Anu and Dagan'; but it is important to observe that he does not include Dagan among the deities in whose honor he assigns names to the gates of his palace. We may, therefore, fix upon the ninth century as the terminus for the Dagan cult in Assyria. Proper names compounded with Dagan do not occur after the days of Ashurnasirbal.[263]
Shamash.
Besides the testimony furnished by the name of the king, Samsi-Ramman, we have a proof for the antiquity of the Shamash cult in Assyria in the express statement of Pudilu (c. 1350 B.C.) that he built a temple to the sun-god in the city of Ashur. He calls Shamash the 'protecting deity,' but the protection vouchsafed by Shamash is to be understood in a peculiar sense. Shamash does not work by caprice. He is, as we have seen, preëminently a god of justice, whose favors are bestowed in accordance with unchangeable principles. So far as Assyria is concerned, the conceptions regarding Shamash reach a higher ethical level than those connected with any other deity. Ashur and Ishtar are partial to Assyria, and uphold her rulers at any cost, but the favors of Shamash are bestowed upon the kings because of their righteousness, or, what is the same thing, because of their claim to being righteous. For Tiglathpileser I., great and ruthless warrior as he is, Shamash is the judge of heaven and earth, who sees the wickedness of the king's enemies, and shatters them because of their guilt. When the king mercifully sets certain captives free, it is in the presence of Shamash that he performs this act. It is, therefore, as the advocate of the righteous cause that Tiglathpileser claims to have received the glorious sceptre at the hands of Shamash; and so also for the successors of Tiglathpileser, down to the days of Sargon, Shamash is above all and first of all the judge, both of men and of the gods. There is, of course, nothing new in this view of Shamash, which is precisely the one developed in Babylonia; but in Assyria, perhaps for the reason that in Shamash is concentrated almost all of the ethical instinct of the northern people, the judicial traits of Shamash appear to be even more strongly emphasized. Especially in the days of Ashurnasirbal and Shalmaneser II.—the ninth century—does the sun-cult receive great prominence. These kings call themselves the sun of the world. The phrase,[264] indeed, has so distinctly an Egyptian flavor, that, in connection with other considerations, it seems quite plausible to assume that the influence of Egyptian reverence for Ra had much to do with the popularity of the sun-cult about this time. Shalmaneser bestows numerous epithets upon Shamash. He is the guide of everything, the messenger of the gods, the hero, the judge of the world who guides mankind aright, and, what is most significant, the lord of law. The word used for law, têrtu, is identical with the Hebrew term torâ that is used to designate the Pentateuchal legislation. No better testimony could be desired to show the nature of the conceptions that must have been current of Shamash. Sargon, again, who is fond of emphasizing the just principles that inspire his acts, goes to the length of building a sanctuary[265] for Shamash far beyond the northern limits of Assyria. But the kings, in thus placing themselves under the protection of the great judge, were not oblivious to the fact that this protection was particularly desired on the battlefield. War being uppermost in their thoughts, the other side of Shamash's nature—his power and violence—was not overlooked. Tiglathpileser invokes him also as the warrior,—a title that is often given to Shamash in the religious literature. There can be little doubt that a nation of warriors whose chief deities were gods of war, was attracted to Shamash not merely because he was the judge of all things, but also, and in a large degree, because he possessed some of the traits that distinguished Ashur and Ishtar.
Ramman.
The association of Ramman with Shamash in the name of the old ruler of Assyria, Samsi-Ramman, is not accidental or due to mere caprice. Only such deities are combined in proper names that are, or may be, correlated to one another. Ramman, as the god of storms, is naturally viewed as a power complementary to the great orb of light.[266] The two in combination, viewed as the beneficent and the destructive power, constitute the most powerful elements of nature, whose good will it was most important, especially for a nation of warriors, to secure. Some such thought surely underlies this association of Shamash with Ramman. The Assyrian Ramman differs in no way from the Ramman of Babylonia, but he is much more popular in the north than in the south. The popularity of the god is but a reflection of the delight that the Assyrians took in military pursuits. Ramman is hardly anything more than another Ashur. Tiglathpileser I., who once calls the god Mar-tu, i.e., "the West god,"[267] has left us an admirable description of him. He is the hero who floods the lands and houses of the country's enemies. The approach of the Assyrian troops is compared to an onslaught of Ramman. His curses are the most dreadful that can befall a nation or an individual, for his instruments of destruction are lightning, hunger, and death. Reference has several times been made to the manner in which Tiglathpileser honors Ramman by making him a partner of Anu in the great temple of the latter at Ashur. But the successors of Tiglathpileser are no less zealous in their reverence for Ramman. It is to Ramman that the kings offer sacrifices during the campaign, and when they wish to depict in the strongest terms the destruction that follows in the wake of an onslaught of the Assyrian troops, they declare that they swept over everything like Ramman. It is natural, in view of this, that Ramman should have been to the Assyrians also the 'mightiest of the gods.'[268] Through the Assyrian inscriptions we learn something of the consort of Ramman.