Solomon, seduced by his foreign wives, introduced the worship of Ashtaroth into Israel; but Jezebel, daughter of the king of Tyre, and wife to Ahab, principally established her worship. She caused altars to be erected to this idol in every part of Israel; and at one time four hundred priests attended the worship of Ashtaroth, 1 Kings xviii, 7.
ASHUR, the son of Shem, who gave his name to Assyria. It is believed that Ashur originally dwelt in the land of Shinar and about Babylonia, but that he was compelled by the usurper Nimrod to depart from thence, and settle higher toward the springs of the Tigris, in the province of Assyria, so called from him, where some think he built the famous city of Nineveh, and those of Rehoboth, Calah, and Resen, Gen. x, 11, 12.
ASIA, one of the four grand divisions of the earth. It is also used in a more restricted sense for Asia Minor, or Anatolia. In the New Testament it always signifies the Roman Proconsular Asia, in which the seven Apocalyptic churches were situated.
ASKELON, a city in the land of the Philistines, situated between Azoth and Gaza, upon the coast of the Mediterranean Sea, about 520 furlongs from Jerusalem. The tribe of Judah, after the death of Joshua, took the city of Askelon, Judges i, 18, being one of the five governments belonging to the Philistines. The place at present is in ruins.
ASMONÆANS, a name given to the Maccabees, the descendants of Mattathias. After the death of Ezra and Nehemiah, the Jews were governed by their high priest, in subjection, however, to the Persian kings, to whom they paid tribute; but with full enjoyment of their liberties, civil and religious. Nearly three centuries of prosperity ensued, until they were cruelly oppressed by Antiochus Epiphanes, king of Syria, when they were compelled to take up arms in their own defence. Under the able conduct of Judas, surnamed Maccabeus, and his valiant brothers, the Jews maintained a religious war for twenty-six years with five successive kings of Syria; and after destroying upwards of two hundred thousand of their best troops, the Maccabees finally established the independence of their own country, and the aggrandisement of their family. This illustrious house, whose princes united the regal and pontifical dignity in their own persons, administered the affairs of the Jews during a period of a hundred and twenty-six years; until, disputes arising between Hyrcanus II, and his brother Aristobulus, the latter was defeated by the Romans, who captured Jerusalem, and reduced Judea to a military province, B. C. 59.
ASNAPPER, the king of Assyria, who sent the Cutheans into the country belonging to the ten tribes, Ezra iv, 10. Many take this prince to be Shalmaneser; but others, with more probability, think him to be Esar-haddon.
ASP, פתן. Deut. xxxii, 33; Job xx, 14, 16; Psalm lviii, 4; xci, 13; Isaiah xi, 8. A very venomous serpent, whose poison is so subtle as to kill within a few hours with a universal gangrene. This may well refer to the bæten of the Arabians, which M. Forskal describes as spotted with black and white, about one foot in length, and nearly half an inch in thickness, oviparous, and whose bite is death. It is the aspic of the ancients, and is so called now by the literati of Cyprus, though the common people call it kufi, (κȣ́φη,) deaf. With the PETHEN we may connect the python of the Greeks, which was, according to fable, a huge serpent that had an oracle at mount Parnassus, famous for predicting future events. Apollo is said to have slain this serpent, and hence he was called “Pythius.” Those possessed with a spirit of divination were also styled Πυθωνες. The word occurs in Acts, xvi, 16, as the characteristic of a young woman who had a pythonic spirit. It is well known that the serpent was particularly employed by the Heathens in their enchantments and divinations. See [Serpent]].
Pethen, פתן, is variously translated in our version; but interpreters generally consider it as referring to the asp. Zophar alludes to it more than once in his description of a wicked man: “Yet his meat in his bowels is turned, it is the gall of asps within him. He shall suck the poison of asps: the viper’s tongue shall slay him.” The venom of asps is the most subtle of all; it is incurable; and, if the wounded part be not instantly amputated, it speedily terminates the existence of the sufferer. To these circumstances, Moses evidently alludes in his character of the Heathen: “Their wine is the poison of dragons, and the cruel venom of asps.” To tread upon the asp is attended with extreme danger; therefore, to express in the strongest manner the safety which the godly man enjoys under the protection of his heavenly Father, it is promised, that he shall tread with impunity upon these venomous creatures. No person of his own accord approaches the hole of these deadly reptiles; for he who gives them the smallest disturbance is in extreme danger of paying the forfeit of his rashness with his life. Hence, the Prophet Isaiah, predicting the conversion of the Gentiles to the faith of Christ, and the glorious reign of peace and truth in those regions which, prior to that period, were full of horrid cruelty, marvellously heightens the force of the whole description by declaring, “The sucking child shall play on the hole of the asp, and the weaned child shall put his hand on the cockatrice’ den. They shall not hurt nor destroy in all my holy mountain; for the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea.”
ASS, המור, Arabic, chamara and hamar. There are three words referred by translators to the ass: 1. המור, which is the usual appellation, and denotes the ordinary kind; such as is employed in labour, carriage, and domestic services. 2. פררא, rendered onager, or “wild ass.” 3. אהון, rendered she ass. To these we must add, ערדיא, rendered wild asses, Dan. v, 21. The prevailing colour of this animal in the east is reddish; and the Arabic word, chamara, signifies to be red.
In his natural state he is fleet, fierce, formidable, and intractable; but when domesticated, the most gentle of all animals, and assumes a patience and submission even more humble than his situation. Le Clerc observes, that the Israelites not being allowed to keep horses, the ass was not only made a beast of burden, but used on journeys; and that even the most honourable of the nation were wont to be mounted on asses, which in the eastern countries were much larger and more beautiful than they are with us. Jair of Gilead had thirty sons who rode on as many asses, and commanded in thirty cities, Judges x, 4. Abdon’s sons and grandsons rode also upon asses, Judges xii, 4. And Christ makes his solemn entry into Jerusalem riding upon an ass, Matt. xxi, 4; John xii, 14. To draw with an ox and ass together was prohibited in the Mosaic law, Deut. xxii, 10. This law is thought to have respect to some idolatrous custom of the Gentiles, who were taught to believe that their fields would be more fruitful if thus ploughed; for it is not likely that men would have yoked together two creatures so different in their tempers and motions, had they not been led to it by some superstition. There might be, however, a physical reason for this injunction. Two beasts of a different species cannot well associate together; and on this account never pull pleasantly either in the cart or plough, and are not therefore “true yoke fellows.” Le Clerc considers this law as merely symbolical, importing that we are not to form improper alliances in civil and religious life; and he thinks his opinion confirmed by these words of St. Paul, 2 Cor. vi, 14: “Be ye not unequally yoked with unbelievers;” which are simply to be understood as prohibiting all intercourse between Christians and idolaters, in social, matrimonial, and religious life. To teach the Jews the propriety of this, a variety of precepts relative to improper and heterogeneous mixtures were interspersed through their law; so that in civil and domestic life they might have them ever before their eyes.