The Babylonian NERGAL, god of war, burning heat and pestilence, and ruler of Hades, the deity with whom was identified Saturn (and also Mars), should find a place in the pantheon. A seal from Taanach describes its owner as 'servant of Nergal' (p. [110]), and the king of Cyprus reports to Egypt the desolation caused by the god's hand. Even as late as the third century B.C. we hear of a Phoenician who was his high-priest. As a solar fire-god he had in the west the name Sharrab or Sharraph with which the familiar Seraph may be identified. The god El of later Phoenician myth (the Greek Kronos; Saturn) was depicted with six-wings like the Seraphim. He was the god to whom children were sacrificed, whence the story that he had set the example by killing his own. If infants had been slain to Sharrab in Palestine, this would be in harmony with Nergal's character, and it may be noticed that Nusku, who is sometimes associated with Nergal, was symbolised by a lamp (cp. above, p. [41]). In the Old Testament the grim rites belong to Molech (properly Melek), but there are independent reasons for the view that the latter was the proper-name of the Phoenician El.[[3]] However this may be, the name MELEK, although really an appellative ('king'), passes over into a true proper-name; but it is not clear whether this is the case in our period where we meet with the personal names 'servant of Melek' (or, the king), 'El is Melek,' etc.
[[1]] M.-J. Lagrange, Études sur les Rel. Sémitiques, p. 107 sq.
It is uncertain whether there is external evidence for the name YAHWEH (Jehovah), the national God of the Israelites. Unambiguous examples outside Palestine appear in North Syria in the eighth century in the form Yau (Yahu), which in one name interchanges with El. Cuneiform evidence for the name in the First Babylonian Dynasty has been adduced, and in the abbreviated Ya it possibly occurs in 'house of Ya,' a Palestinian town taken by Thutmose III. Further, in Akhi-yami (or, yawi), the author of a cuneiform tablet from Taanach, an identification with Akhiyah (the Biblical Ahijah) is not improbable, although other explanations are possible. While other writers salute Ishtar (or Astarte)-Washur, the governor of Taanach, with: May Addu, or may the gods preserve thy life, Ahijah (?) invokes 'the lord of the gods.' In the course of his letter he asks whether there is still lamentation for the lost cities or have they been recovered, and continues: 'there is over my head some one (who is) over the cities; see, now, whether he will do good with thee; further, if he shows anger, they will be confounded, and the victory will be mighty.' It is not clear whether these words refer to the divine Pharaoh or to a deity, the supreme god whom he invokes. If the latter view be correct, it is difficult to decide whether the reference be to the Sun-god, patronised by the ruling powers (whether Egyptian or Hittite), or the great Addu who would be quite in keeping with the allusions to war and victory. Some, however, would recognise a Providence, or, from their interpretation of the writer's name, Yahweh himself. But a single tablet has little evidential value and we can merely mention the possibilities.
The preceding paragraphs touch only the fringe of an important subject—the Palestinian pantheon in and after the Amarna age. Egyptian supremacy involved the recognition of Amon-Re, but it is difficult to determine to what extent this deity differed from the Palestinian Shamash. Excavations illustrate the result of intercourse, especially in the southern part of the land, but the numerous characteristic scarabs, and the representations of Osiris, Isis, Ptah, Sebek, Anubis, and the ever-popular Bes (with moulds), need have no significance for the gods of Palestine. They may not always be specifically Egyptian; Bes, for example, appears to be of non-Egyptian ancestry. Further, a number of the names in the Amarna letters are neither Egyptian nor Semitic, but of northern origin, and the name of the king of Jerusalem, 'servant of Khiba,' introduces a goddess of the earlier 'Hittite' peoples whose influence upon Palestine is to be inferred upon other grounds.[[4]]
[[4]] H. Winckler (Mittheil., No. 35), p. 48.
In Egypt, Babylonia and Assyria numerous deities of varying rank were venerated by the people. Bes, himself, in spite of his subordinate position in the pantheon was a favourite among all Egyptians outside the more elevated classes. The popular beings, like the popular religious ideas, are not to be found in royal inscriptions or temple-hymns. The state and the priesthood often refused to recognise them, but they are to be found not rarely among the personal names of ordinary individuals. This probably holds true also of Palestine, and consequently we must not suppose that the influence of foreigners upon the popular cults of the land is to be ignored or that the more honourable names which we have been noticing were the sole claimants to the worship of the peasantry.[[5]]
[[5]] Comp. M. Jastrow, Religion Babyloniens und Assyriens, i. p. 164 sq.; H. P. Smith, 'Theophorous Proper Names in the Old Testament,' in O. T. and Semitic Studies in memory of William Rainey Harper, i. pp. 35-64 (Chicago, 1908).