[6] See Benzinger, Hebräische Archäologie, pp. 152, 297 foll. (1st ed.).
[7] The theory was opposed by Nöldeke, 1886 (Z.D.M.G. p. 157 foll.), as well as Wellhausen, and since then by Jacobs and Zapletal. (Der Totemismus u. die Religion Israels). See Stanley A. Cook, “Israel and Totemism,” in J.Q.R. (April, 1902).
[8] These sacred arks were carried in procession accompanied by symbolic figures. We note in this connexion the form of a sacred bark represented in Meyer’s Hist. of Egypt (Oncken series), p. 257, viz. the procession carrying the sacred ark and the bark of the god Amōn belonging to the reign of Rameses II. (Lepsius, Denkmäler, iii. 189b). See also Birch, Egypt (S.P.C.K.), p. 151 (ark of Khonsu); cf. Jeremias, Das A.T. im Lichte des alten Orients (2nd ed.), pp. 436-441.
[9] Cf. Zimmern in Z.D.M.G. (1904), pp. 199 foll., 458 foll. This view is based on Dr Pinches’s discovered list in which Sapatti is called the 15th day (Proc. of the Soc. of Biblical Arch., p. 51 foll.). See A. Jeremias, Das A. T. im Lichte des alten Orients (2nd ed.), pp. 182-187. Marti, in his stimulating work Religion des A.T., pp. 5, 72, advocates the exclusive reference of the word Sabbath to the full moon until the time of Ezekiel on the basis of Meinhold’s arguments in Sabbat u. Woche im A.T. The latter regards Ezekiel as the organizer of the Jewish community and the originator of the sanctity of the Sabbath as a seventh day (Ezek. xlvi. 1; cf. Ezek. xx. 12, 13, 16, 20, 24, xxii. 8, 26, xxiii. 38, in which the reproaches for the profanation or neglect of the Sabbath in no way sustain Meinhold’s view). In opposition to Meinhold, see Lotz in P.R.E. (3rd ed., art. “Sabbath,” vol. xvii. pp. 286-289). To this Meinhold replies in Z.A.T.W. (1909), p. 81 f. Cf. also Hehn, Siebenzahl und Sabbat. While admitting that a special significance may have been attached in pre-exilian times to the full-moon Sabbath, and that the latter may have been specially intended in the combination “new moon and Sabbath” in the 8th-century prophets (Hos. ii. 13; Amos viii. 5; Isa. i. 13), we are not prepared to deny that the institution of a seventh-day Sabbath was an ancient pre-exilian tradition. The sacredness of the number seven is based on the seven planetary deities to whom each day of the week was respectively dedicated, i.e. was astral in origin. Cf. C.O.T. i. 18 foll., and Winckler, Religionsgeschichtlicher u. geschichtlicher Orient, p. 39. See also K.A.T. (3rd ed.), pp. 620-626. In the Old Testament the sanctity of the number seven is clearly fundamental (e.g. in the Nif’al form nišba’, “to swear,” in the derivative subst. for “oath,” in Beēr-sheba’, &c.). The seventh day of rest was parallel to the seventh year of release and of the fallow field. It is, therefore, impossible to detach Ex. xxiii. 12 from Ex. xxi. 2. xxiii. 10 foll.; cf. Ex. xxxiv. 21. We therefore hold that the law of the seventh-day Sabbath goes back to the Mosaic age. The general coincidence of the Sabbath or seventh day with the easily recognized first quarter and full moon established its sacred character as lunar as well as planetary.
[10] The tablet is neo-Babylonian and published by Dr Pinches in the Transactions of the Victoria Institute, and is cited by Professor Fried. Delitzsch in the notes appended to his first lecture Babel u. Bibel (5th German ed., p. 81 ad fin. and p. 82). On this subject of Babylonian influence over Israel see Jeremias, Monotheistische Strömungen innerhalb der babylonischen Religion, and E. Baentsch, Altorientalischer u. israelitischer Monotheismus. The text and rendering of the passage are doubtful in the cuneiform letter discovered by Sellin in Ta’annek (biblical Ta’anach, near Megiddo) addressed by Aḥi-jawi (? Aḥijah) to Ishtar-wasur, in which the following remarkable phrases are read: “May the Lord of the gods protect thy life.... Above thy head is one who is above the towns. See now whether he will show thee good. When he reveals his face, then will they be put to shame and the victory will be complete.” The letter appears to belong to about 1400 B.C. See A. Jeremias, Das A.T. im Lichte des alten Orients (2nd ed.), pp. 315, 316, 323. Sellin, Ertrag der Ausgrabungen im Orient.
[11] The allusion in Amos ii. 7; Hos. iv. 13, 14 is sufficiently explicit; cf. Jer. ii. 20-23, iii. 6-11, v. 7, 8. The practice is prohibited in Deut. xxiii. 17.
[12] Column i. 15, 16, 42, 43, ii. 128, iii. 30, 31, iv. 47, 48, &c. Probably we should regard them as differentiated hypostases.
[13] Hence the ’Ashtārōth or offspring of flocks in Deut. vii. 13, xxviii. 18. A like function belonged to the Babylonian Ishtar. See “Descent of Ishtar to Hades,” Rev. lines 6-10, where universal non-intercourse of sexes follows Ishtar’s departure from earth to Hades.
[14] Proleg. Gesch. Israels (2nd ed.), p. 240 foll., cf. p. 258.
[15] Internat. Crit. Commentary, Judges, Introd. p. xxx., also p. 367 foll.