under every green tree: popular religion in sixth-century judahby susan ackerman

Under Every Green Tree: Popular Religion in Sixth-Century Judah by Susan AckermanReview by: Mordechai CoganJournal of the American Oriental Society, Vol. 115, No. 2 (Apr. - Jun., 1995), pp. 315-317Published by: American Oriental SocietyStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/604688 .

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Reviews of Books Reviews of Books Reviews of Books

A more important adverse criticism, however, is that, like all who write on Achaemenid history (including me), Wallinga plays the same old game: he tears the sources apart and then

puts them back together again in support of his argument. Few in this field have yet really faced the issue that, much of the

time, we just do not know what happened because the sources are corrupt beyond salvation. I suspect, however, that we will

go on playing this game. If others do it as challengingly, as

provocatively, and as profitably as Wallinga, then perhaps it is worth playing after all.











T. CUYLER YOUNG, JR. T. CUYLER YOUNG, JR. T. CUYLER YOUNG, JR.

ROYAL ONTARIO MUSEUM ROYAL ONTARIO MUSEUM ROYAL ONTARIO MUSEUM

Cult and Ritual in the Ancient Near East. Edited by H. I. H. PRINCE TAKAHITO MIKASA. Bulletin of the Middle Eastern Culture Center in Japan, vol. VI. Wiesbaden: OTTo HARRAS- SOWITZ, 1992. Pp. vii + 158. DM 68.

This slim volume is a collection of seven articles on cult and

religion in ancient Ugarit, Israel, Assyria, Babylonia, Egypt, and Anatolia. The volume displays no unity of interest or ap- proach. Two of the contributions do not even relate to cult and ritual, and one is only marginally relevant.

Matahisa Koitabashi presents a very brief survey of cultic music at Ugarit and in the Hebrew Bible, emphasizing the im-

portance of cymbals for calling attention to the deity, announc-

ing the beginning of singing, and keeping time in military marches. The article sets about to explain why in KTU 1.3 only cymbals are mentioned, but no solution to this particular diffi-

culty is reached. Eiko Matsushima edits and discusses ten Neo-Babylonian

administrative texts dated from 566-538 B.C.E. mentioning the

elippu sa kusitu, "vestment boat" or simply the divine kusitu. He shows that this boat transported divine clothing from Eanna in Uruk to other temples, and that on occasion it was used to

carry various other cult related commodities such as oil to Eanna.

Tsugio Mikami and Sachihiro Omura offer a preliminary report from the second season of Japanese excavations at

Kaman-Kalehoyok. The dig has shown thus far an Islamic level and a Phrygian level ending in the fourth century B.C.E. It is suggested that these two levels can be expected to be found

throughout the rest of the site as well. Karol Mysliwiec examines two Egyptian royal statues and

dates them on artistic grounds to the Early Ptolemaic period. These items are said to illustrate the process leading to the emergence of a specific Early Ptolemaic artistic "koine" which





























combined very old, pharaonic features with more modernistic elements.

Chikako Watanabe studies a well-known Assyrian relief

showing Ashurbanipal pouring out a libation in front of some slain lions. An unusual arrangement of ritual implements (divine symbol, offering table, censer), as well as the fact that in both the relief and the accompanying inscription there are no

gods, lead to the conclusion that what is depicted is not a reli-

gious ritual per se but a demonstration of Ashurbanipal's priest- hood and kingship.

Ze'ev Weisman discusses the proposed amphictyony model for pre-monarchic Israel. He points out that the Biblical texts

relating to this period do not support the existence of such an institution in its classical form. The only real reflection of an

amphictyonic system is in the Priestly source's depiction of the desert camp.

Daisuke Yoshida concludes the volume with an edition of two

manuscripts of the first tablet of the Hittite AN.TAIJ.SUMSAR festival. A discussion of several lists of gods shows that the ritual goes back to the Old Hittite Period. The texts are no longer linguistically Old Hittite because of their prolonged use in the cult, but the pantheon remains genuine Old Hittite. Text A is older than B, and sign forms place both in the fifteenth century B.C.E. Unfortunately, there is no discussion of the ritual itself.

Most of the articles in this collection have their own intrinsic value, especially those which publish new textual and archae-

ological material. The combination, under one cover, of studies of textual, artistic, and archaeological data is an accurate indi- cation of what types of evidence must be adduced and analyzed for a meaningful reconstruction of ancient religious practice. Nonetheless, most of the issues discussed are minutiae, and, as a volume on cult and ritual, this book merely whets the appetite.

























VICTOR AVIGDOR HUROWITZ

BEN GURION UNIVERSITY OF THE NEGEV





Under Every Green Tree: Popular Religion in Sixth-Century Judah. By SUSAN ACKERMAN. Harvard Semitic Monographs 46. Atlanta: SCHOLARS PRESS, 1992. Pp. xiv + 272.

In this revised Harvard dissertation, the author sets out to

study the cultic practices of those people in Judah she describes as "losers," who, though they may have been in the majority, were condemned by the Deuteronomists, the priests, and the

prophets whose writings were canonized in the Hebrew Bible. Since the non-Yahwistic cults these Judahites practiced were not eradicated by the Josianic reforms, it is erroneous to speak of a reversion into idolatry during the quarter century before the Babylonian conquest (the claims of the Deuteronomists









315 315 315



Journal of the American Oriental Society 115.2 (1995)

notwithstanding); rather, such popular ritual continued una-

bated, surviving even the destruction of 586 B.C.E. Ackerman

recognizes that the reports we have are polemical, but she pro- ceeds with her attempt to read them "with a non-judgmental eye" (p. 3).

Four texts are chosen for investigation: Jer. 7 and 44, Ezek 8, Isa. 57, and Isa. 65:1-7. Each text is treated to a full and thor-

ough analysis: text critical, philological, and analysis of its place in the "history of religion." Epigraphic and archaeological finds are frequently called upon to elucidate elusive items. Through- out, Ackerman exhibits a broad acquaintance with scholarly opinions, as the lengthy bibliography (thirty-six pages!) testifies.

First to be studied is the cult of the "Queen of Heaven" (Jer. 7 and 44), whose fertility and war-like aspects are notable and who was worshiped by the offering of cakes. The identifica- tions of the Queen with Sapsu or Anat are rejected; preferred is one which points to a syncretistic deity who "incorporates aspects of west Semitic Astarte and east Semitic Istar" (p. 34).

Next to be analyzed is Ezek. 8, a text describing four rituals observed in the Jerusalem Temple, which were not related to a

single festival or cultic celebration. The prophet beholds first an "image of jealousy," i.e., an image of Asherah (following the gloss in 2 Chron. 33:7 of 2 Kings 21:7), identified as a styl- ized tree, often planted near an altar. As we now learn from the

Ajrud inscriptions, Asherah was associated in the popular mind with Yahweh. Next, he beholds a ritual banquet, attended by seventy elders led by the aristocrat Jaazaniah, during which "unclean food" (seqes) was partaken, held in a room decorated with idol-like wall reliefs. It is suggested that this "private, per-

haps even secret" activity (p. 69) was a meeting of a marzeah

association, which, under certain circumstances, was an accept- able part of the social life of ancient Israel. In this instance,

apparently, an alien god was being worshiped. Third, the

prophet beholds the wailing for Tammuz, a ritual act well

known in Mesopotamian myth and cult and adopted by wor-

shipers of the Queen of Heaven, Istar-Astarte, who, according to myth, mourned for her dead lover, Tammuz. This rite was

not necessarily new to Canaan/Israel; it may have penetrated into west Semitic areas as early as the second millennium

B.C.E., where it would easily have been assimilated because of

indigenous traditions concerning a dying fertility god. Fourth, a group of men bowing to the sun, with their backs to the

Temple, is taken by Ezekiel as a sign of rejection of Yahweh. The third text, Isa. 57, is dated to the sixth century B.C.E. and

taken to reflect accurately, despite the prophetic polemic, a va-

riety of cults long honored in Judah, including: (1) child sac-

rifice, considered "a legitimate expression" (p. 137) of faith in

certain Yahwistic circles (the infamous Molech cult is under-

stood as a "sacrificial offering" (p. 137), following 0. Eiss-

feldt's classic treatment, Molk als Opferbegriff im Punischen

und Hebraischen und das Ende des Gottes Moloch [Halle: Max

Niemeyer, 1935]; (2) feeding the dead and the practice of nec-

romancy; and (3) various fertility cults. The last text studied, Isa. 65:1-7, is dated to the period of

Temple rebuilding, between 535-520 B.C.E. Here, the popular cults include: (1) burning incense on bricks, illustrated by ref- erence to the Lachish incense altar, which bears the name of the

object Ibnt, "incense altar": such offerings, presented in groves and gardens, had their place in the fertility cult of Asherah, Yahweh's consort; (2) incubation dreams: while known from

legitimate Yahwistic contexts (e.g., where Jacob and Solomon are the dreamers), they are here condemned because of their closeness to necromancy; and (3) eating swine's flesh, in oppo- sition to the restrictions of the dietary laws of holiness.

From these various witnesses, Ackerman concludes that the

efficacy of the Josianic reforms as claimed by the Deuterono- mists is pure fabrication; they had, at most, a limited and only temporary effect. Nor was the Exile the purificatory agent some scholars claim. The cults condemned by Biblical writers were seen by their practitioners as part and parcel of Yahwism, which, to their thinking, was capable of encompassing many more cultic practices than allowed by the rigorists. A plea is

entered that the popular religion of the majority (who stayed in

the land and did not go through the exilic experience) be given its proper place in the histories of Israelite religion.

Ackerman's conclusions concerning the state of cult and re-

ligion in sixth-century Judah hinge upon important historical

interpretations which go beyond her treatment of a verse here

and there or a suggested identification of a particular god or rit-

ual. Some of these seem reasonable; others less so, having been

arrived at by employing more than a little acrobatics; see, for

example, the allusion to "sacred sexual intercourse" uncovered in Isa. 57:5 (pp. 152ff.). These issues deserve more than the

summary treatment given. The following brief remarks are

representative of the points which should be addressed in any

follow-up study. There is a problem with the term "popular religion" as used

in this work. Lumped together under this rubric are rituals which

were practiced within the Temple precinct and may have been

part of some official cult (e.g., Ezek. 8) and rituals which seem

to have had a domestic setting (Jer. 44). Certainly beyond the

popular realm is the "image of jealousy" which, if it is the

Asherah figure set up by Manasseh, enjoyed royal sponsorship in

the national shrine. Furthermore, one is constantly nagged by the

question: How reliable can a report by a visionary such as Ezekiel

be? Can we recover what the masses practiced from his phantas- magoria, much less what they believed? If the Sitz im Leben of

the prophetic texts is theodicy, as may well be the case, how can

we know what was actually going on "under every green tree"?

(Cf. the cogent remarks of M. Greenberg, "Prolegomenon," in

C. C. Torrey, Pseudo-Ezekiel and the Original Prophecy, and

Critical Articles [New York: Ktav, 1970], xviii-xxix.)

316



Reviews of Books Reviews of Books

The issue of the population makeup of Judah during Baby- lonian rule must also be reassessed. While the recorded number of deportees does not suggest a complete emptying out of the

countryside (see I. Ephcal, "Babylonian Exile," in The Resto- ration: The Persian Period, ed. H. Tadmor, World History of the Jewish People [Tel-Aviv: Am Oved, 1983], 17-18 [He- brew]), the loss of population due to war and the consequent flight of refugees to safe havens, taken together with the influx of squatters/settlers (especially in the Hebron hills and northern

Negev), does make for a mixture of peoples in Judah. Their number is much disputed, and their cultic life was most natu-

rally at odds with the one followed by the returnees from Baby- lon. Some of the local residents, with stated foreign pedigrees, claimed rights within the renewed cult of Yahweh (Ezra 4:1-

2), and the Second (Third?) Isaiah held out a welcoming hand to those foreigners who "attach themselves to Yahweh" (Isa. 56). Might these newcomers have been one of the sources and

support of the alien cults this prophet so decried?

Considering the many open questions concerning the end of the monarchic period in Judah and the Exile, a neutral title, without the word "popular," might have been a better choice for this challenging investigation.

MORDECHAI COGAN

THE HEBREW UNIVERSITY

Early History of the Israelite People from the Written and Ar-

chaeological Sources. By THOMAS L. THOMPSON. Studies in the History of the Ancient Near East, vol. 4. Leiden: E. J. BRILL, 1992. Pp. ix + 489. HF1 215, $122.86.

When T. L. Thompson's first work appeared in 1974, it sounded quite revolutionary, and as such did not go unchal-

lenged. It was also noteworthy that he was an American and was trained in America, but who spent time in Germany, where his first work was fashioned. Since then, he has published several other works. One of these, The Origin Tradition of Ancient Israel, vol. 1 (Sheffield: JSOT Press, 1987), promised a sequel which did not appear. Could the volume under review be what we are waiting for?

The problem posed by the author since 1974 is a simple one. The Hebrew Bible is not only a book of religion and faith, as it has been for millennia in the Synagogue and the Church; it is part, as has been well known for over a century, of the lit- erature of the ancient Near East. As such it attempts to convey information which is relevant on both the historiographical and the historico-religious levels. But is it reliable? The author's an-

The issue of the population makeup of Judah during Baby- lonian rule must also be reassessed. While the recorded number of deportees does not suggest a complete emptying out of the

countryside (see I. Ephcal, "Babylonian Exile," in The Resto- ration: The Persian Period, ed. H. Tadmor, World History of the Jewish People [Tel-Aviv: Am Oved, 1983], 17-18 [He- brew]), the loss of population due to war and the consequent flight of refugees to safe havens, taken together with the influx of squatters/settlers (especially in the Hebron hills and northern

Negev), does make for a mixture of peoples in Judah. Their number is much disputed, and their cultic life was most natu-

rally at odds with the one followed by the returnees from Baby- lon. Some of the local residents, with stated foreign pedigrees, claimed rights within the renewed cult of Yahweh (Ezra 4:1-

2), and the Second (Third?) Isaiah held out a welcoming hand to those foreigners who "attach themselves to Yahweh" (Isa. 56). Might these newcomers have been one of the sources and

support of the alien cults this prophet so decried?

Considering the many open questions concerning the end of the monarchic period in Judah and the Exile, a neutral title, without the word "popular," might have been a better choice for this challenging investigation.

MORDECHAI COGAN

THE HEBREW UNIVERSITY

Early History of the Israelite People from the Written and Ar-

chaeological Sources. By THOMAS L. THOMPSON. Studies in the History of the Ancient Near East, vol. 4. Leiden: E. J. BRILL, 1992. Pp. ix + 489. HF1 215, $122.86.

When T. L. Thompson's first work appeared in 1974, it sounded quite revolutionary, and as such did not go unchal-

lenged. It was also noteworthy that he was an American and was trained in America, but who spent time in Germany, where his first work was fashioned. Since then, he has published several other works. One of these, The Origin Tradition of Ancient Israel, vol. 1 (Sheffield: JSOT Press, 1987), promised a sequel which did not appear. Could the volume under review be what we are waiting for?

The problem posed by the author since 1974 is a simple one. The Hebrew Bible is not only a book of religion and faith, as it has been for millennia in the Synagogue and the Church; it is part, as has been well known for over a century, of the lit- erature of the ancient Near East. As such it attempts to convey information which is relevant on both the historiographical and the historico-religious levels. But is it reliable? The author's an-

swer to this question has been, as is well known, negative, and several alleged parallels with ancient Near Eastern texts and institutions have been severely criticized by him. The present reviewer can only agree with him. The biblical text is for me as well a theological (i.e., ideological) product of post-exilic Ju- daism. Its greatest historical value lies in communicating what learned people in those times thought about the nation's pre- history and ancient history. Less charitably put, it represents an

ideological reconstruction of the past, especially of the prehis- tory of the nation, in order to legitimize current institutions.

The work shows, using both archaeological and literary sources, that Israel's origins (the reviewer would rather say: "the

origins of Israel and Judah," but see the author at pp. 401ff.) as described by the Hebrew Bible, oriental sources, and Josephus, must be seen as having taken place in a completely different, although not easily identifiable way.

Thompson joins those who have been arguing in recent

years that the "J" source of the Pentateuch must be late, not much earlier than Ezekiel and Second Isaiah (p. 95); he recognizes explicitly the ideological character of biblical histori-

ography (pp. 116ff.). He follows N. P. Lemche in stating that there is nothing specifically "Canaanite" about the Late Bronze

Age nor specifically "Israelite" in the following Early Iron

Age, rightly criticizing at the same time those (myself in- cluded) who have argued that the history of Israel can only be-

gin with David's monarchy (pp. 133-34, 163ff., 312ff.). (But I

hope I have made my argument clearer in the second edition of A History of Ancient Israel from the Beginnings to the Bar Kochba Revolt, A.D. 135 [London: SCM Press, 1993].) This

proposal needs to be checked also against its "falsifiability": the contention that archaeology can offer a new picture of the Israelite settlement is of course true, but not as a confirmation of the Biblical texts (pp. 158ff.), rather only the opposite!

Furthermore, it is important that pottery from the Upper Galilee is to be associated with Phoenicia rather than with Samaria or Judaea (pp. 243-44). The arrival and the presence of the Philistines in Palestine is independent of and has no cor- relation with their pottery (pp. 266-67). Nor can any continuity be established between the "Israel" mentioned by Merneptah at the end of the thirteenth century B.C.E. and the state of Samaria at the end of the ninth (pp. 306-7). On sedentarization, the author argues (pp. 327ff.) convincingly that the problem is ex-

tremely complex and defies simplistic solutions, and that a slow transition from pastoralism and steppe nomadism to village ag- riculture took centuries to be completed.

Of interest are his descriptions of the reign of Nabonidus (pp. 349ff.) and of the Persian period, in which context he treats the Biblical traditions of the return from the Exile by the decree of Cyrus, by order of YHWH, as an adequate illustration of the Persian policy towards new subjects. The historicity of the law code promulgated by Ezra seems to Thompson historically

swer to this question has been, as is well known, negative, and several alleged parallels with ancient Near Eastern texts and institutions have been severely criticized by him. The present reviewer can only agree with him. The biblical text is for me as well a theological (i.e., ideological) product of post-exilic Ju- daism. Its greatest historical value lies in communicating what learned people in those times thought about the nation's pre- history and ancient history. Less charitably put, it represents an

ideological reconstruction of the past, especially of the prehis- tory of the nation, in order to legitimize current institutions.

The work shows, using both archaeological and literary sources, that Israel's origins (the reviewer would rather say: "the

origins of Israel and Judah," but see the author at pp. 401ff.) as described by the Hebrew Bible, oriental sources, and Josephus, must be seen as having taken place in a completely different, although not easily identifiable way.

Thompson joins those who have been arguing in recent

years that the "J" source of the Pentateuch must be late, not much earlier than Ezekiel and Second Isaiah (p. 95); he recognizes explicitly the ideological character of biblical histori-

ography (pp. 116ff.). He follows N. P. Lemche in stating that there is nothing specifically "Canaanite" about the Late Bronze

Age nor specifically "Israelite" in the following Early Iron

Age, rightly criticizing at the same time those (myself in- cluded) who have argued that the history of Israel can only be-

gin with David's monarchy (pp. 133-34, 163ff., 312ff.). (But I

hope I have made my argument clearer in the second edition of A History of Ancient Israel from the Beginnings to the Bar Kochba Revolt, A.D. 135 [London: SCM Press, 1993].) This

proposal needs to be checked also against its "falsifiability": the contention that archaeology can offer a new picture of the Israelite settlement is of course true, but not as a confirmation of the Biblical texts (pp. 158ff.), rather only the opposite!

Furthermore, it is important that pottery from the Upper Galilee is to be associated with Phoenicia rather than with Samaria or Judaea (pp. 243-44). The arrival and the presence of the Philistines in Palestine is independent of and has no cor- relation with their pottery (pp. 266-67). Nor can any continuity be established between the "Israel" mentioned by Merneptah at the end of the thirteenth century B.C.E. and the state of Samaria at the end of the ninth (pp. 306-7). On sedentarization, the author argues (pp. 327ff.) convincingly that the problem is ex-

tremely complex and defies simplistic solutions, and that a slow transition from pastoralism and steppe nomadism to village ag- riculture took centuries to be completed.

Of interest are his descriptions of the reign of Nabonidus (pp. 349ff.) and of the Persian period, in which context he treats the Biblical traditions of the return from the Exile by the decree of Cyrus, by order of YHWH, as an adequate illustration of the Persian policy towards new subjects. The historicity of the law code promulgated by Ezra seems to Thompson historically

317 317



under every green tree: popular religion in sixth-century judahby susan ackerman

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