Countries & Peoples

The Ammonites were the inhabitants of the kingdom of Ammon, situated to the east of Israel with Rabbath-Ammon as its capital. The Ammonites were related to the Israelites and their language was not so different to Hebrew. They came into conflict with the Israelites, which is why they do not have a good name in the Bible. In Genesis 19:30-38, for example, the story is told of their patriarch Benammi’s incestuous conception by Lot with one of his daughters.

In Greek mythology, Artemis is the goddess of the hunt and the moon, and the ruler over the wild animals. In Latin her name is Diana. Artemis is the daughter of Leto and the god Zeus. Her twin brother is Apollo.

Asherah is the name of a Canaanite goddess who was worshipped in a large part of the ancient Near East. In the Old Testament, the Hebrew word Asherah is also frequently used to refer to a wooden pole that represented the goddess.

Bel is another name for the god Marduk. He was the protector god of the city of Babylon.

Establishing covenants played an important part in the social and political life of the ancient Near East. Numerous texts of international treaties from the time of the Bible have been preserved. These covenants and treaties from the countries surrounding ancient Israel can shed more light on the meaning of the biblical covenant. The most important of these are:

Dagon was the most important god of the Philistines. He had a temple in Gaza and Ashdod (see Judges 16:23). The temple in Ashdod is understood to have existed until the second century BC (see 1 Maccabees 10:83-84).

In Greek religion Dike is the name of the goddess of justice. The goddess occurs in the Bible in Acts 28:4, where she is called “Fate”.

In Greek mythology the Dioscuri were two demigods, called Castor and Pollux. They were the sons of the supreme Greek god, Zeus.

Like most other religions of antiquity Greek religion was polytheistic: there were many different gods. Examples of Greek gods are Apollo, Artemis, Hermes and Zeus (the most important god in the pantheon). The gods were worshipped in various ways in various places. They came to life in stories (myths) that were passed down from generation to generation.

Hermes is the name of a Greek god, who was the son of Zeus and a half-brother of Apollo. He was viewed as a god who provided happiness and fertility. He was the patron of thieves and merchants and the god of eloquence. He was also the messenger of the gods.

The Mesha Stele is a commemorative stone inscribed by King Mesha of Moab. The stele was probably erected around 840 BC.

Various gods were worshipped in Mesopotamia, assembled in a council of the gods. People communicated with the gods by means of signs.

Moabites is the term for the inhabitants of the land of Moab. Their territory lay between the Rivers Arnon and Zered, in the west of present-day Jordan. They were closely related to the Israelites. Their language differed little from Hebrew and their conception of their tribal god Chemosh, is in some regards reminiscent of ancient Israelite religion.
Though they were brother peoples, the Moabites regularly came into conflict with the Israelites. That is why they have a poor reputation in the Bible. Genesis 19:30-38 tells us that their ancestor Moab was conceived by Lot with one of his daughters.

Nisroch is the name of a god mentioned in 2 Kings 19:37. There he is said to be the god of the Assyrian emperor Sennacherib. When Sennacherib goes to worship Nisroch in the god’s temple, he is murdered by his own sons.

In Jeremiah 7:18 and Jeremiah 44:17-18 we are told that the Judean women baked cakes and burned incense for “the Queen of Heaven”. They also presented wine offerings to her. This Queen of Heaven is probably a reference to the goddess Astarte.

Tammuz was the god of crops and harvest in the Mesopotamian religion. They believed that the god died when the plants withered and came back to life in the spring when the new green sprouted.

Every year, at the end of the summer, the death of Tammuz was commemorated in a mourning ceremony.

The Canaanites worshipped several gods, the most important of which were El, Baal, Anat, Astarte and Asherah.

The Northern Kingdom of Israel is the name given to the region belonging to the ten northerly tribes of Israel. The Northern Kingdom emerged after the reign of Solomon, around 926 BC. There were often tensions between the Northern Kingdom of Israel and the Southern Kingdom of Judah. In 722 BC, the Assyrians conquered the capital city of Samaria and brought to an end the Northern Kingdom.

The Southern Kingdom of Judah is the name for the region ruled over by the descendants of the kings, David and Solomon, from around 926 BC. Its capital city was Jerusalem. There were often tensions between the Southern Kingdom of Judah and the Northern Kingdom of Israel. In 586 BC, the Southern Kingdom collapsed. The Babylonians took over the capital, Jerusalem, and destroyed the Temple.