Jehovah's Witnesses worship a pagan god derived from the ancient Canaanite civilization

by Finkelstein 35 Replies latest watchtower beliefs

• 

  smiddy3

  And according to the "Aid Book" published by Jehovah`s Witnesses they admit that the name Jehovah is not an accurate translation of his name but it is the most popular/common name in use in the world .( Satan`s world mind you ) ?

  And who in this world would be the people most likely to be using a name of God ? Why Christendom of course whether they be preachers Clergy Bible Scholars ,Biblical researchers etc.

  ,However they, in the world that are using that name Jehovah all belong in one form or another to Christendoms religions who Jehovah`s Witnesses have branded as apostates .? of the Christian faith.

  So how is it that Jehovah`s Witnesses adopt for God a name that is invented and sanctioned by Apostate Christendom in the thirteenth Century namely Jehovah ?
• 

  Whynot

  Thanks Cobweb!

  Smiddy3, in the 9th JW broadcasting they also openly admitted to the innacurate pronunciation of Jehovah. It's very embarassing lol
• 

  Finkelstein

  They admitted that Jehovah is not an accurate pronunciation of the ancient Hebrew god but more as matter of significance is that the Hebrew god came out of a polytheistic pagan civilization (El), a break away sect out of that civilization.

  But wait there were a whole different civilization that existed even before the Canaanites that had a whole different set of gods in which they worshiped.

  Makes it a difficult and interesting task to established what god came first before all the others doesn't it ?
  
• 

  Finkelstein

  Some little more information about how the ancient Hebrews (Israelites) were really practicing Canaanites before they converted to monotheism with EL or Yahweh .

  From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

  Jump to navigation Jump to search

  

  The land of Canaan, which comprises the modern regions of Israel, Palestine, Lebanon, Jordan and Syria. At the time when Canaanite religion was practiced, Canaan was divided into various city-states.

  Canaanite religion refers to the group of ancient Semitic religions practiced by the Canaanites living in the ancient Levant from at least the early Bronze Age through the first centuries of the Common Era.

  Part of a series on
  Religions of the ancient Near East
  Anatolia Ancient Egypt Arabia Canaan Persia Mesopotamia Sumer Semitic
  v t e

  Canaanite religion was polytheistic, and in some cases monolatristic.

  Contents

  • 1 Beliefs
    • 1.1 Deities
    • 1.2 Afterlife beliefs and Cult of the Dead
    • 1.3 Cosmology
    • 1.4 Mythology
    • 1.5 Religious practices
  • 2 History
    • 2.1 The Canaanites
    • 2.2 Influences
  • 3 Contact with other areas
  • 4 Sources
    • 4.1 Literary sources
    • 4.2 Archaeological sources
  • 5 See also
  • 6 Notes
  • 7 References
  • 8 Bibliography
  • 9 External links

  Beliefs

  Deities

  

  Ba'al with raised arm, 14th–12th century BC, found at Ras Shamra (ancient Ugarit), Louvre

  A great number of deities in a four tier hierarchy[1] were worshiped by the followers of the Canaanite religion; this is a partial listing:[2]

  • Anat, virgin goddess of war and strife, sister and putative mate of Ba'al Hadad.
  • Athirat, "walker of the sea", Mother Goddess, wife of El (also known as Elat and after the Bronze Age as Asherah)
  • Athtart, better known by her Greek name Astarte, assists Anat in the Myth of Ba'al
  • Asherah, queen consort of El. Symbolized by Asherah pole, a common sight in ancient Canaan
  • Attar, god of the morning star ("son of the morning") who tried to take the place of the dead Baal and failed. Male counterpart of Athtart.
  • Baalat or Baalit, the wife or female counterpart of Baal (also Belili)[3]
  • Ba'al Hadad (lit. master of thunder), storm god. Often referred to as Baalshamin.[4]
  • Ba'al Hermon, titular local deity of Mount Hermon.
  • Baal Hammon, god of fertility and renewer of all energies in the Phoenician colonies of the Western Mediterranean
  • Dagon (Dagan) god of crop fertility and grain, father of Ba'al Hadad
  • El, also called 'Il or Elyon ("Most High"), generally considered leader of the pantheon (later conflated with the idiosyncratic god Yahweh)[5][i]
  • Eshmun, god, or as Baalat Asclepius, goddess, of healing
  • Horon, an underworld god. Bethoron in Israel, takes its name from Horon.
  • Ishat, goddess of fire. She was slain by Anat.[6][7][8]
  • Kotharat, goddesses of marriage and pregnancy
  • Kothar-wa-Khasis, the skilled god of craftsmanship
  • Lotan, the twisting, seven-headed serpent ally of Yam
  • Marqod, god of dance
  • Melqart, literally "king of the city", god of Tyre, the underworld and cycle of vegetation in Tyre
  • Moloch, putative god of fire[9]
  • Mot or Mawat, god of death (not worshiped or given offerings)
  • Nikkal-wa-Ib, goddess of orchards and fruit
  • Qadeshtu, lit. "Holy One", putative goddess of love. Also a title of Asherah.
  • Resheph, god of plague and of healing
  • Shachar and Shalim, twin mountain gods of dawn and dusk, respectively. Shalim was linked to the netherworld via the evening star and associated with peace[10]
  • Shamayim, (lit. "Skies"), god of the heavens, paired with Eretz, the land or earth
  • Shapash, also transliterated Shapshu, goddess of the sun; sometimes equated with the Mesopotamian sun god Shamash,[11] whose gender is disputed. Some authorities consider Shamash a goddess. [12]
  • Sydyk, the god of righteousness or justice, sometimes twinned with Misor, and linked to the planet Jupiter[13][14]
  • Yam (lit. sea-river) the god of the sea and the river,[15] also called Judge Nahar (judge of the river)[16][17][18]
  • Yarikh, god of the moon and husband of Nikkal
• 

  Finkelstein

  Yahweh (/ˈjɑːhweɪ/, or often /ˈjɑːweɪ/ in English; Hebrew: יַהְוֶה‬ [jahˈweh]) was the national god of the Iron Age kingdoms of Israel (Samaria) and Judah.[3] His exact origins are disputed, although they reach back to the early Iron Age and even the Late Bronze:[4][5] his name may have begun as an epithet of El, head of the Bronze Age Canaanite pantheon,[6] but the earliest plausible mentions are in Egyptian texts that place him among the nomads of the southern Transjordan.[7]

  In the oldest biblical literature, Yahweh is a typical ancient Near Eastern "divine warrior", who leads the heavenly army against Israel's enemies;[8] he later became the main god of the Kingdom of Israel (Samaria) and of Judah,[9] and over time the royal court and temple promoted Yahweh as the god of the entire cosmos, possessing all the positive qualities previously attributed to the other gods and goddesses.[10][11] By the end of the Babylonian exile (6th century BCE), the very existence of foreign gods was denied, and Yahweh was proclaimed as the creator of the cosmos and the true god of all the world.[11]
• 

  cobweb

  It is eye opening stuff alright. I was fascinated when I read about the Ugaritic discoveries and how Yahweh evolved to take on attributes of El and Baal. Once you see how the Israelite God evolved, it really is the death knell of any belief in it. It is so foundational.

  With a name like Finklestein it is obvious that this was key to you too. I don't normally buy physical books but two I did buy that I'd already read in electronic form were Who wrote the Bible by R.E. Friedman and The Bible Unearthed by Israel Finkelstein. I read that William Dever has some issues with Finkelstein on dating and I don't know the right or wrong of that but its a fascinating book nonetheless. Mark Smith is great on the Ugaritic stuff.
  
• 

  Earnest

  The view that the God of the Hebrews, of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, is related to the Canaanite god El simply because he is referred to as el or elohim is not accepted by all scholars. El is both a name and a description, but the Hebrew scriptures make clear that the name of the God (elohim) of the Hebrews is Jehovah.

  For example, Professor K. Lawson Younger, an authority on the Aramaeans, has published a number of significant works involving ancient Near Eastern texts and their relationship to the Hebrew Bible, and holds that on literary and archaeological grounds the description of the one should not be confused with the name of the other. See particularly his book Ancient Conquest Accounts: A Study in Ancient Near Eastern and Biblical History Writing.

  
  
• 

  Finkelstein

  but the Hebrew scriptures make clear that the name of the God (elohim) of the Hebrews is Jehovah.

  Bullshit the name Jehovah was created by Latin embellishment centuries after Biblical times .

  This video explains how the name Jehovah was created , it was not ever used by the ancient Hebrews (YHWH)

  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aWzetMUXPGo
  
• 

  Finkelstein

  The main point to this thread is explaining and showing that the ancient Hebrew civilization were a off shoot sect from the ancient Canaanite civilization and that they took the main pantheon god El from the Canaanite civilization into a singular monotheistic style of worship creating eventually Yahweh
  
• 

  Earnest

  I understand the main point of the thread. If you read my post you will note it is not about the correct pronunciation of the tetragrammaton but the fact that there is not a relationship between the name El and the noun el (god) when it refers to the God of the Hebrews.

  The idea that the ancient Hebrew civilization is an off shoot sect from the ancient Canaanite civilization is not supported linguistically or archaeologically as shown by Professor K. Lawson Younger in his book Ancient Conquest Accounts: A Study in Ancient Near Eastern and Biblical History Writing.