Peacefulpete: Thank you for the additional data. Generally speaking, I agree with the idea of distinct traditions eventually merging into a new one (it is the way it usually works in History of Religions). In this perspective, I liked Wyatt's reference to Sanskrit too (not to be dismissed too hastily because it is originally from a very different realm).
So the idea of the conflict between Yhwh and Baal, though probably very late, may reflect in some way the old "Yam vs Baal" myth. I would have only two reservations about that: 1) your own arguments, in a previous post, against the identification of "ym" and "yw"; 2) the fact that in the Bible itself the sea mostly has a negative overtone (in Genesis 1 the primeval ocean or "abyss", Heb. tehom = Akkadian Tiamat, is not "created" but subdued as a part of the chaos; and even in Revelation there is no place for the sea in the new creation). The overwhelming evidence, as I see it, favors the identification of the old Yhwh with Haddu-Baal rather than Yam.
On the El-Baal bull-calf traits attributed to Yhwh, I mentioned them earlier (though partly as a joke) in answer to Faraon. To the previous references one could add the description of Yhwh as 'Ab(b)ir (Gen 49:24 etc.), a Hebrew word which generally refers to a bull (sometimes a stallion perhaps)
More specifically, I could not check the ref. BM 93035. I just kept it in case somebody could find what it is.
Just for the sake of clarity, 'adam (= Ugaritic adm) also means "man" and "mankind" in Biblical Hebrew (more than 500 occurrences, only Gen 4:25; 5:1-5 and 1 Ch 1:1 as a personal name "Adam"). So on this point it is more parallel to Ugarit than derived from it.
Earnest: I didn't know that the practice of a "limited transliteration" of the Tetragrammaton Yhwh, as is mainly known from the King James Version, originated with Tyndale. It is not the common practice of French Bibles, but a recent version finally came to something similar.
During the past years I had the opportunity of working on the "Nouvelle Bible Segond", a Protestant Study Bible published in 2002. One of the first questions that came up was the rendering of Yhwh. In Protestant Bible since Olivétan (a relative of Calvin) the use was to "translate" Yhwh as "l'Eternel" ("the Eternal or Everlasting One"), from a dubious interpretation of Exodus 3 mistakenly applied to the whole Bible. The Writing Committee readily agreed that this has to be changed and reversed to the Septuagint-Vulgate substitution (LORD or GOD), mainly because of the N.T. practice. But it quickly appeared that in many cases this substitution was no better than the previous translation. For instance, in Exodus 6:3 a change of personal names is involved, not a change of "meaning" (it's "Yhwh" vs "Shadday", not "the Lord" or "the Eternal" vs "the Almighty"). Also, all the prophetical proclamations like "I am the LORD" are declarations of identity (I am Yhwh) and not of quality (such as "I am the big boss", or "I am eternal"). So we finally resolved to add "(YHWH)" to the common substitution in a number of cases where it seemed necessary (some 700 in the OT). I would personally have favored a consistent transliteration such as Yahweh, but in my eyes it was not too bad a compromise.
