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Baal (), or Baʿal (), was a title and honorific meaning 'owner' or 'lord' in the Northwest Semitic languages spoken in the Levant during antiquity. From its use among people, it came to be applied to gods. Scholars previously associated the theonym with solar god and with a variety of unrelated patron deity, but inscriptions have shown that the name Baʻal was particularly associated with the storm god and fertility god Hadad and his local manifestations.
The Hebrew Bible includes use of the term in reference to various Levantine deities, often with application towards Hadad, who was decried as a false god. That use was taken over into Christianity and Islam, sometimes under the form Beelzebub in demonology.
The god Baal (𐎁𐎓𐎍) is the protagonist of one of the lengthiest surviving epics from the ancient Near East, the Baal Cycle.
/ref>) of the clouds." ( rkb ʿrpt, cf. rkb bʿrbt in Ps. 68:5; Ugaritic rkb ʿrpt.) These are related to Zeus's "gatherer of the clouds" and Yahweh's "rider of the heavens."JANES 5 1973 Weinfeld "Rider of the Clouds" Like the English word ride, rkb has equine and sexual uses.
In the Northwest Semitic languages—Ugaritic, Phoenician, Hebrew language, Amorite language, and Aramaic language—the word baʿal signified 'property' and, by extension, 'lord', a 'master', or 'husband'. Cognates include the Akkadian Bēlu (), Amharic language bal (), and Arabic language baʿl (). Báʿal (בַּעַל) and baʿl still serve as the words for 'husband' in modern Hebrew and Arabic respectively. They also appear in some contexts concerning the ownership of things or possession of traits.
The feminine form is baʿalah (; ), meaning 'mistress' in the sense of a female owner or lady of the house and still serving as a rare word for 'wife'.
Suggestions in early modern scholarship also included comparison with the Celtic god Belenus, however this is now widely rejected by contemporary scholars. Belin, in Gilles Ménage, Dictionnaire étymologique de la langue françoise, 1750. Ménage constructs a derivation of both the "Chaldean" Bel and the Celtic Belin from a supposed word for 'ball, sphere', whence 'head', and 'chief, lord'
The Baʿal of Ugarit was the epithet of Hadad, but as time passed, the epithet became the god's name while Hadad became the epithet. Baʿal was usually said to be the son of Dagan, but appears as one of the sons of El in sources. Both Baʿal and El were sacred bull in Ugaritic texts, as they symbolized both strength and fertility. He held special enmity against snakes, both on their own and as representatives of Yammu ( "Sea"), the Canaanite sea god and river god. He fought the Tannin ( Tunnanu), the "Twisted Serpent" ( Bṯn ʿqltn), "Lotan the Fugitive Serpent" ( Ltn Bṯn Brḥ, the biblical Leviathan), and the "Mighty One with Seven Heads" ( Šlyṭ D.šbʿt Rašm). Baʿal's conflict with Yammu is now generally regarded as the prototype of the vision recorded in the 7th chapter of the Bible Book of Daniel. As vanquisher of the sea, the Canaanites and Phoenicians regarded Baʿal as the patron deity of sailors and sea-going merchants. As vanquisher of Mot, the Canaanite death god, he was known as Baʿal Rāpiʾuma ( Bʿl Rpu) and regarded as the leader of the Rephaim ( Rpum), the ancestral spirits, particularly those of ruling dynasties.
From Canaan, worship of Baʿal spread to Egypt by the Middle Kingdom and throughout the Mediterranean following the waves of Phoenician colonization in the early 1st millennium BCE. He was described with diverse epithets, and before Ugarit was rediscovered, these were supposed to refer to distinct local gods. However, as explained by Day, the texts at Ugarit revealed that they were considered "local manifestations of this particular deity, analogous to the local manifestations of the Virgin Mary in the Roman Catholic Church". In those inscriptions, he is frequently described as "Victorious Baʿal" ( Aliyn or Ảlỉyn Baʿal), "Mightiest one" ( Aliy or ʾAly) or "Mightiest of the Heroes" ( Aliy Qrdm), "The Powerful One" ( Dmrn), and in his role as patron of the city "Baʿal of Ugarit" ( Baʿal Ugarit). As Baʿal Zaphon ( Baʿal Ṣapunu), he was particularly associated with his palace atop Jebel Aqra (the ancient Mount Ṣapānu and classical Mons Casius). He is also mentioned as "Winged Baʿal" ( Bʿl Knp) and "Baʿal of the Arrows" ( Bʿl Ḥẓ). Phoenician and Aramaic language inscriptions describe "Baʿal of the Mace" ( Bʿl Krntryš), "Baʿal of the Lebanon" ( Bʿl Lbnn), "Baʿal of Sidon" ( Bʿl Ṣdn), Bʿl Ṣmd, "Baʿal of the Heavens" ( Baʿal Shamem or Shamayin), Baʿal ʾAddir ( Bʿl ʾdr), Baʿal Hammon ( Baʿal Ḥamon), Bʿl Mgnm.
The epithet Hammon is obscure. Most often, it is connected with the NW Semitic ḥammān ("brazier") and associated with a role as a sun god. Ernest Renan and Gibson linked it to Hammon (modern Umm el-‘Amed between Tyre in Lebanon and Acre in Israel) and Cross and Lipiński to Haman or Khamōn, the classical Mount Amanus and modern Nur Mountains, which separate northern Syria from southeastern Cilicia.
1 Kings 18 records an account of a contest between the prophet Elijah and Jezebel's priests. Both sides offered a sacrifice to their respective gods: Baʻal failed to light his followers' sacrifice while Yahweh's heavenly fire burnt Elijah's altar to ashes, even after it had been soaked with water. The observers then followed Elijah's instructions to slay the priests of Baʿal, after which it began to rain, showing Yahweh's mastery over the weather.
Other references to the priests of Baʿal describe their burning of incense in prayer. and their offering of sacrifice while adorned in special .
It was the program of Jezebel, in the 9th century BCE, to introduce into Israel's capital city of Samaria her Phoenician worship of Baal as opposed to the worship of Yahweh that made the name anathema to the Israelites.
Eshbaʿal became [[Ish-bosheth]] and Meribaʿal became [[Mephibosheth]],. but other possibilities also occurred. Gideon's name Jerubaʿal was mentioned intact but glossed as a mockery of the Canaanite god, implying that he strove in vain.. Direct use of Baʿali continued at least as late as the time of the prophet [[Hosea]], who reproached the Israelites for doing so.
Brad E. Kelle has suggested that references to cultic sexual practices in the worship of Baal, in Hosea 2, are evidence of an historical situation in which Israelites were either giving up Yahweh worship for Baal, or blending the two. Hosea's references to sexual acts being metaphors for Israelite "apostasy".
Brian P. Irwin argues that "Baal" in northern Israelite traditions is a form of Yahweh that was rejected as foreign by the prophets. In southern Israelite traditions, "Baal" was a god that was worshipped in Jerusalem. His worshippers saw him as compatible or identical with Yahweh and honored him with human sacrifices and fragrant meal offerings. Eventually, the The Chronicler disapproved of both "Baals" whilst the used "Baals" for any god they disapproved of.
Likewise, Mark S. Smith believes Yahweh was more likely to be inspired by Baal rather than El, since both are stormy divine warriors and lack the pacifistic traits of El according to the Ugaritic texts and Hebrew Bible. (2025). 9783110656701, De Gruyter. ISBN 9783110656701
The Deuteronomist and the present form of Jeremiah seem to phrase the struggle as monolatry or monotheism against polytheism. Yahweh is frequently identified in the Hebrew scriptures with Elyon, however, this was after a conflation with El in a process of religious syncretism. ’El () became a generic term meaning "god", as opposed to the name of a worshipped deity, and epithets such as El Shaddai came to be applied to Yahweh alone, while Baal's nature as a storm and weather god became assimilated into Yahweh's own identification with the storm. In the next stage the Yahwistic religion separated itself from its Canaanite heritage, first by rejecting Baal-worship in the 9th century, then through the 8th to 6th centuries with prophetic condemnation of Baal, sun-worship, worship on the "high places", practices pertaining to the dead, and other matters.
Baʿal Hammon, however, was identified with the Greek Cronus and the Roman Saturn as the Baal-zebul Saturn. He was probably never equated with Melqart, although this assertion appears in older scholarship.
John Milton's 1667 epic poem Paradise Lost describes the collecting around Satan, stating that, though their heavenly names had been "blotted out and ras'd", they would acquire new ones "wandring o're the Earth" as false gods. Baalim and Astaroth are given as the collective names of the male and female demons (respectively) who came from between the "bordering flood of old Euphrates" and "the Brook that parts Egypt from Syrian ground".John Milton, Paradise Lost, Bk. 1, ll. 419–423.
Baal and derived epithets like Baalist were used as slurs during the English Reformation for the saints and their devotees.
According to some medieval Islamic scholars, the context of the verse above tells of Ilyas and the inhabitants of the town of Baalbek who worshipped Baal.
According to Tabari, baal is a term used by Arabs to denote everything which is a lord over anything.
Al-Thaʿlabī offers a more detailed description about Baal; accordingly it was an idol of gold, twenty cubits tall, and had four faces.
The trilateral root, ( bā, ayn, lam) baʿl occurs seven times in the Qur’an with its common Semitic usage of “owner, husband,” particularly husband. For example, Sarah, wife of Abraham refers to her husband using the term.
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