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El is a Northwest Semitic word meaning 'Deity' or 'deity', or referring (as a proper name) to any one of multiple major ancient Near Eastern deities. A rarer form, ila, represents the predicate form in the Old Akkadian and Amorite language languages. The word is derived from the Proto-Semitic .Kogan, Leonid (2015), Genealogical Classification of Semitic: The Lexical Isoglosses. Berlin: De Gruyter. p. 147.
Originally a Canaanite deity known as El, Al or Il was the supreme god of the ancient Canaanite religion and the supreme god of East Semitic speakers in the Early Dynastic Period of Mesopotamia (c. 2900 – c. 2350 BCE). Among the Hittites, El was known as Elkunirša ( ). Although El gained different appearances and meanings in different languages over time, it continues to exist as El-, -il or -el in compound proper noun phrases such as Elizabeth, Ishmael, Israel, Samuel, Daniel, Michael, Gabriel (Arabic: Jibra'il), and Bethel.
El is often described as the father of gods and creator of mankind. El had many Epithet, including "Bull El," "El the King," and "Father of Mankind," reflecting his authority, wisdom, and paternal role. Over time, in Israelite religion, Yahweh absorbed many of El’s characteristics, gradually merging their identities through a process scholars call "pantheon reduction".
In Ugaritic and Levant mythology, El presided over a council of gods and fathered major deities like Baal, Yam, and Mot. He was depicted as wise and kingly, yet occasionally vulnerable, complementing Baal's role as a sustaining warrior. Archaeological texts show El's association with eternity, creation, and divine authority, often with a consort similar to Asherah. Later sources, including Phoenicia and Hellenistic writings, sometimes equated El with other deities such as Cronus or Poseidon.
In Northwest Semitic use, ʼel was a generic word for any god as well as the special name or title of a particular god who was distinguished from other gods as being "the god". El is listed at the head of many pantheons. In some Canaanites and sources, El played a role as father of the gods, of creation, or both.
However, because the word el sometimes refers to a god other than the great god El, it is frequently ambiguous as to whether El followed by another name means the great god El with a particular epithet applied or refers to another god entirely. For example, in the Ugaritic texts, is understood to mean "El the King" but as "the god Hadad".
The Semitic root ʾlh (Arabic ', Aramaic , , Hebrew ) may be ʾl with a parasitic h, and ʾl may be an abbreviated form of ʾlh. In Ugaritic the plural form meaning 'gods' is , equivalent to Hebrew 'powers'. In the Hebrew texts this word is interpreted as being semantically singular for "god" by biblical commentators.For example: However, according to the documentary hypothesis, at least four different authors – the Jahwist (J), Elohist (E), Deuteronomist (D), and Priestly source (P) sources – were responsible for editing stories from a polytheistic religion into those of a monotheistic religion. These sources were joined together at various points in time by a series of editors or "redactors". Inconsistencies that arise between monotheism and polytheism in the texts are reflective of this hypothesis.
The stem ʾl is found prominently in the earliest strata of east Semitic, northwest Semitic, and south Semitic groups. Personal names including the stem ʾl are found with similar patterns in both the Amorite language and Sabaic languages.
Eventually, El's cult became central to the ethnogenesis of Iron Age Israelites but so far, scholars are unable to determine how much of the population were El worshippers. It is more likely that different locales held different views of El.
Francesca Stavrakopoulou has argued that Yahweh was originally a storm‑warrior deity operating under the authority of the patriarch-god El, and traces how, through a process she terms “pantheon reduction,” Yahweh gradually assumed El’s status and characteristics within Israelite religion, rather than immediately replacing him in a sudden shift to monotheism. Drawing on extensive Near Eastern archaeological and textual parallels, Stavrakopoulou shows that the biblical Yahweh was originally depicted in early texts with a fully anthropomorphic, sexualised, and even bull-horned body—including feet, limbs, torso, face, and genitals—before later Greek‑Platonic influence recast the deity as immaterial and disembodied. She further highlights inscriptions referencing “Yahweh and his Asherah”, indicating a former divine consort akin to El’s spouse—an element later removed during proto‑monotheistic reforms.
In an inscription in the Proto-Sinaitic script, William F. Albright transcribed the phrase ʾL Ḏ ʿLM, which he translated as the appellation "El, (god) of eternity".Albright, Wm. F. (1966) The Proto-Sinaitic Inscriptions and their Decipherment, p. 24
The name Raphael or Rapha-El, meaning 'God has healed' in Ugarit, is attested to in approximately 1350 BCE in one of the Amarna Letters EA333, found in Tell-el-Hesi from the ruler of Lachish to 'The Great One'Robert William Rogers, ed., Cuneiform Parallels to the Old Testament (New York: Eaton & Mains, & Cincinnati, Ohio: Jennings & Graham, 1912), pp. 268–278.
A inscribed amulet of the 7th century BCE from Arslan Tash may refer to El. The text was translated by Rosenthal as follows:
However, Cross translated the text as follows:
In some inscriptions, the name ʾĒl qōne ʾarṣ (Punic language: 𐤀𐤋 𐤒𐤍 𐤀𐤓𐤑 ) meaning 'El creator of Earth' appears, even including a late inscription at Leptis Magna in Tripolitania dating to the 2nd century.Donner & Röllig 1962–1964, No. 129. In Hittite texts, the expression becomes the single name , this Ilkunirsa appearing as the husband of Asherdu (Asherah) and father of 77 or 88 sons.
In a Hurrian hymn to El (published in Ugaritica V, text RS 24.278), he is called and , which Cross takes as 'El of the covenant' and 'El the judge' respectively.
As recorded on the of Ugarit, El is the husband of the goddess Asherah.
Three pantheon lists found at Ugarit (modern , Syria) begin with the four gods Ilib (which according to Cross; is the name of a generic kind of deity, perhaps the divine ancestor of the people), El, Dagnu (that is Dagon), and Baal Saphon (that is the god Haddu or Hadad). Though Ugarit had a large temple dedicated to Dagon and another to Hadad, there was no temple dedicated to El.
El had a variety of epithets and forms. He is repeatedly referred to as ṯr il ('Bull El' or 'the bull god') and ʾil milk ('El the King'). He is bny bnwt ('Creator of creatures'),Cassuto, Umberto. The Goddess Anath: Canaanite Epics on the Patriarchal Age. Bialik Institute, 1951, pp. 42–44 (in Hebrew) abū banī 'ili ('father of the gods'), and ʾab ʾadm ('father of man'). The appellations of "eternal", "creator" and "eternal" or "ancient creator" are "characteristic designations of 'El in Canaanite myths and liturgies". He is ḥātikuka ('your patriarch'). El is the grey-bearded ancient one, full of wisdom, malku ('King'), ʾab šnm ('Father of years'), ʾEl gibbōr ('El the warrior'). He is also called lṭpn ʾil d pʾid ('the Gracious One, the Benevolent God') and lṭpn wqdš ('the Gracious and Holy One').
"El" (Father of Heaven / Saturn) and his major son: "Hadad" (Father of Earth / Jupiter), are symbolized both by the bull, and both wear bull horns on their headdresses.
The Ugaritic text Shachar and Shalim tells how (perhaps near the beginning of all things) El came to shores of the sea and saw two women who bobbed up and down. El was sexually aroused and took the two with him, killed a bird by throwing a staff at it, and roasted it over a fire. He asked the women to tell him when the bird was fully cooked, and to then address him either as husband or as father, for he would thenceforward behave to them as they called him. They saluted him as husband. He then lay with them, and they gave birth to Shachar ('Dawn') and Shalim ('Dusk'). Again El lay with his wives and the wives gave birth to "the gracious gods", "cleavers of the sea", "children of the sea". The names of these wives are not explicitly provided, but some confusing rubrics at the beginning of the account mention the goddess Athirat, who is otherwise El's chief wife and the goddess Raḥmayyu ('the one of the womb').
In the Ugaritic Ba'al Cycle, El is introduced having an assembly of gods on Mount Lel (Lel possibly meaning "Night"),KTU 1.2 III AB B and dwelling on (or in) the fountains of the two rivers at the spring of the two deeps.KTU 1.2 III AB C He dwells in a tent according to some interpretations of the text which may explain why he had no temple in Ugarit. As to the rivers and the spring of the two deeps, these might refer to real streams, or to the mythological sources of the salt water ocean and the fresh water sources under the earth, or to the waters above the heavens and the waters beneath the earth. A few miles from the swamp from which the Litani River (the classical Leontes) and the Asi River (the upper Orontes River) flow, Baalbek may be the same as the ('Source of the Two Rivers'), the abode of El in the Ugaritic Baal CycleKTU 1.4 IV 21. discovered in the 1920s and a separate serpent incantation.KTU 1.100.3.
In the episode of the "Palace of Ba'al", the god Ba'al Hadad invites the "seventy sons of Athirat" to a feast in his new palace. Presumably these sons have been fathered on Athirat by El; in following passages they seem to be the gods ( ʾilm) in general or at least a large portion of them. The only sons of El named individually in the Ugaritic texts are Yamm ('Sea'), Mot ('Death'), and Ashtar, who may be the chief and leader of most of the sons of El. Ba'al Hadad is a few times called El's son rather than the son of Dagan as he is normally called, possibly because El is in the position of a clan-father to all the gods.
The fragmentary text R.S. 24.258 describes a Marzēaḥ banquet to which El invites the other gods and then disgraces himself by becoming outrageously drunk and passing out after confronting an otherwise unknown Hubbay, "he with the horns and tail". The text ends with an incantation for the cure for a hangover.
El's characterization in Ugarit texts is not always favorable. His authority is unquestioned, but sometimes exacted through threat or roundly mocked. He is "both comical and pathetic" in a "role of impotence". But this is arguably a misinterpretation since El had complementary relationships with other deities. Any "differences" they had pertained to function. For example, El and Baal were divine kings but El was the executive whilst Baal was the sustainer of the cosmos.
In Deuteronomy 32, as preserved in the Septuagint and the Dead Sea Scrolls, Yahweh was described as a son of El. Biblical researchers reveal that these verses in Deuteronomy 32, are presenting an etiological explanation for the origin and division of nations. The high mountain god and head of the pantheon Elyon, divides the nations according to the number of his children, each getting a group of peoples to preside over. Yahweh, one of Elyon's sons, is given solely Israel as his inheritance.
In Abraham accepted the blessing of El, when Melchizedek, the king of Salem and high priest of its deity El Elyon blessed him.
According to The Oxford Companion to World Mythology,
It seems almost certain that the God of the Jews evolved gradually from the Canaanite El, who was in all likelihood the "God of Abraham" ... If El was the high God of Abraham—Elohim, the prototype of Yahveh—Asherah was his wife, and there are archaeological indications that she was perceived as such before she was in effect "divorced" in the context of emerging Judaism of the 7th century BCE. (See .)
In some instances, such as in Psalm 29, Yahweh is envisioned as a storm god, something not true for El. It is Yahweh who is prophesied to one day battle Leviathan the serpent, and slay the dragon in the sea in . The slaying of the serpent in myth is a deed attributed to both Ba'al Hadad and 'Anat in the Ugaritic texts, but not to El. (2008). 9789047442325, Brill. ISBN 9789047442325
Such mythological motifs are variously seen as late survivals from a period when Yahweh held a place in theology comparable to that of Hadad at Ugarit; or as late henotheistic and monotheistic applications to Yahweh of deeds more commonly attributed to Hadad; or simply as examples of eclectic application of the same motifs and imagery to various different gods. Similarly, it is argued inconclusively whether Ēl Shaddāi, Ēl 'Ôlām, Ēl 'Elyôn, and so forth, were originally understood as separate divinities. Albrecht Alt presented his theories on the original differences of such gods in Der Gott der Väter in 1929.
But others have argued that from patriarchal times, these different names were generally understood to refer to the same single great god, El. This is the position of Frank Moore Cross (1973). What is certain is that the form 'El does appear in Israelite names from every period including the name ("Israel"), meaning 'El strives'. There are verses where El and Yahweh are unambiguously conflated () but some scholars believe this is an attempt to portray El as a warrior god, as Israelite society grew and evolved into a nation-state.
In the Tanakh, Elohim () is the normal word for a god or the great God (or gods, given that the suffix makes a word plural in Hebrew). But the form also appears, mostly in poetic passages and in the patriarchal narratives attributed to the Priestly source of the documentary hypothesis. It occurs 217 times in the Masoretic Text: 73 times in the Psalms and 55 times in the Book of Job, and otherwise mostly in poetic passages or passages written in elevated prose. It occasionally appears with the definite article as 'the god' (for example in ).
The theological position of the Tanakh is that the names and , when used in the singular to mean the supreme god, refer to Yahweh, while the plural is interpreted to refer to other unspecified heavenly beings, such as .Reinhard Gregor Kratz, Hermann Spieckermann: Götterbilder, Gottesbilder, Weltbilder: Griechenland und Rom, Judentum, Christentum und Islam. Mohr Siebeck, 2006, ISBN 978-3-16-148807-8 (German)
Sky and Earth have separated from one another in hostility, but Sky insists on continuing to force himself on Earth and attempts to destroy the children born of such unions. At last, with the advice of his daughter Athena and the god Hermes Trismegistus (perhaps Thoth), El successfully attacks his father Sky with a sickle and spear of iron. He and his military allies the Eloim gain Sky's kingdom.
In a later passage it is explained that El castrated Sky. One of Sky's concubines (who was given to El's brother Dagon) was already pregnant by Sky. The son who is born of the union, called Demarûs or Zeus, but once called Adodus, is obviously Hadad, the Ba'al of the Ugaritic texts who now becomes an ally of his grandfather Sky and begins to make war on El.
El has three wives, his sisters or half-sisters Aphrodite/Astarte ('Ashtart), Rhea (presumably Asherah), and Dione (identified by Sanchuniathon with Ba'alat Gebal the tutelary goddess of Byblos, a city which Sanchuniathon says that El founded).
El is depicted primarily as a warrior; in Ugaritic sources Baal has the warrior role and El is peaceful, and it may be that the Sanchuniathon depicts an earlier tradition that was more preserved in the southern regions of Canaan. (2025). 9781575060699, Eisenbrauns. ISBN 9781575060699
Eusebius, through whom the Sanchuniathon is preserved, is not interested in setting the work forth completely or in order. But we are told that El slew his own son Sadidus (a name that some commentators think might be a corruption of Shaddai, one of the epithets of the Biblical El) and that El also beheaded one of his daughters. Later, perhaps referring to this same death of Sadidus we are told:
A fuller account of the sacrifice appears later:
The account also relates that Thoth:
This is the form under which El/Cronus appears on coins from Byblos from the reign of Antiochus IV Epiphanes (175–164 BCE) four spread wings and two folded wings, leaning on a staff. Such images continued to appear on coins until after the time of Augustus.
Poseidon is known to have been worshipped in Beirut, his image appearing on coins from that city. Poseidon of Beirut was also worshipped at Delos where there was an association of merchants, shipmasters, and warehousemen called the Poseidoniastae of Berytus founded in 110 or 109 BCE. Three of the four chapels at its headquarters on the hill northwest of the Sacred Lake were dedicated to Poseidon, the Tyche of the city equated with Astarte (that is 'Ashtart), and to Eshmun.
Also at Delos, that association of Tyrians, though mostly devoted to Heracles-Melqart, elected a member to bear a crown every year when sacrifices to Poseidon took place. A banker named Philostratus donated two altars, one to Palaistine Aphrodite Urania ('Ashtart) and one to Poseidon "of Ascalon".
Though Sanchuniathon distinguishes Poseidon from his Elus/Cronus, this might be a splitting off of a particular aspect of El in a euhemeristic account. Identification of an aspect of El with Poseidon rather than with Cronus might have been felt to better fit with Hellenistic religious practice, if indeed this Phoenician Poseidon really is the El who dwells at the source of the two deeps in Ugaritic texts. More information is needed to be certain.
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