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Asherah (; ; ; ;Day, John. " Asherah in the Hebrew Bible and Northwest Semitic Literature." Journal of Biblical Literature, vol. 105, no. 3, 1986, pp. 385–408. JSTOR. Accessed 5 Aug. 2021. Qatabanian: 𐩱𐩻𐩧𐩩 ') was a goddess in ancient Semitic religions. She also appears in Hittites as Ašerdu(š) or Ašertu(š) (),' Asertu, tablet concordance KUB XXXVI 35 - CTH 342 ', Hittite Collection, Hatice Gonnet-Bağana; Koç University. and as Athirat''' in Ugarit as the consort of ʾEl. Asherah was a major goddess in ancient Northwest Semitic cultures, often associated with fertility, Mother goddess, and Sacred tree.
Asherah was sometimes called Elat, the feminine equivalent of El, and held titles such as “holy” (qdš), “lady” (rbt), or “progenitress of the gods” (qnyt ỉlm). Asherah’s iconography frequently depicted her with pronounced sexual features, often combined with tree motifs like Date palm, highlighting her role as a fertility goddess. Some artifacts, such as the Revadim Asherah figurines, illustrate her Breastfeeding children or displaying sexual imagery, emphasizing her maternal and generative symbolism. Her worship may also be reflected in Asherah pole, cultic objects frequently mentioned in the Hebrew Bible, though scholars debate whether these represent the goddess herself or sacred symbols.
Asherah’s influence extended across regions including Israel and Judah, Philistia, Ancient Egypt, and Arabia, appearing under different names and roles. In ancient Israel, she may have been considered a consort of Yahweh, as suggested by inscriptions at Kuntillet Ajrud and Khirbet el-Qom, though interpretations vary, and some scholars argue these references describe cultic objects rather than the goddess. Similarities with other goddesses, such as Shapshu, Hathor, and Qetesh, suggest her image and attributes influenced surrounding cultures. Asherah was also linked to sacred Fertility rite, which may have included women of status in ritual activities, though the association with temple prostitution is now debated. Over time, Monotheism reforms suppressed her worship, and in later texts, references to Asherah were increasingly translated as groves or sacred trees rather than directly as a goddess.
The common Northwest Semitic root ʾṯr (cf ) means "trace, way".
A masculine plural form Asherim appears in Ezekiel 27:6, but refers to boxwood ( Buxus sempervirens) as a variant form of תְּאַשּׁוּר təʾaššur "cypress of Lebanon" ( Cedrus libani).
Some scholars have proposed an early link between Asherah and Eve based upon the coincidence of their common title as "the mother of all living" in through the identification with Ḫepat of Aleppo. Ḫepat, whose name is Northwest Semitic in origin, was the partner of weather god in several cultures speaking unrelated languages, including the West Semitic deity Hadad in Aleppo and Ebla, Teshub in Hurrian religion, and Tarḫunz of the Luwians of Anatolia. Olyan states that the original Hebrew name for Eve, חַוָּה Ḥawwā, is cognate to ḥawwat, an attested epithet of Tanit in the first millennium BCE, though other scholars dispute a connection between Tanit and Asherah and between Asherah and Eve. A Phoenician deity Ḥawwat is attested in the Punic Tabella Defixionis.
There is further speculation that the Shekhinah as a feminine aspect of Yahweh may be a cultural memory or devolution of Asherah. Another such aspect may be seen in the feminine personification of Wisdom in the Book of Proverbs.
Cultic objects dedicated to Asherah frequently depict trees, and the terms asherim and asheroth, regularly invoked by the Hebrew Bible in the context of Asherah worship, are traditionally understood to refer to asherah poles. An especially common Asherah tree in visual art is the date palm, a reliable producer of nutrition throughout the year. Some expect living trees, but Olyan sees a stylized, non-living palm or pole. The remains of a juniper discovered in a 7500 year old gravesite in Eilat has been considered an Asherah tree by some.
Asherah's association with fertility was not limited to her association with trees; she was often depicted with pronounced sexual features. Images of Asherah, often called ’Astarte figurines’, are representative of Asherah as a tree in that they have bodies which resemble tree trunks, while also further extenuating the goddess' connection to fertility in line with her status as a "mother goddess". The "Judean pillar figures" universally depict Asherah with protruding breasts. Likewise, the so-called Revadim Asherah is rife with potent, striking sexual imagery, depicting Asherah suckling two smaller figures and using both of her hands to expose her vagina fully. Many times, Asherah's pubis area was marked by a concentration of dots, indicating pubic hair, though this figure is sometimes polysemically understood as a grape cluster. The womb was also sometimes used as a symbol, as animals are often shown feeding directly (if a bit abstractly) from the pubic triangle. Remarking on the Lachish ewer, Hestrin noted that in a group of other pottery vessels found in situ, the usual depiction of the sacred tree flanked by or birds is in one goblet replaced by a pubic triangle flanked by ibexes. The interchange between the tree and the pubic triangle prove, according to Hestrin, that the tree symbolizes the fertility goddess Asherah. Hestrin draws parallels between this and representations of Hathor as the sycamore goddess in Egypt, and suggests that during the period of the New Kingdom of Egypt's rule in Palestine, the Hathor cult penetrated the region so extensively that she became identified with Asherah. Other motifs in the ewer such as a lion, Persian fallow deer and Nubian ibexes seem to have a close relationship with her iconography
Asherah may also have been associated with the ancient pan- "Master of Animals" motif, which depicted a person or deity betwixt two confronted animals. According to Beaulieu, depictions of a divine "mistress of " Potnia Theron motif are "almost undoubtedly depictions of the goddess Asherah." The lioness was a ubiquitous symbol for goddesses in the ancient Middle East, similar to the dove and the tree. Lion figure prominently in Asherah's iconography, including in the post-Late Bronze Age collapse finds: in Ti'inik known as the Ta'anakh cult stand dating to the 10th century BCE, which also includes a tree motif. An earlier arrowhead (11th century BCE) bears the inscription "Servant of the Lion Lady".
The symbols around Asherah are so many (eight-pointed star, , and lunisolar, arboreal, florid, and serpentine imagery) that a listing would approach meaninglessness as it neared exhaustiveness. Frevel's 1000-page dissertation ends enigmatically with the pronouncement "There is no genuine Asherah iconography".
A limestone slab inscribed with a dedication made by Hammurabi to Ashratum is known from Sippar. In it, he complements her as "lord of the mountain" ( bel shadī), and presages similar use with words like voluptuousness, joy, tender, patient, mercy to commemorate setting up a "protective genius" (font?) for her in her temple. Context of Scripture II 2.107D, pg = II:257 (No author named; only ref: Sollberger and Kupper 1971: 219; Frayne 1990: 359-360).
Though it is accepted that Ashratum's name is cognate to that of Ugaritic Athirat, the goddess occupies different positions within the pantheons of the two religions, despite having in both the status of consort to the supreme deity.
In the first of two Amorite language-Akkadian bilingual tablets from the 2nd millennium BCE and published in 2022, Asherah appears in the Amorite left column as ašeratum, while the corresponding Akkadian divine name in the right column is Belet-ili, the Akkadian name of the mother goddess Ninhursag.
Points of reference in Akkadian epigraphy are collocated and heterographic in the Amarna Letters 60 and 61's Asheratic personal name. Within these Amarna letters is found a king of the Amorites by the 14th century BCE name of Abdi-Ashirta "servant of Asherah".
| um-ma IÌR-d aš-ra-tum |
| um-ma IÌR- a-ši-ir-te ÌR-[-ka4 |
Each is on line ii within the letter's opening or greeting sentiment. Some may transcribe Aširatu or Ašratu.
/ref> Gibson says sources from before 1200 BC almost always credit Athirat with her full title rbt ʾṯrt ym (or rbt ʾṯrt). However, Rahmouni's indexing of Ugaritic epithets states the phrase occurs in only the Baal Cycle. Apparently of Akkadian origin, rabat means "lady" (literally "female great one"). She appears to champion her son, Yam, god of the sea, in his struggle against Baʾal. (Yam's ascription as god of the sea may mislead; Yam is the deified sea itself rather than a deity who holds dominion over it.) So some say Athirat's title can be translated as "Lady ʾAṯirat of the Sea", alternatively, "she who walks on the sea", or even "the Great Lady-who-tramples-Yam." This invites relation to a Chaoskampf in which neither she nor Yam is otherwise implicated. Park suggested in 2010 that the name Athirat might be derived from a passive participle form, referring to the "one followed by (the gods)", that is, "progenitress or originatress", which would correspond to Asherah's image as the "mother of the gods" in Ugaritic literature. This solution was a response to and variation of B. Margalit's of her following in Yahweh's literal footsteps, a less generous estimation nonetheless supported by D's use of the Ugaritian word in an ordinary sense. Binger finds some of these risibly imaginative, and unhappily falls back on the still-problematic interpretation that Ym may also mean day, so "Lady Asherah of the day", or, more simply, "Lady Day". The common Semitic root ywm (for reconstructed Proto-Semitic * yawm-), from which derives (), meaning "day", appears in several instances in the Masoretic Text with the second-root letter ( -w-) having been dropped, and in a select few cases, replaced with an mid vowel of the niqqud for Tiberian Hebrew,, resulting in the word becoming y(a)m. Such occurrences, as well as the fact that the plural "days" can be read as both yomim and yāmim (), give credence to this alternate translation.
Another primary epithet of Athirat was 𐎖𐎐𐎊𐎚 𐎛𐎍 qnyt ʾlm,see KTU 1.4 I 23. which may be translated as "the creator of the deities". In those texts, Athirat is the consort of ʾEl; there is one reference to the seventy sons of Athirat, presumably the same as the seventy sons of ʾEl.
Another significant reason for this conflation would be a passage found in Ugaritic inscription KTU 1.23 which describes the myth known as The Gracious and Most Beautiful Gods. In this text, the twins Shahar "Dawn" and Shalim "Dusk", are described as the offspring of El through two women he meets at the seashore. The brothers are both nursed by "The Lady", likely Asherah, and in other Ugaritic texts, the two are associated with the sun goddess Shapshu.
The second was at Kuntillet Ajrud. In the latter, a jar shows bovid-anthropomorphic figures and several inscriptions that refer to "Yahweh of Samaria and his Asherah" and "Yahweh of Teman and his Asherah." However, a number of scholars hold that the "asherah" mentioned in the inscriptions refers to some kind of cultic object or symbol, rather than a goddess. Some scholars have argued that since cognate forms of "asherah" are used with the meaning of "sanctuary" in Phoenician and Aramaic inscriptions from the same period, this may also be the meaning of the term in the two Hebrew inscriptions. Others argue that the term "asherah" may refer to a sacred tree used for the worship of Yahweh as this is the meaning that the Hebrew term has in the Hebrew Bible and in the Mishnah.
In one potsherd there appear a large and small bovine. This "oral fixation" motif has diverse examples, see figs 413–419 in Winter. In fact, already Flinders Petrie in the 1930s was referring to Davies on the memorable stereotype.
1 NEWBERRY Beni Hasan i Pl xiii register 4 Cf PETRIE Deshasheh Pl v register 3 there is a very example in DAVIES Ptahhetep ii Pl xvii
https://books.google.com/books/content?id=wkdFAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA19&img=1&zoom=3&hl=en&sig=ACfU3U11u8CT1WFcJ4vxFrwiXWvAs8n4_A&ci=101%2C1013%2C391%2C57&edge=0
https://books.google.com/books?id=wkdFAAAAYAAJ&q=licking+her+sucking
It's such a common motif in Syrian and Phoenician ivories that the Arslan Tash horde had at least four.
The Hebrew Bible frequently and graphically associates goddess worship with prostitution (זְנוּת zənuṯ "whoredom") in material written after the reforms of King Josiah. Jeremiah and Ezekiel blame goddess worship for making Yahweh "jealous", and cite his jealousy as the reason he allowed the destruction of Jerusalem in 587 BCE. Although their nature remains uncertain, sexual rites typically revolved around women of power and influence, such as Maacah. The Hebrew term qadishtu, formerly translated as "temple prostitutes", literally means "priestesses" or "consecrated women", from the Semitic root qdš, meaning "holy". However, sacred prostitution is no longer a broad presumption. Some argue that sex acts within the temple were limited to yearly sacred aimed at assuring an abundant harvest.Cf.
The noun ʾăšērâ appears forty times in the Hebrew Bible, although in most cases this refers to some cultic object. The word is translated in LXX as (grove; plural: ἄλση) in every instance apart from Isaiah 17:8; 27:9 and 2 Chronicles 15:16; 24:18, with (trees) being used for the former, and, peculiarly, Ἀστάρτη (Astarte) for the latter. The Vulgate in Latin provided lucus or nemus, a grove or a wood. From the Vulgate, the King James translation of the Bible uses grove or groves instead of Asherah's name. Non-scholarly English language readers of the Bible would not have read her name for more than 400 years afterward. The association of Asherah with trees in the Hebrew Bible is very strong. For example, she is found under trees (1 Kings 14:23; 2 Kings 17:10) and is made of wood by human beings (1 Kings 14:15, 2 Kings 16:3–4). The farther from the time of Josiah's reforms, the broader the perception of an Asherah became. Trees described in later Jewish texts as being an asherah or part of an asherah include Vitis, , , Myrtus, and . (2025). 9780198154020, Oxford University Press. ISBN 9780198154020 Eventually, monotheistic leaders would suppress the tree due to its association with Asherah.
Deuteronomy 12 has Yahweh commanding the destruction of her shrines so as to maintain purity of his worship.Deuteronomy 12: 3–4 Jezebel brought hundreds of prophets for Baal and Asherah with her into the Israelite court. (2025). 9780446545259, Twelve. ISBN 9780446545259
William Dever's book Did God Have a Wife? discusses female pillar figurines, the queen of heaven name, and the cakes. Dever also points to the temple at Tel Arad, the famous archaeological site with cannabinoids and massebot. Dever notes: "The only goddess whose name is well attested in the Hebrew Bible (or in ancient Israel generally) is Asherah."
Beginning during the Eighteenth Dynasty of Egypt, a Semitic goddess named Qetesh ("holiness", sometimes reconstructed as Qudshu) appears prominently. That dynasty follows expulsion of occupying foreigners from an intermediary period. René Dussard suggested a connection to Asherah in 1941. Subsequent studies tried to find further evidence for equivalence of Qetesh and Asherah, although Wiggins does not. His hesitance did not dissuade subsequent scholars from equating Asherah with Qetesh.
One of the Tayma stones (CIS II 113) discovered by Charles Huber in 1883 in the ancient oasis of Tayma, northwestern Arabia, and now located at the Louvre, believed to date to the time of Nabonidus's retirement there in 549 BC, bears an inscription in Aramaic language that mentions Ṣelem of Maḥram (), Šingalāʾ (), and ʾAšîrāʾ () as the deities of Tema. It is unclear whether the name would be an Aramaic vocalisation of the Ugaritic ʾAṯirat or a later borrowing of the Hebrew ʾĂšērāh or similar form. In any event, Watkins says the root of both names is a Proto-Semitic *ʾṯrt. Pritchard excerpts the mention wšnglʔ wʔšyrʔ ʔlhy tymʔ and differs on the root's meaning.J B Pritchard 1948 Palestinian figurines in relation to certain goddesses known through literature page 64. Further refers to Cooke in NSI pp 195 ff.
The Arabic root ʾṯr (as in ʾaṯar, "trace") is similar in meaning to the Hebrew ʾāšar, indicating "to tread", used as a basis to explain Asherah's epithet "of the sea" as "she who treads the ym (sea).(the Arabic root yamm also means "sea")"Lucy Goodison and Christine E. Morris, Ancient Goddesses: Myths and Evidence (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1998), 79.
Asherah survived late in remote South Arabia as seen in some common era Qatabanian and Maʕinian inscriptions.: lists dates from 5th C BCE to 6th C AD.
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