The Cult of Asherah

Alice C. Linsley

The term "Asherah" appears forty times in the Hebrew Bible and yet the exact nature of this term is unclear. Sometimes the Asherah is a pole, a carved post, a pillar, a sacred grove, a goddess, or a cult object. Some biblical rulers tolerated and even encouraged the Asherah cult. Others opposed it. But what exactly were they opposing? 

Perhaps the ambiguity is purposeful and intended. The Asherah cult was not contained in Jerusalem and was not easily controlled by the Jerusalem elite who discouraged local and regional shrines. They sought to boost the prestige of the Jerusalem Temple as a symbol of Jewish identity, especially after the Babylonian captivity. 

However, earlier in Israel's history, an Asherah statue stood in Solomon's temple. When Rehoboam came to the throne, Maacah, his wife and the queen mother, became the royal patron of the cult. Asherah's statue stood within the Jerusalem Temple throughout Rehoboam's reign and throughout the short reign of his son, Abijah. 

There is a long-standing custom of royal women holding office as the protectors of sacred shrines. Sargon (reigned c. 2334–2284 BC) appointed his daughter Heduanna as the "En" of the shrine at Ur. The Akkadian term En means lord, master, royal official, priest or priestess. En-Heduanna served the Creator God Anu, at the house/shrine (pr) of Anu. As with Roman Catholic nuns, she would have been considered “married” to the deity she served. En-Heduanna is credited with a large body of cuneiform poetry.

In ancient Egypt, some royal daughters were appointed to the positions of the God’s Wife (Hemet Netjer) and the Divine Adoratrice (Duat Netjer). These offices were held by women of high social rank, like the queen’s mother, or the wife of the high priest of the most favored royal temple. 

Ahmose I (r. 1550-1525 BC) appointed his principal wife to the office of the God’s Wife of Amun, and he endowed the office with financial resources, servants, real estate, and provided a royal retinue fitting the wife of Amun.

The powerful influence of the royal mother is evident in the story of Bathsheba appearing before her son, King Solomon. When Bathsheba went to speak to Solomon on behalf of Adonijah, the king stood to greet her, bowed down to her and sat down on his throne. He had a throne brought for the king's mother, and she sat down at Solomon's right hand. (1 Kings 2:19)

Different titles appear in ancient texts for women of such high status. Gebirah is a title ascribed to several queen mothers of Israel and Judah. Maacha is called gebirah (“great lady”) and she is associated with the goddess Asherah. Asherah is likely a reference to Hathor who was venerated by the Horite and Sethite Hebrew, but this practice was problematic for Jews who rejected the belief in God Son.

Ash holding the royal scepter with the Horus totem.

Some women attained high rank as royal officials (sometimes termed "priestesses") in charge of Hathor shrines. The shrines were located at sources of water such as rivers, oases, or wells in sacred groves. This suggests that the term Asherah is related to the Egyptian deity Ash, the protector of those who traveled the trade routes between the Nile and Mesopotamia. He was the guardian of oases. 

The archetypal queen mother is Hathor, called Ashratu in Mesopotmia. Ashratu and Asherah are related to Ash, the Sethite Hebrew deity of water shrines.

Another title for royal ladies who served at water shrines is rabitu. Ra-bitu is from the Akkadian words for water (raatu) and house/shrine (biitu). The emblem of the rabitu was the spindle. In the Ugaritic mythology of Elimelek the queen mother holds the title "ra-bitu" and her emblem is the spindle.

According to Tradition, the Annunciaton took place when Mary went to the Temple well. Mary is shown in some icons holding a spindle. The King's Mother is a type of the Virgin Mary, who is crowned by the Sun (Revelation 12:1-5), as a symbol of her being divinely overshadowed (Luke 1:35).

She fulfills the Horite Hebrew expectation that a woman of their ruler-priest caste would conceive the son of God by divine overshadowing as shown in ancient images of Hathor.

I propose that the Asherah cult was associated with water shrines where women sought divine help to conceive. The solar symbolism and the cow-calf imagery suggest a connection to Hathor and the religion of the Horite Hebrew. (See Hathor Veneration at Timna.)

Related reading: Steve A. Wiggins, Athirat, Asherah, Ashratu; Hebrew Rulers With Two Wives; Denying Marriage: A Cunning Royal Strategy; Wells and Brides; A Woman at a Well; Asherah and the Asherah Cult 

Mother and Son Pierced: Image of Intimacy

But he was pierced [sti] for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was on him, and by his wounds we are healed. (Isaiah 53:5)

Simeon blessed them and said to Mary, Behold, this child is set for the fall and rising again of many in Israel; and for a sign which shall be spoken against; Yes, a sword shall pierce [τρύπημα στο- puncture] your own soul also, that the thoughts of many hearts may be revealed. (Luke 2:34,35).

Alice C. Linsley

An exploration of the theme of being pierced reveals the spiritual and emotional connection between Mary and Jesus. On the cross, His side was pierced, and at His Presentation in the Temple the aged priest Simeon told Mary that her mother's heart would be pierced by sorrow.

The oldest Hebrew copy of the Psalms from the Dead Sea Scrolls, dating to the century before Christ reads the verb in this verse as ka’aru. The passage is a Messianic reference:

 ...a pack of villains encircles me;
they pierce my hands and my feet.
All my bones are on display;
people stare and gloat over me.
They divide my clothes among them
and cast lots for my garment.
The Hebrew ka'aru suggests more than a superficial wound. It suggests boring a hole. The term relates to the leather workers (tahash) who bore holes in their materials. They are called karmaara, a word related to the Hindi lohakara, meaning copper smith. The term loha refers to copper in Sanskrit. It is derived from the word lohita, meaning red. (Copper was regarded as red metal and iron as black metal.)

There is a linguistic connection to the biblical word ka-aru. The word appears to be of Nilotic origin. Among the Luo of the Upper Nile ka-Aru means "the place of the one who pierces."

These craftsmen were sea-faring merchants and who moved out of the Nile Valley in a rather militant fashion and founded the maritime civilization of Southern India (Sarasvati civilization). What we seem to have here is language related to the tools of trade of the ancient Horite metal workers. These were the ancestors of Jesus and Mary.

Egyptian boring a hole

In Isaiah 1:6 the King James Version has the word "bruises" using chabbarah. Chabbarah is linguistically related to the Luo chaddho, meaning to cut out, to pluck out, or to bruise the skin. A wound of this type is called chaddhoreh in Luo.

In Isaiah 53:5, "He was bruised [dakha'] for our iniquities" repeats the use of dakah/daqah in Isaiah 28:28. But the piercing of Mother and Son is a different word and the difference is significant.

In the ancient Egyptian the verb to pierce/kill is an interesting reduplication: bbbb, suggesting a set that is intimately related. (Reduplication serves to enhance the meaning.) There is an Egyptian story that treats this in the context of the struggle between Horus and Seth. Horus agreed to do battle, but his mother Hathor-Meri fell to the ground and wept, fearing that her son would be killed. In combat, both Horus and Seth fell into the depths of the Nile and the battle raged for days. The mother's heart suffered bitterly until she could no longer stand by without acting. She made a harpoon from twine and copper and threw the weapon into the water. The harpoon struck her son's side. He surfaced and roared, "Mother! Thy spear hath pierced me!"

Abraham's ancestors who mined copper at Timnah regarded Hathor as their patroness. A temple dedicated to Hathor was discovered at the southwestern edge of Mt. Timnah by Professor Beno Rothenberg of Hebrew University.

The relationship between Mary and her divine Son was and is intimate. The piercing correspondence expresses one aspect of that intimacy. Jesus wants us to honor his blessed mother. Mary wants us to honor and worship the Son of God.

Related reading: Who is Jesus?; The Virgin Mary's Horite Ancestry; The Urheimat of the Canaanite Y; The Ancient Afro-Asiatic Metal Workers; Is Hebrew an African Language?; The Afro-Asiatic Dominion

Another Great Discovery in Bethlehem

Alice C. Linsley



Bethlehem has made the news again with the discovery of a 2700 year old clay seal.

Photo Credit: Clara Amit, courtesy of the Israel Antiquities Authority

Eli Shukron, director of the excavation on behalf of the Israel Antiquities Authority said, "This is the first time the name Bethlehem appears outside the Bible,‭ ‬in an inscription from the First Temple period (1006-586 B.C.)‭, ‬which proves that Bethlehem was indeed a city in the Kingdom of Judah,‭ ‬and possibly also‭ ‬in earlier periods." (From here.) 

Only about 40 other seals of this kind from the first Jewish Temple period have been found, according to Shmuel Achituv, an expert in ancient scripts at Israel's Ben-Gurion University.

The dig is being underwritten by an right wing Zionist organization that hopes to see Jewish settlers populate the Palestinian neighborhood of Silwan. 

In 2009, a 4,000-year-old tomb was discovered in Bethlehem during renovation on a local house. Construction workers were led to the tomb through a hole found near the Church of the Nativity. The tomb dates between 1,900 and 2,200 BC.

Pottery, plates and beads were retrieved from the tomb, along with the remains of two individuals. (From here.)

Todd Bolen, commenting on this find, has written: "Many tombs from this period, including intact ones, have been found throughout Israel. In fact, this period is primarily known from its cemeteries, with relatively few settlements discovered."




Bethlehem in the Bible

The Biblical information about Bethlehem ‭ tells the story of this ancient Horite settlement.

I Chronicles 4:4 lists Hur (Hor) as the "father of Bethlehem." The author of I Chronicles knew that Bethlehem was originally a Horite settlement.

Rachel, Jacob's cousin wife, was buried at Bethlehem. She gave birth to Joseph who married the daughter of the Priest of Heliopolis in Egypt (Gen. 41:45).  Heliopolis (Onn) was a Horite shrine city.

Bethlehem is where Ruth gave birth Obed, the father of Jesse, the father of David. Ruth is praised and likened to Tamar who gave birth to Perez and Zerah. Judah gained these righteous sons by Tamar after losing unrighteous sons. His kingdom was amplified through Perez from whom Israel's greatest king and the promised Messiah came.

Bethlehem is the hometown of King David, who tended the sheep of his father. Jesus comes from a long line of shepherd-priests, on both Joseph's and Mary's sides.  Joseph's family lived in Nazareth which was the home of the eighteenth division of priests, that of Happizzez (1 Chron. 24:15). His cousin bride was Mary. Mary’s father Joachim was a priest who kept flocks, according to the Protoevangelium of James. This may be why the Arabic name for Bethlehem is Bēt Laḥm, meaning "House of Meat/Flesh." In Christian belief, Jesus, the Lamb of God, gave of his flesh for the life of the world.

Horite priests maintained shrines at major water systems or at wells and also kept sheep. Moses tended the flocks of his father-in-law, the priest of Midian. It was at Jethro's well that Moses met his cousin wife, Zipporah. Likewise, Abraham's servant found Rebecca at a well, and Jacob first encountered Rachel at a well.

According to the prophet Micah, Messiah was to come from Bethlehem. The Bablyonian Talmud acknowledges that Jesus was born to Mary. In the Talmud, ignominious names are given to Mary and her Son. Mary is called "Charia" which means dung or excrement, and Jesus is called "Jeschu" which means May his name and memory be blotted out. Sanhedrin 106a acknowledges Mary's noblility but calls her a whore. “She who was the descendant of princes and governors played the harlot with carpenters.”

Mary was of the Horite priestly lines. She was "Miriam Daughter of Joachim Son of Pntjr (Panther) Priest of Nathan of Bethlehem." From the earliest predynastic times among the Egyptian Horites, ntjr designated the king. The name Panther or p-ntjr meant "God is King."



Related reading:  A Bit More on the Bethlehem Bulla; Horite Brides at Wells; Jesus Christ in Genesis; Horite Expectation and the Star of Bethlehem