KTU I.3

Cuneiform Texts from Ugarit
Ancient Near East

Watch! Anat sees the gods. Below, her feet start shaking. All around, her limbs are shivering. Up above, her face sweats. Shudders wrack the bones of every limb; the bones within her spine turn weak. She spoke up and cried out, “Why have Gupan and Ugar come here? What enemy rises up against Baal? What rival faces the Cloud-Rider? Didn’t I crush El’s beloved, Yam (Ocean)? Didn’t I annihilate Nahar (River), the great god? Didn’t I leash Dragon and bind him in a saddle? I crushed the Sinuous Serpent, Encircler, the seven-headed monster. I crushed the gods’ beloved, Arsha. I ravaged El’s young bull, Ataka. I crushed the gods’ she-wolf, Fire. I annihilated El’s daughter, Zabiba. I’ve reaped silver from my fighting; I’ve taken possession of gold.”

Psalm 89:10

Hebrew Bible

8 O Lord God of Heaven’s Armies! Who is strong like you, O Lord? Your faithfulness surrounds you. 9 You rule over the proud sea. When its waves surge, you calm them. 10 You crushed the Proud One and killed it; with your strong arm you scattered your enemies. 11 The heavens belong to you, as does the earth. You made the world and all it contains. 12 You created the north and the south. Tabor and Hermon rejoice in your name.

 Notes and References

"... The pericope Isaiah 51:9-11 has commonly been noted to use motifs of Yahweh as the Divine Warrior, cleaving the sea, fmiliar from the Ugaritic literature ... Isaiah 59:9-11, along with Psalm 74:13-15 and 89:10-11, show several lexical and syntactic commonalities with a particular instantiaion of the motif in Ugaritic literature, KTU 1.3 III 38-46. The markers present in these four texts, I argue, point to a deliberate allusive intention on the part of the authors of the Ugaritic material, Isaiah 51, and Psalms 74 and 89, which may be gauged with a high deal of probability ..."

Hutton, Jeremy M. Isaiah 51:9-11 and the Rhetorical Appropriation and Subversion of Hostile Theologies (p. 271–303) Journal of Biblical Literature, vol. 126, no. 2, 2007

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