Texts in Conversation
Deuteronomy's pairing of arrows and plague recalls the Ugaritic plague god Resheph as an archer, placing a feared divine weapon under God's control.
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2500 BCE
1000+ CE
KTU 1.82:3
Cuneiform Texts from Ugarit
Ancient Near East
[…] Baal struck […] Tunnanu, and […] and poured out […] […] to the earth […] […] Baal, the arrows of Rashap […] his kidneys and his heart. […] your mouth on the mountain, […] your mouth […] your teeth. […] and your lips […] to Mot […] […] the voice of Shapshu […] serpents […] […] [And] he speaks […] take me […] take me. […] in the vineyards […] […] before me […] Baal […] […] Anat […] like […] […] dust […] your house he drives you out.
Deuteronomy 32:23
Hebrew Bible
21 They have made me jealous with false gods, enraging me with their worthless gods; so I will make them jealous with a people they do not recognize, with a nation slow to learn I will enrage them. 22 For a fire has been kindled by my anger, and it burns to lowest Sheol; it consumes the earth and its produce, and ignites the foundations of the mountains. 23 I will increase their disasters; I will use up my arrows on them. 24 They will be starved by famine, eaten by plague, and bitterly stung; I will send the teeth of wild animals against them, along with the poison of creatures that crawl in the dust. 25 The sword will make people childless outside, and terror will do so inside; they will destroy both the young man and the virgin, the infant and the gray-haired man.
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Notes and References
“... Some scholars object to deber as a true deity name,98 but its partnering
with rešep in Habakkuk 3:5 strongly suggests this is the case, “given the
presence of [Resheph] in the Ugaritic texts as a god of destruction (KTU
1.14 I 18–19; 1.82:3).”99 Rešep appears in Deuteronomy 32:23–24, where
Yahweh threatens his apostate people:
23And I will heap disasters upon them;
I will spend my arrows on them;
24they shall be wasted with hunger (rāʿāb),
and devoured by plague (rešep)
and poisonous pestilence (qeṭeb).
As noted above, Resheph is a deity of destruction at Ugarit. He is
portrayed as an archer there (KTU 1.82:3), and so the phrase “spending my
arrows” is interesting. Resheph is accompanied by qeṭeb and rāʿāb. The
former appears in an Ugaritic text as a kinsman of Mōt (“Death”). The
latter appears to be an epithet of Mōt.100
In Psalm 91:3–6, the psalmist writes that those who dwell in the shelter
of the Most High and abide in the shadow of the Almighty will be delivered
“from the deadly pestilence [deber]” (v. 3) and will not fear “the arrow that
flies by day, nor the pestilence [deber] that stalks in darkness, nor the
destruction [qeṭeb] that wastes at noonday” (v. 5–6). Why? Because these
forces are not autonomous deities. Yahweh of Israel is in control of them.
Consequently, he will protect his own from their lethal harm. ...”
Heiser, Michael S.
Demons: What the Bible Really Says about the Powers of Darkness
(p. PDF 39) Lexham Press, 2020
* The use of references are not endorsements of their contents. Please read the entirety of the provided reference(s) to understand the author's full intentions regarding the use of these texts.
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