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KTU

Cuneiform Texts from Ugarit

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Baal Cycle

KTU 1.3 II

[…]
Henna enough for seven girls,
scent of coriander and murex. Anat did close the gates of the mansion,
and she met the pages at the foot of the rock.
And behold! Anat fought in the vale,⁠
battled between the two cities,
struck the people,
silenced the men of the sun-rise.⁠
Heads were like balls beneath her,
palms above her like locusts,
palms of warriors like avenging grasshoppers.
She did stick the heads on her waist,
did bind the palms to her sash. She plunged her knees in the blood of the guards,
her skirts in the gore of the warriors.
With her shafts she drove forth the old men,
with her bowstring the townspeople.
Then behold! Anat proceeded to her house,
the goddess started for her palace;
but she was not sated with her fighting in the vale,
her battling between the two cities. She arranged chairs for the warriors,⁠
she did arrange tables for the soldiers,
stools for the heroes.
Anat fought hard and looked,⁠
she battled and surveyed the scene;
her liver swelled with laughter,⁠
her heart was filled with joy, the liver of Anat with triumph,
as she plunged her knees in the blood of the guards,⁠
her skirts in the gore of the warriors,
until she was sated with fighting in the house,
with battling between the tables. The blood of the guards was wiped from the house
and oil of a peace-offering was poured from a bowl.
The virgin Anat washed her hands,
the sister-in-law of peoples her fingers;
she washed her hands of the blood of the guards,
her fingers of the gore of the warriors.
She did put back chairs with chairs, tables with tables,
she put back stools with stools.
She scooped up water and washed herself,
dew of heaven and oil of earth, showers of the rider on the clouds,
dew that the heavens poured upon her,
showers that the stars did pour upon her.

Texts in conversation

Compare KTU 1.3 II:20 and Isaiah 49:26

Ancient Near East, Ugaritic · Hebrew Bible

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Summary

Isaiah 49 changes Anat's battle feast in the Baal Cycle into the enemies' destruction of themselves, turning an older image of divine violence into a promise of rescue for Zion.

Passages

KTU 1.3 II:20

Ancient Near East, Ugaritic · Cuneiform Texts from Ugarit
Then behold! Anat proceeded to her house, the goddess started for her palace; but she was not sated with her fighting in the vale, her battling between the two cities. She arranged chairs for the warriors, she did arrange tables for the soldiers, stools for the heroes. Anat fought hard and looked, she battled and surveyed the scene; her liver swelled with laughter, her heart was filled with joy, the liver of Anat with triumph, as she plunged her knees in the blood of the guards, her skirts in the gore of the warriors, until she was sated with fighting in the house, with battling between the tables. The blood of the guards was wiped from the house and oil of a peace-offering was poured from a bowl. The virgin Anat washed her hands, the sister-in-law of peoples her fingers; she washed her hands of the blood of the guards, her fingers of the gore of the warriors.
1350–1185 BCE (scholarly estimate) Read in KTU

Isaiah 49:26

Hebrew Bible
23 Kings will be your children’s guardians; their princesses will nurse your children. With their faces to the ground they will bow down to you, and they will lick the dirt on your feet. Then you will recognize that I am the Lord; those who wait patiently for me are not put to shame. 24 Can spoils be taken from a warrior, or captives be rescued from a conqueror? 25 Indeed,” says the Lord, “ captives will be taken from a warrior; spoils will be rescued from a conqueror. I will oppose your adversary and I will rescue your children. 26 I will make your oppressors eat their own flesh; they will get drunk on their own blood, as if it were wine. Then all humankind will recognize that I am the Lord, your Deliverer, your Protector, the Powerful One of Jacob.”
740–450 BCE (scholarly estimate) Read in Isaiah

References

“... Third, the battle produces heaps of corpses (Isa. 34:2) or skulls (Deut. 32:43; Ps. 110:6). The image of harvest appears in Anat’s “gleaning” and in some biblical scenes of divine war (Joel 3:13; Rev. 14:14-20; cf. secular examples in Judg. 8:1-2; 20:44-46; Jer. 6:9; cf. Jer. 49:9; Obadiah 5). Fourth, like the second part of the Ugaritic passage given above, the aftermath of war is described as a feast, a feature attested in Isaiah 34:6-7, 49:26 and perhaps presupposed in the sacrificial language of Deuteronomy 32:43. This feast includes feeding on the flesh of captives (Deut. 32:42), drinking the blood of the victims (Isa. 49:26; LXX Zech. 9:15; cf. Num. 23:24), called “captives” in Deuteronomy 32:42 (as in KTU 1.3 II), and wading in the blood of the vanquished (Pss. 58:11; 68:24). Isaiah 49:26 alters the motif of feeding on the captives. In this verse, the enemies will cannibalize themselves: “I will make your oppressors eat their own flesh, and they shall be drunk with their own blood as with wine.” The image of wading in the blood may be related to the theme of the battle as bloody harvest. Because of its blood red color, the image of the wine harvest appears in biblical descriptions of divine war (Deut. 32:42-43; Isa. 49:26; 63:3; Ezek. 39:19; Joel 4:13; Lam. 1:15; Rev. 19:15). ...”
Mark S. Smith, The Early History of God: Yahweh and the Other Deities in Ancient Israel, 2nd ed., The Biblical Resource Series (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2002), PDF 116.

References are not endorsements of their contents. Read each reference in full to understand its author's intentions in using these texts.

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KTU 1.3 II:20 and Isaiah 49:26

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