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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:27 and Ezekiel 39:19

Ancient Near East, Ugaritic · Hebrew Bible

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Summary

Ezekiel shares the Ugaritic picture of battle as a bloody feast, turning the defeat of an invading army into a public humiliation as animals consume its dead.

Passages

KTU 1.3 II:27

Ancient Near East, Ugaritic · Cuneiform Texts from Ugarit
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
1350–1185 BCE (scholarly estimate) Read in KTU

Ezekiel 39:19

Hebrew Bible
17 “As for you, son of man, this is what the Sovereign Lord says: Tell every kind of bird and every wild beast: ‘Assemble and come! Gather from all around to my slaughter that I am going to make for you, a great slaughter on the mountains of Israel! You will eat flesh and drink blood. 18 You will eat the flesh of warriors and drink the blood of the princes of the earth—the rams, lambs, goats, and bulls, all of them fattened animals of Bashan. 19 You will eat fat until you are full and drink blood until you are drunk at my slaughter that I have made for you. 20 You will fill up at my table with horses and charioteers, with warriors and all the soldiers,’ declares the Sovereign Lord.
600–501 BCE (scholarly estimate) Read in Ezekiel

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:27 and Ezekiel 39:19

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