Texts in Conversation
Isaiah 26 denies that dead rulers will rise, rejecting a hope celebrated at Ugarit, where the Rephaim ride out in horses and chariots, and leaving former lords no future beside God.
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2500 BCE
1000+ CE
KTU 1.20 II:1
Cuneiform Texts from Ugarit
Ancient Near East
[...] eight within my palace. The Rephaim hurried to his sanctuary, to his sanctuary hurried the divinities. They harnessed the chariots, they hitched the horses. They mounted their chariots, they came on their mounts. They journeyed a day and a second. The Rephaim arrived at the threshing floors, [the gods] [at] the plantations. And Danel, [the man of Rapiu], answered, the hero, the man of Harnam, replied: On the threshing floors of the gods, within the [plantations of the divinities] those who have come will eat a meal, the ancient [ones]
Isaiah 26:14
Hebrew Bible
11 O Lord, you are ready to act, but they don’t even notice. They will see and be put to shame by your angry judgment against humankind; yes, fire will consume your enemies. 12 O Lord, you make us secure, for even all we have accomplished you have done for us. 13 O Lord, our God, masters other than you have ruled us, but we praise your name alone. 14 The dead do not come back to life, the spirits of the dead do not rise. That is because you came in judgment and destroyed them, you wiped out all memory of them. 15 You have made the nation larger, O Lord; you have made the nation larger and revealed your splendor; you have extended all the borders of the land. 16 O Lord, in distress they looked for you; they uttered incantations because of your discipline.
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Notes and References
“... In another place of the Isaiah apocalypse the Canaanite royal idea
of “resurrection” is explicitly rejected: “The dead (mtym) do not live
and the shades of the dead kings (rp"ym) do not rise”! (Isa 26:14). [...] It is probable that the cults of the
dead, especially of the royal deceased, played a more important role
in the monarchic period of Israel than the biblical texts reveal (cp.
for example Ezek 43:7ff.).73 It is against this background that we are
to understand the strong rejection of royal “resurrection” in Isa 26:14.
The veneration of the deified royal dead as heavenly host of (war-
rior) stars74—being apparently a common element of royal ideology
in Syria-Canaan, Israel and Egypt—was seen as a contradiction to
YHWH’s exclusive rule as monotheistic god in the postexilic period,
an idea clearly articulated in the context (26:13f.). ...”
* 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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