Unveiling the Ahabite Parenthesis: When Pure Baʿalism Overtook Mixed Yahwism
In this final chapter of both Punctular Time and the study as a whole, the discussion moves to the Northern Kingdom of Israel at a time when Phoenician contact changed the face of the Israelite nation. Through the diplomatic marriage of Ahab, king of Israel, and Jezebel, daughter of Ithobaal I, king of Tyre, the position of Yahweh in Israel was not only lowered but dismissed altogether, for the first time in Israelite history (1 Kgs 16:37) resulting in the direct worship of god Baʿal, rather than the syncretistic combination of Yahweh with Baʿal as seen under Jeroboam.
The Prophet of a National Crisis
The ministry of the prophet is that of checking and balancing the power of the king,, but the king did not always listen to the prophet. As a matter of fact, more often than not the king did not heed the warnings of the biblical prophet – relying instead on his own personal plethora of “yes-men” prophets. Because of this, many of the more famous prophets are those who arose in times of peril and great need. For Elijah, his ministry centered on the crisis of Phoenician Baʿalism in the Northern Kingdom during the Ahabite parenthesis.
Elijah the Prophet
As a preclassical prophet, Elijah does not have actual oracles attached to his name. Instead, his mission seemed to be royally focused, to be bent on the issue of judgment and covenant violation, and even to look for the repentance of the kings. This is in contrast to the classical prophets, whose ministry was expressed through the oracle and in symbolic form (Hill and Walton 2009: 296).
Through the Elijah cycle we learn of the great, though sometimes wavering, faith of the prophet. Surely, Elijah should hold his place as a hero of the faith mentioned in Hebrews 11, for he was one of “the prophets” who were “destitute, afflicted, ill-treated.” In fact, during the Mt. Carmel epic, it appears that Elijah believed himself to be completely alone in Israel (1Kgs 18:22), But even in this loneliness and isolation, much should be said about the fact that Elijah still persisted in his public duties – though showing fear in times outside of the public eye.
The Crisis of Phoenician Baʿalism
But who wouldn’t show fear? This was, in fact, the time of the great apostasy that we can call the crisis of Phoenician Baʿalism.
Baʿalism being the central religious and even socio-political ideal of both lower and upper Canaanite societies, the kingdoms of Israel faced “uphill” battles throughout their existence, a consequent result of their disobedience to completely take the land. At its core, Baʿalism was “a fertility cult offering its devotees agricultural prosperity” (Chisholm 1994: 268). Because of this socio-economic link to the land, Israel was doomed to synthesis since the people – too – wished to grow good crops in the new land.
Beyond the normal results of mingling with an abnormal, or amoral, lower Canaanite society, there was also a strong missionary effort on the part of the Phoenicians. A look at the religious impact of Carthage and other Phoenician established cities on the Mediterranean region shows a religious ferver that is almost to be envied (Moscati 2001: 128).
Whether a connection between Jezebel and Dido, founder of Carthage, have any validity (Peake and Grieve 1920: 302), the evangelistic oriented Jezebel also spread Phoenician Religion, this time the purely Baʿalistic culture reached to the lower Canaanite regions.
In fact, the Scriptures have much to say about the “missionary efforts” of Jezebel, for she ensured the existence of Baʿalism by first killing the prophets of Yahweh. Indeed, once the followers of Yahweh were quieted, through Jezebel, wife of Ahab, we find the very first statesponsored religion outside of Yahwism – note that the prophets of Baʿal ate at Jezebel’s table (Mead 2005: 249).
The Ahabite Parenthesis
We have, then, during the reign of Ahab (and his heir, Ahaziah, who followed closely with Ahab’s politics) what can be termed the Ahabite Parenthesis. This was a short period of time in the Northern Kingdom’s history that was purely Baʿalistic on the socio-religious level (thanks to Jezebel) and almost so on the political level (Ahab seemed to still have a hint of loyalty to Yahweh).
This can be better understood when contrasted with the “sins of Jeroboam,” that infamous phrase attached as a qualifier/yardstick to the northern kings – all of whom fell short (Danelius 1967: 95). 1 Kings 16:31 describes Ahab’s reign as not only following the sins of Jeroboam, but he also married Jezebel and served Baʿal. Indeed, Ahab “did more to anger the LORD God of Israel than all the kings of Israel who were before him” (1Kgs 16.33b, NET).
The reason for this “greater” sin on Ahab’s part was that he went beyond the simple synchetism of the former kings and openly accepted Baʿalism, even to the point of building a temple and erecting an altar to Baʿal in Samaria and making an Asherah. According to the text, Ahab served and sponsored Baʿal (Drinkard 2005: 760). This acceptance is contrasted to the previous kings who in all actuality “served” (if we can use the term lightly) Yahweh but in Baʿalistic manners. This is, then, the meaning of the sins of Jeroboam – a synchrotistic blur of the lower Canaanite socioeconomic culture (Baʿalism) with the ideal (Yahwism) given in the Torah.
Throughout the history of the Northern Kingdom (and to a point the southern), we see a slow but steady move toward blurring Yahwism with the typical pre-invasion socioeconomic culture of Canaan. Indeed, the original sin of Jeroboam most likely had little to do with a desire to pervert Yahwism and very much to do with centralizing power by subverting temple worship in Judah (Toews 1993: 100), but since that time Israel seemed to have slipped deeper into the Canaanite culture, as evidenced time and again throughout the books of Kings.
By the time of Ahab, Israel (the Northern Kingdom) had become quite Baʿalistic, but this was not to be confused with Jezebel’s efforts to spread her faith. No, under Ahab we find a kind of parenthetical pause in the synchrotism of Israel’s faith with Baʿalism. Instead of a Baʿalism where Yahweh is simply another name for Baʿal, we find a complete Baʿalism, even a pure Baʿalism, due in whole to Ahab’s marriage (thus the greater sin of Ahab mentioned above).
Thus enters Elijah. He enters not because the people were Baʿalistic, but exactly on the scene of Ahab and leaves after the death of Ahab’s loyal son, and therefore ministers with the intent to deliver Israel from this utterly non-Yahwistic cult.
This is not a deliverance as we have often seen with the judges; instead, Elijah serves as the office of prophet allows him to serve – as the “cricket” on Ahab’s shoulder, i.e., in a nonpolitical but persuasive manner.
The historical intent of Yahweh is here clearly seen to be people and nationally oriented – a drought is sure to get the attention of not only the king but all of the people of whom have allowed the Phoenician crisis to enter the land.
As we look at this crisis during the Ahabite Parenthesis, and we find Elijah there, we have to again begin to ask ourselves, “Why is this being recorded?” Is the purpose of Elijah’s ministry simply historically focused on the crisis itself? If so, why tell the world about it? If the Elijah narrative is simply historically and not literarily focues, then in truth, there would be no real need to spread the message of change after the parenthesis is over and the changes have occured. For that matter, why record anything in the books of Kings? The answer is much simpler, and takes us back to the purpose of history in general, which according to Oswalt includes human self-knowledge and evaluation for future outcomes. It can be clearly said that records of the ministry of Elijah were given not to those in Elijah’s day but for those after him, those in exile – the children of those who slew the prophets.
The Literary Purpose for the Mt. Carmel Epic
Having moved through the books of Kings from a broad analysis to the purpose of Elijah’s ministry, we move now to a deeper understanding of the literary purpose of the Mt. Carmel epic itself. What we understand is that the Mt. Carmel epic, in addition to the historical value it has, actually vindicates Yahweh’s later judgment of His people because of their disloyalty in the face of a loyal God.
The Mt. Carmel Epic
Having assumed that my audience has a previous understanding of the epic through personal or corporate study, let us simply move forward to point to the reality behind the epic battle, for there is a sort of metaphysical reality linked with the physical reality of the epic itself. Of course, by metaphysical I am not assuming any unreliabity in the text; instead, I point to the hidden backdrop found within the broader understanding of the battle. This hidden backdrop is that of the “gods.”
If one could mentally place himself into the position of an early 9th century Israelite, what would one think of this “battle between the gods”? Surely, these thoroughly Baʿalistic Israelites did indeed expect to see a battle, but a visible battle between the gods was not the norm. As the Baʿal cycle describes, the battles between deities took place in the world of the deities, though the believers understood these battles to have mutual effects in their world. Now, here, we have not a purely metaphysical battle that correlates to the physical world; instead, what the Mt. Carmel epic describes is a physical battle between metaphysical entities. This is, then, when myth became reality, and when Israel understood the absence of Baʿal.
As a reminder of the outcome, Elijah continues the defeat of Baʿalism by slaying the prophets of Baʿal. This victory on the part of Yahweh was more complete with the victory over the prophets for the victory over the prophets was a reactionary event of which the people of Israel partook in. Note, also, that the people siezed the prophets after twice redevoting themselves as Yahwists from Baʿalism. The people who waited for Baʿal to answer the roll-call found Yahweh waiting for them.
Yahweh’s Judgment
The Bible student must remember that the Mt. Carmel epic took place at a time when the curses, of the Torah’s blessings and curses, should have been in full force. Since the time of Solomon, Israel had been engaged in state-accepted polytheism (Mullen 1992: 231). Sure there had been times of remorse and repentance, but, especially in the Northern Kingdom, the people had grown to be almost completely pagan.
As noted earlier, the Northern Kingdom had always, since its conception, been Baʿalistic. Now, during the Ahabite Parenthesis, we no longer find Baʿalistic Yahwism but extreme Baʿalism. The extreme Baʿalism of Israel, enacted by the extreme failure of Ahab (the guardian of the covenant), should have completely complicated the matter of repentance – at least from a legal perpective. Israel did not follow Yahweh’s covenant; through her actions, Israel both perverted and abandoned Yahweh’s covenant.
There is one drawback, though – Yahweh is loyal to Israel. Because of this loyalty, Yahweh sent the prophet to confront the guardian of His covenant with the people in an attempt to bring the people back into loyalty themselves.
The People Dismiss Their God
The Mt. Carmel epic acted, synchronically, as a great reminder of the grace of God to His covenant people. He acted on their behalf, even though they did not deserve it, and He saved them from the curses that would surely have ensued.
Diachronically, on the other hand, we see a different story. While the salvation of the people was proven successful, the people of God soon forgot their covenant. Indeed, the Ahabite Parenthesis was simply a parenthesis because pure Yahwism was not what was installed after Phoenician Baʿalism was defeated, but instead what was installed was the synchretized Baʿalism/Yahwism of Jeroboam (Brueggemann 2008: 19). The Mt. Carmel epic did not save Israel from its future destruction; it simply acted as, perhaps, the greatest testimony of Yahweh’s goodness and graciousness to His own people who did not care enough to care.
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[This is a lecture written for the course 'HIST 262: History of the Ancient Near East,' taught Fall 2024 at God's Bible School and College, a regionally accredited College in Cincinnati, Ohio. Bibliographical material will be posted under Research on this site.]
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