Yes, I can definitely comment on the video you provided. First, the video you provided didn’t address any particular points that are sourced in ancient Jewish or Samaritan texts. I.e. he didn’t actually take a known Jewish text and compare the concepts that the Caananites had with ones that are found in ancient Jewish sources. He also didn't explain what the Caananite vowels were based on ancient Caananite descriptions of their language. Another important issue. He didn't deal with the etymology of certain words the way I did in my video.
We recently placed what is, as far as we know, the first
electronic digital library for the study of the Ugaritic language and its literature on our pre-Pub page.
Ugaritic, the language of ancient Ugarit (in modern Syria), isn’t something that most people think about when it comes to Bible study. However, the clay tablets discovered and deciphered in the late 1920s and early 1930s provide an unparalleled glimpse into the life and religious worldview of the ancient Israelites. Some (including myself) would argue that they are as important as the
Dead Sea Scrolls. Ugaritic is important because of the fact that its vocabulary is so close to biblical Hebrew — many Ugaritic words are letter-for-letter the same as biblical Hebrew. It is the religion of Ugarit, however, that is especially important to Old Testament scholarship.
click here:
What's Ugaritic Got to Do with Anything? (logos.com)
And here is more from the article:
Religious Context. The religion of Ugarit and the religion of ancient Israel were not the same, but there were some striking overlaps. For example, the name of the ultimate divine authority at Ugarit was El, one of the names of the God of Israel (e.g.,
Gen 33:20). El was described as an aged god with white hair, seated on a throne.
However, at Ugarit, El was sovereign, but another god ran things on earth for El as his vizier. That god’s name was Baal, a name quite familiar to anyone who has read the Old Testament. At Ugarit Baal was known by several titles: “king of the gods,” “the Most High,” “Prince Baal” (baal zbl), and—most importantly for our discussion—“the Rider on the Clouds.”
Baal’s position as “king of the gods” in Ugarit, Israel’s northern neighbor, helps explain the “Baal problem” in the Old Testament. Jereboam’s religion in the northern kingdom borrowed from Baal worship, and it soon began to look like there was no difference, or if there was a difference, they were so close that worshipping one or the other was just theological hair-splitting. This is what prophets like Elijah had to contend with. The people had no Bible. They had only the prophets and their words. When a prophet wasn’t around to set the record straight, it was easy to just do what the neighbors were doing—especially if your king didn’t care, or actually preferred it that way.
Given this state of affairs, it's not surprising that
sometimes in the course of their preaching and writing, the prophets counted on familiarity with Baal to make their case that it was Yahweh, not Baal, who was the heavenly king. We know this was the case, since
certain Old Testament books actually quote from the Ugaritic religious texts, most notably the one that modern scholars have called the Baal Cycle. Whereas the Baal Cycle would give Baal credit for things like sending rain and making the crops grow, the prophets would credit those things to Yahweh. The showdown at Carmel (geographically close to Ugarit) is a case in point. God had withheld rain and Elijah challenged the rain giver to a duel, which God won in glorious fashion (1 Kings 17-18).
And here's another very important quote from the article:
“The Cloud Rider”
Throughout the Ugaritic texts, Baal is repeatedly called “the one who rides the clouds,” or “the one who mounts the clouds.” The description is recognized as an official title of Baal. No angel or lesser being bore the title. As such, everyone in Israel who heard this title associated it with a deity, not a man or an angel.
Part of the literary strategy of the Israelite prophets was to take this well-known title and attribute it to Yahweh in some way. Consequently, Yahweh, the God of Israel, bears this descriptive title in several places in the Old Testament (
Isaiah 19:1;
Deuteronomy 33:26;
Psalm 68:33;
104:3). For a faithful Israelite, then, there was only one god who “rode” on the clouds: Yahweh.
Until we hit Daniel 7, that is. You know the scene, but you likely don’t know the full context, since Ugaritic provides that for us:
Ugarit / Baal Cycle
- El, the aged high God, is the ultimate sovereign in the council.
- El bestows kingship upon the god Baal, the Cloud-Rider, after Baal defeats the god Yamm in battle.
- Baal is king of the gods and El's vizier. His rule is everlasting.
Daniel 7
- The Ancient of Days, the God of Israel is seated on the fiery, wheeled throne (cf. Ezekiel 1). Like Ugaritic El, he is white haired and aged (“ancient”).
- Yahweh-El, the Ancient of Days, bestows kingship upon the Son of Man who rides the clouds after the beast from the sea (yamma) is destroyed.
- The Son of Man is given everlasting dominion over the nations. He rules at the right hand of God.
Also, I'm not sure if Ehav4Ever will agree with this next quote from the article since modern Judaism seems to insist that their religion and the Hebrew scriptures only describes one Hashem and only one power in heaven.
Plus, this next quote is definitely aligned with the thread topic, even though, I don't know if this is the type of information that Soapy is looking for:
The striking parallels are especially noteworthy given that this is the only time in the Old Testament where a second personage other than Yahweh is described as “coming with/upon the clouds” (the preposition in Aramaic can be translated either way). The intent of the author to describe this “son of man” with a title reserved only for Yahweh was clear by virtue of how the scene followed the Baal literature — the literary cycle whose central character, Baal, held the Cloud-Rider title!
The Jewish audience reading Daniel understood the implications — the prophet Daniel was describing a second power in heaven — a second being at the level of Yahweh to whom Yahweh himself granted authority. Although we naturally think of the idea of a godhead as distinctly Christian, we have evidence here that the seeds of the idea are found in the Hebrew Scriptures. It’s no accident that Jewish theological writing during the Intertestamental period is filled with references to the “second power in heaven” and attempts to figure out how to articulate what was going on in heaven in light of monotheism. Jewish writers speculated that the “second god” was the archangel Michael, or perhaps Gabriel. Some Jewish writers even wrote that Abraham or Moses occupied that position! For Christians the answer was obvious.
Also, Ehav4Ever might cry foul since Jews don't seem to tolerate any point of view that's related to Christianity as the information in this article is, however, the information that this article brings out are facts about the Ugaritic texts and their similarity and influence on the Hebrew Bible.
(Also, the emphasis in the quotes are mine for the purpose of highlighting certain points.)
