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Yahweh

This article is about the ancient Semitic deity of weather and war in the ancient Levant. For the ancient Semitic religion of ancient Israel and Judah, see Yahwism. For the modern religious conception of Yahweh, see God in Judaism, God in Christianity, and God in Abrahamic religions. For the Hebrew theonym YHWH and its vocalization, see Tetragrammaton. For other uses, see Yahweh (disambiguation).
Yahweh
A coin showing a bearded figure seating on a winged wheel, holding a bird on an outstretched hand.
God on the Winged Wheel coin[a]
Paleo-Hebrew𐤉𐤄𐤅𐤄‎
Venerated inKingdom of Israel[4][5]
Kingdom of Judah[4][5]
SymbolWinged disk[6]
Winged wheel[1][2]
Texts
RegionAncient Levant[7]
Ethnic groupCanaanites
Israelites[4][8]
Part of a series on Ancient Semitic religion
Levantine mythology
Deities
Deities of the ancient Near East
Ancient Egyptian
Arabian
Eblaite
Elamite
Hurrian and Hittite
Levantine
(Canaanite and Ugaritic)
Mesopotamian
Religions of the ancient Near East

Yahweh[b] was an ancient Semitic deity, a lesser deity, and a member of the pantheon of the polytheistic Canaanite religion in ancient Canaan; later the consort of Asherah, the national god of ancient Israel and Judah, and the head of the pantheon of the polytheistic Israelite religion.[4][9][10] Although there is no clear consensus regarding the geographical origins of the deity,[11] scholars generally hold that Yahweh was associated with Seir, Edom, Paran, and Teman,[12] and later with Canaan. The worship of Yahweh reaches back to at least the early Iron Age, and likely to the late Bronze Age, if not somewhat earlier.[13]

In the oldest biblical texts, Yahweh possesses attributes that were typically ascribed to deities of weather and war, fructifying the Land of Israel and leading a heavenly army against the enemies of the Israelites.[14] The early Israelites engaged in polytheistic practices that were common across ancient Semitic religion,[10] because the Israelite religion was a derivative of the Canaanite religion and included a variety of deities from it, including El, Asherah, and Baal.[15] In later centuries, El and Yahweh became conflated, and El-linked epithets, such as ʾĒl Šadday (אֵל שַׁדַּי‎), came to be applied to Yahweh alone.[16] Characteristics of other deities, such as Asherah and Baal, were also selectively absorbed in conceptions of Yahweh.[17][18][19]

As Israelite Yahwism eventually developed into Judaism and Samaritanism, and eventually transitioned from polytheism to monotheism, the existence of other deities was denied outright, and Yahweh was proclaimed the creator deity and the sole deity to be worthy of worship. During the Second Temple period, Jews began to substitute other Hebrew words, primarily ăḏōnāy (אֲדֹנָי‬‎, lit. 'My Lords'), in place of the name Yahweh. By the time of the Jewish–Roman wars—namely following the Roman siege of Jerusalem and the concomitant destruction of the Second Temple in 70 CE—the original pronunciation of the name of the deity was forgotten entirely.[20]

Additionally, Yahweh is invoked in the Aramaic-language Papyrus Amherst 63 from ancient Egypt, and also in Jewish or Jewish-influenced ancient Greek-language Greek Magical Papyri in Roman Egypt dated to the 1st to 5th centuries CE.[21]

  1. ^ a b Edelman 1995, p. 190, 193–194.
  2. ^ a b Stavrakopoulou 2021, pp. 411–412, 742.
  3. ^ Langdon 1931, pp. 43–44: "A coin from Gaza in Southern Philista, fourth century BC, the period of the Jewish subjection to the last of the Persian kings, has the only known representation of this Hebrew deity. The letters YHW are incised just above the hawk(?) which the god holds in his outstretched left hand, Fig. 23. He wears a himation, leaving the upper part of the body bare, and sits upon a winged wheel. The right arm is wrapped in his garment. At his feet is a mask. Because of the winged chariot and mask it has been suggested that Yaw had been identified with Dionysus on account of a somewhat similar drawing of the Greek deity on a vase where he rides in a chariot drawn by a satyr. The coin was certainly minted under Greek influence, and consequently others have compared Yaw on his winged chariot to Triptolemos of Syria, who is represented on a wagon drawn by two dragons. It is more likely that Yaw of Gaza really represents the Hebrew, Phoenician and Aramaic Sun-god, El, Elohim, whom the monotheistic tendencies of the Hebrews had long since identified with Yaw…Sanchounyathon…based his history upon Yerombalos, a priest of Yeuo, undoubtedly the god Yaw, who is thus proved to have been worshipped at Gebal as early as 1000 BC".
  4. ^ a b c d Miller & Hayes 1986, p. 110.
  5. ^ a b Niehr 1995, p. 59.
  6. ^ Cite error: The named reference SeeversKorhonen was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  7. ^ Miller & Hayes 1986, p. 109–110.
  8. ^ "Yahweh". World Encyclopedia. Oxford Reference. Philip's. 2004. Retrieved 24 April 2025.
  9. ^ Niehr 1995, p. 54-55, 59.
  10. ^ a b Sommer 2009, p. 145.
  11. ^ Fleming 2020, p. 3.
  12. ^ Smith 2017, p. 42.
  13. ^ Miller 2000, p. 1.
  14. ^ Hackett 2001, pp. 158–59.
  15. ^ Smith 2002, p. 7.
  16. ^ Smith 2002, pp. 8, 33–34.
  17. ^ Smith 2002, pp. 8, 135.
  18. ^ Smith 2017, p. 38.
  19. ^ Cornell 2021, p. 20.
  20. ^ Leech 2002, p. 60.
  21. ^ Smith & Cohen 1996b, pp. 242–256.


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