Canaanite Ba’al: Who Ruled in the Holy Land Before the Hebrew God?
The key to early Hebrew history is that they were immigrants. They arrived in a strange land, the victims of persecution from far-off Egypt, and carved out a home for themselves there amidst those who had lived in the region for far longer.
Why were they able to do this? The only surviving text which covers this period is of course the Bible, and the Kingdoms of Israel and Judah were allowed to flourish because the Hebrews were the chosen people of capital-G God. More practically they fought their neighbors until they defeated them, but it was this a blessing from God, a promise made in even-farther-off Mesopotamia, which ensured their survival.
“There is no other God than me” the Hebrew God told them, and fair enough, they thought. So, who were these “other Gods” whom God was so worried about the Hebrews worshipping that he devoted the first of the Ten Commandments towards underlining this point?
Well, if you in the area when the Hebrews arrived out of Egypt, then the answer was probably Ba’al.
