Hadad
Encyclopedia
Haddad was a northwest Semitic storm and rain god
, cognate in name and origin with the Akkadian
god Adad
. Hadad was often called simply Ba‘al
(Lord), but this title was also used for other gods. The bull was the symbolic animal of Hadad. He appeared as a bearded deity, often shown as holding a club and thunderbolt while wearing bull horned headdress. Hadad was equated with the Anatolia
n storm-god Teshub
; the Egyptian
god Set; the Greek
god Zeus
; and the Roman
god Jupiter, as Jupiter Dolichenus
.
In the Ugaritic texts El
, the supreme god of the pantheon, resides on Mount Lel (perhaps meaning "Night") and it is there that the assembly of the gods meet. That is perhaps the mythical cosmic mountain.
The Ba‘al cycle is fragmentary and leaves much unexplained that would have been obvious to a contemporary. In the earliest extant sections there appears to be some sort of feud between El and Ba‘al. El makes one of his sons who is called both prince Yamm ("Sea") and judge Nahar ("River") king over the gods and changes Yamm's name from yw (so spelled at that point in the text) to mdd ’il, meaning "Darling of El". El informs Yamm that in order to secure his power, Yamm will have to drive Ba‘al from his throne.
In this battle Ba‘al is somehow weakened, but the divine craftsman Kothar-wa-Khasis
strikes Yamm with two magic clubs, Yamm collapses, and Bal‘al finishes the fight. ‘Athtart
proclaims Ba‘al's victory and salutes Ba‘al/Hadad as lrkb ‘rpt ("Rider on the Clouds"), a phrase applied by editors of modern English Bibles to Yahweh
in Psalm
68.4. At ‘Athtart's urging Ba‘al "scatters" Yamm and proclaims that Yamm is dead and heat is assured.
A later passage refers to Ba‘al's victory over Lotan, the many-headed sea-dragon. Due to gaps in the text it is not known whether Lotan is another name for Yamm or a reference to another similar story. In the Mediterranean area, crops were often threatened by winds, storms, and floods from the sea, indicating why the ancients feared the fury of this cosmic being.
A palace is built for Ba‘al/Hadad with cedars from Mount Lebanon
and Sirion
and also from silver and from gold. In his new palace Ba‘al hosts a great feast for the other gods. When urged by Kothar-wa-Khasis, Ba’al, somewhat reluctantly, opens a window in his palace and sends forth thunder and lightning. He then invites Mot
'Death' (god of drought and underworld), another son of El, to the feast.
But Mot is insulted. The eater of human flesh and blood will not be satisfied with bread and wine. Mot threatens to break Ba‘al into pieces and swallow Ba‘al. Even Ba‘al cannot stand against Death. Gaps here make interpretation dubious. It seems that by the advice of the goddess Shapsh 'Sun', Ba‘al has intercourse with a heifer and dresses the resultant calf in his own clothes as a gift to Mot and then himself prepares to go down to the underworld in the guise of a helpless shade. News of Ba‘al's apparent death leads even El to mourn. ‘Anat
, Ba‘al's sister, finds Ba‘al's corpse, presumably really the dead body of the calf, and she buries the body with a funeral feast. The god ‘Athtar
is appointed to take Ba‘al's place, but he is a poor substitute. Meanwhile ‘Anat finds Mot, cleaves him with a sword, burns him with fire, and throws his remains on the field for the birds to eat. But the earth is still cracked with drought until Shapsh fetches Ba‘al back.
Seven years later Mot returns and attacks Ba‘al in a battle which ceases only when Shapsh tells Mot that El now supports Ba’al. Thereupon Mot at once surrenders to Ba‘al/Hadad and recognizes Ba‘al as king.
's account Hadad is once called Adodos but mostly named Demarûs, a puzzling form, possibly a Greek corruption of Hadad Ramān. Sanchuniathon's Hadad is son of Sky by a concubine who is then given to the god Dagon
while she is pregnant by Sky. This appears to be an attempt to combine two accounts of Hadad's parentage, one of which is the Ugaritic tradition that Hadad was son of Dagon. The cognate Akkadian god Adad is also often called the son of Anu ("Sky"). The corresponding Hittite god Teshub
is likewise son of Anu (after a fashion).
In Sanchuniathon's account, it is Sky who first fights against Pontus
("Sea"). Then Sky allies himself with Hadad. Hadad takes over the conflict but is defeated, at which point unfortunately no more is said of this matter. Sanchuniathion agrees with Ugaritic tradition in making Muth, the Ugaritic Mot, whom he also calls "Death", the son of El.
, or Halab, received a statue of Ishtar
from the king of Mari
, as a sign of deference, to be displayed in the temple of Hadad in Kilasou. The god "Adad" is called on a stele of the Assyrian king Shalmaneser I
"the god of Aleppo
".
Hadad son of Bedad, who defeated the Midianites in the country of Moab, was the fourth king of Edom and Hadad was also the seventh of the twelve sons of Ishmael.
The name Hadad appears in the name of Hadadezer
("Hadad-is-help"), the Aramean king defeated by David
. Later Aramean kings of Damascus
seem to have habitually assumed the title of Benhadad, or son of Hadad, just as a series of Egyptian monarchs are known to have been accustomed to call themselves sons of Ammon
.
An example is Benhadad
("Son of Hadad"), the king of Aram whom Asa
, king of Judah
, employed to invade the northern kingdom, Israel, according to . In the 9th or 8th century BCE, the name of Bar-Hadad 'Son of Hadad', king of Aram, is inscribed on his votive basalt stele dedicated to Melqart
, found in Bredsh, a village north of Aleppo (National Museum, Aleppo, accession number KAI 201).
As a byname we find Aramaic rmn, Old South Arabic rmn, Hebrew rmwn, Akkadian Rammānu ("Thunderer"), presumably originally vocalized as Ramān in Aramaic and Hebrew. The Hebrew spelling rmwn with Massoretic vocalization Rimmôn is identical with the Hebrew word meaning 'pomegranate
' and may be an intentional misspelling and parody of the original.
The word Hadad-rimmon, for which the inferior reading Hadar-rimmon is found in some manuscripts in the phrase "the mourning of (or at) Hadad-rimmon" (Zechariah
12:2), has been a subject of much discussion. According to Jerome
and all the older Christian interpreters, the mourning is for something that occurred at a place called Hadad-rimmon (Maximianopolis
) in the valley of Megiddo
. The event alluded to was generally held to be the death of Josiah
(or, as in the Targum
, the death of Ahab
at the hands of Hadadrimmon). But even before the discovery of the Ugaritic texts some suspected that Hadad-rimmon might be a dying god like Adonis
or Tammuz, perhaps even the same as Tammuz, and the allusion could then be to mournings for Hadad such as those which usually accompanied the Adonis festivals. (Hitzig on , ; Movers, Phonizier, 1.196).
T. K. Cheyne (Encyclopædia Biblica s.v.) pointed out that the Septuagint reads simply Rimmon, and argues that this may be a corruption of Migdon (Megiddo), in itself a corruption of Tammuz-Adon. He would render the verse, "In that day there shall be a great mourning in Jerusalem, as the mourning of the women who weep for Tammuz-Adon" (Adon means "lord").
No further evidence has come to light to resolve such speculations.
God (male deity)
A god, as a male deity, contrasts with female deities, or "goddesses". While the term 'goddess' specifically refers to a female deity, the plural 'gods' can be applied to all gods collectively, regardless of gender....
, cognate in name and origin with the Akkadian
Akkadian language
Akkadian is an extinct Semitic language that was spoken in ancient Mesopotamia. The earliest attested Semitic language, it used the cuneiform writing system derived ultimately from ancient Sumerian, an unrelated language isolate...
god Adad
Adad
Adad in Akkadian and Ishkur in Sumerian and Hadad in Aramaic are the names of the storm-god in the Babylonian-Assyrian pantheon. All three are usually written by the logogram dIM...
. Hadad was often called simply Ba‘al
Baal
Baʿal is a Northwest Semitic title and honorific meaning "master" or "lord" that is used for various gods who were patrons of cities in the Levant and Asia Minor, cognate to Akkadian Bēlu...
(Lord), but this title was also used for other gods. The bull was the symbolic animal of Hadad. He appeared as a bearded deity, often shown as holding a club and thunderbolt while wearing bull horned headdress. Hadad was equated with the Anatolia
Anatolia
Anatolia is a geographic and historical term denoting the westernmost protrusion of Asia, comprising the majority of the Republic of Turkey...
n storm-god Teshub
Teshub
Teshub was the Hurrian god of sky and storm. He was derived from the Hattian Taru. His Hittite and Luwian name was Tarhun , although this name is from the Hittite root *tarh- to defeat, conquer.- Depiction and myths :He is depicted holding a triple...
; the Egyptian
Ancient Egypt
Ancient Egypt was an ancient civilization of Northeastern Africa, concentrated along the lower reaches of the Nile River in what is now the modern country of Egypt. Egyptian civilization coalesced around 3150 BC with the political unification of Upper and Lower Egypt under the first pharaoh...
god Set; the Greek
Greek mythology
Greek mythology is the body of myths and legends belonging to the ancient Greeks, concerning their gods and heroes, the nature of the world, and the origins and significance of their own cult and ritual practices. They were a part of religion in ancient Greece...
god Zeus
Zeus
In the ancient Greek religion, Zeus was the "Father of Gods and men" who ruled the Olympians of Mount Olympus as a father ruled the family. He was the god of sky and thunder in Greek mythology. His Roman counterpart is Jupiter and his Etruscan counterpart is Tinia.Zeus was the child of Cronus...
; and the Roman
Roman mythology
Roman mythology is the body of traditional stories pertaining to ancient Rome's legendary origins and religious system, as represented in the literature and visual arts of the Romans...
god Jupiter, as Jupiter Dolichenus
Jupiter Dolichenus
Jupiter Dolichenus was a Roman god created from the syncretization of Jupiter, the Roman 'King of the gods', and a Baal cult of Commagene in Asia Minor. The Baal gods were themselves king gods and the combination was intended to form a powerful mixture of eastern and western regal traditions...
.
Hadad in Ugarit
In religious texts, Ba‘al/Hadad is the lord of the sky who governs the rain and thus the germination of plants with the power of his desire that they be fertile. He is the protector of life and growth to the agricultural people of the region. The absence of Ba‘al causes dry spells, starvation, death, and chaos. Also refers to the mountain of the west wind. The Biblical reference occurs at a time when Yahweh has provided a strong east wind to carry the sons of Israel across the Red or Erythrian Sea to Elat.In the Ugaritic texts El
El (god)
is a Northwest Semitic word meaning "deity", cognate to Akkadian and then to Hebrew : Eli and Arabic )....
, the supreme god of the pantheon, resides on Mount Lel (perhaps meaning "Night") and it is there that the assembly of the gods meet. That is perhaps the mythical cosmic mountain.
The Ba‘al cycle is fragmentary and leaves much unexplained that would have been obvious to a contemporary. In the earliest extant sections there appears to be some sort of feud between El and Ba‘al. El makes one of his sons who is called both prince Yamm ("Sea") and judge Nahar ("River") king over the gods and changes Yamm's name from yw (so spelled at that point in the text) to mdd ’il, meaning "Darling of El". El informs Yamm that in order to secure his power, Yamm will have to drive Ba‘al from his throne.
In this battle Ba‘al is somehow weakened, but the divine craftsman Kothar-wa-Khasis
Kothar-wa-Khasis
Kothar-wa-Khasis is a Canaanite god whose name means "Skillful-and-Wise" or "Adroit-and-Perceptive" or "Deft-and-Clever". Another of his names means "Deft-with-both-hands". Kothar is smith, craftsman, engineer, architect, and inventor...
strikes Yamm with two magic clubs, Yamm collapses, and Bal‘al finishes the fight. ‘Athtart
Astarte
Astarte is the Greek name of a goddess known throughout the Eastern Mediterranean from the Bronze Age to Classical times...
proclaims Ba‘al's victory and salutes Ba‘al/Hadad as lrkb ‘rpt ("Rider on the Clouds"), a phrase applied by editors of modern English Bibles to Yahweh
Yahweh
Yahweh is the name of God in the Bible, the God of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Jews and Christians.The word Yahweh is a modern scholarly convention for the Hebrew , transcribed into Roman letters as YHWH and known as the Tetragrammaton, for which the original pronunciation is unknown...
in Psalm
Psalms
The Book of Psalms , commonly referred to simply as Psalms, is a book of the Hebrew Bible and the Christian Bible...
68.4. At ‘Athtart's urging Ba‘al "scatters" Yamm and proclaims that Yamm is dead and heat is assured.
A later passage refers to Ba‘al's victory over Lotan, the many-headed sea-dragon. Due to gaps in the text it is not known whether Lotan is another name for Yamm or a reference to another similar story. In the Mediterranean area, crops were often threatened by winds, storms, and floods from the sea, indicating why the ancients feared the fury of this cosmic being.
A palace is built for Ba‘al/Hadad with cedars from Mount Lebanon
Mount Lebanon
Mount Lebanon , as a geographic designation, is a Lebanese mountain range, averaging above 2,200 meters in height and receiving a substantial amount of precipitation, including snow, which averages around four meters deep. It extends across the whole country along about , parallel to the...
and Sirion
Mount Hermon
Mount Hermon is a mountain cluster in the Anti-Lebanon mountain range. Its summit straddles the border between Syria and Lebanon and, at 2,814 m above sea level, is the highest point in Syria. On the top there is “Hermon Hotel”, in the buffer zone between Syria and Israeli-occupied...
and also from silver and from gold. In his new palace Ba‘al hosts a great feast for the other gods. When urged by Kothar-wa-Khasis, Ba’al, somewhat reluctantly, opens a window in his palace and sends forth thunder and lightning. He then invites Mot
Mot
In Ugaritic Mot 'Death' is personified as a god of death. The word is cognate with forms meaning 'death' in other Semitic and Afro-Asiatic languages: with Arabic موت mawt; with Hebrew מות ; with Maltese mewt; with Syriac mautā; with Ge'ez mot; with Canaanite, Egyptian Aramaic, Nabataean, and...
'Death' (god of drought and underworld), another son of El, to the feast.
But Mot is insulted. The eater of human flesh and blood will not be satisfied with bread and wine. Mot threatens to break Ba‘al into pieces and swallow Ba‘al. Even Ba‘al cannot stand against Death. Gaps here make interpretation dubious. It seems that by the advice of the goddess Shapsh 'Sun', Ba‘al has intercourse with a heifer and dresses the resultant calf in his own clothes as a gift to Mot and then himself prepares to go down to the underworld in the guise of a helpless shade. News of Ba‘al's apparent death leads even El to mourn. ‘Anat
Anat
Anat, also ‘Anat is a major northwest Semitic goddess.-‘Anat in Ugarit:In the Ugaritic Ba‘al/Hadad cycle ‘Anat is a violent war-goddess, a virgin in Ugarit though the sister and lover of the great Ba‘al known as Hadad elsewhere. Ba‘al is usually called the son of Dagon and sometimes the son of El....
, Ba‘al's sister, finds Ba‘al's corpse, presumably really the dead body of the calf, and she buries the body with a funeral feast. The god ‘Athtar
Attar (god)
Attar, also known as Athtar, Astar, and Ashtar is the god of the morning star in western Semitic mythology. In Canaanite legend he attempts to usurp the throne of the dead god Baal but proves inadequate. In semi-arid regions of western Asia he was sometimes worshipped as a rain god. His female...
is appointed to take Ba‘al's place, but he is a poor substitute. Meanwhile ‘Anat finds Mot, cleaves him with a sword, burns him with fire, and throws his remains on the field for the birds to eat. But the earth is still cracked with drought until Shapsh fetches Ba‘al back.
Seven years later Mot returns and attacks Ba‘al in a battle which ceases only when Shapsh tells Mot that El now supports Ba’al. Thereupon Mot at once surrenders to Ba‘al/Hadad and recognizes Ba‘al as king.
Sanchuniathon
In SanchuniathonSanchuniathon
Sanchuniathon is the purported Phoenician author of three lost works originally in the Phoenician language, surviving only in partial paraphrase and summary of a Greek translation by Philo of Byblos, according to the Christian bishop Eusebius of Caesarea...
's account Hadad is once called Adodos but mostly named Demarûs, a puzzling form, possibly a Greek corruption of Hadad Ramān. Sanchuniathon's Hadad is son of Sky by a concubine who is then given to the god Dagon
Dagon
Dagon was originally an Assyro-Babylonian fertility god who evolved into a major northwest Semitic god, reportedly of grain and fish and/or fishing...
while she is pregnant by Sky. This appears to be an attempt to combine two accounts of Hadad's parentage, one of which is the Ugaritic tradition that Hadad was son of Dagon. The cognate Akkadian god Adad is also often called the son of Anu ("Sky"). The corresponding Hittite god Teshub
Teshub
Teshub was the Hurrian god of sky and storm. He was derived from the Hattian Taru. His Hittite and Luwian name was Tarhun , although this name is from the Hittite root *tarh- to defeat, conquer.- Depiction and myths :He is depicted holding a triple...
is likewise son of Anu (after a fashion).
In Sanchuniathon's account, it is Sky who first fights against Pontus
Pontus
Pontus or Pontos is a historical Greek designation for a region on the southern coast of the Black Sea, located in modern-day northeastern Turkey. The name was applied to the coastal region in antiquity by the Greeks who colonized the area, and derived from the Greek name of the Black Sea: Πόντος...
("Sea"). Then Sky allies himself with Hadad. Hadad takes over the conflict but is defeated, at which point unfortunately no more is said of this matter. Sanchuniathion agrees with Ugaritic tradition in making Muth, the Ugaritic Mot, whom he also calls "Death", the son of El.
Hadad in Aram and Israel
In the second millennium BCE, the king of AleppoAleppo
Aleppo is the largest city in Syria and the capital of Aleppo Governorate, the most populous Syrian governorate. With an official population of 2,301,570 , expanding to over 2.5 million in the metropolitan area, it is also one of the largest cities in the Levant...
, or Halab, received a statue of Ishtar
Ishtar
Ishtar is the Assyrian and Babylonian goddess of fertility, love, war, and sex. She is the counterpart to the Sumerian Inanna and to the cognate north-west Semitic goddess Astarte.-Characteristics:...
from the king of Mari
Mari, Syria
Mari was an ancient Sumerian and Amorite city, located 11 kilometers north-west of the modern town of Abu Kamal on the western bank of Euphrates river, some 120 km southeast of Deir ez-Zor, Syria...
, as a sign of deference, to be displayed in the temple of Hadad in Kilasou. The god "Adad" is called on a stele of the Assyrian king Shalmaneser I
Shalmaneser I
Shalmaneser I was a king of Assyria.Son of Adad-nirari I, he succeeded his father as king in 1265 BC....
"the god of Aleppo
Aleppo
Aleppo is the largest city in Syria and the capital of Aleppo Governorate, the most populous Syrian governorate. With an official population of 2,301,570 , expanding to over 2.5 million in the metropolitan area, it is also one of the largest cities in the Levant...
".
Hadad son of Bedad, who defeated the Midianites in the country of Moab, was the fourth king of Edom and Hadad was also the seventh of the twelve sons of Ishmael.
The name Hadad appears in the name of Hadadezer
Hadadezer
Hadadezer ; also known as Adad-Idri and possibly the same as Bar-Hadad II ; Ben-Hadad II , was the king of Aram Damascus at the time of the battle of Qarqar against the Assyrian king Shalmaneser III in 853 BCE. He and Irhuleni of Hamath led a coalition of eleven kings at Qarqar...
("Hadad-is-help"), the Aramean king defeated by David
David
David was the second king of the united Kingdom of Israel according to the Hebrew Bible and, according to the Gospels of Matthew and Luke, an ancestor of Jesus Christ through both Saint Joseph and Mary...
. Later Aramean kings of Damascus
Damascus
Damascus , commonly known in Syria as Al Sham , and as the City of Jasmine , is the capital and the second largest city of Syria after Aleppo, both are part of the country's 14 governorates. In addition to being one of the oldest continuously inhabited cities in the world, Damascus is a major...
seem to have habitually assumed the title of Benhadad, or son of Hadad, just as a series of Egyptian monarchs are known to have been accustomed to call themselves sons of Ammon
Ammon
Ammon , also referred to as the Ammonites and children of Ammon, was an ancient nation located east of the Jordan River, Gilead, and the Dead Sea, in present-day Jordan. The chief city of the country was Rabbah or Rabbath Ammon, site of the modern city of Amman, Jordan's capital...
.
An example is Benhadad
Benhadad
Benhadad, Ben Hadad, Ben-hadad , or Benadad , and may refer to:*Any king of Aram Damascus. Hadad was the name of the senior Aramean deity.*Particular kings of Aram-Damascus:**Ben-Hadad I...
("Son of Hadad"), the king of Aram whom Asa
Asa of Judah
Asa was the third king of the Kingdom of Judah and the fifth king of the House of David. He was the son of Abijam, grandson of Rehoboam, and great-grandson of Solomon. The Hebrew Bible gives the period of his reign as 41 years. His reign is dated between 913-910 BCE to 873-869 BCE. He was...
, king of Judah
Kingdom of Judah
The Kingdom of Judah was a Jewish state established in the Southern Levant during the Iron Age. It is often referred to as the "Southern Kingdom" to distinguish it from the northern Kingdom of Israel....
, employed to invade the northern kingdom, Israel, according to . In the 9th or 8th century BCE, the name of Bar-Hadad 'Son of Hadad', king of Aram, is inscribed on his votive basalt stele dedicated to Melqart
Melqart
Melqart, properly Phoenician Milk-Qart "King of the City", less accurately Melkart, Melkarth or Melgart , Akkadian Milqartu, was tutelary god of the Phoenician city of Tyre as Eshmun protected Sidon. Melqart was often titled Ba‘l Ṣūr "Lord of Tyre", the ancestral king of the royal line...
, found in Bredsh, a village north of Aleppo (National Museum, Aleppo, accession number KAI 201).
As a byname we find Aramaic rmn, Old South Arabic rmn, Hebrew rmwn, Akkadian Rammānu ("Thunderer"), presumably originally vocalized as Ramān in Aramaic and Hebrew. The Hebrew spelling rmwn with Massoretic vocalization Rimmôn is identical with the Hebrew word meaning 'pomegranate
Pomegranate
The pomegranate , Punica granatum, is a fruit-bearing deciduous shrub or small tree growing between five and eight meters tall.Native to the area of modern day Iran, the pomegranate has been cultivated in the Caucasus since ancient times. From there it spread to Asian areas such as the Caucasus as...
' and may be an intentional misspelling and parody of the original.
The word Hadad-rimmon, for which the inferior reading Hadar-rimmon is found in some manuscripts in the phrase "the mourning of (or at) Hadad-rimmon" (Zechariah
Book of Zechariah
The Book of Zechariah is the penultimate book of the twelve minor prophets in the Hebrew and Christian Bible, attributed to the prophet Zechariah.-Historical context:...
12:2), has been a subject of much discussion. According to Jerome
Jerome
Saint Jerome was a Roman Christian priest, confessor, theologian and historian, and who became a Doctor of the Church. He was the son of Eusebius, of the city of Stridon, which was on the border of Dalmatia and Pannonia...
and all the older Christian interpreters, the mourning is for something that occurred at a place called Hadad-rimmon (Maximianopolis
Maximianopolis
Maximianopolis can refer to:* Maximianopolis * Maximianopolis * Maximianopolis...
) in the valley of Megiddo
Megiddo (place)
Megiddo is a tell in modern Israel near Megiddo Kibbutz, known for its historical, geographical, and theological importance especially under its Greek name Armageddon. In ancient times Megiddo was an important city-state. Excavations have unearthed 26 layers of ruins, indicated a long period of...
. The event alluded to was generally held to be the death of Josiah
Josiah
Josiah or Yoshiyahu or Joshua was a king of Judah who instituted major reforms. Josiah is credited by most historians with having established or compiled important Jewish scriptures during the Deuteronomic reform that occurred during his rule.Josiah became king of Judah at the age of eight, after...
(or, as in the Targum
Targum
Taekwondo is a Korean martial art and the national sport of South Korea. In Korean, tae means "to strike or break with foot"; kwon means "to strike or break with fist"; and do means "way", "method", or "path"...
, the death of Ahab
Ahab
Ahab or Ach'av or Achab in Douay-Rheims was king of Israel and the son and successor of Omri according to the Hebrew Bible. His wife was Jezebel....
at the hands of Hadadrimmon). But even before the discovery of the Ugaritic texts some suspected that Hadad-rimmon might be a dying god like Adonis
Adonis
Adonis , in Greek mythology, the god of beauty and desire, is a figure with Northwest Semitic antecedents, where he is a central figure in various mystery religions. The Greek , Adōnis is a variation of the Semitic word Adonai, "lord", which is also one of the names used to refer to God in the Old...
or Tammuz, perhaps even the same as Tammuz, and the allusion could then be to mournings for Hadad such as those which usually accompanied the Adonis festivals. (Hitzig on , ; Movers, Phonizier, 1.196).
T. K. Cheyne (Encyclopædia Biblica s.v.) pointed out that the Septuagint reads simply Rimmon, and argues that this may be a corruption of Migdon (Megiddo), in itself a corruption of Tammuz-Adon. He would render the verse, "In that day there shall be a great mourning in Jerusalem, as the mourning of the women who weep for Tammuz-Adon" (Adon means "lord").
No further evidence has come to light to resolve such speculations.
External links
- Online text: The Epic of Ba'al (Hadad)
- Kadash Kinahu: Complete Directory
- Gateways to Babylon: Adad/Rimon