Page 12 - Biblical Backgrounds

Religious Practices in Ancient Canaan:

“El” was the great deity of ancient Canaan. Asherah was the goddess wife of El. Another
deity was Ba’al. Ba’al is seen in many places in Scripture. He is the God of war and
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fertility. Ba’al was also considered the God of storms and rain. This is significant when
one considers Elijah’s duel with the priests. God had withheld rain for three years from
the land. The people and these priests would have looked to Ba’al to bring it. Elijah
prayed for rain to Yahweh in the sight of the rulers and priests, and it
began to rain immediately. This was understood as a cosmic battle in
which the true deity had made himself known. The images on each
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side are of Ba’al.

The Canaanites were also known to sacrifice their children in the flames to Ba’al to
try to entice him to send rain and abundance. John Holmes mentions that this might
be why Jephthah mistakenly thought God would want this sacrifice. Holmes’
supposition seems logical. The culture Jephthah had grown up in was not Jewish. It
was Canaanite. His understanding of how to gain favor was not consistent with
Yahweh; it was consistent with Canaanite (Ugaritic) deities.

Another deity of the time was Astarte, who you may know from the Old Testament as Asherah. She was
the goddess of fertility in terms of sex. She was also the goddess of love and war.

A final deity you will want to know is Yamm. Yamm is the Canaanite god of chaos and is seen as the God
of the sea. Notice that chaos is the state of the earth, pictured as covered in water in Genesis, and
Yahweh creates order. This would be viewed as a clear statement that Yahweh is more powerful than
Yamm.

Social life in Ancient Canaan:
Because the ancient Canaanites were in the land that Abraham went to, he had to interact with their
customs in some cases. He likely lived in goatskin tents. These goat skins were still used to make wine
pouches in the time of Jesus. They would cook in firepit stoves as well.

Marriage customs were like some found in Africa today. The father of the groom would set up the
marriage of his son by choosing a bride. Voss explains that the would-be groom and the bride’s family
would agree to a gift to the family of the bride. The bride’s father would ensure she had a dowry to
provide for her in the case of her husband’s death. The goal of marriage was to produce a male heir to
the family to continue the family name. Sometimes a barren woman would offer her husband a slave girl
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to have a child with (Genesis 16:2). The woman would accept the child as her own when it was born.

Economic customs in the Canaanite world:
Bartering was the custom of the day. Merchants would go back and forth on a price until the details
were agreed to. Voss points out that Genesis 31:41 says that Jacob and Laban had bartered regarding
the number of years Jacob would work for Rachel and then the flock. Jacob challenged Laban when

18 Spar, Ira. “The Gods and Goddesses of Canaan.” In Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History. New York: The
Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2000–. http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/cana/hd_cana.html (April
2009)
19 Images of Ba’al are in public domain. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baal
20 Voss, Nelson's New Illustrated Bible Manners and Customs, 40-41.

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