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ASHERAH AND APHRODITE: A COINCIDENCE?*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 April 2015

Howard Jacobson
Howard Jacobson*
Affiliation:
University of Illinois, Urbana
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Extract

It has long been known that there is a significant connection between Aphrodite and Semitic goddesses. In Walter Burkert's recent words, ‘Behind the figure of Aphrodite there clearly stands the ancient Semitic goddess of love, Ishtar-Astarte.’ This was already recognized by Herodotus (1.105, 131) and Philo of Byblos (Eus. Prep. evang. 1.812). I want here to note a curious and striking item of connection that has not been noticed.

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Type
Shorter Notes
Information
The Classical Quarterly , Volume 65 , Issue 1 , May 2015 , pp. 355 - 356
Copyright
Copyright © The Classical Association 2015 

It has long been known that there is a significant connection between Aphrodite and Semitic goddesses.Footnote 1 In Walter Burkert's recent words,Footnote 2 ‘Behind the figure of Aphrodite there clearly stands the ancient Semitic goddess of love, Ishtar-Astarte.’ This was already recognized by Herodotus (1.105, 131) and Philo of Byblos (Eus. Prep. evang. 1.812). I want here to note a curious and striking item of connection that has not been noticed.

Over a century ago, Paul KretschmerFootnote 3 suggested a compelling etymology for the name Aphrodite, accepting the traditional view that ἀφρ- comes from ἀφρός ‘foam’, and adding that the latter part of the name represented ὁδίτη, a hypothesized female form of ὁδίτης. Thus, Aphrodite was the deity who was ‘auf dem schaume dahinwandelnd’ (‘moving about on the foam’).

It is well known that there was, with the passage of time, substantial confusion and conflation between Semitic goddesses. W.G. Dever comments,Footnote 4 ‘[There is] an extraordinary, almost bewildering fluidity in the conception of many Northwest Semitic deities’, and points specifically to Asherah, Astarte and Anat: ‘[There is] a fusion of the three Canaanite fertility goddesses’ (p. 29). He also notes how Asherah and Astarte ‘interchange as consorts of Ba'al in the Hebrew Bible’ (ibid.). Similarly, J.M. Hadley on the three major goddesses Athirat, Anat and Astarte: ‘In places they all have similar attributes and characteristics, and at times they may play the same role in the myths.’Footnote 5 Also, R.A. Oden, Jr: ‘The Old Testament … exhibits a confusion between the names and roles of Aserah and Astart; and this confusion … suggests the early mingling of all three major goddesses.’Footnote 6

Let us turn to Asherah. In one of her facets, she served as a fertility/love goddess.Footnote 7 Apparently, she was originally Atrt ym in UgariticFootnote 8 and the name was in time reduced to Atrt.Footnote 9 But the root atr in Ugaritic means ‘to go’,Footnote 10 just as it does in Hebrew (ashr, as in AsherahFootnote 11). Thus, Atrt ym means, ‘she who goes upon the sea’.Footnote 12

In other words, if (as seems reasonable and is accepted by many) Kretschmer is correct, not only are Aphrodite and Asherah (Athirat) often the same goddess in terms of their roles, functions and characteristics, but they may actually have the same name ἀϕρ/ὁδίτη (Atrt ym).Footnote 13

Footnotes

*

I am indebted to Professors Dennis Pardee and Wayne Pitard for helpful readings of this note.

References

1 I refrain in this brief paper from getting into the vast Problematik surrounding the Canaanite (and Mesopotamian) goddesses.

2 Burkert, W., Greek Religion (Cambridge, MA, 1985)Google Scholar, 152.

3 Kretschmer, P., Zeitschrift für Vergleichende Sprachforschung 33 (1895), 267.Google Scholar

4 Dever, W.G., BASOR 255 (1984), 28.Google Scholar

5 Hadley, J.M., The Cult of Asherah in Ancient Israel and Judah (Cambridge, 2000)Google Scholar, 38.

6 Oden, R.A. Jr, Studies in Lucian's De Syria Dea (Missoula, MT, 1977)Google Scholar, 97.

7 See Hadley (n. 5), 9. For an elaborate discussion of Asherah and fertility gods, see Frevel, C., Aschera und der Ausschliesslichkeitsanspruch YHWHs (Weinheim, 1995), 570–88.Google Scholar

8 See Albright, W.F., Yahweh and the Gods of Canaan (Garden City, NY, 1968)Google Scholar, 121: ‘Asherah has a name which was originally part of a longer appellation, which appears in Ugaritic as Rabbatu athiratu yammi’; see also Hadley (n. 5), 40: ‘Her full title appears to be rbt atrt ym.’

9 The notion that ym here could be ‘day’ and refer to a solar deity (so T. Binger, Asherah [Sheffield, 1997], 42–5; also Watson, W.G.E., UF 25 [1993], 431–4Google Scholar) has no persuasive force. See also Hadley (n. 5), 40.

10 See del Olmo Lete, G. and Sanmartín, J., A Dictionary of the Ugaritic Language in the Alphabetic Tradition (Leiden, 2003)Google Scholar, 126.

11 See Köhler–Baumgartner (Leiden, 1995), 94.

12 See Albright (n. 8), 121, ‘The Lady Who Treads on the Sea’ or ‘The Lady Who Traverses the Sea’. See also Hadley (n. 5), 50 and Maier, W.A. III, Aserah: Extrabiblical Evidence (Atlanta, 1986), 194–5Google Scholar. But Wiggins, S.A., A Reassessment of ‘Asherah’ (Neukirchen-Vluyn, 1993), 192–3Google Scholar is somewhat sceptical.

13 The chronology of the development of the goddess' name in the Semitic and Greek versions I cannot determine.