standing in the same state of dependence towards him as the woman stood to the man.  It was only the unmarried goddess, Asherah as she was called by the Canaanites, who had a personality of her own.  And since Asherah came in time to be superseded by Ashtoreth, who was herself of Babylonian origin, it is probable that the idea of separate individuality connected with Asherah. was due to the influence of Babylonian culture.  Asherah was the goddess of fertility, and though the fertility of the earth depends upon the Sun, it was easy to conceive of it as an independent principle.

The name Baal was merely a title.  It was applied to the supreme deity of each city or tribe, by whatever special name he might otherwise be known.  There were as many Baals or Baalim as there were states or cults.  Wherever a high-place was erected, a Baal was worshipped.  His power did not extend beyond the district in which he was adored and to which he was territorially attached.  The Baal of Lebanon was distinct from the Baal of Tyre or Sidon, though in every case the general conception that was formed of him was the same.  It was the attributes of particular Baalim which differed; Baal was everywhere the Sun-god, but in one place he showed himself under one shape, in another place under another.  The goddesses followed the analogy of the gods.  Over against the Baalim or Baals stood the Ashtaroth or Ashtoreths.  The Canaanitish goddess manifested herself in a multitude of forms.

As the firstborn was sacrificed to the god, so chastity was sacrificed to the goddess.  The temples of Ashtoreth were crowded with religious prostitutes, and the great festivals of Canaan were orgies of licentious sin.  It was a combination of nature-worship with the luxury that was born of wealth.

The Canaanites of Phoenicia believed that they had originally migrated from the Persian Gulf.  In Canaan, at all events, according to the Book of Genesis, the “Fishers” city of Sidon was the first that was built.  But Tyre also, a few miles to the north of it, claimed considerable antiquity.  The temple of Melkarth or Melek-Kiryath, “the King of the City,” the name under which the Baal of Tyre was worshipped, had been built on the island-rock twenty-three centuries before the time of Herodotus, or B.C. 2700.  Gebal or Byblos, still farther to the north, had been renowned for its sanctity from immemorial times.  Here stood the sanctuary of Baalith, the “lady” of Gebal, of whom we hear in the tablets of Tel el-Amarna.  Still farther north were other cities, of which the most famous was Arvad, with its harbour and fleet.  Southward were Dor and Joppa, the modern Jaffa, while inland were Zemar and Arqa, mentioned in the Book of Genesis and the Tel el-Amarna correspondence, but which ceased to be remembered after the age of the Exodus.  Before the Israelites entered Canaan they had been captured by the Amorites, and had passed into insignificance.