pic from, and link to, "Insight into the Soul" on the Archaeology website:
A reconstruction of the citadel, drawn by Robert Koldewey, a German archaeologist who excavated Zincirli in the 1890s
A reconstruction of the citadel, drawn by Robert Koldewey, a German archaeologist who excavated Zincirli in the 1890s
...Baal signifies "the god the lord", or "the owner and was a term applied to the chief or ruler of one of the primitive groups of nameless deities 1; his spouse was called "Baalath", "the lady". The Baal of Tyre was Melkarth; the Baal of Harran was Sin, the moon god; the Baal of Tarsus was an atmospheric or wind god; the Baal of Heaven was the sun god. 2 There were as many Baals in Asia as there were Horuses in Egypt...
...God of Israel is contrasted with "the Baal" when Elijah, after exposing and slaying Baal's false prophets (1 Kings, xviii), took refuge in a cave.
Behold, the Lord passed by, and a great and strong wind rent the mountains and brake in pieces the rocks before the Lord; but the Lord was not in the wind; and after the wind an earthquake; but the Lord was not in the earthquake; and after the earthquake a fire; but the Lord was not in the fire; and after the fire a still small voice (1 Kings, xix, 11-12).
Baal was thus "the lord" of wind, earthquake, and fire. "In Egypt", says Wiedemann, 1 "Baal was regarded as a god of the sky--a conception which fairly corresponds to his original nature--and as a great but essentially a destructive deity."
