Poems concerning Baal

A number of narrative texts, in varying degrees of preservation and legibility, feature the West Semitic storm-god Baal, the patron deity of Ugarit (Tell Ras Shamra). These are KTU 1.1-1.6, the so-called ‘‘Baal cycle,’’ which will form the basis of the following discussion; 1.7-1.9 (fragments of school exercises, excerpts from the main text); 1.10, 1.11, and 1.13, which deal with the erotic encounters of Baal and Anat; 1.12, apparently a myth relating to atonement and redemption rites, and featuring Baal; and 1.92, which narrates an attempted seduction by Baal of the virgin goddess Athtart (Astarte). KTU 1.133 is a fragment paralleling an episode in KTU 1.5. KTU 1.10 may in fact be part of the ‘‘cycle’’ of 1.1-1.6 (I now consider it to be perhaps the end ofIlimilku’s composition), and KTU 1.13 has been interpreted as a fragment of the third column of 1.10. (For this numbering system see Dietrich et al. 1976, 1995; for convenient recent translations see Pardee 1997a, 1997b, 1997c; Parker 1997; Wyatt 2002b.)

KTU 1.1-1.6 constitute by broad consensus the main body of Baal. Something in the order of 50 percent of the text on these tablets is missing, though a certain amount of minimal reconstruction is possible, thanks to the use of reiterated poetic formulae. There is also a broad consensus on the order in which the tablets are to be read, in the sequence of numbering, though KTU 1.2 appears to contain parts of two distinct tablets (Meier 1986; Wyatt 2002b: 37), thus perhaps representing a parallel version; there are also some sequence dissonances elsewhere. Most interpreters take it as a working hypothesis that there is a rough unity of composition in the main body of material.

Tablet KTU 1.6 ends (col. vi 54-8) with a colophon listing the titles of Ilimilku, the scribe, to whose significance we shall return. A broken colophon may have identified him as the scribe of KTU 1.4 (col. viii lower edge); the other texts of the series, in addition to further ones, notably, in the present discussion, KTU 1.10, being commonly attributed to him on epigraphic grounds. (See also KTU 1.22, one of the surviving Rpum texts, which have been linked by some scholars with the Aqhat story; KTU 1.14-1.16, Keret. Ilimilku named as the scribe at 1.16 vi lower edge; KTU 1.17-1.19, Aqhat. Ilimilku may have been named in colophon at 1.17 vi lower edge). It should be conceded that there is no colophon on tablet KTU 1.10, the reverse of which is uninscribed, and this could be construed as evidence against its putative place as concluding Baal. It could similarly be argued that the full formulation at the end of KTU 1.6 vi marks it out as the end of the composition. But neither argument is conclusive.

The narrative in Baal runs as follows (all references in KTU 1. series). In this synopsis I list the missing materials as well, where they can be inferred, in order to indicate the precise elements of continuity and of discontinuity between various parts.

KTU 1.1 (6 columns. fragmentary). Various embassies are sent, and the sea-god Yam is enthroned as divine king.

KTU 1.2 (fragments, perhaps of 8 columns. see Wyatt 2002b. 36-7). Athtar’s royal claim is rejected, and Baal is surrendered by the divine assembly... Bound beneath Yam’s throne, he emerges to kill Yam with divine weapons.

KTU 1.3 (6 columns. half missing). Baal is feasted, and Anat goes to war, in a real battle, followed by a ritual one (see Lloyd 1996). On receiving messengers from Baal, she insists that she had already killed his enemies, and demands a palace for Baal from El, the high god. Baal sends Athirat’s assistant to Kothar the artificer god...

KTU 1.4 (8 columns. about two column-lengths missing)... .who makes gifts for Athirat. She intercedes with El, the palace is built and inaugurated. Mot is not invited.

KTU 1.5 (6 columns. about two column-lengths missing). Mot demands Baal’s surrender, and he goes into the Underworld. El mourns him.

KTU 1.6 (6 columns. about two column-lengths missing). Anat mourns Baal. She and Shapsh recover his body and she buries him. Athtar is enthroned. El dreams that Baal is restored. A restored Baal fights a restored Mot, and Shapsh separates them, awarding Baal the victory.

KTU 1.10, supposed by some to belong here (3 columns. about half missing). Baal goes hunting, where Anat meets him. They watch a cow in labor, make love, and a son is born to Baal.

A wide range of interpretations has been offered for the Baal story, being largely variations on two main themes, which we may summarize in the briefest form here. There are several useful surveys, which may be consulted for further details (de Moor 1971; Smith 1986, 1994. 58-114; Wyatt 1996. 117-218; 1998.). Initial attempts belong to the ‘‘myth and ritual’’ era of scholarship; they saw two main features in the text. firstly, the deities were seen fairly simplistically as allegorical figures, personifications of every kind of natural and cultural phenomenon, and as essentially ‘‘immanent in nature,’’ a pantheistic evaluation which now seems perverse, but which belongs largely to the polemics of biblical scholarship. Secondly, this approach, adopted from the inception of Ugaritic studies by Virolleaud and Dussaud (for references consult Smith 1994 and Wyatt 2002b), was refined into a pan-Near Eastern ritual pattern by Gaster (1950; cf. Gray 1964), and into a rigorous ritual calendar for Ugarit by de Moor (1971).

This approach is now regarded as broadly discredited, and an ideological basis is seen as a more probable motivation. The discovery of a ritual application of the motif, linked to the cultic use of‘‘divine weapons’’ in Mari, published by Durand (1993), offers a far more plausible Sitz im Leben, which I followed up in a comparative survey (Wyatt 1998). Now the Chaoskampf theme is seen as part of the larger issue of royal ideology, and serves as legitimization of war, in which kings recapitulate the primordial victories of their patron deities.

The distinctive feature of Baal, compared with all other versions, is its incorporation into a larger composition, which is perhaps to be attributed to Ilimilku himself (Wyatt 2002a). The implicit point of the common theme of the possession and use of royal weapons is here linked to the theme of the acquisition of a royal palace (Ugaritic hkl, like its cognates, means both palace of a king and temple of a god). And Baal’s building and inauguration of a palace constitutes a challenge to other rival royal claims; both Yam and Mot are presented as gods challenging Baal’s hegemony. (This rivalry may be compared with the tension between Zeus, Poseidon, and Hades.) Finally, in a tour de force which skillfully echoes the structure of the Chaoskampf narrative (Petersen and Woodward 1977), Baal’s conflict with Mot echoes that with Yam, and is resolved with a comparable setting of Baal’s royal power under the aegis of that of El, the high god. (For further discussion see below.)