When we take all the above considerations into account, the conclusion we inevitably draw is that it was almost impossible that Israel should escape being involved in the cult of Baal if it desired to maintain its existence on is soil, in the midst of Ais people, who were ill affected towards Israel. The only question is whether this way of looking at the matter was—at least for a length of time—shared by all classes of the people without exception, or whether, at least amongst the intel- lectual and religious leaders there were those who even then put forward in downright earnest the supreme plea of the Sinai religion: ‘ Jahweh—and Jahweh alone—is the God of Israel.’ We may infer that there were, judging from the energy with which the struggle against Baal was after- wards undertaken, and which implies a continuous maintenance of exclusive Jahwism. There are, however, no direct testimonies to a struggle main- tained at every period with the worship of Baal. It might perhaps be supposed that a distinction should be drawn between the Canaanite Baal, who was quite early superseded, and of whom there is
no further trace even in the ancient records of the
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opening monarchical period, and the Tyrian Baal imported by Jezebel and Athaliah, against whom a violent storm of opposition at once arose. But this would be to disregard a very trustworthy witness, whose testimony is to quite a different effect, namely Hos 270), When the prophet here reproaches his countrymen with going after their lovers [the baals], who were supposed to have bestowed upon them bread and water, wool and flax, oil and ‘drinks’ (v.14?) vines and fig-trees), he is thinking not of times long gone by, nor of the cult of the Tyrian Baal, but of an ineradicable delusion of the people which can be traced down to the time of Hosea—that is, till the closing days of the Northern kingdom : ‘she knoweth not that it is J [Jahweh] who have bestowed upon her the corn and the must and the oil, and have given her silver and gold in abundance—upon Baal hath she expended it’ (Hos 2”). It may be that the complaint of Hosea applied in a much larger measure to the kingdom of Israel than to that of Judah. But, in any case, it furnishes a very notable testimony to the tenacity with which the belief in Baal as the god of the land and the dis- penser of its fruits persisted amongst a portion of the people.*
2. From all the above considerations it follows that the picture which the Deuteronomic redactor . of the Book of Judges (ef. esp. 2") sketches of the religious conditions of the period of the Judges is not true to the historical reality. To him—from the standpoint of the 7th or 6th cent. B.C.—no other view is possible except that any inclination to the cult of other gods is at the same time complete apostasy from Jahweh, the God of the fathers (Jg 2"). Itis the anger of Jahweh, occa- sioned by their conduct, and the oppression at the hands of their foes to which He gives them over, that (according to this view) first bring Israel to reflexion and a return to Jahweh. But the truth is that in these early times men considered it quite an intelligible position that, on the one hand, they should hold fast to Jahweh in all matters affecting the people as a whole (so, for instance, especially in war; cf. above, p. 686°) ; while, on the other hand, they did not break with Baal, the god of the land and the bestower of fruits, but rendered to him the thanks and the offerings that were his due. Such conduct is not to be viewed as pure idolatry, and still less as polytheism ; it is simply a species of syncretism which aims at satisfying, each in its own way, all the varieties of religious needs. In like manner, among the Arabs, long after the victory of Islam, the local cult of the pre-Islamic gods persisted, partly in the popular usages (forbidden by Islam), partly in some usages incorporated with Islam itself.
3. In the long run, however, this double cult of quite heterogeneous gods became impossible : one or other must yield. And, as a matter of fact, by aid of the ancient sources we can still trace pretty accurately the long process which led to the complete conquest and suppression of the
* Surviving traces of this notion are discovered by Schwally (Semit. Kriegsaltertimer, i. 81 ff.) in such legal prescriptions as that newly planted fruit trees were to be left untouched for three years, but in the fourth year their fruits were to be dedicated to Jahweh (Ly 19238 ; cf. Dt 208, where a similar rule is supposed to hold of vineyards) ; that a field was not to be reaped to its very edges (Ly 199.) ; that a forgotten sheaf was not to be fetched from the field, and that in general all glean- ine was to be dispensed with (Dt 2419), In all these usages it is supposed that there was an intention of propitiating the ‘demons’ and baals (cf. what was said above, p. 617 f., about the sacrifices offered to the sé‘irim). But here again, as elsewhere, it is very questionable whether Deuteronomy (not to speak of Leviticus) has still any consciousness of this meaning of customs inherited from olden times ; at all events, the ancient custom is