March 4, 2008...6:31 am
The Collapse of YHWH
Shu, the god of the air, upholds Nut, the sky-goddess, while Geb, the earth-god, reclines under Nut. The website where I found this argues that this structure is similar to Israelite cosmology, although I must argue that it is similar only in so far as Shu is a YHWH equivalent, along with Ba’al and Marduk in the Caananite and Babylonian pantheons respectively. Note the description in Psalm 24 of YHWH’s victory over chaos, and the nature of YHWH’s kingship.
1Psalm of David. The earth is the LORD’S, and all it contains, The world, and those who dwell in it.
2 For He has founded it upon the seas And established it upon the rivers.
8 Who is the King of glory? The LORD strong and mighty, The LORD mighty in battle.
9 Lift up your heads, O gates, And lift them up, O ancient doors, That the King of glory may come in!
10 Who is this King of glory? The LORD of hosts, He is the King of glory. Selah.
The occasion of this psalm is YHWH’s victory procession entering his temple-palace. It invokes Ancient Near Eastern imagery from the Caananite creation myth in which Ba’al conquers the chaos serpent Yam-Nahar (Sea-River). Some Psalms commentators have suggested that this Psalm, specifically vs. 8, argues for YHWH’s dynamic kingship as opposed to a static one. If that is the case, then YHWH’s struggle with Yam-Nahar is an ongoing battle. YHWH the warrior, the LORD of hosts must continually extert his heroic strength to maintain the order of the world. In the above picture Neither Geb nor Nut represent hostile forces, which is why it is structurally different than Israelite Cosmology. However, as I already mentioned, YHWH can be understood as a Shu equivalent. Both Shu and Yhwh were considered gods of the sky [in the case of YHWH this was only a true assumption in normative Judaism (the ideal Judaism of scripture)]. I envision a picture of YHWH standing where Shu stands in the above picture on top of a serpent while holding up the firmament, and standing upon the earth’s pillars. Quite like the image below.
If the below image of God is the one that Psalms describes, the mighty YHWH holding up the skies and keeping back the sea serpent then we have a problem. If YHWH the warrior battles to maintain order, what happens if the world experiences an ecological collapse, as so many environmentalist prophets predict? The logical result seems to be that YHWH becomes the vanquished warrior assuming the conquered place of the serpent.
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