Journey Through Kings & Chronicles Part 2Намуна

Ritual & Sacramental Living: Behind the Text

One of the remarkable differences between Israel’s rituals and her neighbors was in their understanding of “hospitality” for their God.

Hospitality & the Gods

What do you think was the purpose of this hospitality? Why did ancient Near Eastern people go through so much trouble to accommodate their gods?

Let’s hear what scholar Michael Hundley has to say:

In ancient Near Eastern contexts, the deity’s continued presence was the primary concern, and, as such, the people’s role focused on keeping the deity happy so that it would remain at home and positively disposed to its servants.

In other words, if the gods were happy, they would stick around. If not, they were gone, and they took all of the benefits and protection they provided with them.

Source: Michael Hundley, Gods in Dwellings: Temples and Divine Presence in the Ancient Near East, 2013, p. 10.

As was the case for other religions in the ancient Near East, the Israelites could drive God from their midst by violating the covenant. He would leave the Temple and they would lose the benefit of his provision and protection. This was the worst possible outcome for the people. Bible scholar Dr. Jacob Milgrom notes the similarity here between Israel and its neighbors.

On this point, Israel is in full accord with its neighbors’ obsessive compulsion to purify their temples. They too, in their more sophisticated cultures, believed that human transgressions were responsible for the departure of the deity from his sanctuary. Thus in a Babylonian stele, dedicated to the mother of Nabonides (dated 547 BCE), we find, “Sin, the king of all the gods, became angry with his city (i.e., Harran) and his temple, and went up to heaven and the city and the people within it became desolate” (ANET3 560). Thus the sack of Harran (610 BCE) is attributed not to the attacking forces but to the failings of its citizens.

The most noticeable difference in Israel was that the performance of prescribed ritual was not the guarantee of the deity’s presence. In fact, we’ll find the prophets often saying that this does not influence YHWH’s choice to stay or go. It is rather their relational fidelity to the covenant … to love God by showing mercy and justice to each other.

Source: Milgrom, Leviticus 1–16, 1991, pp. 254-262.