Judaism and Sexuality 3

Furthermore, the ancient Israelites , like all their neighbors, worshiped goddesses; many of them from all periods of Israelite history have been excavated throughout Israel . The ashterot against which the prophets and Deuteronomy railed were not simply sacred poles,” but images of Astarte “upon every high hill and under every leafy tree”(Jer. 2:20), placed next to the male baalim. As they were carved from wood, they have not survived. The Second Book of Kings described such an image in the Temple in Jerusalem (2 Kgs. 23:6), probably set up by King Manasseh (642-634 B.CE.). Even King Solomon , who built the Temple, had“gone after Ashterot, the goddess of Zidon .”(1 Kgs. 11:5, 10) as well as other Canaanite gods, though ostensibly only in his old age to accommodate foreign princesses. It was, after all, the worship of the heathen Sidonian ashterot, that caused the prophet Ahijah of Shilo to instigate the rebellion of Jeroboam against him and to split the kingdom after his death. Worship of this goddess was well known in the northern kingdom, so when Ahab (875-853 B.C.E.) married the Sidonian princess, Jezebel , he built an altar to Baal and Ashterah in his capitol (1 Kgs. 16:31), images which were worshiped to the end of the northern kingdom in 722 B.C.E.. The biblical writers considered this worship as the primary cause of the kingdom’s destruction.

Matters were not very different in the southern kingdom, although several Judean rulers, under prophetic influence, undertook religious reforms by destroying the ashterot. Yet these images quickly returned; they had a strong hold on the common people with their assumed promise of human and agricultural fertility.

The Syrian goddess, Anath, appeared in the Bible only through names of towns and individuals. It is likely, however, that she was the“Queen of Heaven” worshiped after the Babylonians conquered Jerusalem (586 B.C.E.) and was subsequently carried to Egypt by Judean refugees. There Jeremiah attacked her veneration, which he described in detail(Jer. 7:15-18). He interpreted the destruction of Judea as punishment for idolatry; his fellow exiles, however, held the