Cultic incense stand found at Ta‘anach (a site on the rim of the Jezreel Valley close to Megiddo) dated to the time of Israelite occupation in the tenth century BCE.[1]
Earlier Hurrian cult stand

The Ta'anakh cult stand was found in the ancient city of Ta'anakh, near Megiddo, in Israel. It dates back to the 10th century BCE and has various images and symbols that are related to the religious practices of the Israelites. Some scholars think that the stand was used for offering incense[1] to the gods, while others suggest that it was a miniature representation of a temple or a shrine. The stand has four tiers, each with different scenes and figures natural and divine. The stand is one of the most important archaeological discoveries for the study of ancient Near Eastern religions, especially the cult of Yahweh and his possible consort[2] Asherah. Many academic papers have referred to this connection, especially before the 2010s publications of the more blatantly Asheratic Kuntillet Ajrud inscriptions.

Depiction

Not depicted

It's not immediately clear if any of the creatures are meant to depict Yahweh, who's typically shown as anthropomorphic, bovine, or between. Some suggest the apparent windows are in fact voids, i.e.: where God is not shown, as aniconism would rise later from the Babylonian captivity to the Maccabean period.

Depicted

Asherah in embodied form with her typical symbols, and in her[3] form of a small sacred tree. There's also a larger tree without the personal equivalence: "In the Ta’anach stands, the tree is an upright trunk with several furled fronds coming out from the two sides; in one case six and in the other eight." On the upper (IV) storey is the divine sun with a horse, showing[2] a solar-equine motif as central that would persist in Hebrew Zodiac art into the common era.

See also

External

Bibliography

  • Taylor, Joan E. (1995). "The Asherah, the Menorah and the Sacred Tree". Journal for the Study of the Old Testament. SAGE Publications. 20 (66): 29–54. doi:10.1177/030908929502006602. ISSN 0309-0892.

References

  1. 1 2 Taylor 1995, pp. 29–54.
  2. 1 2 Doak, Brian R. (2007-11-18). "A Reevaluation of Some Iconographic Motifs on the Taanach Cult Stand". Digital Commons @ George Fox University. Retrieved 2023-11-04.
  3. ↑ Taylor 1995, pp. 32.
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