Secret Alias wrote:But El is a different god. I am specifically interest in the form YHWH. Thanks
He was different but compiled with all of Els attributes as early as 800BC [attested] by some cultures. [painting/pottery of Yahweh and his Asherah]
What's the earliest attested date?
Only the two you know about which is all we have.
There are two Egyptian texts, one dated to the period of Amenophis III (14th century BCE), the other to the age of Ramses II (13th century BCE) which refer to 'Yahu in the land of the Šosū-Bedouins',(t3 š3św jhw3), in which Yahu is a toponym. Regarding the Shasu of Yhw, Michael Astour observed that the "hieroglyphic rendering corresponds very precisely to the Hebrew tetragrammaton YHWH, or Yahweh, and antedates the hitherto oldest occurrence of that divine name – on the Moabite Stone – by over five hundred years."[5] One hypothesis is that it is reasonable to infer that the demonym 'Israel' recorded on the Merneptah Stele refers to a Shasu enclave, and that, since later Biblical tradition portrays Yahweh "coming forth from Se'ir",[6] the Shasu, originally from Moab and northern Edom, went on to form one major element in the amalgam that was to constitute the "Israel" which later established the Kingdom of Israel.[7] Anson Rainey comes to a similar conclusion in his analysis of the el-Amarna letters.[8] K. Van Der Toorn concludes that,
By the 14th century BC, before the cult of Yahweh had reached Israel, groups of Edomite and Midianites worshipped Yahweh as their god.[9]
I think the problem you may run into, is the multiple use of the name/concept in different cultures. There is no current link between Shasu and Proto Israelites. Were missing a few steps here that leave us in the dark.
