Pool of Baal/Thoth at Temple Complex in Motya Sicily, Identified

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billd89
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Pool of Baal/Thoth at Temple Complex in Motya Sicily, Identified

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https://www.livescience.com/ancient-sacred-pool-sicily

A Phoenician-Egyptian cult-site dating ~100 years before the Pentateuch was written at Alexandria is very interesting to consider.

Ba'al and Thoth were worshipped together there. Previously, I have posted on the Mosaic Cult of the Therapeutae, and on Daniel Völter's theory of the Moses-Thoth origin c.1100 BC. A few centuries later (c.800-550 BC), Baal-Thoth would probably have been associated w/ 'YHWH'; the OT is chock full of Baals, a form of God mentioned in 10 books and 51 times in the Bible. So logically, any 'Phoenician' trading site sacred to Ba'al/Thoth in this period probably had Semitic elements. There are numerous connections to Egypt in the archaeological evidence there; a published report in 1920 recorded a number of scarabs found at the site.

It is therefore entirely plausible these 'Phoenician' astronomers also included (Proto)Judeo-Egyptian mariners, c.600 BC. I suppose this is one of the reasons Haaretz has devoted some attention to this most excellent topic.

https://www.haaretz.com/archaeology/MAG ... 1.10679272
Motya was a multi-cultural city and this Greek inscription is fundamentally important, Nigro explains, adding: “It is dated to the middle of the sixth century B.C.E., on paleographic grounds and also thanks to the small aryballos where it is inscribed.”

There was a statue still present, not of Baal, but apparently of a god with the head of dog-eared baboon, the representative of the god Thoth, lending credence to the astronomical theory of the pool’s function, Nigro says.

The Phoenicians worshiped not only Baal and Thoth, but also cosmic elements. Baal, for instance, was represented by the constellation Orion, Nigro says, and at Motya, the Temple of Ba’al, the gates and several aligned steles are oriented towards the point on the horizon where Orion rises immediately after sunset at the winter, based on archaeo-astronomical reconstruction of the sky in about 550 B.C.E.
Note also that Egyptian god Sah is associated w/ Orion; his consort is Sopdet (associated w/ Sothis); Sah & Sopdet are parents of Sopdu (associated w/ Thoth & Moses) in the Sinai, 1100 BC. The founding of the Motya site, an island trading community, probably dates to that same period.

Haaretz ran a similar story in 2017:
In the pool's southern corner they found an Egyptian greensand statue of a baboon. In Egypt the baboon was sacred to Thoth, the ibis-headed god of Hermopolis, master of wisdom, knowledge and writing, often associated in Phoenician imagery with astral representation. Early-morning screaming by baboons had been thought to be a secret language that only adepts (including pharaohs) could understand, Nigro notes.
One imagines a sacred freshwater pool of Thoth at Motya had the living Ibis and Lotus. Thoth and the Lotus is a common motif in Dynasty 26 (c.600 BC) of the same period this site was inhabited.

The Egyptians believed that from these eight gods came a cosmic egg that contained the deity responsible for creating the rest of the world, including the primeval mound—the first land to arise out of the waters of pre-creation. In some versions of the myth, the egg was laid by a goose named “the Great Cackler,” while in other versions an ibis, the bird associated with the god Thoth, is responsible for the egg (Figures 5-6). Thoth’s appearance here in the myth is probably the work of the Hermopolitan priesthood, who wanted to recognize the importance of the city’s patron deity. After the mound appeared, a lotus blossom bloomed signaling the birth of the newborn sun god (Figure 7). After the sun made its first appearance, the rest of creation could follow. In some cases, this myth further describes a scarab beetle that emerges from the lotus. The scarab is often a solar symbol, and the texts describe how this beetle transforms into a child. When this child cried, his tears became humankind (Figure 8).

The lotus flower was an Egyptian fertility symbol. The stelae are reminders of the Tree-of-Life, even if (for Semites) this would have been the Storm-God Seth-Baal >> Bel >> El >> 'Yahweh', c.800-400 BC.
Numerous biblical scriptures allude to the erection of wooden idols and “pillars” known as asherim and mazzeboth in the Temple of Solomon to pay obeisance to the creators of the Ugaritic pantheon, El (Baal) and Asherah (1 Kings 15: 12–15; 19: 18; 2 Kings 10: 18–24; 2 Chronicles 15: 16; 33: 1–7). According to Hebrew tradition, these customs were outlawed by Moses after his epiphany on Mount Sinai (Exodus 34: 13; Deuteronomy 12: 2–3; 16: 21; Judges 3: 7; 6: 25–28), but the prophet’s divine edicts proved futile in discouraging religious tolerance and polytheistic inclinations of his tribal associates and descendants. Biblical references to the erection of idols and asherim appear to relate to sacral tree worship since, from a scriptural and iconographic point of view, the ‘poles’ (mazzeboth) of Baal and ‘pillars’ (asherim) of Asherah (whose word-roots obviously share a common origin), were undoubtedly plant symbols (Wiggins 1993, pp. 14–15, 93–97) and must surely relate to pillared sacral tree motifs in archeological records of this day. Such practices were apparently shared by the Egyptians, insofar as the famous pharaoh, Rameses II, had a pillar dedicated to Asherah’s daughter, Anat, at Beth Shean during the 13th c. BCE (Cassuto 1971, p. 65). Not only did the idolizing of asherim relate to the practice of “tree worship” (Deuteronomy 16: 21; 1 Kings 14: 23; Hosea 4: 12–13), but the erection of these effigies is described in terms of a “planting” (Deuteronomy 16: 9) and their destruction as an “uprooting” (Micah 5: 14) or a “hewing down” (Exodus 34: 13; Judges 6: 25, 28, 30; 1 Kings 15: 13; 2 Kings 23: 14; 2 Chronicles 14: 2–4; 15: 16).

According to this interpretation, which may preserve an early Hermetic conception c.250 BC:
Some recent writers have supposed that Hermes was the symbol of Divine Intelligence and the primitive type of Plato’s 'Logos.' Manetho {c.250 BC}, the Egyptian priest, as quoted by Syncellus, distinguishes three beings who were called Hermes by the Egyptians. The first, or Hermes Trismegistus, had, before the deluge, inscribed the history of all the sciences on pillars; the second, the son of Agathodemon, translated the precepts of the first; and the third, who is supposed to be synonymous with Thoth, was the counsellor of Osiris and Isis. But these three were in later ages confounded and fused into one, known as Hermes Trismegistus. He was always understood by the philosophers to symbolize the birth, the progress, and the perfection of human sciences. He was thus considered as a type of the Supreme Being. Through him man was elevated and put into communication with the gods.

1. Hermes as Seth (Seth was associated w/ Baal in Egypt). Jewish Hermes?
2. Hermes, Son of Agathodaimon. Greek Hermes?
3. Hermes-Thoth. Egyptian Hermes?

https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals ... EC5FD5B6CB
It has been argued that the circular temenos and the sacred pool constituted a vast astronomical observatory (Nigro 2009c). This interpretation is suggested by several finds, including the pointer of a navigation instrument in the Temple of Ba'al (noted above), and the discovery, in the north-eastern corner of the pool, of a worn statue of a dog-headed baboon — the personification of the Egyptian god Thoth, the god of knowledge and wisdom, who was associated with astronomy (Dothan and Regev 2011) and often depicted in zodiacs (e.g. at Dendera; Priskin 2015) (Figure 10). Temples to the latter in ancient Egypt also featured sacred pools (Gessler-Löhr 1983 ).
Ba'al Statue, from the Site:
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Baal/ Hadad:
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Thoth Statue, from the Site:
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