Some slogans used with passion during these difficult and painful days depict very different visions for the future of the land that knows many names and has known numerous battles over the ages. But I doubt anybody shouting today about the river and the sea knows that the original names for such bodies of water are also the names of the one and the same ancient deity who is involved in the tale of the most epic battle in semitic history.
Some say that on some levels the battle still goes on and maybe always will.
In today’s prophetic vision of what’s yet to come, Zechariah imagines the future triumphant return of all the exiled Judeans, back to their land, despite dispersion and difficulties. Although he lives during the Persian era, in the 6th century BCE, the symbols and stories he knows and references go way back, with mythic fragments from the Babylonian, Assyrian and even older Semitic pantheons, all somehow pieced together. So when he describes the future battle in which YHWH will conquer the enemies and ensure the people’s prosperity, the prophet throws in some terms that could be mere metaphor but may also indicate familiarity with the deepest layers of cosmology and the mythic battle between chaos and order that created our world and continues on. He’s counting on his listeners to recognize the symbols as he winks at the wars of history in the context of the unknown yet to come:
וַהֲשִֽׁבוֹתִים֙ מֵאֶ֣רֶץ מִצְרַ֔יִם וּמֵאַשּׁ֖וּר אֲקַבְּצֵ֑ם וְאֶל־אֶ֨רֶץ גִּלְעָ֤ד וּלְבָנוֹן֙ אֲבִיאֵ֔ם וְלֹ֥א יִמָּצֵ֖א לָהֶֽם׃ וְעָבַ֨ר בַּיָּ֜ם צָרָ֗ה וְהִכָּ֤ה בַיָּם֙ גַּלִּ֔ים וְהֹבִ֕ישׁוּ כֹּ֖ל מְצוּל֣וֹת יְאֹ֑ר וְהוּרַד֙ גְּא֣וֹן אַשּׁ֔וּר וְשֵׁ֥בֶט מִצְרַ֖יִם יָסֽוּר׃
“I will bring them back from the land of Egypt and gather them from Assyria; And I will bring them to the lands of Gilead and Lebanon, and even these shall not suffice for them.
And He shall pass through the sea with affliction, and shall smite the waves in the sea, and all the depths of the River shall dry up: and the pride of Assyria shall be brought down, and the scepter of Egypt shall be banished.”
Zechariah 10:10-11
What begins with outlines of familiar geography quickly morphs here into mythic proportions. The Hebrew word used here for ‘sea’ is ‘Yam’ and the ‘river’ is ‘Ye’or’ -- but these are also the names of old gods that fought each other for dominion. Land over sea, chaos vs. order, nature vs. culture.
This combat myth is central to the Ugarithic, Akkadian, Sumerian, Assyrian, and Babylonian scriptures, so no wonder they made it into the Bible as well. Common to all these stories, with some variations, is the original battle between the original chaos and the subsequent order -- the threat to the old gods that is presented by newer gods. Usually the old guard is fought by the young, often their children,
with one of the young gods stepping up to challenge its ancestors and take over. Often the one to defeat the primordial forces becomes the new chief god and the civilization is formed from the corpse of the old force. The most famous of these battles is the one between Tiamat - the Sea Monster/Mother of Creation who is defeated by her offspring Marduk, who then becomes the head of the Babylonian Gods. That battle is hidden in the first verses of Genesis, and through the psalms.
In other similar cultures, it is the battle between the Sea - Yam - a god or goddess, like Tiamat, that represents nature or chaos - up against the masculine forces of order and culture that overcome what came before. Such is the triumph of Ba’al - head of the Canaanite pantheon, and this is also the hidden history of YHWH who fights Egypt and cuts the sea in two to birth his nation. When it’s time to cross the Jordan river into the promised land, YHWH does it again, cutting the river in two to let the people cross.
But that’s not just a river either. Yam’s secondary name was Nahar, “River”. The Hebrew god’s battle with nature is the story of how the alphabet and the lineary, the law and the man-made system fought against the sea, river, pagan and image - and won. Mostly.
So what’s hiding in this verse of Zechariah is an epic battle between forces that will determine the end of time, the redemption and the triumph of the Hebrew god and people over their enduring threats . During the long years of humiliated dispersion and exile, the motif of yearning for redemption and relief on these epic levels would rise again and again - echoed in the prophetic words of Isaiah and Zeacharia, as well as the poetics of the psalms. The river and the sea represent the forces of nature that will one day be defeated just as YHWH created the world by defeating Tiamat, or Tehom, the abyss of primordial prehistory. Perhaps these also reflect the simple human will to transcend the messiness of body and needs and drives and feelings and ‘elevate’ into some sort of mystical state of being at one? Whatever Zechariah meant - it is a combination of aspirations - political, polemical, mythic and aspirational.
Political reality is complex and the demand for justice and dignity for all who call the holy land their homeland these days is real, legit, and worthy of respect and recognition. What will define the long awaited for solutions are not battles of whatever cosmic dimensions but words and gestures, compassion and courage to begin again.
It’s important to remember that beyond and beneath the modern terms and definitions, the current borders, names of rivers and seas, is a primal myth, a human yearning for freedom, and also for control, an inner struggle between known and untold forces that define our realities in ways our common sense and law may not always be able to contain.
Whatever future battles await the contested region and land, we can just hope and pray that empathy will triumph over rage, and that the patriarchal narratives of binaries and battles will be replaced by new narratives of co-existence, cooperation and enough to go around, from sea to river, from heart to heart, with all the old and new deities celebrated for the life force that all of them and all of them have in common.
Image: Illustration by Elisabeth Suelli
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