As for the places consecrated to her worship, although the numerous passages in which the autho rized version has erroneously rendered nitjt.; by grove, are to be deducted (as is explained below), there are yet several occasions on which gardens and shady trees are mentioned as peculiar seats of (probably, her) lascivious rites (Is. i. 29 ; lxv. 3 ; I Kings xiv. 23 ; Hos. iv. 13 ; Jer. ii. 20; iii. 13). She also had celebrated temples (I Sam. xxxi. ro).
As to the form and attributes with which Ash toreth was represented, the oldest known image, that in Paphos, was a white conical stone, often seen on Phoenician remains in the figure which Tacitus describes, / c. as `Simulacrum non effigie humana ; continuus orbis latiore initio tenuem in ambitum, metre modo, exsurgens, et ratio in ob scum.' Minter is unwilling to consider this a Lingam symbol ; nevertheless, there appears to be some room for disputing his opinion. In Canaan she was probably represented as a cow. It is said in the book of Tobit i. 5, that the tribes which revolted sacrificed r'n' Mira T17 SamcENa, where the feminine article with BciaX is to be remarked. In Phoenicia she had the head of a cow or bull, as she is seen on coins. Sanchoniathon states that ' Astarte adopted the head of a bull as a symbol of her sovereignty ;' he also accounts for the star which is her most usual emblem, by saying that `when she passed through the earth, she found a fallen star, which she consecrated in Tyre' (1. c. p. 34). At length, she was figured with the human form, as Lucian expressly testifies of the Syrian goddess—which is substantially the same as Ashtoreth ; and she is so found on coins of Severus, with her head surrounded with rays, sit ting on a lion, and holding a thunderbolt and a sceptre in either hand. What Kimchi says of her being worshipped under the figure of a sheep is a mere figment of the Rabbins, founded on a mis apprehension of Deut. vii. 13. As the words )NY milt:iv there occurring may be legitimately taken as the loves of the flock (Veneres pecoris), e., either the ewes or the lambs, the whole foun dation of that opinion, as well as of the notion that the word means sheep, is unsound.
The word Ashtoreth cannot be plausibly derived from any root, or combination of roots, in the Syro-Arabian languages. The best etymology, that approved by Gesenius, Flint, and others, identify it with the Persian sitdrah, star, with a prosthetic guttural. The latest etymology is that suggested by Sir IV. Betham, in his Etruria Celtica, ii. 22, who resolves Astarte into the Irish elements : As, out of ; tar, beyond; te, deity— the goddess of long voyages ! Ashtoreth is feminine as to form ; its plural Ashtaroth also occurs (and is sometimes erroneously taken to be the proper name of the goddess) ; but it is understood to denote a plurality of images (like the Greek 'Eplial), or to belong to that usage of the plural which is found in words denoting lord (Ewald's Hebr. Gram. 361 ; Mo vers, Phiinizier ; Creuzer, Symbolik).
To come now to ASHERAH Judg. vi.
25) Selden was the first who endeavoured to skew that this word—which in the LXX. and Vulgate is generally rendered grove, in which our authorized version has followed them—must in some places, for the sake of the sense, be taken to mean a wooden image of Ashtoreth (De Diis Syr is, ii. 2). Not long after, Spencer made the same assertion (De Leg. L. ii. 16). Vitringa
then followed out the same argument, in his note to Is. xvii. 8. Gesenius, at length, has treated the whole question so elaborately in his Thesaurus, as to leave little to be desired, and has evinced that Asherah is a name, and also denotes an image of this goddess. [GRovEs.] Some of the arguments which support this par tial, or, in Gesenius's case, .total rejection of the signification grove, for ;I-Int, are briefly as fol lows :—It is argued that Asherah almost always occurs with words which denote idols and statues of idols; that the verbs which are employed to express the making an Asherah, are incompatible with the idea of a grove, as they are such as to build, to shape, to erect (except in one passage, where, however, Gesenius still maintains that the verb there used means to erect) ; that the words used to denote the destruction of an Asherah are those of breaking to pieces, subverting ; that the image of Asherah is placed in the Temple (2 Kings xxi. 7) ; and that Asherah is coupled with Baal in precisely the same way as Ashtoreth is : comp. Judg. ii. t3 ; x. 6 ; 1 Kings xviii. 1g ; 2 Kings xxiii. 4 ; and particularly Judg. iii. 7, and ii- 13, where the plural form of both words is explained as of itself denoting images of this goddess. Be sides, Selden objects that the signification grove is even incongruous in 2 Kings xvii. to, where we read of 'setting up groves under every green tree.' Moreover, the LXX. has rendered Asherah by Astarte, in 2 Chron. xv. 16 (and the Vulgate has done the same in Judges iii. 7), and, conversely, has rendered Ashtoreth by groves, in I Sam. vii. 3.
On the strength of these arguments most modern scholars assume that Asherah is a name for Ash toreth, and that it denotes more especially the relation of that goddess to the planet Venus, as the lesser star of good fortune. It appears, namely, to be an indisputable fact that both Baal and Ash toreth, although their primary relation was to the sun and moon, came in process of time to be con nected, in the religious conceptions of the Sp ° Arabians, with the planets Jupiter and Venus, as the two stars of good fortune. [MEN!. ] Although the mode of transition from the one to the other is obscure, yet many kindred circumstances illustrate it. For instance, the connection between Artemis and Selene ; that between yuna and the planet Venus, mentioned in Creuzer ii. 566 ; the fact that, in the Zendavesta, Anahid is the name of the genius of the same planet ; and that tktnrintst astr9 (which word is only an Aramaic form of the same sitarah which, as was remarked above, furnishes the best derivation for Ashtoreth) is also the name of the same planet in the religious books of the Tsalians (Norberg's Onomast. Cod. Nasanci, p. 2o). It is in reference to this connection, too, that a star is so often found among the emblems with which Ashtoreth is represented on ancient coins. Lastly, whereas the word Asherah cannot, in the sense of grove, be legitimately deduced from the primitive or secondary signification of any Syro Arabian root -et,t, as a name of the goddess of good fortune, it admits of a derivation as natural in a philological point of view, as it is appropriate in signification. The verb means to prosper; and Asherah is the feminine of an adjective signi fying fortunate, happy.—J. N.