BEKHOROTH. The name of one of the Jewish treatises or tractates which reproduce the oral tradition or unwritten law as developed by the second century A.D. and are included in the Mishnah (q.v.), a collection and compilation completed by Rabbi Judah the Holy, or the Patriarch, about 200 A.D. The sixty-three tractates of the Mishnah are divided into six groups or orders (sedarim). BekhOrOth is the fourth tractate of the fifth group, which is called liodashim (" Holy Things ").
BEL. The name of a Babylonian deity. He appears on the oldest monuments as En-lil, which means the " chief demon." He is " the lord of the lower world." the lower as compared with the upper or heavenly world. Becoming the great deity of Nippur, in course of time he " is released from the limitations due to his local origin and rises to the still higher dignity of a great power whose domain is the entire habitable universe " (M. Jastrow). He then become known as Bel, " the lord " par excellence, and was venerated in north and south alike. Nippur, however, remained his most important place of worship. It was called the " land of Bel." The great temple there called E-Kur or " mountain house " was continually repaired and added to by the kings of Nippur, each of whom wished to be known as " builder of the Temple of Bel at Nippur." Even the patron deity
of the city of Babylon, Marduk, is sometimes honoured by having the name of Bel combined with his own. In the days of Khammurabi when Bel's powers were trans ferred to Marduk, the name was transferred as well. From about the twelfth century Marduk Is referred to repeatedly as Bel. When Tiglathpileser I. wishes to announce that he rebuilt a temple to Bel he adds the word " old " to avoid confusion. The honour bestowed noon Marduk is referred to In a " Marduk hymn " in the Babylonian story of Creation : " Because he created the heavens and formed the earth, ' Lord of Lands' father Bel called his name." Bel figures in the eleventh tablet of the Gilgamesh Epic as the rival of Ea (q.v.) and as wishing to destroy mankind. Bel is mentioned in the Bible in Isaiah xlvi. 1 : "Bel has bowed down, Nebo has crouched " (Cheyne). See Morris Jastrow, Rel. of Baby lonia and Assyria, 189S; H. Winckler, History of Babyl. and Ass., 1907.