HIGH PLACE (Het). banoih, height 1. An expre-sion frequent in the Old Testament. and in variably used I except ill poetry r a- a of a :anetuary. y111 AVIit+11 ip ill alleiellt 1 was e 111(1.141 at high place, and there was. there fore, a very large number of .neli -brines. Co neral ly they were located on the top of a hill or a mountain. which accounts for the name: but sometimes a banigh was within a city. at the gate. or ill a valley, not neee-sunrily even on an artificial mound. a. has been supposed. At a high place there would be an altar, a sacred stone of phallic Shape. a wooden ? sacred tree, or ()fig.!t a sacred fountain. While some may have been only small shrines. other: had large ball- where the wor-hiper- took part in tile saerifieial meal. as well as an adyt M for the image of the deity. There probably way an id, I in every such temple. .‘t Bethel and Dan there were hull images of Yahweh. at Jerusalem a brazen serpent as well as hulls. The worship at these sanctuaries was. in earlier Hines. charac terized by joy. by eating. drinking. dancing. and sexual indulgence:. This rejoieirm was hallowed by offerings of saerifices, libations, and inter course with the hierodules. As most of the-.e high places mere taken over tram the Canaanites and the denunciations of the prophets slum the continuality in Israel, c‘en at II late date, of the morship of the Itaals, it i.s probable that mitt' \ 'dimeh other deities also, especially the Bao/iin r /aim, 'lords' or 'gods,' to whom the sanctuaries had owe belonged. more recognized by sacrifices in these temples. That these high places mere once regarded as altogether legitimate is evident from the tact that Samuel conducted worship at a number of them, David. Solomon, and all his dorm to sacrificed in them, and at these sanctuaries the stories of the patriarchs were told. :Many of the stories of Genesis cluster about the high places of Shechein and Bethel, Alizpali and .Malainaint. Hebron and Beersheba, and But the of the eighth I.entury, men like Amos and Hosea, Isaiah and Alicalt. denounced these temples of the na tion and the sacrificial cult there carried on. They maintained that Yahweh haul not cum mantled that sacrifices he brought to Him, that lsrael was happiest and most idcasing to Yahweh no sacrifices could lie offered, viz. in the wilderness: and they attacked the drunkenness and religious prostitution that flour ished at these temples. While the earliest law of
Israel. the Covenant Code (Ex. xxi.-xxiii.), re gards p at those sanctuaries where Yah weh had revealed Himself as perfectly legitimate, the Denterononde law introduced by King Josiah about Ci:20 declares that sacrifices shall he offered in only one place. 'fhb; centralization of the cult in Jerusalem may have been an ideal of the local priesthood as early as the days of Ilezekiali, and some Judean temples may have been closed and destroyed as is stated in II. Kings xviii. 4. 2'2; xxi. 3, though it is pro cable that the author of these verses has wrongly given Ilezekiah credit for the same reformatory work as Josiah. That Josiah attempted to carry out the change pro posed in Deuteronomy, and did so with a high hand. there can be no doubt (II. Kings, xxiii.). But it is equally certain that the affection of the people could not by his violent measures be di Nerted from their ancient temples. 'Ile destruc tion of the temple in .ferngalein by Nebuchad nezzar naturally enhanced the importance of the smaller shrines and caused a reaction against the Yahweh cult in favor of the worship of other god The relnetance to rebuild the temple in Jerusalem complained (11 by llaggai was nn doubt, in part caused by this reaction. There is evidenc• in parts of the Book of Isaiah written during the Persian and Greek periods of the sur vival of licentious and idolatrous rites that van he connected with the temple in 'Tent salem. A positive proof of the existence of other temples besides that in the capital at a very late tune is found in (lie letter of Onias to Ptolemy and Cleopatra. (puled by Josephits (int. xiii. 3. 1), in which lie states that the heirs of Egypt, Co•e-Syria, and Pln•nicia have many temples of ditTerent patterns. and therefore wishes to have permission to build his temple in Leontopolis (see ONtAs's Tr.mtst.E). on the model of that in .Ieru salem. From this it must be ooncluded that the idea of the illegitimacy of all worship except at Jerusalem cannot have been universally cherished among the Jews. and that the hill temples are likely to have attracted worshipers as late as in the second century uses If Onias's letter should prove to he a forgery. its testimony would not be 111 less it would then show a still longer su•vkal of this attitude. Consult Von Gall, AI/Israeli/I:Ow 111111Sn/11e/1 (Giessen, 1898), and Aloore. in L'iwyclovt(lut