The Stele of MESHA (Moabite Stone) and the BIBLE

This basalt stele of 125 cm, was made by the Moabite king MESHA, around the middle of the IX century BC. It presents a text of thirty four lines.

A part of the text relates a conflict between Mesha, king of Moab, and the son of Omri, king of Israel. It is this part that we study here today.

The language used is Moabite, close to Hebrew and Ugaritic. The stele is written with the Phoenician alphabet which was common at that time in these lands. The text is read from right to left.

Legible reproduction of the text of the Mesha Stele — https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mesha_Stele#/media/File:Mesha_Stele_drawing.png (Credit = Mark Lidzbarski [Public domain])

Reading the text of the stele, one understands that the type of relationship between the God Kamosh and the Moabite king (and his people) is similar to what the Old Testament describes of the relationship between Yahweh and the Israelite kings (and His people).

At the beginning of the text of the stele, Mesha introduces himself. Then he enters the narrative:

“Omri had been king of Israel and had oppressed Moab for a long time (…) His son had succeeded him, too: ‘I will oppress Moab!’ (…)”(1)

The inscription ‘’Omri had been king of Israel’’, is readable on the top of the stele (red frame) on lines 4 and 5 — Source : Wikipedia — ( Louvre Museum [CC BY 3.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0)] )

The text continues:

“Kamosh said to me, ‘Go, take Neboh over Israel! ‘’ and I went by night. I fought against it from dawn until noon, and I took it and killed all its inhabitants, seven thousand men and boys, women and girls, and even the pregnant women, for I had dedicated them to Ashtar-Kamosh. And I took the altars of the burnt offerings of Yahweh there and dragged them before Kamosh.” (1)

The word “Yahweh” is indicated (red frame) — Source: Wikipedia — ( Louvre Museum [CC BY 3.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0)] )

“The earliest extra-biblical reference to Yahweh is found on a 3,000-year-old Moabite stele, which boasts of having defeated Israel (…) and describes a God quite different from the one we know.” (3)

Indeed, the account of the stele clearly describes a revolt of the king of Moab against his overlord the king of Israel, as it says in the Bible. But the stele tells us that this revolt resulted in a dawn attack on the king of Israel, which ended in a crushing victory for Moab.

This conflict was described in the Bible in “II Kings 3” (2)

And indeed, we read there that Moab revolted against the overlord Ahab, king of Israel:

“Mesha king of Moab had flocks, and he paid tribute to the king of Israel of a hundred thousand lambs and a hundred thousand rams with their wool. When Ahab died, the king of Moab rebelled against the king of Israel.

However, the Bible’s account then diverges:

“Then king Jehoram went out of Samaria and surveyed all Israel. And he went out and said to Jehoshaphat king of Judah, ‘The king of Moab has rebelled against me; will you come with me to attack Moab? And Jehoshaphat said, I will go, I as you, my people as your people, my horses as your horses. (…) So the king of Israel, the king of Judah, and the king of Edom, went forth; (…)”

“And the king of Israel said, Alas, the LORD has called these three kings to deliver them into the hand of Moab. But Jehoshaphat said, Is there no prophet of the LORD here, by whom we may inquire of the LORD? (…) There is Elisha here (…) Elisha said, (…) the LORD will deliver Moab into your hand (…)”

“But the Moabites rose up early in the morning, and went against the camp of Israel. But Israel arose, and struck Moab, and they fled before them. And they went into the land, and struck Moab.

“And when the king of Moab saw that he had the upper hand in the battle, he took with him seven hundred men who drew swords to make his way to the king of Edom; but they could not. And he took his firstborn son, who was to reign in his stead, and offered him for a burnt offering upon the wall. And great indignation came upon Israel, and they departed from the king of Moab and returned to their own land.”

Thus, the three kings, potentially victorious by the promise of Yahweh, renounced it because the king of Moab had offered his son as a sacrifice-holocaust to his own God Kamosh. In so doing, did not the three kings in fact reinforce the image of the superior power of Kamosh over Yahweh?

No doubt this supposed renunciation also made it possible to explain the return of the survivors without victory and without a trophy. While trying to save face and prophecy.

In conclusion, I would say that ancient heroic stories, whatever the media on which they are read, are not always to be taken literally.

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….. (1) — Translation by André Lemaire (1986)

….. (2) — The Bible — Translation by Louis Segond 1910

….. (3) — Article: When God Wasn’t So Great: What Yahweh’s First Appearance Tells About Early Judaism — by Ariel David — Haaretz Sept. 13 2018

“The oldest extra-biblical reference to Yahweh is in a 3,000-year-old Moabite stele, which boasts of defeating Israel, may mention King David — and paints a very different picture of God than the one we know”

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Stele of Mesha — Source : Wikipedia — ( Louvre Museum [CC BY 3.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0)] )

Mesha Stele — Transcription of the text to make it readable — Source : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mesha_Stele#/media/File:Mesha_Stele_drawing.png — (Credit = Mark Lidzbarski [Public domain])

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Note: Original article by JPCqd (aka JPCiron)- March 2019:

https://www.agoravox.fr/actualites/religions/article/la-stele-de-mesha-moabite-stone-et-213429

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