u/Slow-Pie147

I know — in contrast to the traditional Islamic and Orientalist narrative — in Arabia, polytheism was largely replaced by monotheism by the 5th century which is shown in the epigraphy, the poetry, and the politics. For example, Himyar converted to Judaism in the late 4th century. Plus Gabriel Reynolds thinks that Hijaz was majority Christian in the 6th century though this is not widely accepted. Yet the word mushrikūn is mentioned in the Qur'ān more than the People of Book, Christians, and Jews.

I know the pre-monotheistic Allāh was worshipped as a light-giving creator, but I couldn't find much information about the prevalence of the mushrikūn in contrast to Christianity and Judaism. I know most academics think mushrikūn were the majority, but it feels like people just say mushrikūn were the majority and don't elaborate. I feel like somebody in here can expand it more.

Apophis is the underworld snake anti-god whose lethal powers are directed against Ra. Eternal and persistently hostile, Apophis symbolises primeval forces of chaos.

The gigantic body of Apophis, often a concertina of coils, represents a kind of void or "black hole" forcing those he swallows into that non-existence which the Egyptians feared so greatly.

The name of Apophis was interpreted in the Roman period as "He Who was Spat Out" and was linked to the saliva of the goddess Neith.

All texts and depictions attempt to bring about the defeat and destruction of Apophis, but his suppression is only momentary. Apophis becomes non-existent when the striumphs over him on his journey in the solar boat through the Underworld. His indestructibility is such that he at once returns as a malevolent force trying to devour Ra and his supporters. It is at the point when Ra subdues Apophis temporarily that the heads of his previous victims appear from his body. A scene in the tomb of Ramesses VI (Dynasty XX) in the Valley of the Kings, shows Apophis being carried by gods, and with the twelve heads of those it has devoured emerging from its coils. Once Ra has passed by the heads are destined to return into the body of Apophis until freed again briefly on the next night.

In a papyrus in the British Museum, which dates to circa 300 BC but contains linguistic styles of 2,000 years earlier, there is an account of the overthrow of Apophis and victory of Ra. Apophis is hacked up and burnt; this destruction is made more efficacious by practical instructions for magic including drawing a picture of Apophis in green on a new sheet of papyrus, sealing it in a box, setting it on fire and spitting on it four times.

Apophis is the serpent described as lying in wait to swallow Ra on Bakhu, the furthest mountain in the west. He is over 16 m long with his front consisting of flint. As the boat of the Ra sinks into the western horizon Apophis hypnotises all its occupants with his stare except for Seth. Ra is in jeopardy, but Seth charms Apophis with a spell, and Ra begins his journey through the Underworld.

Naturally, human beings require divine help against Apophis or can even transform themselves into powerful deities to counteract his onslaught. In order to board the Ra boat in the sky, the Bull of Millions provides a ladder to escape from Apophis. As navigator of the solar boat the dead person claims to know how to repel Apophis and save Ra from becoming entangled in his coils. The deceased can assume the form of the god Shi to protect Ra at the perilous entrance into the Underworld on the western horizon.

The overthrow and binding of Apophis is emphasised in violent statements or vivid pictures. There are references to seventy- seven papyri-rolls which are given to the dead person by means of a spell, containing formulae for bringing Apophis to his place of execution where he is cut up, crushed and consumed by fire. Apophis is represented with spearheads in his coils or, as at Gate 10 in the Underworld, chained by his neck. His symbolic annihilation is forcefully portrayed by the cat of Ra decapitating Apophis, blood spurting out as he cuts into Apophis' vertebrae.

The fact that Apophis is a complete antithesis to the sun-god, i.e. the darkness of a chthonic deity opposed to the light of Ra, comes across in the imagery surrounding Gate 2 in the Underworld. There Atum is condemning to destruction enemies of the sun-god and included among them is Apophis, the ‘khefty’ (opponent) of Ra, with his head to the ground awaiting slaughter.

Apophis is imagined as possessing a hideously loud roar which resounds throughout the Underworld. He is placed outside of the natural world requiring no nourishment except to "breathe" his own shouts.

The source: The Routledge Dictionary of Egyptian Gods and Goddesses, George Hart

As the title says, there is a very big issue with how people perceive Zoroastrianism. It is parroted that Zoroastrianism is the first monotheistic religion. Yet we should ask "How true is this claims?" The answer? It is a misinformation, and I want to talk about that today. First, let's have a look at the pre-colonial Zoroastrianism.

Historical Zoroastrianism cannot be explained as monotheistic in any way. Yes, one god was held as supreme (Ahura Mazda). It is just that he was the supreme god over many other gods (yazata in Avestan, bagan in Old Persian, and yazdan in Middle Persian) within the Zoroastrian pantheon. Ancient Zoroastrians, in their daily religious life, understood themselves as engaging with multiple divine figures, each with their own attributes, powers, and spheres of influence; Mithra over truth, Asha over sunlight, Anahita over water, and Drvaspa over pastures and cattle. These divine beings have been referred to as yazata (still are).

People argue that if Abrahamic religions are monotheistic despite the belief of angels, then so is Zoroastrianism. Casually ignoring that angels are not gods. In the Avestan language, the word yazata means "worthy of worship/sacrifice/adoration". Yes, this is the literally definition of "god'. The term is used, not only for Ahura Mazda and his divine emanations (Amesha Spentas), but also for a group of spiritual beings known collectively as the yazata. These divine beings help safeguard the good creations of the world and offer strength, guidance, and support to those who invoke them; they are coworkers (hamkar) of the Amesha Spentas and Ahura Mazda and aid in the fight against evil. hey preside over cosmic functions as well as mainyava (spiritual) creations and gaethya (material) creations; they are said to combat evil and daevas, and the worship of yazatas is continuously affirmed in the Avestan hymnals. (1500–1000 BCE), especially in the Yasna and Yashts. In contrast to Abrahamic religions where angels are venerated in some denominations at best.

>"Ahura Mazda spoke unto Spitama Zoroaster, saying: "Verily, when I created Mithra, the Lord of Wide Pastures, O Spitama! I created him as worthy of sacrifice, as worthy of prayer as myself, Ahura Mazda."

The starting verse from the Avestan Hymn to Mithra.

>"Zoroaster asked Ardvi Sura Anahita: "O Ardvi Sura Anahita! With what manner of sacrifice shall I worship you? With what manner of sacrifice shall I worship and forward you? So that Mazda may make thee run down (to the earth), that he may not make thee run up into the heavens, above the Sun, and that the Serpent may not injure you with...., with...., with...., and.... poisons."

From the Avestan Hymn to Ava Ardevi sur Anahita.

>"We worship the good, strong, beneficent Fravashis of the faithful, who are the mightiest of drivers, the lightest of those driving forwards, the slowest of the retiring, the safest of all bridges, the least-erring of all weapons and arms, and who never turn their backs."

From the Avestan Hymn to the Fravashis.

We also see the worship of the natural elements such as fire.

>Y25:7–8: "Yea, we worship you, the Fire, Ahura Mazda's son, I the holy lord of the ritual order, and we worship all the Fires, and Mount Ushi-darena (which holds the light) Mazda-made and holy, the Yazad mount, brilliant with sanctity. And we worship every holy spiritual Yazad, and every holy earthly Yazad (who exists)!"

We also see their worship outside the Avestan hymnals, such as in the Achaemenid, Parthian and Sasanian empires. For the sake of keeping this short, I will only put forth evidence for the Achaemenid, but there is just as much evidence for the Parthian and Sassanian eras.

>In Darius the Great’s Behistun inscription in Iran (DB, Column IV, lines 61–67), he declares: “For this reason Ahura Mazda bore aid, and the other gods who are because I was not hostile, I was not a Lie-follower, I was not a doer of wrong, neither I nor my family. According to righteousness I conducted myself. Neither to the weak nor to the powerful did I do wrong."

>In Artaxerxes II's (r. 404 – 358 B.C.) trilingual (Old Persian, Elamite, and Babylonian) inscription at Susa (A2Sa) and Hamadan (A2Hc), which have the same text, he appeals to "Ahura Mazda, Anahita, and Mithra protect me against all evil," and beseeches them to protect what he has built.

>Mithra is invoked again in the single known inscription of Artaxerxes III, A3Pa, found at Persepolis. In that inscription, Artaxerxes III appeals to "Ahura Mazda and the God Mithra preserve me, my country, and what has been built by me."

There is plenty more want to give evidences for the worship of the yazata as noted by non-Persians.

>For example, Herodotus describes in The Histories, during the reign of the Achaemenid Empire, Persians worshipped multiple gods, even going so far as to name some of them and even describing how sacrifices were conducted (Godley and Herodotus, 1920, 1.131-1.133). The Strabo’s Geographica notes that Cappadocia has many temples dedicated to the Persian deities, that there aretemples of Anaitis and of Omanus (Strabo, Hamilton and Falconer, 1903, 15.3.14), and Persians rehearse and teach in song and prose the deeds of their gods (Strabo, Hamilton and Falconer, 1903, 15.3.18).

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So when, why, and how did Zoroastrianism came to be known as the first monotheistic religion? To figure out this, we have to go back a few centuries, to when Western Orientalists and Western Christians first made contact with the Zoroastrians, especially with the Parsis.

Thomas Hyde (1636–1703)

There was a vivid interest in Zoroaster, the archetypical Oriental sage and magician, throughout pre‐modern European history (Stausberg 1998a; Rose 2000), and scholarly work on Zoroastrianism took root as part of the rise of Oriental studies in the 17th century. The first scholarly monograph on pre‐Islamic Iranian religious history was published in 1700 by Thomas Hyde (Williams 2004), the Oxford scholar of Arabic, Semitic, and Persian who contributed to the establishment of the term “dualism” (which he held to be an aberration of “orthodox” Zoroastrianism).

Hyde had a fundamentally sympathetic attitude towards his ancient Persians and he emphatically defended their "monotheism". At the same time, he placed ancient Persian religion into a Biblical framework and claimed that the oldest Persian religion derived from Abraham before falling into decay in order to be then once more reformed into its pristine purity by Zoroaster who had been a pupil of one of the Biblical prophets.

The Wiley Blackwell Companion to Zoroastrianism

I'm sure you are already seeing how problematic this is; it gets worse with this guy: Martin Haug.

Martin Haug (1827–1876)

Martin was a German Orientalist and philologist known for his theological works on Hinduism and Zoroastrianism.

While Hyde deduced that Zoroaster had himself taught an original monism, his interpretation was refined on in the 19th century by Haug who made a new interpretation of Y30:3 where he attributed to Zoroaster the doctrine that the twin spirits of that verse were Spenta Mainyu and Angra Mainyu, and the “father” of both was Ahura Mazda. There is no trace of such a doctrine in Zoroastrian tradition (which most Western scholars at that time disregarded as a corruption of Zoroaster’s own teachings). However, when Haug propounded it in Bombay, Reformist Parsis adopted it gratefully, as offering them an escape from the dualism for which Christian missionaries had been attacking them.

In due course, Reformist Parsi writings reached Europe and were taken there to express an independent Zoroastrian tradition, corroborating Haug’s interpretation. Accordingly, the opinion became widespread that Zoroaster had himself proclaimed Ahura Mazda as omnipotent, the ultimate source of evil as well as good. Contradicting medieval Zoroastrian texts, for example Bundahishn, where Ohrmazd, Middle Persian Ahura Mazda, is neither omnipotent nor the creator of evil and Avestan-language literature where Ahura Mazda didn't create the evil. Never mind, refusing the worship of yazatas.

Here the picture becomes clear. All things regarding Zoroastrianism being the first monotheistic religion are Orientalist phenomena, mostly emerging due to the Western Orientalists and Christian missonaries who were constantly attacking Parsis, as they perceived monotheism as an "advanced" and more "civilized" form of worship, to no one's surprise. Reformist Parsis adopted the monotheist framework to escape attacks from Christian missonaries, and then these ideas were popularized. Yes, modern Zoroastrianism is monotheistic. Some still worshipyazatas, but most Parsis are Reformists.

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Before we move on, let's actually assess the claim of monotheism more deeply.

Monotheism in Mazdayasna is a very difficult matter to evaluate. It is founded on the observation that within Ahura Mazda’s entourage we can find no deity with a Vedic equivalent (mostly because the entites in the Gathas get downgraded to either angels abstract concepts by the supporters of monotheism.) Yet, this means nothing, as Mary Boyce (1969b: 10–34) has reminded us that the Gathas are hymns to Ahura Mazda, and that a hymn addressed to a particular god will not necessarily mention the other gods, and despite this we still see mention of some yazatas as well as allusions to others in the Gathas and the Old Avestan hymnals as a whole. In the Gathas, we see the Amesha Spentas, the Ahuras, Sraosa, Asi, Vayu, and Gausurvan. In the Yasna Haptanghaiti, we see Zam, Atar, the Ahuranis, Gausurvan, and the Fravasis.

With the Yasna Haptanghaiti, a very strong critique could be made of Gathic monotheism. While the Yasna and Yashts are ignored based on the argument that they are later, texts, the Yasna Haptanghaiti cannot be ignored in the same way, Johanna Narten (1986), has shown us that the grammar and language of the Yasna Haptanghaiti is identical to the Gathas, with the only difference being on the lexical level, yet this text is thrown aside for seemingly no reason other than to uphold the already weak position of monotheism.

In the Yasna Haptanghaiti, we see the worship of divine beings in a much better way; they are worshipped in the same manner as Ahura Mazda, with the Avestan verb to worship, yazamaide. We see the worship of Ahura Mazda and the Amesha Spentas, worship of Earth (Zam) and the Fravashis (righteous souls of men and women), as well as worship of the Ahuranis (female divinites presiding over water) and the worship of the cow’s soul (Gushurvan).

>38:1: "Now we worship this earth here together with the noblewomen."

>39.1: "In this way, we now worship the cow’s soul and (her) maker. Now we worship our own souls as well as those of the domestic animals which desire to gain our support, (the animals) for which people here indeed (shall be available) and which indeed shall be available for people here."

>39:2: "Now we worship the souls of the truthful ones, men and women, wherever they may have been born, whose very good beliefs prevail, will prevail or have prevailed."

>39:3: "Finally, in this way we worship the good bounteous immortals, both male and female, who live forever, who thrive forever, (the male ones) who are on the side of good thought and (the female ones) who (are) as well."

A Zoroastrian Liturgy: The Worship in Seven Chapters, Almut Hintze

Acceptance of monotheism also leads to another problem: the rejection of dualism. When dualism has been the defining feature of Mazdayasna since it's beginning. It has been noted by both ancient Greeks and Muslim Araba. Dualism is the most important doctrine of Zoroastrianism, one which cannot be separated from Zoroastrianism without causing the whole belief system to collapse. There is no indication whatsoever in any of the Avestan texts that Ahura Mazda created evil. In fact, a very strong dualistic belief is presented, especially in the Gathas.

>Y45:2: "Thus, I shall proclaim the two inspirations (Av. mainiiu‐) at the beginning of (this?) state of existence, of which two the life‐giving one shall tell (him) whom (you know to be?) the Evil One: 'Neither our thoughts, nor announcements, nor guiding thoughts, nor preferences, nor utterances nor actions, nor visions‐souls (Av. daēnā‐) nor breath‐souls (Av. uruuan‐) go together.'"

>Y30:4: "And when these two spirits initially come together, they create life and unlife respectively and that ultimately the life of the deceitful ones will be very bad, but for the truthful one (it will be) the best thought."

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Conclusion

Now, then what type of theism is the theism historical Zoroastrianism? Dualistic, in the sense that a very dualistic worldview is presented, good vs evil, asha vs druj, Angra Mainyu and daevas against Ahura Mazda and yazatas. Henotheistic in the sense that there is one supreme god where lesser gods are also worshipped. It is pretty clear that pre-colonial Zoroastrianism is a dualist henotheistic religion.

Note: This masterpiece has been written by Zoroastrian u/Papa-kan. I merely fixed typos and replaced his conclusion with mine.

Rāvaṇa, the towering and monstrous archnemesis of Rāma, is, at least in Vālmīki’s portrayal, a more interesting and complex figure than the crude villain of countless later texts and performative media as well as in the popular imagination. Thus, in spite of his overweening arrogance, lust, and sexual predation, as well as the havoc his aggression wreaks throughout the three worlds, he is nonetheless represented in the Sundarakāṇḍa as a rather glorious potentate, a passionate lover, a husband mourned by his many wives, and, at one point in the Yuddhakāṇḍa, a figure who finally comes to realize the folly of his ultimate transgression. But in the grand account of his career in the epic’s final book the Uttarakāṇḍa we see different aspects of the character of this monstrous but fascinating antihero and are given, interestingly, some insight into his formation.

The very first things we learn about Rāvaṇa in this account take place before he is born or even conceived, and they are highly determinative of his character. Rāvaṇa’s mother Kaikasī was the child of the powerful rākṣasa ascetic Sumālin. Sumālin, uninterested in negotiating a marriage for Kaikasī, sends her off on her own to ask the brahman Viśravas, the son of seer Pulastya and grandson of Brahmā himself, to marry her. At her father’s command, she approaches Viśravas when he is in a state of consecration as he performs the vedic agnihotra rite. The poet describes the moment as “that fearsome hour (dāruṇā velā).” Viśravas determines, through his supernatural mental powers, that Kaikasī wishes to marry him and bear his children. He consents to this but warns her that, since she approached him at such a fearsome hour, she will give birth to fearsome and cruel rākṣasa children. Horrified by this pronouncement, she pleads that such horrible sons would not be worthy of a descendant of Brahmā. Viśravas partially relents, promising that her youngest son alone will be righteous and worthy of his noble lineage. Thus, in due time, Kaikasī gives birth to three sons, Rāvaṇa, Kumbhakarṇa, and righteous Vibhīṣaṇa, as well as their daughter Śūrpaṇakhā. The birth of Rāvaṇa is accompanied by dire omens, as recounted later by Agastya:

After some time, Rāma, the young girl, who had been addressed in this fashion, gave birth to a horrendous and very fearsome child who had the form of a rākṣasa. He had ten heads, huge fangs, and he looked like a heap of black collyrium. He had coppery lips, twenty arms, huge mouths, and hair that glowed like fire. The moment he was born, jackals, their mouths emitting flames, and other carnivorous beasts circled in a clockwise direction. The god rained down blood, and the clouds made a harsh rumbling. The Sun vanished from the sky, and great meteors crashed to the ground.

This episode is a curious and disturbing one where an innocent error of timing on the part of a young girl has hideous consequences for her yet-to-be-conceived children, imposed by their own father. Thus, according to this tale, Rāvaṇa is hardly to be held wholly accountable for his evil nature which stems largely from his mother’s minor and unintentional transgression and his father’s excessively cruel overreaction to it. Moreover, Rāvaṇa’s parental difficulties do not end with his father’s prenatal curse. Although he is cursed to be born with an inherently evil nature, it is his mother who in her greed and ambition, goads him into a state of bitter envy and ultimately hostility toward his glorious elder half-brother Kubera, the god of wealth. In a fit of sibling rivalry, Rāvaṇa vows to equal or surpass Kubera in power and glory, and it is this mission that sets him on his course of fearsome asceticism so that he can acquire the boons that will enable him to conquer and terrorize the triple world, starting with Kubera himself.

Rāvaṇa’s aggressiveness and martial exploits are legendary, and he does not hesitate to challenge any representative of masculine power and authority, whether a king, a god, a great serpent, a demon, or even supreme deities such as Śiva. And it even makes little difference to him if they are his kinsmen: He defeats and slays Kubera, and in the mad frenzy of battle, he kills his brother-in-law the dānava Vidyujjihva. Neither does he hesitate to molest, seduce, abduct, and rape any woman he encounters. True to his rākṣasa nature, he also does not scruple to devour a messenger and a group of great seers who have assembled for a holy sacrifice.

There is no space here to list all of Rāvaṇa’s many battles, rapes, and evil deeds, but the epic is sometimes at odds with itself in its accounts of his abductions of women. For example, in the Sundarakāṇḍa, when the poet describes the beautiful women of Rāvaṇa's harem, he says that none of them had been taken against their will but had been won over by his virtues and had never previously belonged to another man. Yet in the Uttarakāṇḍa, he is represented as having brutally ripped his women, wailing and crying, from their husbands, brothers, and fathers. They then collectively curse him to ultimately die on account of a woman as requital for his depredations.

Yet despite Rāvaṇa’s lengthy career of murder, rape, mayhem, and his abduction of Sītā, Rāma treats him remarkably gently. Not only does he offer to spare Rāvaṇa, if he returns Sītā willingly, but during their first encounter in battle, Rāma, seeing that is Rāvaṇa tiring, merely shoots off his diadem and dismisses him from the battlefield to rest up for the next encounter. Finally, once he has slain Rāvaṇa, Rāma orders Vibhīṣaṇa to give him full funerary honors according to the Vedic cremation ritual, praises him as a great warrior and declares an almost fraternal regard for him.

It is also worth noting that, although Rāvaṇa is generally regarded as a figure inimical to and dominant over all other powerful beings in the three worlds and ultimately vulnerable to the Supreme Divinity Viṣṇu alone, the Uttarakāṇḍa records three occasions where he is outmatched by a rival whom he then forges a friendly alliance. The first and best known of these occurs when Rāvaṇa, flying across the Himalayas, finds the motion of his vehicle arrested as he tries to pass over a grove where Śiva is dallying with his wife. Enraged, Rāvaṇa tries, in his unparalleled strength, to uproot the entire mountain. However, Śiva is amused at Rāvaṇa's presumption and playfully presses down on the summit with his toe, crushing his mighty arms and causing him to utter a tremendous roar of pain. Pleased with Rāvaṇa's strength and daring and in commemoration of his mighty cry that reverberated throughout the universe, Śiva confers upon him the name Rāvaṇa, “He Who Makes the Worlds Reverberate with His Cries,” thus, replacing, for all practical purposes, the rākṣasa’s birth-name Daśagrīva, “Ten-necked.” This episode, along with a single reference later in the book to Rāvaṇa’s worship of a golden lin̄ga, is probably the inspiration for the tradition — not explicitly mentioned by Vālmīki — that Rāvaṇa was a devotee of Śiva.

Rāvaṇa also meets his match in the persons of the monkey king Vālin and Haihaya King Arjuna Kārtavīrya, both of whom best him in wrestling matches and take him prisoner. Both episodes end with Rāvaṇa forming alliances with his new friends. In the former case, this may explain why Rāma forms an alliance with Sugrīva rather than with Vālin, Sugrīva's more powerful brother who is Rāvaṇa’s friend and ally.

The source: The Rāmāyaṇa of Vālmīki: The Complete English Translation, Robert P. Goldman and Sally J. Sunderland Goldman

§1 (A i 3-4) [Mist seized the windows. Smoke] seized [the house. In the hearth, the logs] were stifled.

§2 (A i 5-7) [At the altars, the gods were stifled]. In the sheepfold, [the sheep were stifled. In the cattle barn, the] cattle [were stifled. The ewe rejected her lamb. The cow] rejected her calf.

§3 (A i 8-13) [The Storm God of the Sky set out toward the steppe], the meadow, [and the moor (?). He carried off plenty, prosperity, and abundance. The Storm God departed], and barley [and wheat] no longer [ripened. Cattle, sheep], and humans did not [become pregnant]. And those who [were pregnant did not give birth] from that time.

§4 (A i 14-15) [The mountains] dried up. [The trees] dried up. And the shoots (?) [did not come forth. The pastures] dried up. The springs dried up.

§5 (A i 16-21) [The Sun God made] a feast and invited the Thousand Gods. [They ate] but couldn't get enough. They drank but couldn't quench their thirst. [The Storm God's father] said, "My son [is not there]. He became angry and [carried off] everything good. He carried off grain, animal fecundity, abundance, plenty, and satiation."

§6 (A i 22-25) [All the gods] began to search for the Storm God. [ . . . ] sent the swift eagle: "Go search the high mountains. [Search] the deep valleys. Search the Blue Deep."

§7 (A i 26-29) [The eagle went] but did not find him. The swift eagle brought a report [to the Sun God]: "I searched the highmountains. I searched the deep valleys. [I searched] the Blue Deep, but I did not find him, the Storm God of the Sky."

§8 (A i 30-33) [The Storm God's] father went to his (i.e., the Storm God's) grandfather and said to him, "Who sinned [grievously(?)], so that the seed perished, and everything dried up?" The grandfather said, "No one sinned; you alone sinned grievously(?)."

§9 (A i 34-36) The Storm God's father said, "It wasn't I who sinned." The grandfather said, "I will trace this matter out, and I will kill you. So go search for the Storm God."

§10 (A i 37-42) The Storm God's father went to Gulsa and Hannahanna. Thus, said Gulsa and Hannahanna: "Why have you come, Storm God's father?" The Storm God's father replied, "The Storm God became angry, and everything dried up, and . . . perished. My father says, 'It is your fault. So I will trace the matter out and kill you.' Now, how shall I act? What has happened?"

§11 (A i 43-46) Hannahanna said, "Don't be afraid. If it is your fault, I will make it right. And even if it is not your fault, I will still make it right. Go search for the Storm God [before] his grandfather hears."

§12 (A i 47-50) The Storm God's father said, "Then where shall I go search?" Hannahanna replied, "I will give him to you. Go bring [the bee] here, and I myself will instruct it. It will search for [the Storm God]."

§13 (B ii 16-20) The Storm God's father said, "But if the [great] gods and the [lesser gods] searched for him and didn't find him, will this [bee] find him? [Its wings] are tiny, and it itself is tiny, and furthermore it is all by itself(?). [Hannahanna replies, but the content is broken away.]

§14 (A ii 2-6) The Storm God said, "Go [plural] [ . . . ]. Let His Majesty not bring me [water] of turning (?). Let him bring [ . . . ]. He who [ . . . the . . .] of purification, took for himself an empty [ . . . ].

§15 (A ii 7-11) He poured His Majesty's water of turning(?) [ . . . ] , and he [ . . . ]. And he went back to his father. [He brought grain . . . ], abundance, plenty, [and satiety]. And he proceeded [to . . . ] in the courtyard.

§16 (A ii 12-16) What gods were in the house of his father [ate] and were satisfied. They [drank and quenched their thirst]. (The Storm God's father said, "My son has come back home [and has brought back] grain . . . ,[abundance, plenty], and satiety."

[Text breaks off for the rest of column ii.]

§17 (A iii 1-2) [I have taken a basket (with) a thousand small holes. I have poured out the fearas-grains, the "rams] of Kamrusepa."

§18 (A iii 3-6) [Out] over the Storm God [I have made a burning this way and that. I have taken his evil from the body] of the Storm God. I have taken his sin. [I have taken his anger and wrath.] I have taken his pique(?). [I have taken sullenness.]

§19 (A iii 7-12) The Storm God's wrath, [his soul and body] were stifled [like kindling wood. Just as they burn] these [pieces of kindling wood] may the Storm God's anger and wrath, [sin and sullenness] burn up in the same way. The Storm God's wrath, his soul and body, are a blazing fire. And just as this fire [is extinguished, so may] his anger, wrath, and sullenness [be extinguished in the same way].

The source: the Hittite Myths by Harry Α. Hoffner, Jr.

Pharaoh Akhenaten's campaign to push Atenism and erase polytheism is infamous, as Akhenaten became one of the most famous pharaohs thanks to his devotion to Aten. Such an attempt to erase polytheism and a religion didn't happen until the rise of Abrahamic religions.

It is easy to think that Akhenaten was just a crackhead who came out with the idea of Aten out of nowhere, but history is rarely that simple. Indeed, the worship of Aten was not a sudden innovation on the part of one pharaoh but the climax of a religious quest among Egyptians for a benign god limitless in power who manifests in all countries and natural phenomena.

The word Aten itself carries the literal meaning of a disk, not always in a solar context, e.g. the surface of a mirror or the Moon, but it is in its sun imagery that we can trace its progression to godhead. It is the Sun as an astronomical concept that is conveyed by Aten in the inscription of Queen Hatshepsut’s standing obelisk in the Karnak Temple Complex — the electrum covering the shaft illuminates Egypt like the Sun (Aten). The sun disk is a symbol in which major gods can appear, e.g. "Atum Who is in His Disk" (Aten). It is only a small step from this link with divine power for the Aten itself to become a god. It is in an inscription of Thutmose I (Dynasty XVIII) found at Tombos in Nubia that the word Aten occurs for the first time with the god symbol following it in the form of a deity bearing a sun disk on his head, but nearly 500 years earlier, even without this symbol, the word Aten carried the idea of divinity. In the narrative of the adventures of harem official Sinuhe, the death of Amenemhat I (Dynasty XII) in 1956 BC is described as soaring into the sky and uniting with his creator Aten.

Thus, the connection between Aten as a manifestation of the sun god and the pharaoh is formulated in texts by the Middle Kingdom. Later Ahmose (Dynasty XVIII), the Theban ruler who finally drove the last foreign Hyksos monarch out of Egypt into Palestine, is flattered on a stela by being likened to "Aten When He Shines". His successor Amenhotep I (Dynasty XVIII) becomes on death "United with Aten" coalescing with the one from whom he had come.

The earliest iconography of Aten appears on a monument at Giza dedicated to Amenhotep II (Dynasty XVIII). It is a winged sun disk with outstretched arms grasping the cartouche of the pharaoh. By the reign of Thutmose IV (Dynasty XVIII), Aten is by royal assent a prominent deity still rising in the state pantheon. During the rule of Thutmose IV, a historical text on the underside of a scarab mentions Aten being in the vanguard of the pharaoh’s army in battle — a role commonly given to Amun.

Amenhotep III, father of Akhenaten, furthered the fortunes of Aten. From his reign, comes the earliest evidence of a priesthood and temple to Aten at Heliopolis. Several of his courtiers bore titles connecting them with the Cult of Aten, e.g. Hatiay who is the "Scribe of the Two Granaries of the Temple of Aten in Memphis" and Ramose (not the vizier but the owner of tomb 46 in the Theban necropolis) who is the "Steward of the Mansion of the Aten", depicted with his wife going to view the sun disk. The palace of Amenhotep III at Malkata on the west bank at Thebes was called the "Splendour of Aten". From the latter years of Amenhotep III, it was also known as the "Per Hay" or the "Home of Rejoicing" — a description we shall meet again applied to part of the Great Temple of the Aten at Amarna. Here also, at Malkata, Amenhotep III ordered the construction within 16 days of a lake over a mile in length for the pleasure of his principal wife Tiye — inaugurating it by sailing its waters on a boat called "Aten Glitters".

Source: The Routledge Dictionary of Egyptian Gods and Goddesses, George Hart

The Miltonian myth of Satan as an angel named Lucifer who rebelled against God and was cast out of heaven in primordial times has no real grounding in the Bible, and yet it is the origin story that many—if not most—Christians regard as canonical. In the Old Testament, Satan operates as an obedient member of God’s heavenly court even as he roams the earth testing God’s followers. In Jubilees, he is the leader of the evil spirits who remain after the flood, permitted by God to tempt humans. Early Christianity incorporates Satan into a Middle Platonist matrix, imagining him to be the prince of the corrupt angels or demons who control the earth and lowest heavens. It is only the tradition we find in the apocryphal text Life of Adam and Eve which moves Satan’s expulsion back to Eden and explains why it happened.

In discussions of whether the Edenic version has a Biblical basis, people inevitably bring up a certain verse in Luke:

I watched Satan fall like lightning from heaven. (Luke 10:18b)

Taken without more context, it’s easy to see why this verse can be interpreted as confirming some version of Satan’s primordial expulsion. But is that what the verse is really talking about? Instead, the author argues that Satan’s “fall from heaven” is not a reference to the myth of Satan as a rebellious angel expelled from heaven in primordial times. It does describe the dethronement of Satan — his loss of dominion over the lowest heavenly realm and the demons.