Journal
of the American Scientific Affiliation 32.4 (Dec. 1980) 193-202.
Copyright © 1980 by American
Scientific Affiliation, cited with permission.
Ancient Ecologies and the Biblical
Perspective
by Edwin M.
Yamauchi
History
Department
The word "ecology" was first
coined in 18731 but men in
ancient
times were at least partially aware of "the inter-
relationships
of living things to one another and their sur-
rounding
environment."2 Today we
understand much
more clearly
the delicate balances involved in the relation-
ships
between nature and man's activities. But
even now we
do not
always foresee all the results of constructing a pro-
ject like
the Aswan Dam in Egypt.3
Although we may comprehend the causes and
processes,
we are still
unable to do much more than the ancients to
prevent such
natural disasters as droughts and locust
plagues. In recent years disastrous droughts caused by
the
failure of
the summer monsoon rains affected twenty
million
people in the
Periods of drought kill the predators of
locusts and
grasshoppers,
and also leave cracks in the ground which
provide good
nesting areas. If such periods are
followed by
moist
seasons, conditions are ripe for the formation of
plagues of
such swarming insects. In the summer of
1978,
33 locust
swarms were reported over
time huge
infestations of grasshoppers have been reported
attacking
the fields in
that they
obstructed the view of the sun, devastated
in 1873 and
in 1919.7
In the following study I examine how the
peoples of the
ancient
world viewed such calamities. I compare
the view-
Edwin M. Yamauchi 194a
points of
the pagans and those of Jews and Christians,
noting both
similarities and differences. Such a
study raises
questions
which I consider in the conclusion.
THE CLIMATE OF THE
The lands of the Bible include for the Old
Testament
period
Mesopotamia
(
have in
addition the lands to which the Gospel was carried:
Anatolia (
areas border
the
climatic
conditions associated with it with, of course, local
variations. The chief features of the common
"Mediterra-
nean"
climate are: (1) a prolonged summer drought, (2)
heavy winter
rains, and (3) a relatively small range of
temperatures.8
Throughout the entire area, with few excep-
tions, rain
water was precious and was conserved by
cisterns.9
The land "between the rivers," the
associated
with the Garden of Eden (Gen. 2:14). At
the
northern
edge of the
the
"hilly flanks" of the
the alluvial
plains of
of
for the
first area to develop the Neolithic "revolution" of
agriculture.10
As for the central area of
M. A. Beek
observes:
Because of the dryness of the climate the
soil of
and nearly impenetrable. Consequently, when the heavy rainfall in
the northern areas coincides with the
melting of the snow in the
Taurus and
The Mesopotamian floods are not only
destructive but
they are
highly unpredictable. They come in the
spring
Edwin M. Yamauchi 194b
rather than
in the summer when the water is most needed.
Especially
swift are the flood waters of the
Akkadian
name Idiglat (cf. Hebrew Hiddeqel, Gen. 2:14)
means
"Arrow." The people of
were able to
use the waters of the rivers through canals for
irrigation
purposes, though this demanded the combined
efforts of
communities as constant attention was required
to maintain
the dikes and canals.12 In
times of war, the
canals would
be neglected and the weeds would grow in
them. In his lamentation over
river which
had been made fit for the magur-boats-in its
midst the. .
. -plant grows."13
In striking contrast to
situation of
was
"the gift of the
tropical
rains of central Africa, the
Nile from
with such
regularity that the Egyptians were able to regulate
their
calendars by the annual floods.14
The flooding also
came at the
most propitious time for agriculture.
The four
months of
inundation (June to September) were called
Akhet "Flood," followed by Perit
"Coming Forth" (Oc-
tober to
January) and by Shemou "Deficiency" (February
to May).15
The Egyptians could tell how high the
a Nilometer
which they had carved at the
tine near
fields would
be irrigated and that famine would ensue.
On
the other
hand, a
destruction
of dikes. Ordinarily
surplus to
supply starving bedouins from
the biblical
patriarchs (cf. Gen. 12:10 ff., 26:1 ff., 43:1
ff.).16
Down through the period of the
Edwin M. Yamauchi 194c
By the 14th cent. B.C. the Egyptians had
invented the
shaduf, a weighted lever to lift the water. The saqiya, the
animal-drawn
water wheel, was introduced only in Persian
or Ptolemaic
times (5th to 3rd cent. B.C.).17
Archimedes
(287-212
B.C.) is credited with the invention of the
hydraulic
screw.
Apart from the coastal region, rain rarely
falls in
According to
H. Kees:
At the present day
rain with a rainfall of about 8 inches,
while
has on the average, mostly in January 1 ½ to
2 inches. In the upper
reaches, rain has always been an exceptional
phenomenon, the ac-
companiment of occasional storms and less a
blessing than a
catastrophe, associated in people's minds
with the dangerous powers
of the desert.18
rainless
summer from the middle of May to the middle of
September. The stormy weather of winter generally
brought
sailing and fighting to a halt. As the
prevailing,
winds are
from the west, three times as much rain falls in
the west as
falls in the east, for example, in Corcyra (
as compared
to Athens.19
In 1966 Rhys Carpenter offered a
climatological explana-
tion for the
fall of the Mycenaean kingdoms c. 1200 B.C. in
place of the
traditional view of a Dorian invasion.20 His
theory was
criticized by E. Wright, who pointed out that
pollen
samples from northwestern
indicated no
drought.21 But climatologists
have shown
from records
for 1955 that the climatic pattern which
Carpenter
posited, with an extensive drought for the
Peloponnese
but not for northwest
quite
possible.22 Whether or not
such a drought caused the
Mycenaean
decline is still a moot point.23
It is more likely
that a
combination of factors, including drought and
Edwin M. Yamauchi 194d
famine
followed by the dislocations of such groups as the
Dorians and
the Sea Peoples, caused the Mycenaean col-
lapse and
the beginning of the Greek Dark Age.24
ANCIENT ECOLOGIES AND THE BIBLE 195a
Palestine.25
Meteorological Factors.
Several factors produce the characteristic
weather of
as far south
as
southernmost
section of
northern
margin of the subtropical region. The
presence of
the
and the east
play a major role, as does the great variety of
topographical
features.
The following regional generalizations may
be made: (1)
temperature
decreases with height and increases with depth
below sea
level. (2) The temperature ranges increase as one
moves away
from the moderating influence of the sea. (3)
Rain tends
to decrease from north to south. (4) Rain
decreases
from west to east. (5) Rain increases as heights are
encountered.
(6) As the prevailing moisture bearing winds
are from the
west, rain precipitates on the western slopes,
leaving the
eastern slopes in a "rain shadow."26
Winds.27
During the summer
monsoon low
over the
area in the
winds and a
sunny almost rainless summer, as there are no
frontal
storms of cold air clashing with warm air masses. In
the winter, however,
cold maritime air pushes south into
the
masses,
creating wet and stormy weather (Job 37:9).28
In the winter season the moisture bearing
winds from the
W and SW
precipitate rains as they encounter colder land
and air
masses (I Kgs. 18:44; Lk. 12:54). But
during the
summer the
drier NW winds encounter only warm land and
air masses
and do not precipitate any rain. The
winds do,
however,
mitigate the heat of the day. The
westerly winds
reach the
Transjordanian plateau about
regular
winds are used for the winnowing of grain (Ps. 1:4)
ANCIENT ECOLOGIES AND THE BIBLE 195b
even to this
day.
North winds are relatively rare. There are two types.
Chiefly in
October a cold dry wind seeps over the mountain
barriers
from
of polar air
across the Balkans may produce heavy rains
(Prov.
25:23).
The scorching desert wind (sirocco,
khamsin) from the E,
SE, or S was
and still is a dreaded phenomenon. It
strikes
for three to
four days in the transitional seasons. A
sirocco
will produce
the hottest temperatures of the year, often 20
degrees
above the average (Jer.
worse is the
fact that it is an exceedingly dry wind, dropping
relative
humidity by 30-40%, fraying tempers, and
debilitating
energies. The air is filled with a fine
yellowish
dust which
veils the sun and reduces visibility.
The siroccos
of the
spring are particularly devastating, withering the
winter vegetation
in a few hours (Ps. 103:15-16; Isa. 40:6-8;
Ezk.
the sirocco
is experienced in the Transjordan, the
and the Rift
Valley. In coastal regions the sirocco
winds
may pour
down the slopes at 60 miles per hour, shattering
ships in the
harbors (Ps. 48:7; Ezk. 27:26).
Precipitation.29
The Rainy Season. The exact commencement of the
rainy season
is not predictable but in general the rainy
season runs
from mid-October to mid-May.30
The rainy
season
includes, but is also more extensive than our winter
months (cf.
Song
heavy rain
alternate with dry days during which cold desert
winds blow
from the east.31
The Early and the Latter Rains. The Bible refers
repeatedly
to the early (RSV "autumn") and the latter
(RSV
"spring") rains (Deut.
giving the
average reader the impression that rains fall only
at the
beginning and the end of the rainy season.
As a mat-
ter of fact
most of the heaviest rains fall in the middle of the
season (Lev.
26:4; Ezra 10:9, 13). These initial and
final
ANCIENT ECOLOGIES AND THE BIBLE 195c
rains are
stressed because they are crucial for agriculture.
The early
rains come in October before plowing and sow-
ing. The latter rains fall in March and April and
are needed
to make the
grain swell for a good harvest (Hos. 6:3; Zech.
10:1).
Drought and Unseasonable Rains. If the high pressure
areas over
Europe and
high
pressures over Africa and
storms from
arriving through the trough of low pressure in
the
until as
late as December; in some years rain amounts to
only 50 to
75% of the average. A catastrophic
drought that
lasted 3 1/2
years is recorded for Elijah's day (I Kgs. 17:1;
Lk. 4:25;
Jas. 5:17. Cf. Deut. 28:23-24; I Kgs. 8:35; Jer.
14:3-6).32
If the thermal difference between the warm
and cold air
masses is
not great, rainless clouds float by (Prov. 25:14;
Jude
12). On rare occasions a late surge of
cold Atlantic air
penetrates
into the area of
ing
unseasonable rain (I Sam.
The Distribution of Precipitation. As Amos 4:7 in-
dicates,
there are considerable local differences in the
distribution
of rainfall in Palestine.33
greatest
amount of rain from 28" to 40".
coast
receives an average of 24", Tiberias 16-18", and
Beth-shean
in the
foothills
receive 16-22". Rainfall at
fluctuates
from 17" to 28", with an average of 25".34
of 1944 it
recorded 13".35 The
southern end of the Dead
Sea receives
only 2".
The steppe region around
12" to
16"; areas in the
8". In
the Hellenistic and early Roman era, the Nabataean
Arabs by a
careful conservation of water by terraces were
able to
raise wheat, barley, legumes, grapes, figs and dates
in the
Negev.36 Modern Israeli
researches have attempted to
reduplicate
their feats.37
Edwin M. Yamauchi 196a
Dew.38 The summer drought was not due to the lack of
humidity,
which is in fact twice as intense in the summer as
in the rest
of the year. The lack of rain storms is
due to the
absence of
frontal clashes between warm and cold air
masses. The summer humidity manifests itself in the
dew
that
condenses as the ground cools during the night. At
many times
as 250 nights per year. Gideon was able
to col-
lect a bowl
full of water from the fleece which he had set
out (Jud.
Dew is vital for the growth of grapes during
the summer
(Zech. 8:
12). It was indeed a calamitous drought
when not
even dew was
available (II Sam.
of God's
grace and goodness to the benefaction of dew
(Gen. 27:28;
Isa. 18:4; Hos. 14:5; Mic. 5:7; Sirach 43:22).
THE MYTHOLOGICAL VIEWS
OF THE PAGANS
Among the early Sumerians (3rd millennium
B.C.) the
bringing of
rain and subsequent flooding was attributed
either to
Enlil, the leading god of the pantheon, or to Enki,
god of water
and wisdom. Without Enlil "in
heaven the
rain-laden
clouds would not open their mouths, the fields
and meadows
would not be filled with rich grain, in the
steppe grass
and herbs, its delight would not grow."39
For the later Babylonians (2nd-1st
millennium B.C.) the
pre-eminent
rain god was the Syrian god Adad (Hadad).
In
the Atrahasis
Epic, the full text of which was discovered
only in
1965, we have the following developments
preceding
the catastrophic Flood. When Enlil is
disturbed
by the
clamor of proliferating mankind, he orders:
Cut off supplies for the peoples,
Let there be a scarcity of plant life to satisfy their hunger.
Adad should withhold his rain,
Edwin M. Yamauchi 196b
And below, the flood should not come up from the abyss.40
Let the wind blow and parch the ground,
Let the clouds thicken but not release a downpour, (II.i.9-l6)41
People sought to placate Adad with gifts of
loaves and
offerings,
so that "he may rain down in a mist in the morn-
ing, and may
furtively rain down a dew in the night."
(II.ii.16-17)42 But "Adad roared in the clouds,"
and sent
not just
rain but the Deluge.
From the Gilgamesh Epic we learn that
when the Flood
came,
(Even) the gods were terror-stricken at the deluge,
They fled and ascended to the heaven of Anu;
The gods cowered like dogs. . . .43
Important mythological concepts regarding
fertility
centered on
the Mesopotamian cult of Inanna (Ishtar) and
her consort
Dumuzi (Tammuz). In the text of the famous
myth,
"The Descent of Inanna (Ishtar)," the goddess
descends
into the Underworld and is slain by her sister.
Upon her
death procreation among animals and humans
ceases only
to be restored with her resurrection.44 The
Mesopotamians
practiced a hieros gamos or "sacred mar- "
riage"
rite between the king representing Dumuzi/Tammuz
and a sacred
prostitute representing Inanna/Ishtar to en-
sure the
fertility of the land by sympathetic magic.45
The Egyptians honored the
whom they depicted
as a well nourished man with pen-
dulous
breasts. Thousands of miniature figures
of this god
were made
and offered to him in temples prior to the
flooding of
the river.46 The most
important god of the
Egyptians
apart from the sun god was Osiris, the god of the
underworld. As early as the
B.C.) Osiris
was identified with the life-giving waters. Ac-
cording to
Breasted:
Edwin M. Yamauchi 196c
It was water as a source of fertility, water
as a life-giving agency with
which Osiris was identified. It is water which brings life to the soil,
and when the inundation comes the Earth-god
Geb says to Osiris:
"The divine fluid that is in thee cries
out, thy heart lives, thy divine
limbs move, thy joints are loosed," in
which we discern the water
bringing life and causing the resurrection
of Osiris, the soil.47
The seasonal cycle of fertility and drought
is most vividly
depicted by
the Greek myth of Demeter and her daughter
Persephone,
who was abducted by Hades. While
Demeter,
the goddess
of grain, mourned for her missing daughter,
the entire
land was afflicted with infertility.48 After she was
discovered,
Persephone still had to spend four months each
year in the
Underworld because she had eaten four
pomegranate
seeds there. The mysteries of Demeter
and
Persephone
were celebrated at
Athens.49
Because of the regularity of the seasons in
seldom
necessary to pray for rain. According to
Nilsson:
On
When there was need of rain the priest of
Zeus went to this well, per-
formed ceremonies and prayers, and dipped an
oak twig into the
water.
Thereupon a haze arose from the well and condensed into
clouds, and soon there was rain all over
Arcadia.50
The climate of
role in the
development of Canaanite religion. Baly and
Tushingham
describe the situation as follows:
Precariousness, indeed, is everywhere the
dread companion of rain-
fed
agriculture in the
and inward
from the seacoast. Over very large areas
it is impossible
to
exaggerate the sense of desperate insecurity which accompanies
the farmer
upon his rounds. . . . Almost the whole
of Canaanite
religion was
built around this desperate anxiety, this passionate long-
ing for a
fertile earth, . . . .51
Edwin M. Yamauchi 196d
Our
understanding of the Canaanites has been greatly
advanced by
the discovery of Ras Shamra (ancient
on the coast
of
Ugaritic
texts. These reveal that the Canaanite Baal
or
"Lord"
par excellence was Hadad, the god manifest in
storms and
rains.52 Millard comments:
ANCIENT ECOLOGIES AND THE BIBLE 197a
Controlling the rains, mist, and dew, Hadad
held the keys of good
harvests, so the existence of a myth
describing his battles with death,
barrenness, and threatening flood waters
among the texts of
is no surprise.53
As in
magically
with the fertility of the land. When the
legendary
"king
Kret was sick, nature likewise languished.
When
prince Aqhat
died, a great drought ensued:
Thereupon Danel the Rephaite prayed (that)
the clouds in the heat
of the season, (that) the clouds should rain
early rain (and) give plen-
tiful dew in summer for the fruits. Baal failed for seven years, the
rider on the clouds for eight (years,
leaving the land) without dew,
without showers. (Aqhat I.i.38-44)54
Many scholars have supposed, in analogy with
Greek
mythology,
that Baal died annually and rose to life, sym-
bolizing the
rainless summer and the rainy winter.
But the
epic does
not speak of an annual event but of a prolonged
drought. As Gordon points out, the summer is normally
dry and what
was dreaded were dewless summers and
rainless
winters.55
The priests of Baal, who were confronted by
Elijah (I
Kgs. 18),
tried to arouse their god to produce rain not only
by their
prayers but also by magical rites such as leaping
about the
altar and shedding their blood-but in vain.56
Patai has
suggested that Elijah also used magical gestures.
But it is
quite clear that when Elijah had water poured on
the
offerings, he was not making a libation but was
demonstrating
the supernatural power of God by making
the ignition
more difficult.57
THE OLD TESTAMENT PERSPECTIVE
Though some have blamed the Judeo-Christian
tradition
of man's
relation to nature as expressed in Gen. 1:28's com-
mand
"to replenish the earth and subdue it" as the grounds
ANCIENT ECOLOGIES AND THE BIBLE 197b
for our
present ecological crisis,58 further reflection
demonstrates
that this is not a sound conclusion. As
John
Black notes,
the Hebrews evolved "a concept of man's
responsibility
to God for the management of the earth, a
concept
which was duly carried over into Christianity,
becoming
part of the western heritage."59 Commenting on
Judeo-Christian
theology, Glacken observes:
Most striking for our themes, is the idea of
the dominion of man as
expressed in Genesis, and repeatedly
expressed in other writings,
notably Psalm 8. But one must not read these passages with
modern
spectacles, which is easy to do in an age
like ours when "man's con-
trol over nature" is a phrase that
comes as easily as a morning
greeting. . . . Man's power as a vice-regent
of God on earth is part of
the design of creation and there is in this
fully elaborated conception
far less room for arrogance and pride than
the bare reading of the
words would suggest.60
It is man's sinful exploitation of the
universe, his con-
tempt for
God's creation, which has led to our present
ecological
crisis. As E. M. Blaiklock writes:
The ravaged world, the polluted atmosphere,
the poisoned rivers,
dead lakes, encroaching desert, and all the
irreversible damage to
man's fragile environment comes from
treating the globe we live on
with contempt. Modern man is arrogant and domineering. Man was
put in a garden, says the old Hebrew account
in Genesis "to tend
it."61
If blame must be placed, we might well
consider our
western
heritage from the Romans. From his
survey of the
ancient
world and ecology, Hughes concludes:
Our
Western attitudes can be traced most directly to the secular
businesslike Romans. Today the process of dominating the earth is
seen not as a religious crusade following a
biblical commandment
but as a profitable venture seeking economic
benefit. In this, we are
closer to the Romans than to any other
ancient people, and in this we
demonstrate to a great extent our heritage
from them.62
ANCIENT ECOLOGIES AND THE BIBLE 197c
The
Blessings of Rain
(Citations are from the RSV.)
According to Deut. 11:10-11, 13-14, the Lord
said to the
children of
For the land which you are entering to take
possession of it is not like
the
your seed and watered it with your feet, like
a garden of vegetables;
but the land which you are going over to
possess is a land of hills and
valleys, which drinks water by the rain from
heaven, . . . And if you
will obey my commandments. . . (I) will give
the rain for your land
in its season, the early rain and the later
rain, that you may gather in
your grain and your wine and your oil.
Jeremiah proclaims that it is only the Lord
rather than
the pagan
gods who sends rain (Jer.
among the
false gods of the nations that can bring rain?
Or
can the
heavens give showers? Art thou not he, O
Lord our
God? We set our hope on thee, for thou doest all
these
things." But the wayward children of
recognize
this (Jer.
'Let us fear
the Lord our God, who gives the rain in its
season, the
autumn rain and the spring rain, and keeps for
us the weeks
appointed for the harvest.' "
Elihu, Job's friend, declares:
Behold, God is great, . . . .
For he draws up the water, he distils his
mist in rain which the skies
pour down and drop upon man abundantly. Can
anyone under-
stand the spreading of the clouds, the
thunderings of his pavilion?
(Job 36:26-29)
Among the questions which the Lord Himself
posed as
He spoke out
of the whirlwind to Job are the following:
Who has cleft a channel for the torrents of
rain, and a way for the
thunderbolt, to bring rain on a land where
no man is, on the desert
in which there is no man; to satisfy the
waste and desolate land, and
to make the ground put forth grass? Has the rain a father, or who
ANCIENT ECOLOGIES AND THE BIBLE 197d
has begotten the drops of dew? (Job
38:25-28)
God has promised rain as a blessing for
obedience: "If
you walk in
my statutes and observe my commandments
and do them,
then I will give you your rains in their season,
Edwin M. Yamauchi 198a
and the land
shall yield its increase, and the trees of the
field shall
yield their fruit." (Lev. 26:3-4)
The Judgment
of Drought
Conversely for disobedience the Lord has
threatened
drought:
Take heed lest your heart be deceived, and
you turn aside and serve
other gods and worship them, and the anger
of the Lord be kindled
against you, and he shut up the heavens, so
that there be no rain,
and the land yield no fruit, and you perish
quickly off the good land
which the Lord gives you. (Deut. 11:16-17)
The most famous instance of drought as a
judgment of
God is the
three and a half year drought called down by Eli-
jah in the
reign of Ahab in the 9th cent. B.C. (I Kgs. 17;
Sirach
48:2-3; Luke 4:25; Jas. 5:17). In the
early 6th cent.
B.C. when
the heavens
to be appalled, literally "be exceedingly dried
up"
(Jer.
drought
conditions.
Still later in the 6th cent. after the
Exile, the Jews return-
ed from
temple. When they were less than dedicated to the
task, the
prophet Haggai
rebuked them with a paronomasia or play
on
words. He proclaimed that because the
Lord's house
had remained
in "ruins" (hareb, Hag. 1:4,9) the Lord
would bring
a "drought" (horeb, Hag.
land.
On the other hand, as a sign of God's displeasure
Samuel
called down
rain during the late wheat harvest (June), when
rain was not
expected:
"Is it not wheat harvest today? I will call upon the Lord, that he may
send thunder and rain; and you shall know
and see that your
wickedness is great, which you have done in
the sight of the Lord, in
asking for yourselves a king." So Samuel called upon the Lord, and
the Lord sent thunder and rain that day. . .
. (I Sam. 12:17-18)
Edwin M. Yamauchi 198b
Prayers for
Rain
When a drought was prolonged, the remedy lay
in repen-
tance and in
prayer as we see from Solomon's famous in-
tercession
(I Kgs.
When heaven is shut up and there is no rain
because they have sinned
against thee, if they pray toward this
place, and acknowledge thy
name, and turn from their sin, when thou
dost afflict them, then
hear thou in heaven, and forgive the sin of
thy servants, thy people
thy people as an inheritance.
The most dramatic instance of the prayer of
a godly man
to end a
drought was, of course, Elijah's intercession in his
contest with
the priests of Baal (I Kgs. 18; Jas.
called for a
fast along with repentance to end the double
calamity of
drought and locust swarms in his day (Joel
from the
Lord in the season of the spring rain, from the
Lord who
makes the storm clouds, who gives men showers
of rain. . .
."
Problematic is the interpretation of M.
Dahood that
Psalm 4 is
actually a prayer for rain. His
interpretation is
based on
rendering the Hebrew word tob "good" in verse 7
as a word
for rain by comparing Jer. 17:6, Deut. 28:12, etc
where it is
clear that "good" means "rain."63
THE NEW TESTAMENT PERSPECTIVE
In the Sermon on the Mount Jesus commended
the
benevolence
of God in that He "makes his sun rise on the
evil and on
the good, and sends rain on the just and on the
unjust"
(Mat.
care over
the birds of the air (Mat.
field (Mat.
ample
reasons trusting in God's provisions and for eschew-
ing anxiety.
In his sermon to the pagan Lycaonians of
Lystra, Paul
Edwin M. Yamauchi 198c
adduces
God's provision in nature as evidence that He had
not left the
pagan nations without a witness (Acts
"yet he
did not leave himself without witness, for he did
good and
gave you from heaven rains and fruitful seasons,
satisfying
your hearts with food and gladness." Cf.
1:19, 20.64
As an example of the effective prayer of a
righteous man
James cites
the example of Elijah who first prayed for a
drought and
then ended it (Jas.
man of like
nature with ourselves and he prayed fervently
that it
might not rain, and for three years and six months it
did not rain
on the earth. Then he prayed again and
the
heaven gave
rain, and the earth brought forth its fruit." In
the
Apocalypse the two witnesses of Rev. 11 "have power
to shut the
sky, that no rain may fall during the days of
their
prophesying" (Rev. 11:6).
A number of droughts and famines are
recorded by
Roman
historians for the New Testament era. In
22 B.C. a
mob shut up
the Roman Senate in the Curia building and
forced them
to vote Augustus the dictatorship so that he
could deal
with the food situation. In his
autobiographical
Res Gestae (5.2) Augustus boasted: "I did not
decline in
the great
dearth of grain to undertake the charge of the
grain
supply, which I so administered that within a few days
I delivered
the whole city from apprehension and im-
mediate
danger at my own cost and by my own efforts."65
There was a
later famine in his reign in A.D. 6.
During the reign of Claudius a noteworthy
series of
droughts and
poor harvests culminated in a widespread
famine
during the procuratorial administration of Tiberius
Julius
Alexander over
reports
(Antiq. III.320 ff.; XX.51-53, 101) that Queen
Helena of
Adiabene, a recent convert to Judaism with her
son Izates,
sent aid to the Jews in the form of monetary
gifts, grain
from
same drought
which was predicted by Agabus, a prophet
from
Edwin M. Yamauchi 198d
Now in these days prophets came down from
And one of them named Agabus stood up and
foretold by the Spirit
that there would be a great famine over all
the world; and this took
place in the days of Claudius. And the disciples determined, every
one according to his ability, to send relief
to the brethren who lived
in
nabas and Saul.
ANCIENT ECOLOGIES AND THE BIBLE 199a
Kenneth S.
Gapp correlates the famine under Claudius
with an
unusually high
prices
doubled.66 He concludes that
"the evidence of of-
ficial
documents among the papyri from
dependent sources. Pliny and Josephus, so supports Luke's
account of
the universal famine that the accuracy of the
statement
can no longer be challenged."67
Gapp makes the
acute
observation that in the ancient world famine was
essentially
a class famine:
Since the poor and the improvident never had large reserves either
of
money or of food, they suffered immediately
upon any considerable
rise in the cost of living. The rich, on the
other hand, had large
reserves both of money and of hoarded grain,
and rarely, if ever, ex-
perienced hunger during famine. Thus, while
all classes of society
suffered serious economic discomfort during
a shortage of grain, the
actual hunger and starvation were restricted
to the lower classes.68
Christ taught that one should be satisfied
with one's
"daily
bread."69 In view of the
disparity of wealth, the
"Christian
ethic inspired sharing with those in need” (Acts
POST-BIBLICAL JEWISH DEVELOPMENTS
The Jewish rabbis of the first three
centuries of the com-
mon Era
(lst-3rd cent, A.D.) elaborated upon biblical
precepts,
sometimes by fanciful exegesis.
Rabbi Simeon ben Yohai said: Three things
are equal in their
value: Earth, Man and Rain, R. Levi bar
Hiyya said: And all the
three are of three letters. . . . , to teach
you, that if there is no earth,
there is no rain, if there is no rain, there
is no earth, and without
both of them no man can exist.71
In the early 2nd cent, A.D. the rabbis
attributed a
gradual
diminution in rain to the sins of the people.
Rabbi
Eleazar b.
Perata (fl. A.D. 110-35) said: "From the day the
ANCIENT ECOLOGIES AND THE BIBLE 199b
the
world. There is a year which has
abundant rains and
there is a
year with but little rain."72
To assure the coming of rain the rabbis laid
stress on the
feast of
Sukkoth (Tabernacles) on the basis of Zech.
14:16-17. They also laid down elaborate regulations for
the
observation
of fasts in times of drought in the Mishnah
(Ta'anith
1.2-7). If by the seventh of Marheshvan
(around
November)
there has been no rain, one begins praying for
rain. If none has fallen by the 17th, public fasts
are ordered
on Mondays
and Thursdays all through the winter season.73
Commenting on Eccl. 10:11, "If the
serpent bite before it
is charmed,
then the charmer (lit. whisperer) hath no ad-
vantage,"
Rabbi Ami said: "If you see a generation over
whom the
heavens are rust-colored like copper and do not
let down dew
or rain, it is because there are no 'whisperers'
(i.e. people
who pray silently) in that generation."74
One sage, Honi the Rainmaker, had a
legendary gift for
calling down
rain. It is said that he drew a circle,
and stand-
ing in the
middle of it said:
"Lord of the world! . . . I swear by
your great name that I shall not
move from here until you will turn merciful
unto your children."
When the rain began dripping he said:
"Not thus did I ask but a rain
for cisterns, pits and caves." Then the rain began to fall violently
and Honi said: "Not thus did I ask but
a rain of mercy, blessing and
generosity." Then the rain fell as it should fall.75
Even in such calamitous times as droughts
there were
always the
unscrupulous few who tried to exploit the situa-
tion for
their own advantage. The rabbis
denounced the
wealthy who
hoarded up large stocks of grain, wine and oil
to sell them
at inflated prices by quoting Amos 8:4-7.
In the
days of
Rabbi Tanhuma, the people came to him and asked
him to order
a fast for rain. "He ordered a
fast, one day, a
second day,
a third day, and no rain came. Then he
went to
them and
preached: 'My sons, have compassion on
each
ANCIENT ECOLOGIES AND THE BIBLE 199c
other and
the Holy One blessed be He will also have com-
passion on
you.'"76
POST-BIBLICAL CHRISTIAN DEVELOPMENTS
During the early
blame the
Christians for any unnatural disaster.
As Ter-
tullian so
pungently expressed it: "If the
walls, if
the
doesn't move
or the earth does, if there is famine, if there is
plague, the
cry is at once: 'The Christians to the lion.'"77
The pagan
Symmachus blamed the famines of A.D. 384
upon the
Christians.
Arnobius, a Christian apologist (fl. A..D.
300), in his
work, Against
the Heathen, asks:
What is the ground of the allegation, that a
plague was brought
upon the earth after the Christian religion
came into the world, and
after it revealed the mysteries of hidden
truth? But pestilences, say
my opponents, and droughts, wars, famines,
locusts, mice, and
hailstones, and other hurtful things, by
which the property of men is
assailed, the gods bring upon us, incensed
as they are by your wrong-
doings and by your transgressions. . . . For
if we are to blame, and
if these plagues have been devised against
our sin, whence did anti-
quity know these names for misfortunes?78
Augustine
likewise responded by pointing out that such
calamities
had occurred long before the conversion of Con-
stantine and
the Christianization of the Empire: "Let those
who have no
gratitude to Christ for His great benefits,
blame their
own gods for these heavy disasters."79
Finally, Christians turned the accusation
against pagans,
Jew,
Samaritans, and heretics, blaming them for unsea-
sonable
calamities. In the Novellae Theodosiani
3.1.8 (4th
cent. A.D.)
we read the following denunciation:
Shall we endure longer that the succession
of the seasons be
changed, and the temper of the heavens be
stirred to anger, since the
embittered perfidy of the pagans does not
know how to preserve
ANCIENT ECOLOGIES AND THE BIBLE 199d
these balances of nature? For why has the
spring renounced its ac-
customed charm? Why has the summer, barren
of its harvest,
deprived the laboring farmer of his hope of
a grain harvest? Why has
the intemperate ferocity and the winter with
its piercing cold
doomed the fertility of the lands with the
disaster of sterility? Why
all these things, unless nature has
transgressed the decree of its own
law to avenge such impiety?80
LOCUSTS
As noted in the introduction, periods of
unseasonable
heat and
drought are sometimes accompanied by plagues of
locusts. The Canaanite texts speak of the dreaded succession
Edwin M. Yamauchi 200a
of dry or
locust years.81
Their frightening numbers made
them an
image of frequent appearance in the ancient texts.
In the
Sumerian lamentation the possessions of
devoured as
by a "heavy swarm of locusts."82 In the
Ugaritic
Keret Epic (I.iv.29-31) the soldiers of an army are
said to have
"settled like locusts on the field(s), like hop-
pers on the
fringe of the wilderness."83
At the end of treaties a frequent curse
which was invoked
upon those
who might be tempted to break the agreement
was the
locust plague. In the Aramaic Sefire
treaty of north
locust
devour (Arpad), and for seven years may the worm
eat. . .
."84 A similar curse is found in the treaty between
the Assyrian
king Esarhaddon (7th cent. B:C.) and his Me-
dian
vassals: "Like locusts devour. . . may they cause your
towns, your
land (and) your district to be devoured."85
There are nine Hebrew words which designate
locusts in
the Old
Testament.86 Akkadian
recognizes 18 names and
the Talmud
20 names for locusts. Of the many Hebrew
words arbeh
is used most frequently, 24 times. The
word is
probably
derived from the root raba "to become
numerous." It occurs in Akkadian as erebu, arbu,
and in
Ugaritic as irby.
The arbeh plague (Deut. 28:38) is
listed as one of the
divine
curses which would befall the Israelites if they
disobeyed
God's commands. The arbeh is one
of the
plagues which
Moses called down upon
Ps. 78:46,
105:34).87
Locusts are used in similes of vast numbers
in Jud. 6:5,
7:12; Jer.
46:23; Nah. 3:15. Though they had no
leader yet
their mass
movements are coordinated (Prov. 30:27). Rest-
ing at night,
they stir with the heat and disappear (Nah.
like a
locust" (Job 39:20).
Locusts belong to the order of the Orthoptera
"straight-
winged"
insects. With the grasshoppers they
belong to the
sub-family,
Saltatoria, "leapers," which were considered
edible (Lev.
Edwin M. Yamauchi 200b
family of
"short-horned grasshoppers."
Of the 91 species
found in
Palastine only the desert locust (Schistocerca
gregoria or Acridium peregrinum) has served
to plague the
Near East
from time immemorial. It was only in
1929 that
the phase
change from solitary green grasshoppers to the
larger,
yellow gregarious phase was first observed.
Accord-
ing to
Baron:
Basically, the Desert Locust is a winged big
brother of its fellow-
acridid, the familiar grasshopper of English
meadows, and quite
often leads much the same sort of life. Like other species of locusts,
however, it has the peculiarity of being
able to change its habits-to
live two lives, as it were--and it is this
characteristic that makes it so
great a potential menace.89
At maturity the desert locusts are two and a
half inches
long. They have two sets of wings and an enlarged
pair of
legs for
jumping. Their appearance has been
compared to
horses (Joel
2:4; Job 39:20; Rev. 9:7; cf. German
Heupferd, Italian cavallette.)
Desert locusts are phenomenal
travelers. They are able to
fly for 17
hours at a time and have been known to travel
1500
miles. The sound of their wings can be
compared to
the sound of
chariots (Joel 2:5; Rev. 9:9). Their
route of
travel is
determined by the prevailing winds (Ex.
In the 1915
plague the locusts came to Jerusalem from the
northeast
(cf, Joel
The Bible does not exaggerate when it speaks
of swarms
of locusts
covering the ground (Ex. 10:5).
According to
Baron:
We know from modern measurements of swarm
areas and volumes
that the descriptions repeatedly given in
the Bible and elsewhere, of
the sky being darkened and the sun eclipsed,
are literally correct. For
instance, during the plague that continued
from 1948 to 1963,
several swarms were recorded as exceeding a
hundred square miles;
and one is said to have been the size of
London.91
Edwin M. Yamauchi 200c
A truly
large swarm may contain ten billion locusts!
What
is
devastating is that each insect eats its own weight every
day; a large
swarm may weigh up to 80,000 tons.92
The four words used by Joel (1:4, 2:25) in
his vivid
description
of the locust plague evidently represent stages
of the
locusts' development (RSV) rather than separate
species of
insects (KJV).93 In Joel
arbeh, the mature locust which deposits the
eggs.94 The
yeleq may be the larva as it emerges from the
egg.95 The
hasil may be the intermediate instar (stage
between moults):
The gazam
may be the ravenous nymph who strips the bark
from trees,
To remove such insect plagues pagans
resorted to prayer
and to
magical spells. From Sultantepe in
northwest
pillar,
devourer. . . cricket, red bug, vermin of the field
from the
field."96 The Greeks
prayed to Apollo Parnopios
(Locust) to
obtain aid against locusts, just as they prayed to
Apollo
Smintheus (Field Mouse) against the plague.
To get
rid of
caterpillars the Roman writer Columella "directs that
a young
menstruous girl should walk three times round the
garden with
bare feet and loosened hair and garments."97
In contrast to the pagans, the Israelites
resorted to
fasting,
repentance, and prayer in cases of locust plagues
and other
kinds of pestilences (I Kgs. 8:36-37; II Chr. 6:28).
In the midst
of a devastating locust plague the prophet Joel
called the
people to fasting and prayer (Joel
and promised
that the Lord would see their repentance and
bless them
(Joel
prescribed
the blowing of the ram's horn to announce a
fast:
"For these things they sound the shofar in every place:
blasting or
mildew, locust or caterpillar, wild beasts or the
sword. They sound the shofar in that they are an
overrun-
ning
affliction." (Ta'anith 3.5)98
Edwin M. Yamauchi 200d
CONCLUSIONS
1. How is the biblical revelation different
from pagan
mythologies?
Unlike materialistic naturalism the biblical
perspective
shares with
the ancients a belief in the supernatural.
But it
differs
radically from contemporary mythologies in
ANCIENT ECOLOGIES AND THE BIBLE 200a
upholding a
single, omnipotent God, who though He may
be depicted
in human similes, wholly transcends man and
nature--in
contrast to the pagan gods who were crudely an-
thropomorphic
and who were intrinsically a part of the
natural
order.99 The Babylonian gods,
for example, sent the
Flood in
capricious annoyance at man's rambunctious
noisiness. Jehovah sent the Flood as a judgment against
man's
wickedness.
2. Why
was God's revelation given where it was?
Certainly the local geographic and climate
conditions of
the
Lord's
revelation. The sovereign God chose
Palestine as the
location for
His revelation, a land whose climate made the
Hebrews very
conscious of their reliance upon God for rain
and food.
3. Now that we know the causes of droughts
and the
progression
of locust plagues are they any less the works of
God?
Such a conclusion may be reached by
unbelievers, but
believers
can only stand in greater awe as they learn more of
the marvels
and intricacies of God's creation. He is
the God
who uses the
hurricane but also the lowly worm (Jonah 4:6)
to reveal
His power and purpose. As C. S. Lewis
has
remarked,
"Each miracle writes for us in small letters
something
that God has already written, or will write, in
letters
almost too large to be noticed, across the whole can-
vas of
Nature."100
4. Why do natural disasters occur? Are they judgments
of God?
Natural disasters remind us that we do not
live in a
Paradise,
and that the Creation itself groans for its redemp-
tion (Rom.
each tragedy
but can realize that we live in a flawed
universe. Though any given calamity may not be a
specific
judgment for
sin (cf. John 9:1-3), each reminds us of our
ANCIENT ECOLOGIES AND THE BIBLE 200b
creaturely
weakness and the fragility of our life.
From the
divine
perspective death is not the ultimate tragedy but
rather a
life lived without recognizing the Creator (
1:19-21.101 If we are not thankful for His daily provision
Jas. 1:17; I
Tim. 4:3), He may get our attention by more
drastic
events.
5. If God works through Nature, ought we
do anything
to interfere
with it?
Some extreme Calvinists opposed the
introduction of
anaesthesia
in the light of Gen. 3:16. Within the
past year
members of a
Dutch Reformed group have refused inocula-
ions as an
interference with God's natural order.
But God
does not
call us to the passive fatalism of some Muslims
who say to
everything, In sha'Allah "If Allah wills," and
then do
nothing. Rather He has called us into
partnership
with Him as
stewards of His grace and creation.
Times of
disaster
provide us with opportunities for sharing and even
witness as
organizations like World Vision have
demonstrated
in our day.
REFERENCES
1Lynn White, "The Historical Roots of
Our Ecologic Crisis," Science
155 (1967), 1203.
2J. Donald Hughes, Ecology in Ancient
Civilizations (Albuqueque: Univer-
sity of
3Time, 105 (
4R. A. Bryson and T. J. Murray, Climates
of Hunger (Madison:
University of Wisconsin, 1977), pp. 95, 104-105.
5Time, 112 (
A-15.
6Time, 112 (
7Lawrence Svobida, An Empire of Dust
(
1940), pp. 15, 17.
8Marion
1924); Ellen C. Semple, The Geography of the
Region (New
York: Henry Holt, 1931); Erwin R. Biel, Climatology
of the Mediterranean Area (Chicago: University of Chicago, 1944);
ANCIENT ECOLOGIES AND THE BIBLE 200c
Michael Grant, The Ancient
Scribner's Sons, 1969).
9T. J. Jones, Quelle, Brunnen und Zisterne im A.T. (
Texte und Forschungen, 1928); Cyril E. N. Bromehead, "The
Early
History of Water Supply," Geographical Journal 99
(1942), 142-51;
J. G. D. Clark, "Water in Antiquity," Antiquity
18 (1944), 1-15.
10Robert J. Braidwood, The
(Eugene, Oregon: Oregon State System of Higher Education, 1962),
pp. 11-13. Two other areas
that independently developed the
domestication of crops are
Yamauchi, "Problems of Radiocarbon Dating and of Cultural
Diffusion in Pre-History," J.A.S.A. 27 (1975), 25-31.
11M. A. Beek, Atlas of Mesopotamia
(London: Thomas Nelson, 1962),
p. 12.
12Cf. The Hammurabi Law Code, ## 53-57;
Stanley Walters, Waters for
Larsa (New
Haven: Yale University, 1971).
13S. N. Kramer, The Sumerians
(Chicago: University of Chicago, 1963), p.
143; cf. J. B. Pritchard, ed., The Ancient Near East (
Princeton University, 1969), p. 612.
14Alan Moorehead, The White Nile (New
York: Haper& Row, 1971); idem,
The
15Richard Parker, The Calendars of
Ancient
Chicago, 1950); P. Montet, Everyday Life in Egypt (London:
Edward
Arnold, 1958), pp. 31-33.
16P. Montet, Egypt and the Bible
(Philadelphia: Fortress, 1968), pp. 3-4.
17K. W. Butzer, Early Hydraulic
Civilization in Egypt (Chicago:
18Hermann Kees, Ancient Egypt: A Cultural
Topography (Chicago: Uni-
versity of
19A. Zimmern, The
1961), pp. 36-40; cf. M. Cary, The Geographic Background of
Greek
and Roman History (New York: Oxford University, 1952).
20Rhys Carpenter, Discontinuity in Greek
Civilization (Cambridge: Cam-
bridge University, 1966).
21E. Wright, "Climatic Changes in
Mycenaean Greece," Antiquity 42
(1968), 123-27.
22Bryson and Murray (note 4), p. 16; R. A.
Bryson, H. H. Lamb, and D. L.
Donley, "Drought and the Decline of Mycenae," Antiquity
48
(1974), 46-50.
23Robert Claiborne, Climate, Man and
History (New York: W. W. Norton,
1970), p. 326.
ANCIENT ECOLOGIES AND THE BIBLE 200d
24Edwin M. Yamauchi, "Homer, History
and Archaeology," Bulletin of the
Near East Archaeological Society 3 (1973), 36; idem, Greece and
Babylon
(Grand Rapids: Baker, 1967), pp. 42-46.
ANCIENT ECOLOGIES AND THE BIBLE 201a
25Edwin M. Yamauchi, "
Pfeiffer, H. F. Voss, and J. Rea (Chicago: Moody, 1975), II, 1270-
72. In general, the climate of Palestine has remained more or less
the
same since New Testament times. D. Sperber, "Drought, Famine
and
Pestilence
in Amoraic Palestine," Journal of the Economic and
Social History of the Orient 17 (1974), 272, writes: "While it is
known that there were no significant climatic changes in
over the last two thousand years. . . , undoubtedly there were
climatic ups-and-downs within this period."
On the other hand, for
Old Testament times palynological
analyses, that is, studies of pollen from boreholes from the Hula
Valley and the Mediterranean coast, indicate periods of a more
humid climate at certain eras.
A. Horowitz, "Human Settlement
Pattern in
favorable climate returned during Middle Bronze Age II and to some
extent also during the Late Bronze Age when, it may be recalled,
26M. Harel, "Reduced Aridity in Eastern
Journal 7 (1957), 256-63.
27Efraim Orni and Elisha Efrat, Geography
of
Program for Scientific Translations, 2nd ed., 1966), pp. 108-11.
28D. H. K. Amiran and M. Gilead, "Early
Excessive Rainfall and Soil Ero-
sion in
basic conditions for the development of excessive rain appear to
be
the formation of extended upper troughs reaching in a meridional
direction from polar latitudes into the
together with the formation of a Cyprus Low."
29Orni and Efrat, pp. 111-15. Note: 1"
of rain =25.4 mm.; conversely 1
mm. = .03937".
30Orni and Efrat, p. 114: "Between
November and February almost 70%
of the annual rainfall occurs." Biehl, p. 89, table 25, lists
the
frequency of days with precipitation.
31R. Patai, "The Control of Rain in
Ancient
lege Annual 14 (1939), 283: "The ancient Jewish
inhabitants of
could guess whether rain would fall, and in what quantity. A sure
sign of rain were the clouds called 'PWRHWT,' i.e., thin clouds
below thick clouds. . . . Bright clouds were regarded as an omen
of
light rain, dark clouds as of heavy rain." Cf. Mat. 16:2-3.
32Semple (note 8), p. 506: "Modern
records show that the rainfall at Jerusa-
lem fluctuates between 12.5 and 42
inches (318 mm. and 1,091
ANCIENT ECOLOGIES AND THE BIBLE 201b
mm.); that during the sixty years from 1850 to 1910 it dropped
twelve times below the critical 20 inches (500 mm.) " Orni
and
Efrat, p. 116: "Drought years in
the entire country. In
1950/51, for example, only 35% of the
annual average fell on the northwest shore of the
43% in
there are series of drought years, as in the five winters between
autumn 1958 and spring 1963." Cf. J. Neumann, "On the
Incidence
of Dry and Wet Years,"
33D.
15 (1965), 169-76.
34N. Rosenan, "One Hundred Years of
Rainfall in
ploration Journal 5 (1955), 137-53; A. Bitan-Buttenwieser,
"A
Comparison of Sixty Years' Rainfall between
Aviv,"
35M. Zohary, "Ecological Studies in the
Vegetation of the Near Eastern
Deserts,"
36M. Evenari and D. Koller, "Ancient
Masters of the Desert," Scientific
American 194 (April, 1956), 39;
(New York: Grove Press, rev. ed., 1960), pp. 210-25; Philip
Natural History 76 (June-July, 1967), 36-43; J. I. Lawlor, The
Nabataeans in Historical Perspective (
1974), 76-85.
37W. C. Lowdermilk, "The Reclamation of
a Man-Made Desert," Scienti-
fic American 202 (March, 1960), 54-63; M. Evenari, L.
Shanon, and
N. Tadmor, The
38D. Ashbel, "Frequency and
Distribution of Dew in
Geographical Review 39 (1949), 294: "As is well known, the Negeb
is the region poorest in rainfall; in dew formation, however, it
is the
richest in
Dew Observation in
120-23.
39S. N.
Kramer, The Sacred Marriage Rite (
sity, 1969), p. 51.
40Cf. Gen. 7:11.
41W. G. Lambert and A. R. Millard, Atra-Hasis:
The Babylonian Story of
the Flood (Oxford: Clarendon, 1969), p. 73.
42Ibid., p. 75.
43A. Heidel, The Gilgamesh Epic
(Chicago: University of Chicago, 1963),
p.85.
ANCIENT ECOLOGIES AND THE BIBLE 201c
44J.B. Pritchard, ed., Ancient Near
Eastern Texts (
iversity, rev. ed., 1955), p. 108;
Edwin M. Yamauchi, "Descent of
Ishtar," in The Biblical
World, ed. C. Pfeiffer (
1966), pp. 196-200.
45Cf. Kramer (note 39); Edwin M. Yamauchi,
"Cultic Prostitution," in
Orient and Occident, ed. H.
A. Hoffner (Kevelaer: Butzon und
Bercker 1973), pp. 213-22.
46J. Gwyn Griffiths, "Hecataeus and
Herodotus on 'A Gift of the River',"
Journal of Near Eastern Studies 25 (1966), 57-61.
47J. H. Breasted, Development of Religion
and Thought in Ancient
(New York: Harper & Bros.,
1959), p. 21. Cf. E. A. W. Budge, The
egyptienne
(Paris: Presses Universitaires de
France, 1949), pp. 59 ff.
48The Metamorphoses of Ovid, tr. Mary M. Innes (
1955), pp. 127 ff.
49C. Kere nyi,
50M. P. Nilsson, Greek Folk Religion
(New York: Harper & Bros., 1961),
pp.6-7.
51Denis Baly and A. D. Tushingham, Atlas
of the Biblical World (New
52John Gray, The Canaanites (New
York: Frederick A. Praeger, 1964),
p.30.
53A. R. Millard, "The Canaanites,"
in Peoples of Old Testament Times, ed.
D. J. Wiseman (Oxford: Clarendon,
1973), p. 45.
54G. R. Driver, Canaanite Myths and
Legends (
1956), p. 59.
55C. H. Gordon, Ugaritic Literature (
1949), pp. 4-5; idem,
"Canaanite Mythology," in Mythologies of the
Ancient World, ed.
S. N. Kramer (
56Cf. J. G. Frazer, The New Golden Bough,
ed. T. H. Gaster (Garden City.
N. Y.: Doubleday & Co.,
1961), pp. 21-27, 77-78; U. Basgoz,
"Rain-making Ceremonies in
Journal of the American Oriental Society 87 (1967), 304-306.
57Patai (note 31), p. 254.
58E.g. Lynn White (reference 1), p. 1205.
59John Black, The Dominion of Man: The
Search for Ecological Responsi-
bility (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University, 1970),
p. 46.
60Glacken (reference 2), p. 166.
ANCIENT ECOLOGIES AND THE BIBLE 201d
61E. M. Blaiklock, The Psalms of the
Great Rebellion (
1970), p. 39.
62Hughes (note 2), p. 149.
63M. Dahood, Psalms I (Garden City,
N. Y.: Doubleday & Co., 1966) pp.
23-25.
64The writer of Hebrews (6:7) uses as an
illustration of those who respond
or do not respond to God's grace the following: "For land
which has
drunk the rain that often falls upon it, and brings forth
vegetation
useful to those for whose sake it is cultivated, receives a
blessing
from God."
65Res Gestae Divi Augusti, ed. P. A. Brunt and J. M. Moore (
66Kenneth
ological Review 28 (1935), 259.
67Ibid., p. 265.
68Ibid., p. 261. George E.
Mendenhall, "The Ancient in the Modern," in
Arbor:
famines often involve social as well as natural factors: "The
many
references to famine that almost always accompany warfare and
disintegration cannot therefore be explained as archaeologists
always
tend to do-by appealing to natural phenomena such as drought. The
repeated references in available sources to emergency shipment of
grain
ANCIENT ECOLOGIES AND THE BIBLE 202a
proves beyond question that regions quite near the center of
famine
have an available surplus. The famine is therefore the result of
complex socio-economic processes."
69Edwin M. Yamauchi, "The Daily Bread
Motif in Antiquity,"
Theological Journal 28 (1966), 145-56.
70Edwin M.
Yamauchi, "How the Early Church Responded to Social Pro-
blems, Christianity Today 17
(
The
Bros., 1961), pp. 153 ff.; Martin Hengel, Property and Riches
in
the Early Church (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1975).
71Patai (reference 31), p. 251.
72Sperber (reference 25), p. 273.
73The Mishnah, tr. H. Danby (London: Oxford University,
1933), pp.
194-95.
74Sperber, p. 285.
75Cited in Patai, p. 282. Cf. J. Goldin,
"On Honi (Onias) the Circle-Maker:
A Demanding Prayer," Harvard Theological Review 56
(1963), 233-
37; G. F. Moore, Judaism
(Cambridge: Harvard University, 1955),
II, 235-36.
76Patai, p. 285.
77A New Stevenson, ed. J. Stevenson (London: S.P.C.K.,
1957), p. 169.
78Arnobius, "Against the
Heathens," tr.
bell, The Ante-Nicene Fathers
(Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1975), VI,
414.
79Augustine, The City of
Library, 1950), p. 107.
80Cited in Sperber, p. 297.
81Cf. Gordon in Kramer (note 55), p.
184. Cf. Emmanuel Le Roy Ladurie,
Times of Feast, Times of Famine (Garden City, N. Y.: Doubleday &
Ages caused
even sometimes great heat. These were responsible for the plagues
of locusts which in the ninth-twelfth centuries sometimes spread
over vast areas, sometimes far to the north. In A.D. 873, a time of
great famine, they were found from
autumn of 1195, they reached as far as
82Kramer, The Sacred Marriage Rite
(reference 39), p. 47.
83Driver, Canaanite Myths and Legends
(reference 54), p. 33.
84J. A. Fitzmyer, The Aramaic
Inscriptions of Sefire (
Biblical Institute, 1967), p. 15.
ANCIENT ECOLOGIES AND THE BIBLE 202b
85D. J. Wiseman, The Vassal-Treaties of
Esarhaddon (
86See Edwin M. Yamauchi, "arbeh,"
"gazam," "hagab," "hasil,"
"hargol," "yeleq," in A
Theological Word Book of the Old
Testament, ed.
R. L. Harris, Gleason Archer, and Bruce Waltke
(
87Greta Hort, "The Plagues of
Egypt," Zeitschrift fur alttestamentliche
Wissenschajt 70
(1958), 49-54. U. Cassuto, A
Commentary on the
Book of Exodus (Jerusalem; Magnes, 1967), p. 124: "The locusts
will even enter into the houses (it happened for example, in
the year 1865, that the locusts in their multitudes invaded the
houses
by way of the windows and doors). . . . " Cf. Exodus 10:6.
88L. Kohler, "Die Bezeichnungen der
Heuschrecke im Alten Testament,"
Zeitschrift der Deutschen
Palastina-Vereins 49 (1926), 328-31;
George Cansdale, All the Animals of the Bible Lands (
Zondervan, 1970), pp. 238-44: Fauna and Flora of the Bible
(London: United Bible Societies, 1972), pp. 53-54.
In Lev.
as edible insects. Bas
reliefs from
skewered locusts for Sennacherib's table.
John the Baptist (Mat.
3:4; Mark 1:6) subsisted on honey and
locusts. Cf. F. I.
Andersen, "The Diet of John the Baptist," Abr
Nahrain 3
(1961-62),60-75; C. H. H. Scobie, John the Baptist
(Philadelphia: Fortress, 1964), pp. 138-39.
The Damascus Document of
the Dead Sea Scrolls stipulates: "As
for the various kinds of locust, these are to be put in fire or
water
while they are still alive; for that is what their nature demands."
The
&
Many Africans and Arabs
after removing the wings, legs, and
heads eat locusts either cooked or ground up as flour.
89Stanley Baron, The Desert Locust
(New York: Charles Scribner's, 1972),
p. 30. Cf. F. S. Bodenheimer, Animal Life in
Mayer, 1935), pp. 309-24; B. Uvarov, Grasshoppers and Locusts I
(Cambridge: Cambridge University, 1966).
90John D. Whiting, "
graphic 28 (Dec., 1915), 511-50.
91Baron, p. ix.
92Ibid., p. 123. Augustine (note
79), p. 108, reports with some exaggera-
tion a locust plague of 204 B.C. as follows: "One may also
read that
ANCIENT ECOLOGIES AND THE BIBLE 202c
visited by a prodigious multitude of locusts, which, after
consuming
the fruit and foliage of the trees, were driven into the sea in
one vast
and measureless cloud; so that when they were drowned and cast
upon the shore the air was polluted, and so serious a pestilence
produced that in the
perished 800,000 persons, besides a much greater number in the
neighboring districts. At
then garrisoning it, there survived only ten."
93S. R. Driver, The Books of Joel and
Amos (
versity, 1897), pp. 82-91; Ovid R.
Sellers, "Stages of Locust in Joel,"
American Journal of Semitic Languages
52 (1935-36), 81-85; John
A. Thompson, "Joel's Locusts in the Light of Near Eastern
Parallels," Journal of Near Eastern Studies 14 (1955),
52-55.
94Whiting, p. 516: "Each female, now
loaded with eggs, seeks a place
suitable to deposit them, and with her ovipositors is able to sink
a
hole as much as 4 inches deep through hard compact soil, such as
would try the strength of human muscles even with iron
tools."
95In Joel 1:4 and
locust. The New English Bible and Jerusalem Bible
suggest
"hopper." But in Jer. 51:27 the yeleq is
described as "rough,"
alluding to the horn-like sheath which covers the rudimentary
wings
of the nymph stage. In Nah.
as the locust moults and then unfurls its wings.
960. R. Gurney and J. J. Finkelstein, ed., The
Sultantepe Tablets (
British Institute of Archaeology in
Hayim Tawil, "A Curse Concerning Crop-Consuming Insects in
the
Sefire Treaty and in Akkadian," Bulletin of the American
Schools of
Oriental Research 225 (Feb., 1977), 59-62.
97W. R. Halliday, Greek and Roman
Folklore (
1963), p. 60.
98Danby (reference 73), p. 198.
99Edwin M. Yamauchi, "Anthropomorphism
in Ancient Religion," Biblio-
theca Sacra 125 (1968), 29-44.
100C. S. Lewis, Miracles (New York:
Macmillan, 1947), p. 140.
101C. F. D. Moule, Man and Nature in the
New Testament (
Fortress, 1967), pp. 20-21.
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