ISRAELITE AND INDIAN. 61 



seldom with distinct proper names, so that it was easy to regard 

 them as a whole and confound them together. Yet the power 

 bore different names in different tribes. In some cases it was 

 called El, or Alon, or Eloah ; in other cases Elion, Saddai, Baal, 

 Adonai, Ram, Milik or Moloch. 



The Elohim, though generally bound together, sometimes acted 

 separately ; thus each tribe gained in time its protecting god, 

 whose function was to watch over it and direct it to success. 



In the transition to nationality, the Israelites conceived a na- 

 tional god, Jahveh, who was not just, being partial toward Israel 

 and cruel toward all other peoples. The worship of a national 

 god is not monotheistic, but henotheistic, recognizing other gods 

 of other peoples. The work of the later prophets consisted in 

 restoring the attributes of the ancient elohism under the form 

 of Jahveh, and in generalizing the religious cult of a special god. 



Jahveh was not at first the god of the universe, but subse- 

 quently became so because he was the God of Israel, and very 

 long afterward was claimed to be the only god, mainly because 

 the Israelites claimed to be the peculiar people. Even down to 

 the time of the prophet Isaiah, there was alternation of conflict 

 and of co-ordination between Jahveh and the other gods of Canaan, 

 especially Baal. 



The revolution accomplished by the prophets did not change 

 expressions. The concept of Jahveh was too deeply rooted to be 

 removed, and the people spoke of Jahveh as they had formerly 

 spoken of the Elohim. He thus became the supreme being who 

 made and governed the world. In time even the name of Jahveh 

 was suppressed and its utterance forbidden ; and it was replaced 

 by a purely theistic word meaning the Lord. Undoubtedly the 

 prophets, at the time of the kings and later, taught the worship 

 of one God, but the people were not converted to the doctrine un- 

 til after the great captivity. 



When established in Palestine, the Israelites entered into com- 

 munion with the Canaanites, their kindred, and worshiped Baal. 

 Later they frequently bowed down to the Dagon of the Philistines, 

 probably because he was the god of their warlike victors. Solo- 

 mon, perhaps from admiration of Sidonian culture, introduced the 

 service of Astarte, which was intermitted ; but later, Ahab estab- 

 lished the worship of the Sidonian divinities in the kingdom of 

 Samaria. It was subsequently readopted in the kingdom of Judah, 

 and not until the reign of Josiah were the Sidonian altars finally 

 demolished. 



The true parallel, therefore, between the Indians and the 

 Israelites, as to belief in a single overruling God, is not that both, 

 but that neither, held it. 



In the stage of barbarism all the phenomena of nature are 



