eventually the most popular deity of the Semitic people, being known as 

 Yao (lAft of the Greeks) to the Phoenicians, Yahoo OH* 1 ) to the 

 Canaanites, and Tammuz to the Aramaeans, while his lover Istar became 

 the Phoenician Ashtoreth. les, the god of wine, and Greek Dionysos r 

 was another saviour sun-god worshipped largely by the Phoenicians ; but 

 was most probably of Egyptian origin, being identical with Mises, the 

 Egyptian Bacchus. As already stated, the Southern Semites of Arabia 

 retained, in common with their Ethiopian brethren, the old and simpler 

 worship of the supreme god El and his son Yahouh, although, owing to 

 their propinquity to Egypt, many strange inferior deities had been intro- 

 duced into Arabia from that country, which resulted, in much later times, 

 in the formation of various religious sects, each having a particular 

 tribal deity, or patron god, though all recognising El as supreme. One 

 of these tribes, with Yahouh as their tribal god, on which account they 

 were called Yahoudi, having left their native Arabian home, penetrated 

 far into the country of the Northern Semites, learning from the 

 Canaanites, Phoenicians, and Babylonians the strange legends of the 

 Northern Semitic deities, including the Adonis myth ; and, after 

 wandering about for many years, one large portion of their tribe settled 

 in the delta of the Nile, while the remainder crossed the desert of Syria 

 and approached the confines of Babylonia, finally settling in the barren 

 and rocky interior of Syria, and making the spot where now stands the 

 small town of El-Khuds (Jerusalem) their headquarters. During their 

 long wanderings they became acquainted not only with the various 

 Semitic myths of the north, but also with the Babylonian and Persian 

 legends, and incorporated a quantity of strange deities and customs into- 

 their own rude and primitive religion, thus manufacturing a very com- 

 plicated and weird system of mythology. 



The date of the Yahudean migration into Syria was certainly not 

 earlier than about B.C. 250, despite the declaration of interested parties 

 that these people were known as Israelites and Jews for centuries before 

 that time. The following quotation from Major-General Forlong's 

 "Rivers of Faith" is worth reproducing on this point: "The first 

 notice of the Jews is, possibly^ that of certain Shemitic rulers of the 

 Aram, paying tribute about 850 B.C. to Vool-Nirari, the successor of 

 Shalmaneser of Syria, regarding which, however, much more is made 

 by Biblicists than the simple record warrants. This is the case also- 

 where Champollion affirms that mention is made on the Theban 

 temples of the capture of certain towns of the land we call Judea, this 

 being thought to prove the existence of Jews. Similar assumption 

 takes place in regard to the hieratic papyri of the Leyden Museum, 

 held to belong to the time of Rameses II. ; an inscription read on the 

 rocks of El-Hamamat, and the discovery of some names like Chedor- 



