You should have quite a few direct references to him seeing that he is well known through historical artifacts.
I don't know any Christians that believe monotheism was developed by the Israelites. We believe it was from the beginning, with gentiles, long before the Israelites.
I didn't ask that question. I asked you two or three questions which you haven't answered. They are simple questions but you would have to admit that you can't disprove what I can't prove through written historical documents outside the Bible.
Concerning the King of Persia I'd only have Biblical references and possibly Islamic references, I would steer clear of websites on google as they might be misleading. What I do know of Cyrus is that his name is Latinized and is derived from the Greek, we see this with the myth hero Jesus who bares a Hebrew name and with Christ a Greek title.
Gentile is described as a person who is not Jewish. Also, the term "gentiles" is derived from Latin, used for contextual translation, and not an original Hebrew or Greek word from the Bible. Even on the sermon on the mound Jesus the myth hero infers to Gentiles as "pagans" (Matthew 5:47), bearing in mind that the term Pagan is a derogatory and it meant a country hick during the spread of Christianity in Rome, the proper term is Polytheist. The Israelite's adopt or term the usage of the word God as El and earlier they would term the word Yahweh for their supreme deity. Abraham comes out of Ur, making the common stock West Semitic name Abraham improperly used, meaning Abraham is Sumerian as Ur is a Sumerian city.
Outside of proper names, the word ’el occurs about 230 times in the Hebrew Bible. It usually occurs as an appellative designating a foreign deity (
Ezekiel 28:2) as well as Israel’s chief deity. Most commonly, the word is used with other elements (such as the definite article or a suffix). El appears as a proper name of the deity in poetic books, such as Psalms (5:5, 7:12; 18 [2 Sam 22]:3, 31, 33, 48; 102:25), Job, and Second Isaiah (
Isaiah 40:18; 43:12; 45:14, 22; 46:9; cf. 42:5).
A common assumption is El’s cult didn’t exist in Israel except as part of an identification with Yahweh. For ancient Israel, this question depends on whether Yahweh was a title of El or secondarily identified with El. Besides the grammatical objections sometimes raised against this view, the oldest biblical traditions place Yahweh originally as a god in southern Edom (northwestern Saudi Arabia), known by the biblical names of Edom, Midian, Teman, Paran, and Sinai. This general area for old Yahwistic cult is attested in the Bible (
Deuteronomy 33:2;
Judges 5:4–5; Psalm 68:9, 18;
Habakkuk 3:3)39 as well as in inscriptional sources. Extra Biblical evidence from Kuntillet ‘Ajrud, a southern shrine preserving inscriptions written by visiting northerners, also attests to “Yahweh of Teman.” These facts argue against designation identification of Yahweh as originally a title of El.
So how were Yahweh and El related? Biblical evidence necessarily occupies a central place in this discussion. In at least one instance, biblical material points to the cult of El in the Iron I period in Israel. C. L. Seow notes El language and characteristics reflected in aspects of the cult of Shiloh. The tent tradition associated with Shiloh (Psalm 78:60;
Joshua 18:1;
1 Samuel 2:22) conforms to the Ugaritic descriptions of El’s abode as a tent. The narrative elements of the divine appearance to Samuel in incubation-dreams, the divine gift of a child to Hannah, and the El name of Elqanah (suggesting an El worshipper?), also cohere with the view that El was the original god of the beˆt’elo¯hıˆm (
Judges 18:31; cf. 17:5).
It is no accident that Psalm 78 repeatedly uses El names and epithets in describing the rise and fall of the sanctuary at Shiloh. Traditions concerning the cultic site of Shechem may also illustrate the cultural process behind the Yahwistic inclusion of old cultic sites of El. In the city of Shechem the local god was ’e¯l beˇrıˆt, “El of the covenant” (
Judges 9:46; cf. 8:33; 9:4).
According to many scholars, this word ’ilbrt apparently appears as a Late Bronze Age title for El (CAT 1.128.14–15).45 In the patriarchal narratives, the god of Shechem, ’e¯l, is called ’elo¯heˆ yis´ra¯’e¯l, “the god of Israel,” and is presumed to be Yahweh. In this case, a process of reinterpretation is at work. In the early history of Israel, when the cult of Shechem became Yahwistic, it continued the El traditions of that site. As a result, Yahweh received the title ’e¯l beˇrıˆt, the old title of El.
Finally, Jerusalem is seen as a cult place of El, if there is a connection of El Elyon and El “creator of the earth” in
Genesis 14:8–22. This record illustrates the old transmission of West Semitic/Israelite traditions. Israelite knowledge of the religious traditions about other deities did not only reflect contact between Israel and her Phoenician neighbors in the Iron Age. In addition, as a function of the identification of Yahweh-El at cultic sites of El, such as Shiloh, Shechem, and Jerusalem, the old religious lore of El was inherited by the priesthood in Israel. At a variety of sites, Yahweh was incorporated into the older figure of El, who belonged to Israel’s original West Semitic religious heritage. Other biblical evidence for El suggests that the cult of El perdured into the Iron II period.
Whatever one is to make of ’eˇlo¯hıˆm in the “E source” or various El epithets” in the “priestly source,” these materials are interpreted as evidence for the cult of El in the Iron II period within Israel. The usage in the book of Job and Psalm 18 (
2 Samuel 22), may point in this direction as well.
The distinction between El and Yahweh in Israel includes not only biblical texts but also Iron II epigraphic evidence. It is not necessary to interpret ’l in the Kuntillet ‘Ajrud inscriptions as “God” and assume the identification with Yahweh, as M. Weinfeld translates one inscription where b‘l and ’l occur in the
following manner:
“[W]hen God shines forth (El appears) the mountains melt...Baal on the day of w[ar] . . . for the name of God on the day of w[ar].”
It is unclear whether ’l here should be translated as El. Similarly, Hebrew proper names with the element ’l should not therefore always be attributed to Yahweh, as W. D. Whitt has recently argued. J. Tigay’s important study of inscriptional onomastica is compatible with the historical reconstruction that early Israelite tradition identified El with Yahweh. Israelite inscriptions include 557 names with Yahweh as the divine element, names with *’l, a handful of names with the divine component *b‘l, and no names referring to the goddesses Anat or Asherah. Tigay argues that the element *’l in proper names represented a title for Yahweh. Just as no cult is attested for Anat or Asherah in Israelite religion, no distinct cult is attested for El except in his identity as Yahweh. It is unclear whether ’l in all these instances is to be understood as a generic reference to Yahweh.
At some point, a number of Israelite traditions identified El with Yahweh or presupposed this equation. The Hebrew Bible rarely distinguishes between El and Yahweh or offers polemics against El. West Semitic El lies behind the god of the patriarchs in
Genesis 33:20 and 46:3 (and possibly elsewhere). Later tradition clearly intended that this god be identified as Yahweh. For example, the priestly theological treatment of Israel’s early religious history in
Exodus 6:2–3 identifies the old god El Shadday with Yahweh:
And God said to Moses, “I am Yahweh. I appeared to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, as El Shadday, but by my name Yahweh I did not make myself known to them.”
This passage shows that Yahweh was unknown to the patriarchs. Rather, they are depicted as worshippers of El. In Israel El’s characteristics and epithets became part of the repertoire of descriptions of Yahweh. Like El in the Ugaritic texts, Yahweh is described as an aged, patriarchal god (Psalm 102:28;
Job 36:26;
Isaiah 40:28; cf. Psalm 90:10;
Isaiah 57:15;
Habakkuk 3:6;
Daniel 6:26; 2 Esdras 8:20; Tobit 13:6, 10; Ben Sira 18:30), enthroned amidst the assembly of divine beings (
1 Kings 22:19;
Isaiah 6:1–8; cf.
Psalms 29:1–2, 82:1, 89:5–8;
Isaiah 14:13;
Jeremiah 23:18, 22;
Zechariah 3;
Daniel 3:25). Later biblical texts continued the notion of aged Yahweh enthroned before the heavenly hosts.
Daniel 7:9–14, 22 describes Yahweh as the “ancient of days,” and “the Most High.” He is enthroned amid the assembly of heavenly hosts, called in verse 18 “the holy ones of the Most High,” qaddıˆsˇeˆ‘elyoˆnıˆn (cf. 2 Esdras 2:42–48;
Revelation 7).
This description for the angelic hosts derives from the older usage of Hebrew qeˇdo¯sˇıˆm, “holy ones,” used for the divine council (Psalm 89:6;
Hosea 12:1;
Zechariah 14:5; cf. KAI 4:5, 7; 14:9, 22; 27:12) and the tradition of the enthroned bearded god appears also in a Persian period coin marked yhd, “Yehud.” The iconography belongs to a god, possibly Yahweh. D. V. Edelman has studied the depictions of deities and symbols on coins from the Persian period through the Hasmonean period. She concludes that the late Persian period coins are the first to show any avoidance of depiction of gods other than Yahweh in non cultic contexts; as this single example indicates, Yahweh is evidently represented. Based on this part of Edelman’s study and the reference in
Judges 17 to an image, apparently of Yahweh, one might be inclined to suggest that ancient Israel tolerated some images of Yahweh outside of the national shrines
and condemned images of other deities. In short, the prohibition of images of other deities seems to reflect a general worship of Yahweh that discouraged worship of other deities.
El and Yahweh are rendered with a similar compassionate disposition toward humanity. Like El, Yahweh is a father (
Deuteronomy 32:6;
Isaiah 63:16, 64:7;
Jeremiah 3:4, 19; 31:9;
Malachi 1:6, 2:10; cf.
Exodus 4:22;
Hosea 11:1) with a compassionate disposition, many times expressed as “merciful and gracious god,” ’e¯l-ra¯hfiuˆm weˇhfiannuˆn (
Exodus 34:6;
Jonah 4:2;
Joel 2:13;
Psalms 86:15; 103:8; 145:
8;
Nehemiah 9:17). Both El and Yahweh appear to humans in dream-visions and function as their divine patron. Like El (CAT 1.16 V–VI), Yahweh is a healing god (
Genesis 20:17;
Numbers 12:13;
2 Kings 20:5, 8; Psalm 107:20; cf. the personal name, reˇpa¯’e¯l, in
1 Chronicles 26:7). Moreover, the description of Yahweh’s dwelling-place as a “tent” (’o¯hel) (e.g.,
Psalms 15:1; 27:6; 91:10; 132:3), called in the Pentateuchal traditions the “tent of meeting” (’ohel moˆ‘e¯d) (
Exodus 33:7–11;
Numbers 12:5, 10;
Deuteronomy 31:14, 15), recalls the tent of El. The tabernacle of Yahweh has qeˇra¯sˇıˆm, usually understood as “boards” (
Exodus 26–40);
Numbers 3:36; 4:31), whereas the dwelling of El is called qrsˇ, perhaps “tabernacle” or “pavilion” (CAT 1.2 III 5; 1.3 V 8; 1.4 IV 24; 1.17 V 49). Furthermore, the dwelling of El is set amid the cosmic waters (CAT 1.2 III 4; 1.3 V 6; 1.4 IV 20–22; 1.17 V 47–48), a theme evoked in descriptions of Yahweh’s abode in Jerusalem (
Psalms 47:5; 87;
Isaiah 33:20–22;
Ezekiel 47:1–12; Joel 4:18;
Zechariah 14:8). Other passages include motifs that can be traced to traditional descriptions of El (
Deuteronomy 32:6–7).
The eventual identification of Yahweh and El within Israel perhaps held ramifications for the continuation of other deities as well. It has been argued that Asherah became the consort of Yahweh as a result of his identification with El. Perhaps originally associated with El, they became part of the divine assembly subordinate to Yahweh. The information in the preceding section makes this question reasonable, despite the apparent complications that this reconstruction may pose for later theology.
Moreover, it is a reasonable hypothesis because of one basic piece of information: the name of Israel contains not the divine element of Yahweh but El’s name, with the element *’e¯l. If Yahweh had been the original god of Israel, then its name might have been *yis´raˆ-yahweh, or perhaps better *yis´raˆ-ya¯h in accordance with other Hebrew proper names containing the divine name. This fact would suggest that El not Yahweh was the original chief god of the group named Israel.
As to your questions, ask specifically your questions. I do not know what you mean by "prove", this isn't an atheistic discussion, wherein you are a Christian and if I was an atheist I would debate; you cannot prove the existence of God. We aren't proving or disproving "God", what we are getting at is whether or not Polytheism came before Monotheism, it would have to, as the only indicator is that the Israelite's are Monotheistic after their captivity in Babylon.
