Dominic Rudman, «A Note on Zephaniah», Vol. 80 (1999) 109-112

The phrase Cr)h yhl) lk t) hzr...hwhy in Zeph 2,11 has long been a source of confusion for commentators and various attempts have been made to explain the term hzr: does YHWH "shrink" the gods by reducing their domains, or can we understand this term as derived from an Aramaic root and translate, "YHWH...will rule..."? An alternative suggestion, long-discarded, takes a more literal line and understands YHWH to "famish" the gods through the withdrawal of burnt offerings made by their worshippers. While this reading is working along the right lines, this passage appears in fact to refer to the Babylonian ritual of providing cult images with formal meals-a practice which will end with the conversion of the nations.

about such practices in Babylon and Egypt. According to Babylonian thought, there was a clear identity between the cult statue and the god whom it was supposed to represent. While the god remained transcendent, something of the divine essence lodged within the statue, and it was held to be truly "alive". In this context, Jacobsen cites an inscription of King Agum-kakrime of Babylon (1602-1585 BCE) speaking of the return of a statue to the temple from which it was plundered in terms underlining its identity with the deity¹²: "I sent to a faraway land and so they verily led hither by the hand Marduk and Sarpanitum...To Esagila and Babylon I verily returned them..."¹³.

        In both Egypt and Babylon, the cult statue was animated by means of a ceremony called "opening (or washing) the mouth". According to Morenz, this was "a ritual...performed on the statues while they were still in the sculptor’s workshop..., as a result of which the work of human hands was thought to come alive"¹⁴. Such a belief is reflected in a text in the British Museum relating how an image of the sun god Shamash was remade at the command of Nabu-appla-iddina (885-852 BCE): "...he carefully prepared the image of Shamash, the great lord...he washed his mouth and he (i.e. Shamash) took up his dwelling (sc. in the statue)" (BM 91000 col. iv. 20-28). This belief in the "living" nature of the statue is reflected in this particular text by the lavish gifts of food (cols. iv. 1.47–v. 1.7) and clothes (cols. v. 39–vi. 13) given to the image by Nabu-apla-iddina¹⁵. In the same context, a hymn from the time of Ashurbanipal deals with the animation of a statue of the moon-god:

You day on which a god was formed, a pure image perfected,
You day on which a god was made manifest unto all countries...
...(Yet) this new moon cannot
— not having undergone the rite of mouth washing —
Smell incense, eat food, drink water¹⁶.

        Concerning this idea, Curtis observes that "the daily care given to the statue reflects the belief that the statue was alive and needed the same attention and sustenance that any living individual would require. Two meals a day were provided for the images in the Uruk temple"¹⁷. The