Francesca Stavrakopoulou, «Exploring the Garden of Uzza: Death, Burial and Ideologies of Kingship», Vol. 87 (2006) 1-21
The Garden of Uzza (2 Kgs 21,18.26) is commonly regarded as a pleasure garden
in or near Jerusalem which came to be used as a royal burial ground once the tombs
in the City of David had become full. However, in this article it is argued that the
religious and cultic significance of royal garden burials has been widely
overlooked. In drawing upon comparative evidence from the ancient Near East, it
is proposed that mortuary gardens played an ideological role within perceptions of
Judahite kingship. Biblical texts such as Isa 65,3-4; 66,17 and perhaps 1,29-30 refer
not to goddess worship, but to practices and sacred sites devoted to the royal dead.
Exploring the Garden of Uzza 11
as a condemnation of goddess worship (35), which in its turn is fuelled
by the assumption that a further Isaian critique of twng in 1,29-30 is a
veiled allusion to sacred groves dedicated to the goddess Asherah. This
latter text reads:
29. For you will be ashamed (36) of the (mighty) trees (37) in which you
delighted,
and you will blush for the gardens (twng) that you have chosen,
30. for you will be like a tree (38) whose leaf is withered,
and like a garden (hng) without water.
Several commentators read these verses as an allusion to fertility
rites supposedly associated with Asherah worship, taking as their cue
the verb dmj, frequently rendered “delightâ€, “pleasureâ€, which, they
assert, carries connotations of sexual lust (39). This interpretation
complements the use of a garden as a setting for love in the Song of
Songs and comparative literature (40), yet it is especially encouraged by
biblical condemnations elsewhere of cult practices ˆn[r ≈[ lk tjt,
“under every green tree†(41), which many scholars take as references to
ritual sexual intercourse (42). However, there are good reasons to
(35) Most recently, J. Blenkinsopp (“The One in the Middleâ€, Reading from
Right to Left. Essays on the Hebrew Bible in Honour of David J. Clines [eds. J.C.
EXUM – H.G.M. WILLIAMSON] [JSOTSS 373; Sheffield 2003] 63-75) has argued
that the rituals occurring in the gardens of these verses are to be identified with
Asherah worship. His argument hinges around the difficult phrase Ëšwtb dja rja,
“following (the) one in the centreâ€, which he takes as a reference to the role of a
priestess of Asherah, favouring qere tja for ketib dja. However, given the textual
difficulties of Ëšwtb dja rja, this verse is unable to bear the interpretative weight
placed upon it (cf. J.A. EMERTON, “Notes on Two Verses in Isaiah [26:16 and
66:17]â€, Prophecy. Essays Presented to Georg Fohrer on his Sixty-Fifth Birthday
[ed. J.A. EMERTON] [BZAW 150; Berlin 1980] 21-25).
(36) Reading wçbt for MT wçby.
(37) µylya, frequently rendered “oaksâ€.
(38) hla, usually rendered “terebinthâ€.
(39) E.g., ACKERMAN, Under Every Green Tree, 187-188; cf. BLENKINSOPP,
Isaiah 56–66, 270-271.
(40) See further M.V. FOX, The Song of Songs and the Ancient Egyptian Love
Songs (Madison, WI 1985); W.G.E. WATSON, “Some Ancient Near Eastern
Parallels to the Song of Songsâ€, Words Remembered, Texts Renewed. Essays in
Honour of John F.A. Sawyer (eds. J. DAVIES – G. HARVEY – W.G.E. WATSON)
(JSOTSS 195; Sheffield 1995) 253-271.
(41) E.g., Deut 12,2; 1 Kgs 14,23; 2 Kgs 16,4; Isa 57,5.
(42) E.g., J.L. MCKENZIE, Second Isaiah. Introduction, Translation and Notes
(AB 20; Garden City, NY 1968) 157; J.N. OSWALT, The Book of Isaiah Chapters
40–66 (NICOT; Grand Rapids, MI 1998) 476-477; see also W.L. HOLLADAY, “On
Every High Hill and Under Every Green Treeâ€, VT 11 (1961) 170-176.
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