‘In other books he states his belief that there is a kind of reason which pervades the whole of nature and is endowed with divine power. This same power he assigns also to the stars, and to the years and months and changing complexion of the years. In interpreting Hesiod’s Theogony* (which means ‘The Birth of the Gods’), he dispenses totally with customary notions of the gods. He does not regard Jupiter, Juno, Vesta, or deities similarly named as among the company of the gods, but teaches that these names by a sort of symbolism have been pinned on things without life and speech.

Cicero. The Nature of the Gods (Oxford World’s Classics) (p. 16). OUP Oxford. Kindle Edition.

It is also true that the Homeric Zeus is full of contradictions. He is “all-seeing,” yet he is cheated; he is “omnipotent,” yet he is defied; he is “eternal,” yet he has a father; he is “just,” yet he is guilty of crime.

…

And yet there are passages, even in Homer, which clearly distinguish Zeus from all the other divinities, and mark him out as the Supreme. He is “the highest, first of Gods” (bk. xix. 284); “most great, most glorious Jove” (bk. ii. 474). He is “the universal Lord” (bk. xi. 229); “of mortals and immortals king supreme,” (bk. xii. 263); “over all the immortal gods he reigns in unapproached pre-eminence of power” (bk. xv. 125). He is “the King of kings” (bk. viii. 35), whose “will is sovereign” (bk. iv. 65), and his “power invincible” (bk. viii. 35). He is the “eternal Father” (bk. viii. 77). He “excels in wisdom gods and men; all human things from him proceed” (bk. xiii. 708-10); “the Lord of counsel” (bk. i. 208), “the all-seeing Jove” (bk. xiii. 824). Indeed the mere expression “Father of gods and men” (bk. i. 639), so often applied to Zeus, and him alone, is proof sufficient that, in spite of all the legendary stories of gods and heroes, the idea of Zeus as the Supreme God, the maker of the world, the Father of gods and men, the monarch and ruler of the world, was not obliterated from the Greek mind. 167

Cocker, B.F.. Christianity and Greek Philosophy (p. 122). Oia Press. Kindle Edition.

Chapter 1: The Origins of Hebrew Religion

Gen_14:13 Then one who had escaped came and told Abram the Hebrew, who was living by the oaks of Mamre the Amorite, brother of Eshcol and of Aner. These were allies of Abram.

Abraham is identified as a Hebrew very early in the book of Genesis. This is a designation that is neither introduced nor described. He is a member of a known people group, the Hebrews. This people group is recognized as far as Egypt:

Gen_39:14 she called to the men of her household and said to them, “See, he has brought among us a Hebrew to laugh at us. He came in to me to lie with me, and I cried out with a loud voice.
The Egyptians despise the Hebrews, who they perhaps see as a feral people. The book of Genesis records that Hebrews are excluded from sharing meals:
Gen 43:32 They served him by himself, and them by themselves, and the Egyptians who ate with him by themselves, because the Egyptians could not eat with the Hebrews, for that is an abomination to the Egyptians.

It is unclear if this practice is being presented as a general feature in Egyptian culture or relegated to the upper echelons of Egyptian society. This feature could be attributed to the Egyptian disdain for shepherds: “Gen 46:33…for every shepherd is an abomination to the Egyptians”, but Pharaoh doesn’t seem to associate the Hebrews as shepherds in the very passage in which this disdain is described. This feature could also be attributed to the dietary practices of the Egyptians. Herodotus records that in the 5th century BC that Egyptians would not share meals with those who ate cattle.

Another option is that the Hebrews might have had a specific history with deep cultural connotations. In The Mythology of All Races: Semitic, Vol V, historian Stephan Hebert Langdon describes what he sees as the origins of the Hebrew race as well as the historic identification of their God.

The Hebrew deity El, whose character as a Sun-god has been repeatedly mentioned, and whose name occurs also quite regularly in the plural Elohim, but employed as a singular, is the god of the Habiru, a people who appear in various kingdoms and local city dynasties of Babylonia and Assyria from the twenty-second century until the Cassite period, among the Hittites, and as an invading warlike tribe in Syria, Phoenicia, and Canaan in the fifteenth and fourteenth centuries. I am entering upon debatable ground here when I assume that the Habiru and their god Ilani (plural always written ideographically) are identical with the Hebrews and their god Elohim. There seems to be no doubt at all but that this is the case; every argument against it has been specious and without conviction. Accepting this thesis, the Hebrews had served for six centuries as mercenary soldiers and traders among the Babylonians, Assyrians, Hittites, Mitannians, and Aramaeans before they entered and occupied Canaan and, granted that their persistent use of ilani Habiri, ” the Habiru gods,” is, in reality, a singular like the Hebrew Elohim, it follows that it is identical with the Hebrew god El, Elah, Elohim. Phoenician also uses the word “gods” as a singular.

Langdon paints the Hebrews as a warrior race, used as mercenaries and who shared ideas about God with the surrounding cultures. He locates them as ancient as the 20th century BC. In this passage, Langdon pays particular attention to how in Semitic religion plural nouns were commonly used of gods and kings:

This is a common usage among Canaanitish scribes of the period of the Habiru invasions into Syria and Palestine. So, for example, Shuwardata of Kelte calls Pharaoh, ” my god and my sun,” in the text actually ” my gods and my Shamash.” A man of Qadesh in Northern Syria writes to Pharaoh attributing his defeat of the invading Habiru to the fact that ” his godhead ” and ” sunship ” went before his face. Here the plural ilanu is used as an abstract noun, as is also the word ” god Shamash.” In Hittite the Habirite god is called Hani Habiriyas, Habiries, ” Habirite gods. That the Habirites, or, as I assume, the Hebrews, in the days of their wanderings in Babylonia, from the days of Abraham ” the Hebrew ” and Hammurabi (Amraphel), had a deity known to the peoples with whom they came into contact as “the Hebrew god,” is proved by a list of nine gods and goddesses worshipped in the temple of Adad at the old capital of Assyria, in a text at least as old as the twelfth century. Here the singular, ilu Habiru occurs, which I take to mean not ” god Habiru,” but ” Habirite god,” or, if ilu is here, as in Hani Habiri, a specific name of a deity, i.e., El, the ” Habirite El.” The genitive and accusative of this gentilic word is Habiri and the nominative plural should be Hani Habiru or the ” Hebrew Elohim ” in the texts of the Hittite capital, Boghazkeui.

The Hebrews worshiped El, associated with both the plural “Elohim” and, within the Bible, the proper name “Yahweh”. In Josiah 22:22, this association is explicit. Mark Smith translates this passage as follows: “God [El] of gods [Elohim] is Yahweh. God [El] of gods [Elohim] is Yahweh…” El and Yahweh are used interchangeably in this fashion within the Bible, often within the same passage.

According to the Bible, the proper name of God had not always been known to the world. Genesis 4 records a distinct time the name of Yahweh came of use:

Gen 4:26 To Seth also a son was born, and he called his name Enosh. At that time people began to call upon the name of the LORD [Yahweh].

Although “people began to call on the name of Yahweh”, some early Hebrews may not have adopted this use. The book of Exodus recounts that the patriarchs knew Yahweh as “El Shadday” (the “Shadday” is an enigmatic term much like the curious Greek conception of Zeus who holds the “aegis” ). The patriarchs did not know Yahweh by His proper name:

Exo 6:2 God spoke to Moses and said to him, “I am the LORD [Yahweh].
Exo 6:3 I appeared to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, as God Almighty [El Shadday], but by my name the LORD I did not make myself known to them.

These features might suggest that although Israel (a specific subset of Hebrews) might not have used the name Yahweh, other Semitic tribes might have adopted the use. In Lewis Bayles Paton’s The Origin of Yahweh-Worship in Israel: II, the author describes some evidence that Yahweh was worshiped outside of Israel:

2. There is considerable evidence that Yahweh was known to other ancient peoples besides Israel. Delitzsch and other Assyriologists believe that the name occurs in documents of the first dynasty of Babylon (ca. 2300-2200 B. C.). This claim is disputed, so that it is better not to press the argument. Other evidence is clearer. A son of the king of Hamath in the time of David bore the name Yoram (Joram). This is certainly a compound with Yahweh. Three hundred years later a king of Hamath mentioned in the annals of Sargon, King of Assyria, bore the name of Ya-ubi’di, which is paraphrased elsewhere as Ilu-ubi’di. This also is unquestionably a Yahweh compound. In 739 B. C. Tiglath-Pileser III fought against a certain Azriyau (Azariah), king of Ya’udi, whose capitol was Kullani in northern Syria. This name is a Yahweh-compound of a familiar Hebrew type. Tobiah and Jehohanan, the Ammonites, mentioned in Neh. 4:3; 6:18, bear Yahweh-names. In all these cases it is arbitrary to assume that these theophorous names are due to a spread of the Hebrew religion in foreign countries. Of proselyting before the exile there is not the slightest evidence. It is more likely that Yahweh was known to other Semitic peoples besides Israel.

John Day adds in his Yahweh and the Gods and Goddesses of Canaan:

Most scholars who have written on the subject during recent decades support the idea that Yahweh had his origins outside the land of Israel to the south, in the area of Midian (cf. Judg. 5.4-5; Deut. 33.2; Hab. 3.3, 7)… Also, the epithet ‘Yahweh of Teman’ in one of the Kuntillet ‘Ajrud inscriptions fits in with this. References to the Shasu Yahweh in Egyptian texts alongside the Shasu Seir may also be cited in support. Though M.C. Astour has questioned this, claiming that the reference was not to Seir in Edom but to Sarara in Syria, on balance, however, the Egyptian Scrr still seems more likely to be a slip for S ‘r (Seir) than the name Sarara.

It is rational to assume that Yahweh was worshiped outside of Israel. This would make sense of the tension between Genesis 4 and Exodus 6, although the evidence is not solid. While references to Yahweh are found almost entirely in the Hebrew Bible, the name of El was common among the Semites. Most notable was the chief god of the Canaanites in the Baal Cycle. In the Baal cycle, El sits supreme. The other gods approach El to request permission to act. El is the creator of all.

The words “under El” which were put in brackets in my initial definition of the thrust of the cycle are here vitally important. But how can El be greater than the Baal who after his palace has been built calls himself “he that is king over the gods, that indeed fattens gods and men, that satisfies the multitudes of earth” (4 VII 49-52) or the Baal whom both Anat and Athirat in trying to persuade El to let him have a palace speak of as “our king, our ruler, over whom there is none” (3 V 32 = CT A 3 E 40-41; 4 IV 43-44)? And yet El has to be approached for permission to build the palace, and the fact is that for all that Anat threatens him with physical violence if he does not accede to Baal’s request, El is able to refuse it and the help of his consort Athirat has to be enlisted before he can be made to change his mind. In spite of Baal’s title as king it is not really in doubt, then, that El is in charge of the universe. He, not Baal, is the creator god of the pantheon, the “creator of creatures” (4 III 32; 6 III 5), the “father of mankind” (not in the Baal texts but see, in the Keret epic, 14 I 37), and the “father of years”, i.e. controller of the course of time (4 IV 24; 6 I 36). The title “bull” is always used with the first of these phrases and the title “king” with the third of them. Perhaps the most revealing reference is that contained in the speeches of Anat and Athirat just mentioned when, immediately after they have called Baal their king, they present Baal’s appeal to “the king who installed him” (3 V 36 = CT A 3 E 44; 4 IV 48) 13

The text both describes Baal’s supremacy and also shows that El is supreme over Baal, illustrating common idiomatic speech. Attributes, even incomparability, have their limits. Even in the Bible, Yahweh’s incomparability is found in passages specifically comparing Him to others. This flexibility in characteristics is evident in the text.

Mark Smith describes some other attributes shared between the Canaanite El and the Biblical Yahweh:

In Israel the characteristics and epithets of El became part of the repertoire of descriptions of Yahweh. In both texts and iconography, El is an elderly bearded figure enthroned, sometimes before individual deities (KTU 1.3 V; 1.4 IV-V), sometimes before the divine council (KTU 1.2 I), known by a variety of expressions; this feature is attested also in Phoenician inscriptions (KAI 4:4-5; 14:9, 22; 26 A III 19; 27:12; cf. KTU 1.4 III 14). In KTU 1.10 III 6 El is called drd, “ageless one,” and in KTU 1.3 V and 1.4 V, Anat and Asherah both affirm the eternity of his wisdom. His eternity is also expressed in his epithet, ‘ab šnm, “father of years.” In KTU 1.4 V 3-4 Asherah addresses El: “You are great, O El, and indeed, wise; your hoary beard instructs you” (rbt ‘ilm lḥkmt šbt dqnk ltsrk). Anat’s threats in 1.3 V 24-25 and 1.18 I 11-12 likewise mention El’s gray beard. Similarly, Yahweh is described as the aged patriarchal god (Ps. 102:28; Job 36:26; Isa. 40:28; cf. Ps. 90:10; Isa. 57:15; Hab. 3:6; Dan. 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; Isa. 6:1-8; cf. Pss. 29:1-2; 82:1; 89:5-8; Isa. 14:13; Jer. 23:18, 22; Zechariah 3; Dan. 3:25). Later biblical texts continued the long tradition of aged Yahweh enthroned before the heavenly hosts. Daniel 7:9-14, 22, describes a bearded 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,” qaddîšê ’elyônîn (cf. 2 Esdras 2:42-48; Revelation 7). This description for the angelic hosts derives from the older usage of Hebrew qĕdōšîm, “holy ones,” for the divine council (Ps. 89:6; Hos. 12:1; Zech. 14:5; cf. KAI 4:5, 7; 14:9, 22; 27:12). The tradition of the enthroned bearded god appears also in a Persian period coin marked yhd, “Yehud.” The iconography belongs to a god, apparently Yahweh.

The overlap between Semitic religions is apparent and not surprising. Israelite religion is not a unique enlightened religion among primitive religions. Instead, these religions share cultures and pantheons. The question of Israelite worship is not “what type of god” they will worship, but which particular god they will worship. The attributes of Yahweh are meant to set Him apart as uniquely worthy of worship rather than to paint Him as an entirely different type of being altogether.

Yahweh is not particularly exclusive to Israel, either. Other nations worship El, and the identification with El with Yahweh puts worshipers of El as accepted believers. Even within the Bible, foreign priests of El appear as true believers. The most famous example is that of Melchizedek. He was a: “He was priest of God Most High.” This title elyon El is used of the Canaanite El. The book of Hebrews portrays this priesthood in an approving manner.

Another foreign priest is Moses’ father-in-law, Jethro, who is described as a “priest of Midian” in several passages. His daughter, Zipporah, appears intimately familiar with circumcision rites in Exodus 4:25. She appears to know who Yahweh is and what Yahweh wants, which is likely as result of growing up in a priestly house. Furthermore Jethro performs a benediction in Exodus 18 towards Yahweh:

Exo 18:10 Jethro said, “Blessed be the LORD, who has delivered you out of the hand of the Egyptians and out of the hand of Pharaoh and has delivered the people from under the hand of the Egyptians.
Exo 18:11 Now I know that the LORD is greater than all gods, because in this affair they dealt arrogantly with the people.”

Given this evidence, Jethro could have held Yahweh as a god or the primary God in his priestly duties. He is not condemned, but accepted, in the texts which he appears.

…

[to be continued]

From THE STORY OF SI-NUHE, Ancient Near Eastern Texts Relating to the Old Testament

“Well, of course, his son has entered
into the palace and has taken the inheritance of his
father. Moreover, he is a god without his peer. There
is no other who surpasses him. He is a master of understanding,
effective in plans and beneficent of decrees.
Going forth and coming back are in conformance with
his command. He it was who subdued the foreign
countries while his father was in his palace, and he
reported to him that what had been charged to him had
been carried out How joyful is this land which he
has ruled!

From The Hymn to the Aton, Ancient Near Eastern Texts Relating to the Old Testament

How manifold it is, what thou hast made!
They are hidden from the face (of man).
O sole god, like whom there is no other!
Thou didst create the world according to thy desire,
Whilst thou wert alone:
All men, cattle, and wild beasts,
Whatever is on earth, going upon (its) feet,
And what is on high, flying with its wings.

From The Hymn to Enlil, from Ancient Near Eastern Texts Relating to the Old Testament:

Enlil whose command is far-reaching, lofty his word (and) holy,
Whose pronouncement is unchangeable, who decrees destinies unto the distant future,
Whose lifted eye scans the land,
Whose lifted beam searches the heart of all the land—When Father Enlil seats himself broadly on the holy dais, on the lofty dais,
When Nunamnir [another name for Enlil] carries out to supreme perfection lordship
and kingship,
The earth-gods bow down willingly before him, The Anunna humble themselves before him, Stand by faithfully in accordance with (their) instructions.
The great (and) mighty lord, supreme in heaven (and) earth, the all-knowing one who understands the judgement,
…
When in his awesomeness he decrees the fates,
No god dares look at him,
…
Not (even) a god can behold your countenance.
…
Who are the judge (and) decision-maker of the universe
Your noble word is as weighty as heaven, you know no opposition,
…
The lofty one, whose words are firmly grounded,
Whose command and favor are unalterable,
Whose pronouncements is all enduring,
Whose plans “confirm the word”—
Oh Great Mountain Enlil, exalted is your praise.

What I have tried to show in this chapter is that contempt for the human condition and hatred for the body was a disease endemic in the entire culture of the period [first few centuries CE]; that while its more extreme manifestations are mainly Christian or Gnostic, its symptoms show themselves in a milder form in pagans of purely Hellenistic education; and that this disease found expression in a wide variety of myths and fantasies, some drawn from Greek, others from oriental originals (often with a changed meaning or a changed emphasis), while others again are apparently new.

E. R. Dodd, Pagan and Christian in an Age of Anxiety

‘I come now, Balbus, to the philosophers of your school.* Zeno* proposes that the law of nature is divine, with the power of enjoining what is right and of forbidding the opposite. How he lends life to this law—and we certainly require a god to be a living creature—we fail to understand. He also says elsewhere that the upper air is god; but can we fathom a god which is without feeling, a god which never confronts us in our prayers, aspirations, or vows? 36 ‘In other books he states his belief that there is a kind of reason which pervades the whole of nature and is endowed with divine power. This same power he assigns also to the stars, and to the years and months and changing complexion of the years. In interpreting Hesiod’s Theogony* (which means ‘The Birth of the Gods’), he dispenses totally with customary notions of the gods. He does not regard Jupiter, Juno, Vesta, or deities similarly named as among the company of the gods, but teaches that these names by a sort of symbolism have been pinned on things without life and speech.

Cicero. The Nature of the Gods (Oxford World’s Classics) (p. 16). OUP Oxford. Kindle Edition.

From The Community Rule:

From the God of knowledge stems all there is and all there shall be. Before they existed he made all their plans and when they came into being they will execute all their works in compliance with his instructions, according to his glorious design without altering anything. In his hand are the laws of all things and he supports them in all their needs. He created man to rule the world and placed within him two spirits so that he would walk with them until the moment of his visitation: they are the spirits of truth and of deceit. In the hand of the Prince of Lights is dominion over all the sons of justice; they walk on paths of light. And in the hand of the Angel of Darkness is total dominion over the sons of deceit; they walk on paths of darkness. Due to the Angel of Darkness all the sons of justice stray, and all their sins, their iniquities, their failings and their mutinous deeds are under his dominion in compliance with the mysteries of God, until his moment; and all their punishments and their periods of grief are caused by the dominion of his enmity; and all the spirits of their lot cause the sons of light to fall. However, the God of Israel and the angel of his truth assist all the sons of light. He created the spirits of light and of darkness and on them established all his deeds [on their p]aths all his labors ‘and on their paths [all] his [labors.]”. God loved one of them for all eternal ages and in all his deeds he takes pleasure for ever; of the other one he detests his advice and hates all his paths forever.

…

In agreement with man’s birthright in justice and in truth, so he abhors injustice; and according to his share in the lot of injustice he acts irreverently in it and abhors the truth. For God has sorted them into equal parts until the appointed end and the new creation. He knows the result of his deeds for all times [everlas]ting and has given them as a legacy to the sons of men so that they know good [and evil], so they decide the lot of every living being in compliance with the spirit there is in him [at the time of] the visitation.

ATTICUS fr. 9, quoted from his book ‘against those who interpret Plato through Aristotle’ at Eusebius, Preparation
for the Gospel 15.13.1–5

The thoughts [noēmata] of god are prior to things: they are incorporeal and intelligible paradigms of what comes to be. They are always and in all ways the same, existing pre-eminently and principally, but are contributory causes of every other thing’s being the kind of thing it is, each according to its similarity with them. So Plato perceived things that are not easily seen, nor even capable of being clearly explained in words; and he dealt with them as far as it was possible to speak and think about them, and to prepare those who were to follow on afterwards. He arranged the whole of his philosophy with this in view: he says that in these things and their understanding are rooted wisdom and knowledge, through which comes the human end and the most blessed form of life.

From On Not-Time:

In ‘Greco-Roman-Christian’ thought time is mechanistic.33 At some undefined or semi-defined point in the past it began at some point in the future usually thought of as infinity it will (may) end and the person is at some median point-a one-dimensional vector progressing with measurable and constant velocity.34 Time is a principle part of Western Martial culture. Graves defined “’Time’ is our method of measuring the intervals between events”.35 This idea looks at the mechanism; as the end product of the enquiry system. Compare Rabbi Nahman’s view with purely mechanistic Graves’ or with that of the novelist Charles Morgan (“The Fountain”; c. 1932) who said “It is not time that passes away from them but they who recede from the constancy the immutability of time…” These are the themes concerning time in Western thought: mechanistic, constancy, immutability, vectorial. While in Hebrew language and Jewish philosophy we see ideas of control, subjectivity use of time as a tool. Indeed the difference of view of time between the two cultures is vast, but quite different from what has been described by Shirts, Thienhous et al.

Tablet 1
[Ea]
Ea, the all-wise, saw through their scheme. (60)

[Nudimmud]
Anu begot in his image Nudimmud.
This Nudimmud was of his fathers the master;
Of broad wisdom, understanding, mighty in strength,

[Marduk]
He rendered him perfect and endowed him with a double godhead.
Greatly exalted was he above them, exceeding throughout.
Perfect were his members beyond comprehension,
Unsuited for understanding, difficult to perceive.
Four were his eyes, four were his ears;
When he moved his lips, fire blazed forth.
Large were all four hearing organs,
And the eyes, in like number, scanned all things.

[Tiamat]
Mother Hubur, she who fashions all things,
Added matchless weapons, bore monster-serpents,

[Tiamat to Kingu, who are later defeated by Marduk and the Tablet of Destinies transferred (x4)]
Your utterance shall prevail over all the Anunnaki! She has given him the Tablet of Destinies, [fastened on his breast]: As for you, your command shall be [unchangeable, your word shall endure]!

Tablet 2
[Tiamat (x3)]
Her decrees are firm, they are beyond resisting.

[Anshar to Anu]
“My son, you who knows all wisdom,

[Anu, before his failed attempt against Tiamat, Nudimmud, before his failed attempt against Tiamat]
Let my word, instead of you, determine the fates.
What I may bring into being shall be unalterable;
The command of my lips shall be neither recalled nor changed.”

[The lessor gods]
All the great gods who decree the fates. (130)

Tablet 3

[Marduk]
Let my word, instead of you, determine the fates. (120)
Unalterable shall be what I may bring into being;
Neither recalled nor changed shall be the command of my lips!’
Now hasten here and promptly fix for him your decrees,

Tablet 4
[Marduk, before attacking Tiamat]
“You are the most honored of the great gods,
Your decree is unrivaled, you command is Anu.
You, Marduk, are the most honored of the great gods,
Your decree is unrivaled, your word is Anu.
From this day your pronouncement shall be unchangeable.
To raise or bring low–these shall be in your hand.
Your utterance shall be true, your command shall be unimpeachable.
No one among the gods shall transgress your bounds!
Adornment being wanted for the seats of the gods,
Let the place of their shrines ever be in your place.
O Marduk, you are indeed our avenger.
We have granted you kingship over the universe entire.
When you sit in Assembly your word shall be supreme.
Your weapons shall not fail; they shall smash your foes!
O lord, spare the life of him who trusts you,
But pour out the life of the god who seized evil.”

Tablet VII

[Marduk, who is Tutu]
Truly, he is supreme in the Assembly of the gods;
No one among the gods is his equal.
Tutu is Ziukkinna, life of the host of the gods,
Who established for the gods the holy heavens;
Who keeps a hold on their ways, determines their courses;
He shall not be forgotten by the beclouded. Let them

[Marduk, who is Shazu]
Shazu, who knows the heart of the gods,
Who examines the inside;
From whom the evildoer cannot escape;
Who sets up the Assembly of the gods, gladdens their hearts;
Who subdues the insubmissive; their wide-spread protection;
Who directs justice, roots out crooked talk,
Who wrong and right in his place keeps apart. (40)

[Marduk, who is Aranunna]
Aranunna, counselor of Ea, creator of the gods, his fathers,
Whose princely ways no god whatever can equal.

[Marduk]
Aside from him no god knows the answer as to their days.

Epilogue
[Marduk]
Let him rejoice in Marduk, the Enlil of the gods,
That his land may be fertile and that he may prosper. (150)
Firm in his order, his command unalterable,
The utterance of his mouth no god shall change.
When he looks he does not turn away his neck;
When he is angry, no god can withstand his wrath.
His heart is unfathomable, his purpose is broad,

Clement of Rome is one of the earliest Church Fathers, student of, perhaps, Peter. His writings sound Open-Theistic. His idea is that God actively watches the world and sees everything we are doing. This is not a “timeless” knowledge, but an active scanning. God is “receiving” information, which Calvinists claim God cannot do. We also have Clement encouraging people to reform their ways to avoid judgement. The future is not set, but open.

1Clem 27:5
Who shall say unto Him, What hast thou done? or who shall resist
the might of His strength? When He listeth, and as He listeth, He
will do all things; and nothing shall pass away of those things that
He hath decreed.
1Clem 27:6
All things are in His sight, and nothing escapeth His counsel,
1Clem 27:7
seeing that The heavens declare the glory of God, and the firmament
proclaimeth His handiwork. Day uttereth word unto day, and night
proclaimeth knowledge unto night; and there are neither words nor
speeches, whose voices are not heard.
1Clem 28:1
Since therefore all things are seen and heard, let us fear Him and
forsake the abominable lusts of evil works, that we maybe shielded by
His mercy from the coming judgments.
1Clem 28:2
For where can any of us escape from His strong hand? And what world
will receive any of them that desert from His service?

From the Manual of Discipline:

All that is and ever was comes from a God of knowledge. Before things came into existence He determined the plan of them; and when they fill their appointed roles, it is in accordance with His glorious design that they discharge their functions. Nothing can be changed. In His hand lies the government of all things. God it is that sustains them in their needs.