The Grandfather of the Hebrew Bible (and What Is Zion?)

In 1929, a farmer in French-occupied Syria hit a rock with his plow and accidentally uncovered the lost city of Ugarit — and with it, a library of Bronze Age tablets that has been quietly reshaping how scholars read the Hebrew Bible ever since. This week, we're diving into the Baal Cycle: an elderly patriarchal high god named El, a youthful storm-riding warrior who fights the chaotic sea (and then, memorably, drinks him), a goddess who winnows Death himself like grain, and a whole pantheon that ought to look awfully familiar. Then, in History's Mysteries, we tackle a word Dan B has used his entire life without ever quite knowing what it means: Zion. Where did it come from, why does it seem to start out as a dry rocky stronghold, and how did it stretch into a portable, symbolic, cosmic idea that runs from Jerusalem all the way to Jackson County, Missouri? Support Data Over Dogma and get every episode early and ad-free, plus exclusive bonus content — become a patron: https://www.patreon.com/DataOverDogma Get your Data Over Dogma merch at our online store: https://data-over-dogma-shop.fourthwall.com/ Watch every episode on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@dataoverdogma Follow us: Instagram — https://www.instagram.com/dataoverdogmapod TikTok — https://www.tiktok.com/@data.over.dogma.pod Threads — https://www.threads.com/@dataoverdogmapod X — https://x.com/data_over_dogma Facebook — https://www.facebook.com/DataOverDogmaPod Get Dan McClellan's New York Times bestselling book, The Bible Says So: https://static.macmillan.com/static/smp/bible-says-so-9781250347466/ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices