I. Name
Ashima was the god worshipped by the people of Hamath, who after their deportation to Samaria by the Assyrian king, continued to serve him in their new home (2 Kgs. 17.30).
II. Identity
The name of the god, in its Biblical form, has been recovered only from the context of Arab tribes at Teima; in a dedicatory inscription from Teima, ʾšymʾ is invoked, along with the gods ṣlm and šnglʾ (See Livingstone 1983; Beyer & Livingstone 1987). This attestation is somewhat surprising if the primary associat…