I. Name

By far the most common biblical Hebrew word for ‘moon’ or ‘Moon-god’ is yārēaḥ, which appears 27 or 28 times in the OT. In 24 instances and in several Jewish pseudepigraphic and apocryphal works, yārēaḥ repeatedly appears in combination with šemeš, ‘sun’ or ‘Sun-god’ (Shemesh). Its derivative yeraḥ occurs with the calendrical meaning ‘month’ and is also attested in early inscriptional Hebrew (cf. the Gezer calendar and Arad ostracon 20). The only biblical text where the reading yārēaḥ has been contested is Deut. 33…