In Egypt, Babylonia and Assyria numerous deities of varying rank were venerated by the people. Bes, himself, in spite of his subordinate position in the pantheon was a favourite among all Egyptians outside the more elevated classes. The popular beings, like the popular religious ideas, are not to be found in royal inscriptions or temple-hymns. The state and the priesthood often refused to recognise them, but they are to be found not rarely among the {97} personal names of ordinary individuals. This probably holds true also of Palestine, and consequently we must not suppose that the influence of foreigners upon the _popular_ cults of the land is to be ignored or that the more honourable names which we have been noticing were the sole claimants to the worship of the peasantry.[5] [5] Comp. M. Jastrow, _Religion Babyloniens und Assyriens_, i. p. 164 _sq._; H. P. Smith, 'Theophorous Proper Names in the Old Testament,' in _O. T. and Semitic Studies in memory of William Rainey Harper_, i. _pp._ 35-64 (Chicago, 1908). {98} CHAPTER VIII CONTEMPORARY THOUGHT--CONCLUSION +Miscellaneous Ideas.+--Although the native literature of our period consists almost entirely of the begging-letters and reports in the Amarna Tablets, yet even from the language addressed to the human representative of the Sun-God, we may gain some idea of the intellectual environment, some hints, it may be, suggestive of the religious thought of the age.[1] The Egyptian monarch is addressed not only as king of lands, king of battle but as a god (pp. 63, 78). His commands are as powerful as the Sun (Shamash) in Heaven; he is like the Sun which rises over the lands every day, and, as for the rising of the Sun in Heaven, so the writers await the words which come from his mouth. They keep the king's command day and night and acknowledge that the king will curse {99} the man who does not serve him. He who hearkens not to the word of the king, his lord, his city and house go to ruin, and his name will not be in the land for ever; but (says the writer, the king of Tyre) the servant who hearkens to his lord, his city and house flourish, and his name is unto eternity, 'for thou art the Sun which rises over me and the wall of bronze which is lifted up for me.' [1] It need hardly be remarked that the paragraphs classifying the more interesting ideas in the letters from Palestine and Syria have been made as literal as possible.