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Persephone. The latter association implies some connection with fertility and the agricul-
tural cycle. In this aspect, she is sometimes confused with Al- ’Uzza.
Al- ’Uzza is ultimately traceable to Inanna/ Ishtar, the great goddess of ancient
Mesopotamia. In Sasanid Iraq in the sixth century, she was worshipped by several names,
including Nanai (Inanna) and Ishtar, and she was also syncretized with the goddess Anahit
in Persia. As Dlibat Ishtar she was identified with the planet Venus. According to Michael
Morony, the epithet applied to Dlibat Ishtar meant “passionate,” which evokes the ancient
Akadian epithet ezzu (“raging”) originally applied to Ishtar. Ezzu then became the Arabic
name Al- ’Uzza for the planet Venus (az- Zuhra).^25
Al- ’Uzza was probably worshipped first by the Sabaeans of Yemen, who identified her
with the planet Venus. The Nabataeans of Petra, now in Jordan, conflated her with Isis and
Atargatis (the local goddess of fertility—especially the life- engendering power of water
and soil), as well as other Hellenistic goddesses. Carved into the façade of the Treasury
Building at Petra, dating to 131 ad, are several female figures representing different god-
desses or aspects of a single goddess, Al’Uzza/ Atargatis/ Isis. Although they are severely
worn, it is still evident that they hold cornucopias and are decorated with ears of wheat,
representing agricultural abundance. At the Nabataean temple of Khirbet et- Tannur, a
similar image of Al’Uzza/ Atargatis/ Isis appears against a background of leaves, flowers,
fruit, and grain, suggesting a relationship to Ceres.^26 However, in the ninth- century Book
of Idols by Hisham ibn Muhammad ibn al- Kalbi (discussed in the next section), Al- ’Uzza,
like Asherah, is characterized as a goddess of trees. Her shrines were typically located in
sacred groves at the center of which stood three trees where an epiphany of the goddess
descending from heaven was supposed to occur. The sacred groves of Al- ’Uzza were tended
by a priest and priestess.Al- ’Uzza: Goddess of Date Palms
As we have seen, the worship of date palms, or their aniconic equivalents in the form of
posts or pillars, was a feature of the cult of Asherah as described in the Hebrew Bible, and
the date palm continued to be revered as a sacred tree by diaspora Jews after the fall of
the Second Temple in 70 ce. In the Ethiopian Book of Enoch, the prophet Enoch flies to
Paradise and discovers that the Tree of Life is a date palm.
Arab worship of date palms can also be traced back at least as far as the first century ad,
when the Greek historian Diodorus provided the following description of a religious sanc-
tuary in a date palm oasis located in the Sinai:Directly after the innermost recess [of the northwest coast] is a region along the sea
which is especially honored by the natives because of the advantage which accrues
from it to them. It is called the Palm- grove and contains a multitude of trees of this
kind which are exceedingly fruitful and contribute in an unusual degree to enjoy-
ment and luxury. But all the country round about is lacking in springs of water and
is fiery hot because it slopes to the south; accordingly, it was a natural thing that the
barbarians made sacred the place which was full of trees and, lying as it did in the
midst of a region utterly desolate, supplied their food. And indeed not a few springs
and streams of water gush forth there, which do not yield to snow in coldness; and