None of the other gods is majestic in holiness, awe-inspiring in splendors, nor do they perform miracles. In my view, that is only a tease, for both are rhetorical questions, with the clear answer that there is no one like Israel’s God, YHWH. In Exodus 15:11 and following, Moses sang, “Who is like You among the gods, O YHWH? Who is like you, majestic in holiness, awe-inspiring in splendors, doer of miracles?”Īt first sight, the text seems to be acknowledging the existence of other gods. 1 The Song of the Sea is the song that Moses and the Israelites, followed by Moses’s sister Miriam, sang after the crossing of the Reed Sea. My first piece of evidence comes from Exodus 15, the Song of the Sea, which scholars generally agree is very early, perhaps dating to the very end of the second millennium B.C.E. When did the Israelites first begin to worship YHWH, refusing to worship or even recognize the existence of other deities? Was monotheism part of Israelite religious belief from the beginning, or was it an idea that developed later? While many biblical scholars view monotheism as a relatively late development within Israelite religion, I believe-based on evidence from early Israelite poetry-that the origins of biblical monotheism can be located early in Israel’s history, most likely by early in the first millennium B.C.E.

Pictured here is the reconstruction of the site’s inner sanctuary, which included altars and two standing stones, or masseboth. The well-known Iron Age temple discovered at Tel Arad in southern Israel was likely dedicated to Israel’s God YHWH.

Pharaoh akhenaten and moses