The expression in a hymn to Ishtar that "she has a beard like the god Ashur" may be satisfactorily explained as an astrological statement, the meaning of which is that the planet Dilbat (Ishtar, Venus) at certain times equals the sun (represented by Ashur) in brilliancy, her rays being likened to a beard.[741] A similar astrological interpretation is offered by Jastrow of a passage (to which attention was called by François Lenormant) in which a female Dilbat and a male Dilbat are spoken of. Other astrological texts indicate that the terms 'male' and 'female' are employed as expressions of greater or less brilliancy.[742] Lajard's view, that all Babylonian and Assyrian deities were androgynous, hardly needs discussion now.[743]
+409+. Of a more definite character are expressions in two Phoenician inscriptions. In an inscription of Eshmunazzar II (probably early in the fourth century B.C.) the great goddess of Sidon is called "Ashtart _Shem_ Baal."[744] The word _shem_ means 'name,' and, if it be so interpreted as to give the goddess the name of a male divinity, she may be understood to have partly male form. But such change of name is hardly probable, and this is not necessarily the natural force of the phrase. In Hebrew to "call one's name on a person or thing" is to assert ownership in it or close connection with it.[745] In the West Semitic area some personal names signify simply 'name of such and such a deity,' as, for example, Shemuel (Samuel), 'name of El,' Shemzebul, 'name of (the god) Zebul,' denoting devotion or subordination to the deity in question. "Shem Baal" as a title of Ashtart may then indicate her close relation with the god, or, perhaps, if the expression be understood more broadly, her equality with him in power (the name of a deity involves his attributes)--he was the great god, but she, the expression would say, is not less mighty than he; or, less probably, _baal_ may be taken not as proper name but as title, the sense then being that the goddess is the lord of the city.[746] Another proposal is to read "Ashtart shamē Baal," 'Ashtart of the heaven [sky] of Baal.'[747] There is a Phoenician Baal-shamem, 'lord of the sky,' but nowhere else is the sky described as the abode of a baal, and the transference of the local city-goddess to that region would be strange; nor in the expression 'Baal-shamem' is Baal a proper name--it is merely a title.