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The Procession of the Bull Apis by Frederick Arthur Bridgman, oil on canvas, 1879. Cattle are prominent in some religions and mythologies. As such, numerous peoples throughout the world have at one point in time honored bulls as sacred. In the Sumerian religion, Marduk is the "bull of Utu". In Hinduism, Shiva's steed is Nandi, the Bull.
Bull worship was common in many cultures. In Egypt, whence according to the Exodus narrative, the Israelites had recently come, the bull-god Apis was a comparable object of worship. Some believe Yahweh, the national god of the Israelites, was associated with or pictured as a sacred bull through the process of religious assimilation and ...
In ancient Egyptian religion, Apis or Hapis, [a] alternatively spelled Hapi-ankh, was a sacred bull or multiple sacred bulls [1] worshiped in the Memphis region, identified as the son of Hathor, a primary deity in the pantheon of ancient Egypt. Initially, he was assigned a significant role in her worship, being sacrificed and reborn.
Some Egyptian cities kept sacred bulls that were said to be incarnations of divine powers, including the Mnevis bull, Buchis bull, and the Apis bull, which was regarded as a manifestation of the god Ptah and was the most important sacred animal in Egypt. Cows were connected with fertility and motherhood.
The Serapeum of Saqqara was the ancient Egyptian burial place for sacred bulls of the Apis cult at Memphis.It was believed that the bulls were incarnations of the god Ptah, which would become immortal after death as Osiris-Apis, a name which evolved to Serapis (Σέραπις) in the Hellenistic period, and Userhapi (ⲟⲩⲥⲉⲣϩⲁⲡⲓ) in Coptic.
Especially patronised by Ptolemy VI who was born in the same year as this bull and was referred to as "twin of the living Apis upon their birth-brick." [5] Tahor: 164 BC: 21 July 143 BC: Pagereghor, Athribis: Ptolemy VIII's titulature closely associated him with this bull. [6] Gerege II: 18 February 142 BC: 8 September 119 BC: Temple of Ptah ...
The earliest known Israelite place of worship is a 12th-century open-air altar in the hills of Samaria featuring a bronze bull reminiscent of the Canaanite El-bull. [18] Early Israel was a society of rural villages, but in time urban centers grew up and society became more structured and complex. [ 23 ]
The bull was portrayed as Adad/Iškur's sacred animal starting in the Old Babylonian period [18] (early 2nd millennium BCE). Adad/Iškur's consort (both in early Sumerian and the much later Assyrian texts) was the grain goddess Shala, who is also sometimes associated with the god Dagānu. She was also called Gubarra in the earliest texts.