Debra Ballentine argues that “enemies defeated by the victorious warrior deities across ancient West Asian conflict traditions are not agents of “chaos” but rather agents of an alternative divine power structure” (2015, 186). In other words, “chaos” and Chaoskampf are inaccurate representations of traditions in the Hebrew Bible, as she demonstrates by analyzing the develop of the traditions for different ideological purposes. This is important because it marks an important shift in how agents of “alternative divine power structure” should be discussed.
Interestingly, Konrad Schmid, in his entry on Creation in “The Oxford Encyclopedia of the Bible and Theology” (2015 volume I, 174), describes the tehom of Genesis 1, lion in Job 38:39-40, Leviathan, crocodile, and Behemoth as “representatives of chaos”. Unfortunately such appropriation of these previous characters ignores the conflict myth consistently present through the ancient Near East that is utilized to legitimize certain ideologies through the conflict myth, a motif well explored by Ballentine.
In my view any current, and future, discussion about Chaoskampf must address the arguments of Ballentine. To do otherwise would be to do disservice to her wonderful work and dismiss it. Though perhaps it will be a challenge to leave the traditional German Chaoskampf in which so much scholarship is rooted.
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