Baalbek
1:
BA´ALBEK (bāʹal-bek; Gk. Heliopolis, “city of the sun,” but distinct from three other sites whose names also have reference to the sun: Beth-shemesh, no. 4; the City of Destruction [Ir-hahares, KJV]; and On [all which see]).A popular ancient center of the worship of Baal in the region between Lebanon and Anti-Lebanon or “Hollow-Syria.” Later called Heliopolis when the Greeks associated Helios with Baal. It is fifty-three miles E of Beirut and is to be distinguished from a city in Egypt, On (which see), that is also sometimes called Heliopolis. The site may be identical with Baal-gad “in the valley of Lebanon at the foot of Mount Hermon” (Josh. 11:17). Greek architectural skill and Rome’s resources were lavished on Baalbek and its immense and beautiful temples. The temple complex was probably begun as early as the reign of Augustus (27 b.c.-a.d. 14), and construction continued there for a couple of centuries.
A worshiper entered the acropolis area through a tower-flanked propylaea 165 feet wide, passed through a hexagonal court and a great altar court, and finally ascended a magnificent stairway to the temple of Jupiter. Six of its Corinthian columns still stand to a height of 65 feet, tallest in the Greco-Roman world. Adjacent to the temple of Jupiter on the south and at a lower level is the temple of Bacchus with a peristyle of 46 columns 57 feet high. Beautifully preserved, it is the best surviving example of a Roman temple interior. East of the acropolis was a round temple, probably erected to Venus, constructed about a.d. 250. A German archaeological team began serious work at the site in 1900, and French and Lebanese efforts continued there intermittently until hostilities forced termination in 1975. The Baalbek complex is the most magnificent example of pagan worship and architecture in the Middle East. m.f.u.; h.f.v.
bibliography: F. Ragette, Baalbek (1980).
Unger, M. F., Harrison, R. K., Vos, H. F., Barber, C. J., & Unger, M. F. (1988). The new Unger's Bible dictionary. Revision of: Unger's Bible dictionary. 3rd ed. c1966. (Rev. and updated ed.). Chicago: Moody Press.
2:
Baalbek (bahlʹbek), a city located in the Beqaa Valley of Lebanon. It is the site of Roman Heliopolis and the ruins of temples for the triad of Jupiter, Mercury, and Venus (this is not the Heliopolis of Jer. 43:13, which was the Egyptian city of On). The Heliopolitan cult of Jupiter, Venus, and Mercury at Baalbek, which was an adaptation of one of the older Semitic gods Hadad, Atargatis, and Baal, became widespread throughout the Roman Empire.
Achtemeier, P. J., Harper & Row, P., & Society of Biblical Literature. (1985). Harper's Bible dictionary. Includes index. (1st ed.) (85). San Francisco: Harper & Row.
3:
Baalbek
A town situated near the source of the Orontes River, on the eastern edge of the fertile Beqa˓a Valley. Baalbek was named Heliopolis by the Greeks after the classical sun-deity, who was identified with Baal during the Hellenistic period. The Semitic name indicates an earlier occupation or shrine, but no evidence for pre-Hellenistic occupation has been found.
The city was the cultic center of the so-called Heliopolitan triad: Jupiter (Zeus) Heliopolitanus, Mercury (Hermes), and Venus (Aphrodite). Their syncretic Semitic counterparts were Baal with Jupiter and Atargatis with Venus; the local equivalent of Mercury remains problematic. One of the city’s temples is depicted on late 2nd/early 3rd-century a.d. coins.
The visible architectural remains date to the Roman period and include a major temple complex with a large staircase and ceremonial gateway leading through a hexagonal court into a vast courtyard. Pools of water flanked a central altar. West of the courtyard was the Jupiter temple, placed on a rectangular platform that raised it above the surrounding buildings. South of the Jupiter temple is the so-called temple of Bacchus, although it may have been dedicated to Venus. Late in the 4th century a Christian basilica replaced the central altar, and a mosque was placed west of the temple of Bacchus after the Arab conquest. Not far from the acropolis is a quarry where stone for the temples was prepared.
Thomas W. Davis
Freedman, D. N., Myers, A. C., & Beck, A. B. (2000). Eerdmans dictionary of the Bible (135). Grand Rapids, Mich.: W.B. Eerdmans.
