Bull of Bashan

Scripture references: Numbers 29:12–34; Psalm 22:12; 68:30; Amos 4:1; Ezekiel 39:18; Isaiah 34:7

Bashan and its cattle, Bashan is the broad, fertile plateau east of the Jordan River and south of Damascus, in what is now the Golan Heights and southern Syria. Its basalt-rich soil and abundant rainfall produce exceptional grass and grain. The cattle of Bashan, fed on this rich pasture, were the finest, largest, best-developed cattle in the ancient Near East. "The bulls of Bashan" (abirei Bashan, literally "strong ones of Bashan") was a known expression for power, size, and well-fed aggression. The Bashan cattle knew no shortage; they were the apex of bovine development.

Strong bulls encircle, Psalm 22:12, "Many bulls encompass me; strong bulls of Bashan surround me; they open wide their mouths at me, like a ravening and roaring lion." Psalm 22 is the psalm Jesus quotes from the cross: "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" (Matthew 27:46; Mark 15:34). The bulls of Bashan encircling the sufferer are the image of the most powerful available enemies, well-fed, aggressive, surrounding without exit, opening their mouths. They are then compared to a ravening lion, the encirclement of the best-fed bulls and the hunger of the lion combined in one image of surrounded violence. The same psalm includes the "dogs" (verse 16), the "sword" (verse 20), and the piercing of hands and feet (verse 16). The bulls of Bashan are the enemies who surround Jesus at the cross.

Cows of Bashan, Amos 4:1, "Hear this word, you cows of Bashan, who are on the mountain of Samaria, who oppress the poor, who crush the needy, who say to your husbands, 'Bring, that we may drink!'" Amos addresses the wealthy women of Samaria directly as cows of Bashan, the same rich-pasture cattle, now applied to the indulgent class whose satisfaction is purchased at the cost of the poor they oppress. The term is deliberately degrading: the women of Samaria are treated as the well-fed Bashan cattle who demand more feeding ("bring that we may drink"). Their judgment: they will be taken away with hooks.

The bull-sacrifice calendar, Numbers 29:12–34, The Feast of Booths (Sukkot) has the most elaborate sacrifice calendar in the Torah. On the first day: 13 bulls, 2 rams, 14 male lambs. Each subsequent day: one fewer bull, down to 7 bulls on the seventh day. The total: 70 bulls over seven days. The rabbinic tradition interprets the 70 bulls as corresponding to the 70 nations of the world (Genesis 10), Israel offering sacrifices on behalf of the nations at Sukkot. The descending bull count (13, 12, 11, 10, 9, 8, 7) is numerically structured in a way unique in the Torah's calendar.

Eschatological feast, Ezekiel 39:18; Isaiah 34:7, Ezekiel 39:18: "You shall eat the flesh of the mighty, and drink the blood of the princes of the earth, of rams, of lambs, and of he-goats, of bulls, all of them fat beasts of Bashan." The fat beasts of Bashan appear in the eschatological reversal: the Bashan cattle are served at YHWH's great feast for the birds and beasts. Isaiah 34:7: "Wild oxen shall fall with them, and young steers with the mighty bulls." The bulls of Bashan at the end of the age.

The bulls of Bashan are the Scripture's image of well-fed, powerful encirclement, circling Psalm 22's sufferer who is Jesus on the cross, rebuked in Amos as the Samaria women who oppress the poor, counted in the Sukkot calendar's 70 bulls offered for the nations, and served at YHWH's eschatological feast. The Sanctum holds them as Canon-tier: from "many bulls encompass me" to the fat beasts of Bashan at the age's end.