ARAMEAN DEITIES.

The very few inscriptions that provide information about the Aramean religion during the 8th, 7th, and 6th centuries BC record only the religious feelings of the ruling class. No indication of what kind of religious life of the commoners might have been is ever found. The understanding of the ancient Near Eastern religion comes down to a listing of names, with occasional glimpses as to what a given deity must have meant in concrete terms to an individual.
Associations of powers from gods of various origins are frequent in the epigraphic texts as a result of confederacies in which different clans or groups would invoke their respective entities in order to warrant their mutual commitments. In this respect 'the stele of Zakkur' and the treaties concluded by Matiel, an Aramean king of Arpad, deserve special attention.
Zakkur was king of Hamath and Luath. Hostilities in this Northern part of Syria reached a dramatic point at the beginning of the 8th century. The inscription informs that Zakkur, a usurper, erected the stele for his god, Ilmer, and to express appreciation for Beelshamen's help in delivering him from his many Aramean enemies. The inscription states that Zakkur lifted his hands to the god Beelshamen, and the entity spoke to him through seers and messengers saying:"Fear not, because it was I who made you king."The two entities are mentioned again, along with Shamash and Sahar, on the right face of the stele. Ilwer is the Aramaic spelling of the ancient Mesopotamian name Ilmer, a storm god who came to be assimilated into Hadad. Beelshamen (Phoenician Baalshamim) is an epitet, meaning "lord or power of the heavens." Hadad was worshiped by the Arameans in the Syrian hinterland, and Beelshamen by the Phoenicians on the Mediterranean coast. The association of the entities could have been intended as a powerful move in order to gain to Zakkur's side the alliance of Western people.
Treaties concluded by Aramean rulers point to the active role that unseen entities played in daily life, since they were always invoked to witness the treaties, and their divine curses were called on in the event that there be any violation of the clauses. Matiel, the Aramean king of Beit Gusi, of which Arpad, some 19 miles North of Aleppo, was the capital, concluded a treaty with Ash'Ur'Nirari V. To ensure it against possible violations, the Assyrian king summoned the gods to curse Matiel "should he sin against the treaty." Sin and Hadad were called on in this particular manner:
"May the great lord Sin who dwells in Harran, clothe Mati'Ilu, his sons, his officials, and the people of his land in leprosy as in a cloak so that they have to roam the open country, and may he have no mercy on them ...May Hadad put an end on Mati'Ilu, his land and the people of his land through hunger, want, and famine, so that they eat the flesh of their sons and daughters and it taste as good to them as the flesh of spring lambs. May they be deprived of Adad's thunder so that rain be denied to them. Let dust be their food, pitch their ointment, donkey's urine their drink, rushes their clothing, let their sleeping place be in the corners of walls."
The city of Hamath was located on the Orontes River, along important trade routes, 81km/50mi inland from the Mediterranean, about 190km/118mi North of Damascus, and about 120km/75mi South of Aleppo. The oldest account of Hamath in the Scripture tells how the 12 Israelites spies came up from the South as far as "the entering in of Hamath,"referring to the Southern boundary of the territory. It was to this limit that Joshua's conquest was pushed Northward.
Toi (Tou) king of Hamath sent his son Joram(Hadoram)to congratulate King David for having defeated their common enemy Hadad'Ezer. Hamath was then an independent kingdom (2 Samuel 8:3,9,10; 1Ch. 18:3,9,10). However, during Solomon's reign the kingdom of Hamath was under Israel's control, for Solomon built storage cities in that region (2 Ch. 8:3,4). After Solomon's death, Hamath was free again.
In the 9th century BC, Jeroboam II temporarily brought Hamath again under Israelite control(2K 14:28)
About this time Hamath was described as "populous Hamath" (Amos 6:2). In the 8th century BC, the city and her neighbors, including the Ten-Tribe Kingdom of Israel, were overrun by the Assyrians in their sweep to world domination. Assyria's policy was to exchange and relocate her captives, and so people of Hamath were brought in to replace inhabitants of Samaria who, in turn, were moved to Hamath and other places (2 Ki 12:24; 19:12,13; Isa 10:9-11; 37:12,13). In the high places of Samaria, the people of Hamath then set up images of their god Ash'Ima (2 Ki. 17:29,30; 18:33,34; Isa 36:18,19)
According to an extant cuneiform inscription, after the Battle of Carchemish in 625BC (Jeremiah 46:2)
Nebuchadnezzar's forces overtook and destroyed the fleeing Egyptians in the district of Hamath.
In this same area, a few years earlier, Pharaoh Nechoh had taken King Jeho'Ahaz captive (2Ki 23:31-33). Then in 607BC, with the Fall of Jerusalem, Zedekiah and other captives were taken to Riblah in the region of Hamath, and there before his eyes Zedekiah's sons, along with other of the nobility, were put to death (2 King 25:18-21; Jeremiah 39:5,6; 52: 9,10, 24-27). Nevertheless, GOD had promised that in due time HE would restore a remnant of His captive people, including those in the land of Hamath. (Isaiah 11: 11,12)