Mot

Mot is Death personified, a mythic power in Israelite poetry continuous with the Ugaritic god Motu. He is the insatiable swallower whose throat stretches to the netherworld: Death and Sheol open their jaws and enlarge their appetite to gulp down the multitude, and personified Death climbs in through the windows to cut off children in the streets. He is called the Firstborn of Death, whose disease consumes the limbs of the wicked. In the tradition's forward-looking hope Yahweh confronts and defeats him, promising to ransom his people from the power of Sheol and to swallow up Death itself forever, an inversion of Mot's own devouring appetite.

Domains

• death
• underworld

Powers

• swallows the living into his throat
• climbs in through the windows to seize victims

Epithets

• בְּכוֹר מָוֶת — the Firstborn of DeathHebrew Bible, Job 18:13 (primary)

Relations

• enemy: YahwehYahweh is proclaimed the one who will swallow up Death forever and ransom his people from its power.Hebrew Bible, Isaiah 25:8; Hosea 13:14 (primary)

Sources

• Death appears in Israelite poetry as a personified power, Mot, continuous with the Ugaritic god of death, insatiably devouring the living.: Hebrew Bible, Isaiah 5:14; 25:8; Hosea 13:14; Habakkuk 2:5; Job 18:13 (primary); John Day, Yahweh and the Gods and Goddesses of Canaan (2000) (secondary)