DAGON dā’ gŏn (דָּגﯴן, H1837, from דָּגָן, H1841, “grain”). The god Dagon is associated in the OT with the Philistines (1 Chron 10:10), particularly in the centers Gaza (Judg 16:23) and Ashdod (1 Sam 5:2-7). For a brief period the Ark of God was captured by the Philistines and deposited in Dagon’s temple in Ashdod (1 Sam 5). The presence of the Ark in the same sanctuary with the idol of Dagon gave rise to a series of judgments on the idol including the severing of its hands and head. In a remarkably similar manner the Philistine capture of Samson, the man of God, brought disaster to the temple of Dagon in Gaza (Judg 16:23ff). Because of his association in the OT with Philistines who live by the sea and because of the popular etymology of Dagon (deriving it from dag “fish”) it has been argued that the god Dagon was a sea god. Extra-Biblical evidence does not favor this view, nor does the correct etymology (deriving Dagon from dagan “grain”). Dagon under his Amorite form Dagan was venerated from before 2000 b.c. His temple in Ugarit has been dated to c. 2000 b.c., and he was widely worshiped among Amorites in Mesopotamia in the age of Hammurabi of Babylon and the kingdom of Mari (c. 1850-1750 b.c.). During the Amarna Age (c. 1500-1200 b.c.) Dagon was venerated as a grain god at Ugarit and was considered to be the father of the chief god Baal-Hadd. C. H. Gordon has claimed that the divine name Daguna (= Dagon) appears in Minoan Linear A tablets on Crete c. 1500 b.c. The popularity of Dagon in Pal. during the Late Bronze Age is attested both by personal names of Palestinian princes (Dagan-takala in El Amarna tablets) and the spread of place names such as Beth-Dagon, of which there were at least three: (1) in Judah (Josh 15:41), (2) near Joppa (Annals of Sennacherib), and (3) in Asher (19:27). In Mesopotamia Dagon’s consort was the goddess Shala, who was possibly of Hurrian extraction. In the Old Babylonian period in the region of Mari, Dagon was considered the father of the storm god, just as at Ugarit Baal the storm god is “son of Dagon.” In this same Middle Euphrates region Dagon bore the epithet “King of the Land,” under which epithet the ziqqurat of Mari was dedicated to him. In the Babylonian god list An: Anum Dagon is equated with Enlil, the god of the wind. In Pal. he appears to have yielded place as a vegetation fertility god in some locales to Baal, but have held his own against Baal in others. See Philistines.

Bibliography H. Schmökel, Der Gott Degan (diss. Heidelberg, 1928); Reallexikon der Assyriologie II, 99-101; E. Dhorme, “Les avatars du dieu Dagan,” RHR 138 (1950), 129-144; H. W. Haussig (ed.), Wörterbuch der Mythologie I/1, 49ff. (D. O. Edzard), 276ff. (M. H. Pope).