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If, for example, the Canaanite Baals are gods or lords of underground irrigation, this is because they, as divine lords of the particular regions, control all phenomena; they are, in fact, also gods of rain and thunderstorms, harvests and war. So rain-gods in general are to be regarded as local deities, among whose functions that of bestowing rain was regarded as specially important.
A fire-god, wind- and rain-gods, and the serpent hostile to man, on whom these made war, are common to both countries. The institution of sacrifice, in which the deities are served with offerings and with hymns, is markedly alike in both countries.
The same thing is true, perhaps, of Zeus and Jupiter in their character of rain-gods as all-sufficient divine patrons they would be dispensers of all blessings, including rain; they seem, however, to have been originally gods of the sky, and thus naturally the special guardians of rain. +316+. Great masses of water have given rise to myths, mostly cosmogonic.
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