HADAD. - Throughout ancient western Asia the god of the storm, of lightning and of rain was one of the most prominent deities of the pantheon of each of the numerous nations that inhabited it. This god was called H. by the Arameans and Adad or Addu by the Babylonians and Assyrians, while the Sumerians had the name Iškur to designate him. But other nations of those regions worshiped him under other names. He also belonged to the pantheon of the Elamites, of the Urartians (Biainei), of the Hurrians, of the Canaanites, of the Hittites and of the numerous other races of Asia Minor.
Everywhere it was believed that it was he who hurled the lightning that shatters and sets fire to the trees of the forest, who sent the rain that can be as beneficial as it is harmful, and who made the wind and the hurricane blow. Therefore he was depicted with the three-pronged thunderbolt in one hand and with the axe and the hammer in the other. He is often represented standing on the back of a bull, which was his sacred animal, since it was believed that thunder was nothing other than the bellowing of the bull of H. Among the Canaanites he was the principal god and therefore bore the name Baal, that is, "lord" par excellence. He was also the principal god among the Hittites: the Hittite Empire stood under the protection of their storm god. The Babylonians and Assyrians worshiped him especially as the god of divination, in which he was associated with the sun god Šamaš, since lightning and everything that happens in the sky constitute phenomena from which the future can be determined.
Bibliography
Giuseppe Furlani