This word translates the Hebrew bama (sg.) or bamoth (plural). The basic meaning of the word is a place of prominence on a hill. Many of the occurrences of the word in the OT may, therefore, indicate just such a secular usage, i.e., prominence on a hill rather than the pagan sites most Christians have come to associate with the word. But, since pagan cultic places were located on natural heights, the term came also to refer to any kind of non-Jewish shrine or sanctuary. In many of the passages where the word occurs it may be difficult to decide whether a secular meaning or a cultic one is intended. As a guide, we suggest that, where no cultic activities are specified (as in Num 21:28; Deut 32:13; 1 Sam 9:14; Amos 4:13) we should take the word to mean a hilly prominence and not insist that it was a pagan shrine.
The bama - the circular stone structure (center) - at Megiddo
Cultic high places, where ancient Israel's neighbour worshipped and offered sacrifices, attract considerable attention from the prophets and historicans of the OT, with their voices directed mainly in two directions. The first is their consistent condemnation of such places and the call to destroy them; this is nowhere more insistently voiced than in the injunction of Deut 12:2-4 (even though the word bamoth is not specifically used):
"Destroy completely all the places on the high mountains and on the hills and under every spreading tree where the nations you are dispossessing worship their gods. Break down their altars, smash their sacred stones and burn their Asherah poles in the fire; cut down the idols of their gods and wipe out their names from those places. You must not worship the LORD your God in their way.
The second is the consistent note of recognition that ancient Israel was not very successful in obeying the injunction but was repeatedly drawn in by the allure of the high places. Solomon set the royal example, and the historians directed one of the sharpest criticism of the practice at the king, "Solomon showed his love for the LORD by walking according to the statutes of his father David, except that he offered sacrifices and burned incense on the high places" (1 Ki 3:3). No one could have missed his presence at Gibeon, "the most important high place" where he offered up a thousand burnt offerings on that altar (1 Ki 3:4). There is a note of resigned acceptance in the biblical histories that, practically, until the temple was built, it was difficult to stop people from sacrificing at the high places ("the people, however, were still sacrificing at the high places, because a temple had not yet been built for the Name of the Lord" 1 Ki 3:2). Besides, for many years after their occupation of the land, the tabernacle of God was kept at the high place at Gibeon (1 Chron 21:29). But not only can one not miss the sigh of failure in the recurring phrase "the high places, however, were not removed" in her history (1 Ki 22:42; 2 Ki 12:3; 14:4; 15:4; 15:35; 2 Chron 20:33), but the very active and deliberate establishment of the high places at Bethel and the appointments of priests to them by Jeroboam ben Nebat would introduce the other recurring phrase in her history with regards to the high places, i.e., "the ways of Jeroboam and his sin, which he caused Israel to commit" (1 Ki 13:34; 15:34; 16:2, 19, 26; 21:22; 22:52; 2 Ki 17:21; 23:15). That attraction and the failure to act decisively with regards to the high places led Israel and Judah into a syncretism hateful to Yahweh that slowly but surely took them in the direction of her exile from the land.
You may also wish to read the following: Asherah poles, sacred stones.
Further Reading & Resources:
☰ John T. Whitney, "'Bamoth' in the Old Testament," Tyndale Bulletin 30 (1979): 125-147.
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