Berith

Berith is the abbreviated name for Baal-berith ("lord of the covenant"), the Canaanite deity whose temple at Shechem plays a pivotal role in the narrative of Abimelech in Judges 9. After Gideon's death the people of Shechem "went whoring after the Baals and made Baal-berith their god" (Judges 8:33). The temple of Berith at Shechem served as the city's treasury: Abimelech received seventy pieces of silver from "the house of Baal-berith" to fund his campaign to murder his seventy brothers and seize sole rule (Judges 9:4). The funding of fratricide from a god's treasury is presented as emblematic of Shechem's moral corruption.

The deity's name combines baal (lord) with berith (covenant), suggesting a god who presided over treaty-making or alliances in Canaanite religious practice. Later in the same chapter (Judges 9:46), when Abimelech attacked Shechem, the citizens took refuge "in the stronghold of the house of El-berith" — the same deity under a variant title. Abimelech burned the stronghold with its occupants inside, fulfilling the curse of Jotham's parable of the thornbush king (Judges 9:20). The destruction of the Berith temple stands as the judgment on Shechem's apostasy and illustrates the self-destructive consequences of political and religious compromise with Canaanite cult.