This document is about Baal. For other homonyms, please refer to the document Baal (son of Reaiah).
Baal was the chief god of a pagan religion widely spread in Mesopotamia.
He was the god of fertility and the god who brought rain from the sky.
The idol worshipped as a pair with Baal is Asherah, who is the goddess of the earth.
That is, the concept was that when Baal brought rain from the sky, the earth goddess Asherah received it, and crops grew.
The main ritual of the sacrifice was for priestesses to have sexual relations with men in the temple with the purpose of arousing Baal's lust. This Baal worship remained in the Palestine region for a very long time and was one of the pagan religions that greatly angered God.
The main symbol is a bull or a calf, and idols were sometimes made in the form of a golden calf.