Asher @ happy, Jacob's eigth son; his mother was Zilpah, Leah's handmaid Genesis:30:13). Of the tribe founded by him nothing is recorded beyond its holding a place in the list of the tribes (35:26; 46:17; Exodus:1:4, etc.) It increased in numbers twenty-nine percent, during the thirty-eight years' wanderings. The place of this tribe during the march through the desert was between Dan and Naphtali Numbers:2:27). The boundaries of the inheritance given to it, which contained some of the richest soil in Palestine, and the names of its towns, are recorded in Joshua:19:24-31; Judges:1:31-32. Asher and Simeon were the only tribes west of the Jordan which furnished no hero or judge for the nation. Anna the prophetess was of this tribe Luke:2:36).
Asherah @ and pl. Asherim in Revised Version, instead of "grove" and "groves" of the Authorized Version. This was the name of a sensual Canaanitish goddess Astarte, the feminine of the Assyrian Ishtar. Its symbol was the stem of a tree deprived of its boughs, and rudely shaped into an image, and planted in the ground. Such religious symbols ("groves") are frequently alluded to in Scripture Exodus:34:13; Judges:6:25; 2Kings:23:6; kjvKings:16:33, etc.). These images were also sometimes made of silver or of carved stone ( 2Kings:21:7; "the graven image of Asherah," R.V.). (See GROVE [1].).
