The answer is BAAL, four letters. IDOL fits the same four squares and appears almost as often, so a single crossing letter normally settles which the grid wants. Longer slots open onto MOLOCH, MAMMON and DAGON, and each of those responds to a different shade of the wording.
Baal was a title before it was a name
In the Northwest Semitic languages, baal is an everyday noun meaning lord, master or owner. Communities across the Levant attached it to whichever deity was theirs, which is why the Hebrew Bible so often uses the plural form, and why place-bound versions exist such as Baal of Peor or Baal-zebub of Ekron. Treating the word as one proper name is a later convenience rather than an ancient fact.
The figure best documented behind the title is a storm and rain god, and the evidence comes from clay tablets recovered at Ras Shamra on the Syrian coast, site of the Bronze Age city of Ugarit. Digging began there in the late 1920s and produced a long poetic cycle in which Baal contends with Yam, the sea, and with Mot, death itself. The same element survives inside Carthaginian personal names, Hannibal and Hasdrubal among them.
Who the longer entries belong to
MOLOCH, six squares, is named in connection with child sacrifice, and Milton placed him at the head of the fallen angels in Paradise Lost, which is what keeps the name in literary circulation. DAGON, five, belonged to the Philistines in the biblical account, where a statue of him topples inside his own temple at Ashdod, though the god is attested much earlier in Mesopotamian records. MAMMON, six, is not a deity at all. The word derives from an Aramaic term for wealth or property, and it acquired a personality only when medieval writers dressed the abstraction up as a demon of greed.
Every candidate, sorted by square count
| Letters | Answer | Reading it serves |
|---|---|---|
| 4 | BAAL | A named Canaanite deity |
| 4 | IDOL | The category of misplaced worship |
| 5 | DAGON | Philistine and Mesopotamian, less frequent |
| 6 | MOLOCH | Sacrifice mentioned in the surface |
| 6 | MAMMON | Wealth or money in the surface |
Working out which half of the wording is live
This clue functions because English lets the phrase do two jobs at once. It can point at a specific named deity that some source text rejects, sending you to BAAL, DAGON or MOLOCH. It can equally describe the class of anything wrongly worshipped, sending you to IDOL or MAMMON. Nothing on the surface announces which reading is active.
Two habits help. American grids favor the four-letter pair, because short biblical fill is standard there, so with four blanks you are choosing between BAAL and IDOL and very little else. British and cryptic setters use MAMMON more freely, usually planting a money word somewhere in the surface as a nudge. And the near-twin wording graven image nearly always wants IDOL, since it describes a manufactured object rather than naming anybody.
Setters recycle a small pool of surfaces for these entries:
- Object of misplaced worship
- Golden calf, for one
- Canaanite storm deity
- Graven image
- Greed, personified
Frequently asked questions
What is the answer to the false god crossword clue?
BAAL, four letters, is the usual entry, with IDOL as the direct rival at the same length. BAAL names a specific Canaanite storm deity, while IDOL covers the general category of anything wrongly worshipped. One crossing letter almost always separates the two.
Was Baal one god or many?
The word is an ordinary Northwest Semitic noun meaning lord or master, and communities across the Levant applied it to their own local deity. That is why the Hebrew Bible uses the plural and why place-linked forms such as Baal of Peor exist. Behind the title stands a storm and rain god documented at Ugarit.
When would MAMMON be the answer?
When money or greed appears anywhere in the surface reading. Mammon was never a deity: the word comes from an Aramaic term for wealth or property, and medieval writers turned that abstraction into a demon. It takes six squares, the same as MOLOCH, so the crossings decide between them.
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