BEL, or Belus, the supreme god of the ancient Chaldeans or Babylonians. He was the founder of the Babylonian empire; and is supposed to be the Nimrod of Scripture, and the same as the Phœnician Baal. This god had a temple erected to him in the city of Babylon, on the very uppermost range of the famous tower of Babel, or Babylon, wherein were many statues of this deity; and one, among the rest, of massy gold, 40 feet high. The whole furniture of this magnificent temple was of the same metal, and valued at 800 talents of gold.—This temple, with its riches, was in being till the time of Xerxes, who, returning from his unfortunate expedition into Greece, demolished it, and carried off the immense wealth which it contained. It was the statue of this god which Nebuchadnezzar, being returned to Babylon after the end of the Jewish war, set up and dedicated in the plain of Dura; the story of which is related at large in the third chapter of Daniel.