Babylonian Cosmogony
The Babylonian Myth of Creation; few creation myths are more replete with interest than those which have literary sanction. These are few in number as, for example, the creation story in Genesis, those to be found in Egyptian papyri, and that contained in the ‘Popol vuh’ of the Maya of Central America. In such an account we can trace the creation story from the dim conception of world-shaping to the polished and final effort of a priestly caste to give a theological interpretation to the intentions of the creative deity; and this is perhaps more the case with the creation myth which had its rise among the old ‘Akkadian’ population of Babylonian than with any other known to mythic science. In the account in Genesis of the framing of the world it has been discovered that two different versions have been fused to form a single story.
The Gilgamesh Epic
It is probable that the materials of the Gilgamesh epic, the great mythological poem of Babylonia, originally belonged to the older epoch. Thus a tablet dated 2100 B.C contains a variant of the deluge story interested in the XIth tablet of the Gilgamesh epic. In the remote Sumerian period, perhaps this and other portions of the epic existed in oral tradition before they were committed to writing. Ashurbanipal was an enthusiastic and practical patron of literature. In this great library at Nineveh (the nucleus of which had been taken from Calah by Sennacherib) he had gathered a vast collection of volumes, clay tablets and papyri; most of which had been carried as spoil from conquered lands. He also employed scribes to copy older texts, and this is evidently how the existing edition of the Gilgamesh epic came to be written.
Eabani
The most important of the various mythological strata underlying the Gilgamesh myth is probably that concerning Eabani; who, as has been said, is a type of primitive man, living amongst the beasts of the field as one of themselves. However he is also, according to certain authorities, a form of the sun-god even as Gilgamesh himself. The transfer of power, from Ea to Merodach, however was skilfully arranged by the priesthood, for they made Merdach the son of Ea, so that he would naturally inherit his father’s attributes. In this transfer we observe the passing of the supremacy of the city of Eridu to that of Babyloia. Ea or Oannes, the fish-tailed god of Eridu, stood for the older and more southerly civilisation of the Babylonian race, whilst Merodach, patron god of Babylon, a very different type of deity,
represented the newer political power. Strange as it will appear, although he was patron god of Babylon, he did not originate in that city, but in Eridu, the city of Ea, and probably this is the reason why he was first regarded as the son of Ea. He is also directly associated with the Shamash, the chief sun-god of the later pantheon, and is often addressed as the god of canals, and opener of subterranean fountains; in appearance he is usually drawn with tongues of fire proceeding from his person, thus indicating the solar character. At other times he is represented as standing above the watery deep, with a horned creature at his feet, which also occasionally surface to symbolise Ea. It is noteworthy too, that his temple at Babylon bore the same name E-Sagila, their lofty house, as did Ea’s sanctuary at Eridu. We find among the cuneiform texts a copy of an older Babylonian text an interesting little poem which shows how Merodach attracted the attributes of the other gods to himself.
Ea is the Marduk (or Merodach) of canal,
Ninib is the Marduk of strength,
Nergal is the Marduk of war,
Zamama is the Marduk of battle,
Enlil is the Murduk of Sovereignty and control,
Nebo is the Marduk of passion,
Sin is the Marduk of illumination of the night,
Shamash is the Marduk of judgement,
Adad is the Marduk of rain,
Tishpak is the Marduk of the host,
Gal is the Marduk of strength,
Shukamunu is the Marduk of the harvest;
This would seem as if Merodach had absorbed the characteristics of all the other gods of any importance so successfully that he had almost established his position as the sole deity in Babylonia, and that therefore some degree of monotheism had been arrived at.
Merodach’s ideograph is the sun, and there is abundant evidence that he was first and last a solar god. The name, originally Amaruduk, probably signifies the young steer of days, which seems to be a figure for the morning sun. He was called Asari, which may be compared with the Asar, the Egyptian name of Osiris. Here we can see the similarities between Sumerian-Babylonian and Egyptian civilisations.
Sargon, born in concealment and sent adrift like Moses, like in an ark of Bulrushes on the waters of the Euphrates, whence he was rescued and brought up by on Akki (an Akkidian), a husbandman.
The older bel, the Chief seat of his worshiper was at Nippur, where the name of his temple, E-kur or mountain-house, came to be applied to a sanctuary all over Babylonia. When we first encounter the Babylonian civilisation, we find it grouped round about two nuclei, Nippur in the North and Eridu in the south. The first had grown up around a sanctuary of god-Enlil, who held sway over the ghostly animistic spirits which at his bidding might pose as the friends or enemies of men. A more ‘civilised’ deity held sway at Eridu, which was the home of Ea or Oannes, the god of light and wisdom, who exercised his knowledge of the healing art for the benefit of his votaries.
The ancient Sumerian city of Eridu, which means ‘on the sea shore’, was invested in great sanctity from the earliest of times, and Ea/Eabani (Eabe); the great magician of the gods, “was invoked by workers of spells, the priestly magicians of historic Babylonia. The mythological spell exercise by Eridu in later times suggests that the civilisation of Sumeria owed much to the worshipers of Eabani (Eabe or Eebow). At the sacred city the first man was created: there the souls of the dead passed towards the great deep, its proximity to the sea- Ea was Nin-Bubu, “god of the sailor;” may have brought it into contact with other people and other early civilisations. Like the early Egyptians, the early Sumerians may have been in touch with Punt=Somali people, which some regard as the cradle of Mediterranean race. The Egyptians obtained from the sacred land incense-bearing trees, which had magical potency. In a fragmentary Babylonian charm there is a reference to a sacred tree or bush at Eridu.
Professor Sayce has suggested that it is the biblical “tree of life” in the Garden of Eden. His translations of certain vital words, however is sharply questions by Mr R Campbell Thompson of British Museum, who does not accept the theory. It may be that Ea’s sacred bush or tree is a survival of tree and water worship. If Eridu was not the cradle of the Sumerian race, it was possibly the cradle of Sumerian civilisation. [1]
[1]: Myths and Legends of Babylonia and Assyria
Along with En-lil and Ea, Anu makes up universal triad. He is called the ‘Father’ but appears to be of the Gods; descended from still older deities. His name is seldom discovered in the inscriptions prior to the time of Khammurabi, but such notices as occur of him seem to have already fixed his position as ruler of the sky. His cult was specially associated with the city of Erech. It is probable that in the earliest days he had been the original Sumerian sky-father, as his name is merely a form of the Sumerian word for heaven. This idea is associated by the manner in which his name is originally written in the inscriptions as the symbol signifying it is usually that employed for ‘heaven’. It is plain, therefore, that Anu was once regarded as the expanse of heaven itself, just as are the ‘sky-fathers’ of numerous primitive people. Several writers who deal with Anu appear to be of the opinion that a God of the heaven is an abstraction, popular fancy.
BA (see Egyptian myth, KA)
Baal (see dying Gods, Phoenician myth)
Many Canaanite fertility-gods were called Baal (Lord) before the Baal, Lord of thunder and rain, assumed their god which, as with the Hebrew deity Yahweh, could be pronounced only by initiates and under exceptional circumstances with his chief temple at tyre, his worship entered Israel via Jezehel (jeze-baal), Ahab’s wife, but Elijah had all the prophets of baal slaini Yahweh triumphed, temples to baal-hammon, lord of the altar of incense were popular from carthage to pallmyra. The Babylonian Belmardule may be associated, or maybe a masculinisation of the Sumerian goddess Belili. Connection with the British Bel (or Belinas) is unsure though the celtic may day festival of Beltane fire of Bel is suggestive.
Baal’s father was El, or Dagon. His wife (and mother) was anat. Later Astarte, defeating the sea-god Yam. Baal denied the authority of mot, his brother, Lord of the arid desert, also spirit of the harvest. Mot invested Baal to the land of the dead, and would not revive him. Anat killed Mot burning, grinding and scattering his members on the over the fields. Baal and Mot were duly resurrected, fighting an annual stalemate which ended only when \el dismissed Mot, leaving Baal in sole authority. The fecund god of rainfall and vegetation overcoming the parched, harvest plains. Babel tower of (nimrod) Genesis XI 1-9 tells how men tried to build the tower of babel, so high that from its summit they could assault heaven itself. The work went well, for all men spoke the same language. To confound it, Yahweh cursed the so all began babbling in different tongues, and split into seventy hostile nations, scattering over the face of the earth.
The name babel is commonly derived bab-ili, gate of god. The biblical account says this tower was built in the land of shinar the prophet micah calls Assyria the land of nimrod – in Hebrew Lore the name of the evil king who ordered the tower to be built. Others have identified it with the ziggurat esagilla in Babylon itself. The myths seeks to account for the dispersal of humanity into different nations and languages, similarly a Sumerian legend tell how the god Ea diversified language, so ending the golden age. (The myth and legends, S. Gordon, Pg 47-48
Babylonian myth (concordance)
About 3500 BC or earlier the Sumerian culture developed in mesopatamian desert and marsh lands adjacent to the Persian gulf land fertilised by the rivers tigris and Euphrates. Here arose the first states – Lagashm Kish and Eridu, sippar and uruk. Here too writing developed. Pictographs embraced on tablets of baked clay led to the wage shaped cuniform script. Babylon (bab-ili, gate of the gods, or gate of the gods; babel) was one such city state, though prominent only after the accession c. 2200 BC of the first dynasty. By the era of Hammurabi (1792-1750 BC; famed for his code of civil law). Babylon epitomised a new culture and, amid the waves of semitic invasion. Yet Sumerian texts survived, being now interweaved with akkadian translation.
Thus Babylonian ( and Assyrian) myths remained much as first expressed by the Sumerians, not least as all mesopotomiam culture relied whatever the era-on the fertility of the land between the two rivers. Yet shifts in attitude arose from historical conflicts shaping the politics of the region. The Babylonian creation epic Enuma Elish (from its opening words: when on hish...) agrees with the Sumerians that the gods created man to serve them, and in return for which service they renew the world each day – but the nature and status of earlier god changed. The Sumerian Ea, Lord of the deep, creator of all things, is known in Babylon, but now bows to babylons champion marduk (Bel-Marduk), slayer of the dragon Tiamat. Enlil city god of nippur and a powerful Sumerian deity retains name and status in the Assyirio-Babylonian pantheon, but the fearful aspect of his elemental nature is emphasised. Yet the names of shamash (sun-god), Sin(moon-god), Nergal(God of the death and the underworld), Ishtar(love-goddess, consort of tammuz and the Babylonian version of the Sumerian inanna) are not semitic, but Sumerian.
And though the epic of Gilgamesh was found the library of the Assyrian emperor Ashurbanipal (668-627 BC), the tale remains Sumerian from the third millennium BC. The cultural continuity remains. Our problem is that we deal not with centuries but with millennia. Between the earliest Sumerian city states and hammurabi’s Babylon lie at least 1200 years: and again 1200 from Hammurabi to the Jewish captivity. In Europe, 1200 years ago, Charlamagne was crowned. Before the birth of Alexander the great, Babylon the great was already a memory, 2400 years ago. King Nebuchadnezzar (d. 562 BC) and Belshazzar his son (d. 539 BC), to whom Daniel interpreted the writing on the wall just before Cyrus the Persian seized Babylon, precede Alexander by as many years as napoleon precedes the last decade of the twentieth century. But mythic memory endures. Before the Gulf war Saddam Hussein of Iraq was attempting to restore this city and its empire rebuilding the walls of ancient Babylon.
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