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Mythology (Richard McLaughlin) Glossary of Mythological Terms Myths of the Ancient Near East
Home Page | Email Ritualism [Sir James Frazier (The Golden Bough)]:
Parallelism [Karl Jung (diametrically opposed to ritualism)]:
Ritualist School (Frazier): to understand a mythological story you must understand the ritual behind it Structuralist School: must know the entire body of mythology to properly understand individual myths Psychological School (Freud): psychoanalyze gods and other mythological characters Diffusionist School:
Parallelist School (Carl Jung): different groups have the same gods and motifs just because they are human -- ideas are passed on genetically through the collective unconscious There is usually a top echelon of named gods with specific roles and characteristics as well as an army of unnamed gods. Each of the top gods ordinarily has an epithet. Myths of the Ancient Near East
Home Page | Email Myths of the Ancient Near East The Ancient Near East consists of the geographical area from the Indus Valley to the Mediterranean, plus Egypt and Greece. These are the myths of the Sumerians, Babylonians, Canaanites, Egyptians, Hebrews, Persians, Christians, and Greeks. I. Persian Plateau (Persia) II. Mesopotamia (surrounded by Tigris & Euphrates Rivers) III. The Levant (Strip of land on eastern coast of the Mediterranean) IV. Anatolia (North of the Levant, modern-day Turkey) V. Iberia (Modern-day Spain) Afro-Asiatic language family: Hamitic (North Africa) and Semitic (Hebrews, Arabs, etc.) Indo-European language family: a postulated language (none found, no words known, no origin known). The Persians, for example, were an Indo-European people. c. 5000 B.C. A semitic civilization existed in Mesopotamia: the Akkadians. They were a highly civilized people. c. 4000 B.C. Sumerians conquered southern Mesopotamia and Akkadia. 1800 B.C. King Hammurabi does away with the Sumerians. Builds Hammurabi City which becomes Babylon, capital of Mesopotamia (or Babylonia). The Canaanites were inhabiting the Levant (Canaan) by 2000 B.C. c. 1300 B.C. the Assyrians conquered (northern) Mesopotamia and eventually everything. c. 600 B.C. the (Neo-) Babylonians rebel and defeat Assyria, taking over the world. 500 B.C. Neo-Babylonia falls to the Persians c. 350 B.C. Alexander the Great spreads Hellenism. The Great Ancient Near East lasts until Alexander the Great and is finished by the start of the Roman Empire. Ninurta Saves the World from Draught The Wooing of Inanna or The Courting of Inanna Inanna's Descent to the Underworld
Home Page | Email The Sumerians The Sumerian language may be a sister language to an Indo-European language. The Sumerians came up through the Persian Gulf. No one knows where they came from. They were "light-haired" (i.e., their hair was not jet black like everyone else in the region), "light-eyed" (i.e., not black-brown), "light-skinned" (i.e., olive) [They were, in other words, not an Aryan people.], hairy, short, and squatty. They invented the wheel, writing (c. 3400 B.C. they invented a stylus to write in cuneiform -- wedge-writing). All cultures of the ancient Near East used cuneiform. The Sumerians came from a mountainous countryside. They created ziggurats (step-pyramids) and used them to worship on. They made illustrated books for their myths and legends. They carved cylinder seals out of stone to roll imprints on wet clay. Sumerian priests shaved their entire bodies bald. Other men had huge beards and long wavy hair, thick eyebrows, and enormous eyes (as depicted in the artwork of the time). The eyes of statues were made of shell for the white and lapis lazuli for the iris [Possible explanation: Conquerors never want to merge with the conquered so they accentuate the differences between them in often exaggerated detail.]. The Akkadians were heavily influenced by the Sumerians -> Babylonians worshipped similar gods.
Gods of Sumer: (Babylonian equivalents noted in parentheses) Nammu, the great primeval chaotic ocean/goddess/mother figure. Archetype: Pre-Creation Chaos From Nammu, came a mountian of dry land: Anki, the "Cosmic Mountain," represented by the ziggurat. From the Cosmic Mountain came Enlil, (Lord of the Wind) God of Air, son of Anki who is both male ("An" the sky) and female ("Ki" the earth). ("An" is "Anu" in Babylonian myth). Ki -> Ninhursag (another name for Ki). An ("Anu") is the sky god, thought of as being a god, but as the sky he is a solid dome made of lapis lazuli. Since he emerged from chaos, An represents the principle of order. He becomes king of the gods. (Typically the high priest representing a god is also the king of that god's city. If two cities fought, it was believed that the two gods of those cities were also fighting each other.) "An" is a word which represents kingship -- order through unquestioned obedience to An and his high priest. An is thought of as a busy older man, king of the universe. As for Ki, Enlil returns home one day and rapes her (his mother). This union yields all living things on earth. Ki is then called the "Mother of All Living Things." An and Ki are parents of the gods. Enlil is the god of air. By separating An and Ki (through the rape of his mother), he holds them apart forever (a common archetype). He is a very powerful god and the second in command. He is characteristically unpredictable like the wind. He is a god of wisdom. He gave humanity a gift: a pickaxe. This is the symbol for agriculture (taught by Enlil). The pick side symbolizes (phallic) the rape of the virgin soil, thus the rape of Ki. Enlil eventually evolves into a god who seems to slowly replace An as king of the gods because An has become too busy with keeping the universe in balance. People begin eventually to pray to Enlil. Enki, ("Ea") "Lord of the Soil", God of Water. He is a trickster, a prankster, a liar. He loves to win. He is totally unpredictable. He is very clever. He has an advantage: he is the only god who knows magic in addition to his deified powers. This allows him to win virtually every time. But no one ever goes to him first. He is usually the third god approached. He gives to humanity the knowledge of writing (cuneiform). Written and spoken language are both closely associated with magic. Enki's tricks always catch up with him. His magic doesn't keep him out of trouble. Enki lives in the Abzu (the Abyss -- the bottom of the Euphrates). Enki is also associated with law. Trials were often performed as trials by ordeal. The accused would be thrown into the Euphrates to let Enki decide his innocence or guilt. If Enki kept him (drowning), he was guilty and considered justly punished. If Enki threw him back (survival), he must be innocent. Many men were acquitted this way. Later on, they began tying people up first before sugjecting them to this trial. Enki has a thunderbird, called Imdugud. Imdugud is considered to be the South Wind. It carries the rain on its back. It has the body of a bird and the head of a lion (to explain the roar of thunder). Enki is a patron god of artisans. (The only real raw material that existed for the Sumerians was clay. Water is needed to work with the soil and make clay. This is why Enki was known as the Lord of the Soil. The words En and Ki literally mean "Lord of the Soil.") Enki is represented with rays coming off him directed downward, symbolizing water, with fish swimming in the rays. En = "Lord of" Nin = "Lady of" (usually; it is sometimes a masculine name as well) Nanna ("Sin") is the God of the Moon. Nanna is an extremely powerful god who came from An and Ki. The moon is often portrayed as feminine, but Nanna is male. He taught the seasonal planting and harvesting, the lunar month (calendar), tides, astrology (also including astronomy). The Children of Nanna Utu ("Shamash"), the God of the Sun (a reversal of the common archetype in which the sun is considered the superior figure). The word "shamash" means "sun." (A "shamash" candle lights the menorah.) Utu is the Judge of the Gods. He is immensely wise and inescapable (because the sun is always watching). He is tremendously powerful. (Shamash is depicted giving Hammurabi the Code of Law). He is depicted as an ordinary Sumerian man, with rays coming off him, and holding either a comb (to separate the truth from the lie) or a saw (to cut through to the truth). Kur, the Underworld. "Kur" can mean three things:
Nergal, God of the Underworld. A very powerful but not very popular god. (Death and the gods related to it are not usually considered to be evil, but they are not popular.) Nergal abducts a consort from the living world (because no one likes him enough to come willingly). Her name is Ereshkigal. She becomes queen of the Underworld and pushes Nergal out of the picture. No one can come from outside the Underworld and force her in any way (a typical archetype). She is not an evil goddess; she is just unpopular. Ereshkigal cannot be fooled. She has a gatekeeper (a position of tremendous honor) called Neti. Along one side of Ereshkigal's throne room sit seven judges called the Anunaki. They are called the "Seven Judges of the Underworld." When lightning seems to come up from the ground, it is said that the Anunaki are raising their torches. Ninurta, Lord of the Plow. He is the Storm God, "Lord of the South Wind." He is thought of like Imdugud. He is also a God of War, but atypically he PREVENTS war, like a peace officer. He is the son of An and Ki and is very dear to his mother. He is the patron god of farmers and herdsmen. His herds are the clouds. Inanna, daughter of Nanna. She is also called (in Babylonian) "Ishtar." She is the goddess of fertility (in humans), of lust, and of love. She is the goddess of hate, war, and slaughter. Love between a man and a woman was considered to be a form of insanity (passion). This kind of love leads to irrational behavior. Passion is a driving emotion which cannot be overcome. To be struck by this goddess meant complete insanity. Therefore, one shouldn't make any serious decisions in this state of mind (e.g., marriage). There was therefore ample provision for divorce in Sumerian society, because it was understodd that the insanity would eventually pass. Inanna shoots barbed arrows. If one of the spouses does not wish to be divorced, it was justifiable to effect the divorce "Italian Style" (murder); this was considered a crime of passion. The passionate insanity of love was considered an acceptable defense for murder. Hate is equally passionate and powerful (e.g., Euripides's "Medea": "Love is diseased."). The worst thing that can happen to a man is to be noticed by Inanna who will immediately want to have an affair with him, after which she will kill him. If he refuses her, she will kill him anyway. She is irresistibly beautiful and totally self-centered. She always holds a grudge and never forgives. Men were always positive that women were scheming to get them and that they used magical charms to do it. (In Celtic folklore, women were said to have "cast a glamour" meaning that a woman's beauty is an illusion.) [One of the three major revolutions of civilization was the medieval advent of courtly love, when the woman became an object of adoration.] Dumuzi is the God of Fertility in Animals. Dumuzi is brash, impetuous, and he never stops talking. He is very egocentric. He eventually marries Inanna. Enkimdu is the God of Fertility in Vegetation. Enkimdu is rather shy, modest, unassuming. There are demons in these early cultures.
Myths of Sumer
Ninurta Saves the World from Draught The world was in the grips of a terrible draught. Ninurta resolves to go find Asag, face him in battle, and destroy him. He knows Asag wis hiding in Kur. Ninurta sets out to find him. Suddenly, he comes face to face with him and then turns and flees in terror. Later, Ninurta returns to face Asag in battle (this differentiates bravery and courage) and kills him. Kur reacts in horror. The Underworld water floods to the surface of the earth -- dead stagnant water that would kill everything. Ninurta is worried because he knows it's his fault. He begins to throw boulders into the fault out of which the water springs forth. He manages to build a mountain which stops the waters. The mountain is called Hursag. Ki, Ninurta's mother, sees his accomplishment and is terribly proud. As a reward, she comes down to give him her blessing. He is flattered. To return her favor, he bestows upon her an honorary name, Ninhursag, the Lady of the Mountain. Ninhursag is kind of a loner, although most gods tend to be noisy and boisterous. At one point the heat was becoming unbearable, so Ninhursag decides to plant a garden, intending to make a place she could go to for solitude and shelter from the heat. She goes to a very barren plain called Edinu. She asks Utu to help her. She asks that, as he goes through the Underworld during the night, he should break open the ground and let fresh water come forth. He does this. She plants eight plants, nurturing and tending to them. Eventually there is a huge garden which is very cool and moist. One day, An summons her to visit. She is worried that wild animals will come and destroy her garden. But Enki comes by with his prime minister Isimud. Ninhursag asks them to guard her garden in her absence, and they agree. She leaves. Later, Enki begins to get hungry. Isimud says that he should eat the fruit of the garden, but Enki declines. Isimud encourages him further. Eventually, Enki eats the entire garden -- down to the ground. Everything is gone. They leave. When Ninhursag returns, she's furious. She utters eight curses (for the eight plants), each striking a different part of the body of the culprit. Enki begins to die. His magic can't cure him. The gods are unable to help him. He realizes that he must confess. The gods bring him to Ninhursag and she forgives him (gods don't hold grudges). She has to create eight minor goddesses to cure each of the curses. [Pun is a very popular literary device throughout history - each of the 8 goddesses has a name which is a pun: Ninti, is the Lady of Life (who gives life) while her name also means Lady of the Rib (the part of Enki which she cures). Christian parallels: Examine the name of the garden. Edinu -> Eden. The taboo of eating the fruit of the garden which results in punishment. Eve is referred to as the "mother of living things." Parallel of the rib.] Archetype: The Curing of the Curse Enki lives in the Abzu. At one point, he feels that he should have a palace temple (city) for himself. He builds Eridu in the depths of the Abzu. It floats to the surface and he attaches it to the shore. Then he begins to worry because he hasn't gotten An's permission and blessing. He travels to An's city, Uruk ("Erech"). He has a great feast with much wine and beer. Enki asks An if he might build a city and if An would bless it. An grants permission and gives Enki the Seven Tablets of Law or Civilization as a blessing. Enki takes them back to his city, making his city the most important city in Mesopotamia. Later, Inanna, who shares Uruk with An, decides that she should have the greatest city and resolves to wrest the power away from Enki. She takes her prime minister Ninshubur and they sail down the Euphrates. When they arrive at Eridu, they surprise Enki. He asks them why they've come. Inanna expresses concern for him. Enki, foolishly, is flattered. He lays out a great feast in her honor. Enki drinks a lot and then says that if there is anything he can do for Inanna, she need only ask. Inanna asks to "borrow" the Seven Tablets, to which Enki agrees. She and Ninshubur take them and leave immediately. As Enki sobers, he realizes he has been duped and sends Isimud after Inanna in another boat. He catches them and asks for the tablets back. They refuse. He conjures up monsters, but the two are oblivious. They arrive in Uruk and keep the tablets. Eridu and Uruk are real cities of the ancient world < 3,000 B.C. Eridu was the greatest. Power shifted to Uruk at some point. These stories are a political allegory to explain this transfer of power. The Wooing of Inanna or The Courting of Inanna Dumuzi and Enkimdu were courting Inanna. The courtships lead to a debate. Utu, Inanna's brother, favors Dumuzi for Inanna because of his brashness. But Inanna favors Enkimdu because of his certain controllability. Dumuzi leaps up and begins boasting of his greatness. He is very persuasive and charismatic. His attempts are so convincing that Enkimdu then gets up and says, "You know, he's the one you should marry," and he leaves. Inanna takes Dumuzi to be her consort. Dumuzi later assumes Enkimdu's role as well, placing the control of all fertility between Dumuzi and Inanna. Archetype: Enmity Between the Farmer and the Herdsman
Inanna's Descent to the Underworld Inanna is ruling in Uruk. One day, she decides she ought to be ruling over a much greater realm. She decides to go to the Underworld and take it from Ereshkigal and add it to her realm. She has an idea. She dresses herself up in all of her greatest finery. She is unbelievably beautiful. She plans to stun everyone into submission. Ninshubur is worried about this plot. Inanna tells Ninshubur that if she does not return in 3 days, he should get help and rescue her. Inanna goes to Ereshkigal's gate, pounding imperiously. The gate slowly opens and Neti is there, looking a little confused. He sees Inanna and asks what she wants. She is caught off guard. Remembering her success in Eridu, she doesn't expect to be challenged. She says that she is very concerned for Ereshkigal. Neti is not deceived. He says, "Wait here, I'll ask my mistress," and closes the gate in her face. He reports to Ereshkigal, who is not pleased but decides to give Inanna a chance to tell the truth. Inanna is brought in "in the usual way." Neti opens the gate, and Inanna enters. Neti removes her tiara saying it is the law. She goes through 6 more gates and finally enters the throne room completely naked. Ereshkigal asks why she has come. Inanna holds to her lie. Ereshkigal becomes very angry. She nods to the Anunaki and they turn the eyes of death upon Inanna, turning her into a corpse. A servant comes and takes her body and hangs it up on a meathook on the wall. Meanwhile, Ninshubur is frantic. He goes to An for help. An says that he would like to help but he cannot command Ereshkigal. Ninshubur goes to Enlil, who says the same thing. He then goes to Enki, who says he'll think of something. He comes up with a fascinating plot: First, Enki creates two sexless beings out of the dirt from under his fingernails. He gives them instructions and sends them on their way. They go to the Underworld, carrying with them the Water of Life. Neti opens the gate and asks what they want. They say they are ambassadors of Enki with a message for Ereshkigal. He brings them in. Ereshkigal tells Neti to give them whatever they want and then bring them before her. They bathe, eat, and rest, then go to Ereshkigal. They say that she must release Inanna. She asks why. They say if she does not, they will hold her to the Universal Laws (a prominent archetype). One of the laws is the Law of the Host and Guest -- the guest must arrive home as safely as they arrived at the host's door. Another law: Anyone who eats and/or drinks in the Underworld may never leave (a worldwide archetype). Ereshkigal can not obey both laws unless she releases Inanna which she ends up doing. The sexless beings sprinkle the Water of Life on Inanna's body and she comes to life. Ereshkigal is not happy. She wants more than the two sexless beings, which are meaningless and expendable. She makes a demand: Inanna is to choose a real being to come down and take her place. She agrees. Ereshkigal sends two creatures with Inanna (they are sometimes called the Hounds of Hell -- they have long claws & fingers to drag their victims to the Underworld). They arrive in Uruk and Ninshubur come out to greet them. His robes are torn, his face tearstreaked. He is overjoyed to see Inanna. The Hounds want to take him, but Inanna refuses. Dumuzi comes out wearing his finest robes, assumedly in honor of Inanna's return. She says she is pleased to see how anxious he has been for her return. Dumuzi replies, "Oh, were you gone?" She gives him to the Hounds of Hell. The world turns brown because the God of Animal & Vegetable Fertility is gone. The gods get together and agree that they must get Dumuzi back. They plead with Ereshkigal, but she has fallen in love with him and doesn't want to give him up. She makes a deal to give him back every other six months, thus explaining the portion of the year when the world is fertile. Archetype: The Dying God Theme Gilgamesh in the Land of the Living
Home Page | Email The Babylonians further developed the concept of the demon called the utukku. Sumerian equivalents are shown in parentheses. The Utukku Edimmu. A being that comes into existence when someone who has died isn't given the proper funeral feast. He harangues the person who was supposed to give the funeral feast -> ("haunt"). The only way to appease him is to carry out the funeral feast properly. Shedu. Everyone has a guardian shedu. A pair guard each temple doorway. They are invisible, 35 feet tall with the body of a bull, the head of a man, and gigantic wings. The plural of shedu is shedubim (like "cherubim"). Arallu. They spread crime, disease, war, and family disunity. They will even attack the gods -- especially Sin (Nanna), the moon god. They ambush him, stuff him in a sack and he has to fight his way out (a lunar eclipse). They are all male, so they can't reproduce. They are immortal. Originally, they issued from the bile of Ea (Enki), from the stagnant water under the Kur. They have the body of a man, the head of a lion, lion's paws, huge wings, and small goat horns. The Assyrian name is Pazuzu. He does possess bodies (i.e., demonic possession) and must be exorcised. He is considered very powerful. (Modern film reference: "Exorcist II: The Heretic") Apsu and Tiamat were in the beginning and nothing else. Apsu, the male proto-god, is the fresh water (Apsu, the inanimate = Abzu). Tiamat, Apsu's consort, is the great chaotic primeval ocean and the dragon, great maternal mother goddess. They give birth to the pantheon of gods and to Muumuu, who is mist, water vapor, fog (a very weak proto-god). Muumuu hangs around the Apsu all the time as a counselor. There's nothing for them to do because there is nothing, so the gods party all the time, making so much noise that Tiamat and Apsu cannot sleep. Apsu becomes irritated and wants to kill all the gods. Muumuu encourages him. He goes to Tiamat and tells her what he wants to do. She says, "These are my children. I'm not going to help you kill them. You're just going to have to do it yourself." Apsu sends word to the other gods that he is going to kill them. They are terrified and decide that Anu (An), the oldest and greatest, must go forth. He takes one look at Apsu and flees. Enlil is next. It is then Ea's turn. He brings a large coil of rope with him. The moment he catches sight of Apsu, he throws the rope around him and ties him up tight and kills him. He then kills Muumuu. Ea then becomes the god of all fresh waters. Tiamat is furious. She decides to go and kill them herself. First, she creates an army of demons. One, Kingu, is larger than the rest. He is her new consort. She sends word to the gods. Now they are truly terrified. No one will face her. Ea's son Marduk steps up, a vigorous young warrior, and says he will go face Tiamat. They all burst out laughing in derision. His idea is that if each of the gods gives him all their power, he will be strong enough to face Tiamat. They consent. They bestow their powers on him (without losing them). Marduk goes out in a storm chariot pulled by storm horses. He has a bow and arrow (lightning bolts), a huge net, and two giant sacks tied at the mouth. In one are the four directional winds. In the other sack are the seven evil winds. Tiamat sees him coming. She laughs and opens her mouth to devour him. He opens the sack with the seven evil winds, which rush straight into her mouth and blow her up like a balloon. He throws the net over her and releases the other sack. Each of the four directional winds takes a corner of the net so she can't float away. Then he shoots arrows down her throat into her heart and kills her. He kills Kingu and the rest of the demons easily. Out of Tiamat's carcass, Marduk slits her in half lengthwise and creates the universe (a common archetype). Her skull is the solid dome of the sky. Her blood is the ocean. Her bones are stones and her hair vegetation. He wants someone to look after the universe for him. He notices a small pool of Kingu's blood from which he creates human beings. He goes back to the gods who complement him and ask for their powers back. He decides to keep the powers and be their king. They all consent. Marduk has 50 names. The Enuma Elish ("When above . . .") is a poem found on seven tablets. Allegories: a way to tame the waters; political -- each of the various semitic states had an army. After some time, all the city-states yielded their power to Hammurabi, King of Babylon, who then conquered Sumeria and then refused to surrender their autonomy. (Marduk = God of Babylon)
Adapa is the prime minister of Ea, who favors him so much that he has taught him all of his secrets. One day, Adapa is fishing in a boat on the Euphrates. He has just hooked the biggest fish he's ever seen when a sudden squall capsizes his boat. He loses the fish and utters a curse, breaking the wing of the South Wind. When Anu hears of this, he wants to meet him. Adapa is terrified and prays to Ea for guidance. Ea tells him what to do and then says, "But remember, you mustn't accept any food or drink from Anu because it is the Food of Death." Adapa tears his robe and spreads ashes over himself and then goes to Anu, clearly in mourning. There he meets Tammuz (Dumuzi) and Ningizsida, a god of fertility,who died. He is a snake with a human head. When Adapa arrives, he is questioned. They ask why he is mourning. He says it is because two of the great gods have died. They are flattered and put in a good word for him with Anu. Anu then questions him, and then offers him food and drink. Adapa refuses. Anu is surprised and sends away the food and then laughs saying that he has just refused the Food of Immortality. He gives him a new robe. The robe is to remind everyone that priests get special treatment. The robe is symbolic of the expectation placed on the recipient of the robe. Archetype: The Lying Messenger
In Assyria, King Ashurbanipal (Ashur was the main god; the land was cald Ashuria.) lived in Nineveh. He was a great patron of the arts but was also one of the cruelest of the Assyrian kings. He wanted to build a library so he sent men out to gather literature. The Rescension, or the Nineveh Rescension, refers to the translation and editing of this literature. All the myths come from this, as does the story of Gilgamesh, King of Uruk. It is a story written on twelve tablets called "Gilgamesh in the Land of the Living," an epic. The story consists of Sumerian episodes put together by a Babylonian editor. This, not Homer, is the first epic. It was found in Nineveh in four different languages: Sumerian, Assyrian, Babylonian, and Hittite (from Anatolia). It was completely written in poetry. Gilgamesh in the Land of the Living Gilgamesh was two thirds god and one third man (i.e., two of his parents were gods and one was human). He was notorious for being a cruel tyrant because of his superiority. He took anything he wanted. At one point, the people are desperate so they go over Gilgamesh's head, praying directly to the gods for help. The gods hear them. One of the goddesses takes some earth and creates Enkidu, a wild man. He is stronger than a lion, faster than a gazelle, and friends with the animals. He has long hair and beard. He is naked and eats only grass. He drinks only water from the ditches or milk from female animals. A notice comes to the city elders that this wild man keeps rescuing the wild animals they have captured. The elders perceive Enkidu to be the answer to their prayers. They set out to capture him and bring him back. They select a temple prostitute. She meets a hunter and sets out after Enkidu. The hunter says, "There he is. Bare yourself to him and seduce him." So she opens her robe and they have a wild sexual union for seven days and seven nights. Enkidu then goes to run with the animals but finds himself "strangely weak." He is contaminated by the civilized and the animals reject him. He has no choice but to join civilization. The prostitute and the hunter cut and curl his hair. They wash him and anoint him with oil. They put a robe on him. (Both the anointment and the robe symbolize selection for a task.) They give him bread and beer (both synthetic). They go to Uruk. Enkidu and Gilgamesh grapple (wrestle). Enkidu goes down on one knee. He has lost. But Gilgamesh takes him to be his comrade because he has finally found a peer. They become lifelong comrades. Enkidu considers himself a lesser person, so he always goes before Gilgamesh. They decide to travel to the Cedar Forest (Lebanon) which is guarded by a giant, called Humbaba (in Assyrian, Huwawa). Gilgamesh is presented with a beautiful bronze axe and sword by the elders. The Cedar Forest was placed there by Enlil, now head of the gods, and Humbaba was made to guard the forest. Enkidu pushes the gate of the forest with his hand and immediately his right side becomes paralyzed. They meet Humbaba, have a great fight, and win. Humbaba pleads for his life. Gilgamesh agrees to spare him. But Enkidu insists they kill him so Gilgamesh decapitates him with his great axe. They return to Uruk, exalting in their victory. Gilgamesh looks incredibly god-like. He is so magnificent that Inanna notices him and becomes interested. She appears before him and suggests a liaison. He refuses, remembering Dumuzi's fate. Enkidu laughs. Inanna goes stomping back to Enlil and demands that he kill them both. Because they just killed his giant, he allows Inanna to send the Great Bull of Heaven after them. He comes charging out of heaven killing one hundred men with his first snort, two hundred with his second, etc. The people see him coming. Gilgamesh is pleased about the impending fight. Enkidu takes no weapon but stands in front of Gilgamesh. The second the bull gets to him he leaps up and does a handspring off the bull's back. The bull turns to see what has happened and Gilgamesh plunges his sword into the bull's breast (the Minoans of Crete did this same kind of bull jumping as a sport). Gilgamesh takes the prime cut (the right rear thigh) of the bull to place it on Enlil's altar, thinking Enlil is angry about Humbaba's death. Just then Inanna appears. Seeing Enkidu holding the meat, she says she accepts his offering. So Enkidu either throws the cut onto her altar with a sneer or throws the bull's genitals onto her altar (depending on the telling). She is furious. She goes to Enlil demanding their death. Enlil declines. Inanna says Enkidu at least must die. And Enlil can't think of a reason why not. So Enkidu falls ill and dies in three days. Gilgamesh mourns. He begins contemplating that if Enkidu was his equal and he died -- could he die as well? This worries him considerably. So he promises the spirirt of Enkidu that he will wear a lion skin on his back, until it falls off him, in Enkidu's honor. He also promises to travel to the Land of the Living where the immortal man and his wife live. The immortal man is Ziusiudra in Sumerian and Utnapishtim in Babylonian. Everywhere Gilgamesh goes, people ask him for his story. He eventually meets a barmaid and he asks her where the ferry to the Land of the Living is. She tells him. But the ferryman Urshanabi isn't there. Gilgamesh finds some stones in the boat and smashes the stones on the ground in anger. But Urshanabi then appears and says that these stones would have powered the boat. So they have to cut saplings to pull themselves across. Once across, first thing, Utnapishtim fires Urshanabi in anger. Gilgamesh tells Utnapishtim that he wants to live forever. Utnapishtim says he couldn't even stay awake for seven days let alone live forever. Gilgamesh says, "I can, too." So he sits down and immediately sleeps for seven days (Utnapishtim's wife places a fresh loaf of bread beside him each day, marking the time.) So Gilgamesh agrees that he cannot live forever. But Utnapishtim tells Gilgamesh where to find the herb of eternal youth, a plant with thorns and beautiful flower at the bottom of the sea. So Gilgamesh ties large rocks to the bottoms of his feet, sinks to the bottom, gets the herb, and then cuts the ropes and floats back up (the origins of deep sea diving). Urshanabi and Gilgamesh travel together. They get to a cool pool of water. Gilgamesh puts down the herb of eternal youth so he can bathe. A snake comes out of the water, swallows the herb, and goes back into the water, thus explaining why snakes become young again and again. Gilgamesh has learned humility. He becomes the greatest king ever known. Utnapishtim tells Gilgamesh the story of how he became immortal. It parallels the story of Noah's ark.
Home Page | Email c. 3000 - 2000 B.C. People moved into the Levant (the eastern end of the Mediterranean boundaried by mountains). They were the Canaanites. They were the best merchants of the ancient world. Clothing at this time was always very drab. People used vegetable dyes which are not very vivid. The Canaanites developed a dye that was vivid and colorfast from the murex shell/animal which made a very vivid maroon color that wouldn't fade. One drop of the dye could be extracted from each murex. Only the wealthy could afford this luxury -- only nobility. In Greece, all the young nobles wanted it (Royal Purple). The Greeks went to the Canaanites and called them the Phoenicians (Phoenix -> Purple). They were great navigators, sailors, mariners -- the greatest in the world. They were not a bellicose people. They were merchants. But they had pretty good land, several cities (Tyre, Sidon, Byblos -- port cities). c. 1250 - 1200 B.C. Other people began moving: Aramaans, Hebrews, the Philistines (Philistine is now Palestine). The Canaanites colonized. They discovered the Atlantic Ocean. They colonized most of the Mediterranean except for the Aegean. They traded with the Azores (halfway across the Atlantic). They may have had tin mines in Cornwall. They found Carthage and settled it c. 800 B.C., controlling all of the Mediterranean. They circumnavigated Africa in 500 B.C. They were the first great sharp traders. They invented their own form of writing. (1) syllabary (like kanji - Japanese characer text) (2) the first alphabet with 22 letters and no vowels -- the basis for virtually every alphabet in the modern world. The Greeks added vowels.
Gods of Canaan El, king of the gods (El means "God" - the plural is Elohim), a fertility god, represented by a bull or by a man wearing a helmet with bull horns. An elderly man with a mustache and goatee. He lives on a place called Har Mo'ed (the apostrophe represents a glottal stop, it used to be represented by "h" in English), "the mount of assembly", or "the mount of the North." The Hebrews called this "the place of the last battle" or Armageddon. Dagon, fertility god, rain/water god, grain god. He is portayed with a sheaf of grain for hair and the body of a fish from the waist down (a merman). He doesn't appear in Canaanite mythology because he was adopted by the Philistines (in Biblical history, Samson destroyed the Temple of Dagon). Dagon is probably El's brother. His son holds a position which is traditionally that of the king's nephew. Baal (son of Dagon) is a young, impetuous fertility god. He is portrayed as a man with bull horns on his helmet or as a calf -- sometimes a golden calf. He is also a storm god. His major epithet is "He Who Mounts the Clouds." The clouds are called "the heavenly herd of cows." He is often the butt of jokes. "Baal" = "lord." He is called "Lord Prince" or "Baal Zebul" (-> Beelzebub, Hebrew for "Lord of the Insects" -> "Lord of the Flies"). Kothar, artisan of the gods, smith of the gods (a widespread archetype). He can make anything. Yamm (also Lotan), the great primeval chaotic ocean. He is male, a very old dragon with seven heads (like the Greeks' Hydra). A dragon with many heads as god of the ocean, with seven heads especially -- this image is perhaps inspired by the giant octopus. Mot moves freely from the upper world to the Underworld. When in the upper world, he is sterility and usually lives in the desert. In the Underworld he is death. He is not a very popular god, but he is not evil. Shapash (from Shamash), goddess of the sun. Epithet: "the Torch of the Gods."
Asherah, Anat, Ashtoreth (Archetype: The Triple Goddess): Asherah is the consort of El and is called "Mother of the 70 Gods" (i.e., all of them). She is El's best friend and loving consort AND his bitterest enemy. She is the goddess of love and hate, the mother goddess. She is shown as standing between two goats up on their hind legs. She holds a sheaf of grain in each hand, feeding them (they are sometimes gazelles). She is eventually shown as the Tree of Life, with goats eating of her fruit. Anat is Baal's consort and sister. Her real interest is destroying things. She is the goddess of war and slaughter. She is depicted with a sword in each hand with a big smile on her face. Human arms, heads, and legs are flying through the air all around her. Ashtoreth is unbelievably beautiful (like Inanna). She is not anyone's consort. She is the goddess of love. She likes being single. She is associated with the moon and with the oceans. The crescent moon is her symbol -- she wears it in her hair. The Greeks referred to her as Astarte, a moon goddess. All three are inspired by Inanna/Ishtar. The Greeks had Hera (As[hera]h), Athena (from Anat), Aphrodite (from Ashtoreth). The Egyptians made Isis from Asherah and Hathor from Anat/Ashtoreth. The world has just been created. No one is yet ruling. Two gods want to: Baal and Yamm. They go to El to ask for his judgment and wisdom. El chooses Yamm to be the first King of Earth. Yamm builds himself a palace and has a wonderful time. Eventually, he begins to get very arrogant. He sends messengers to Har Mo'ed to tell the gods he demands tribute. The gods are uneasy; Baal is furious. Ashtoreth says she can solve the problem. She dresses up in her greatest finery and goes to talk Yamm out of his foolishness. She struts back and forth on the shore in front of the ocean to lure Yamm out. He doesn't come. She begins to undress (a strip tease) until eventually he comes out. He dispatches his messengers immediately saying he demands tribute AND Ashtoreth as his consort. Baal leaps up and drives the messengers out of Har Mo'ed, kicking their backsides as they go, saying he will destroy Yamm. The other gods praise his courage, given Yamm's greater size and strength. Baal worries. He goes to Kothar and asks him for weapons that will make him equal to Yamm. Kothar makes two weapons (axes or hammers) which, when thrown, will go straight to their mark and then return to Baal's hand (thunderbolts). He goes to Earth armed and stands on the seashore screaming insults until Yamm is furious and comes slithering up out of the ocean. Baal throws the first hammer, hits Yamm between the eyes, and knocks him out cold. Baal goes up to Yamm to kill him. Anat appears and says it will give him no glory to kill an unconscious victim. So Baal kicks him back into the ocean, throws a net over him, and stakes the net down to the ocean floor. Now Baal becomes King of Earth. Now Baal wants his own palace but is afraid to build without the consent of El and afraid to ask. So he asks Anat if she will go with him and intercede on his behalf. She agrees but suggests that they solicit Asherah's help as well. Baal leads a donkey, which Asherah rides, with Anat walking behind. They arrive at Har Mo'ed and talk to El. El doesn't mind at all but says he will not build the palace for Baal. Baal says of course . . . and asks Kothar to build it for him. Kothar begins building and says he ought to put a window in the turret, but Baal refuses. Kothar reluctantly leaves out the window. Eventually the palace is finished. All the gods ask why there isn't a window. Baal fears that Yamm will sneak in through the window and kill him. So he thinks to do the same to Yamm. He kills Yamm, and then asks Kothar to put the window in after all. It is from that window that Baal hurls his lightning bolts. Baal begins to become arrogant and sends a message to Mot in the Underworld that he's going to come down and take over. Mot is furious and says he will devour him. Baal insists. Mot says, "Okay, come down and visit, we'll sit down and have a bite to eat . . ." Baal is gullible enough to go. After a meal and drink, he is stuck in the Underworld (see common archetypes). The fertility of the earth ends for six years. In the seventh year, Anat feels the lack of a consort and wants to bring back Baal. She asks Shapash to find his body when she travels through the Underworld and to bring it back. Shapash does this. Anat is unable to bring him back to life. She mourns. One day she encounters Mot and asks him to bring Baal back to life. Mot says, "No way." She seizes Mot. With a blade, she cleaves him; with a shovel, she winnows him; with fire she parches him; with a stone, she grinds him; and then she scatters him in the field. Baal comes back to life. This is symbolic of the harvest as well as the sowing and fertilization of the ground. Seven years later, Mot pulls himself together and battles with Baal. This cycle reverses on itself every seven years. Baal vs.Yamm - young god borrows weapons, imprisons the great primeval chaotic ocean and then kills it (Marduk vs.Tiamat, Enki vs.Apsu, etc. -- archetype) Baal builds a palace -> parallel to Enki's palace Baal and Mot -> Inanna's Descent to the Underworld (Archetype: The Dying God Theme). A seven year cycle because the Canaanites had little arable land -- enough but very little. They could only plant year-round to accomodate their available agriculture. Every seventh year they would leave the ground fallow (the year of rest they called "sabbath"). They stored food for the year of famine. Sometimes, though, Mot would win the battle, and the year of sabbath did not replenish the land sufficiently. Crops would be poor and this made the next year of sabbath more difficult to prepare for. Their years were measured in centuries. 7x7=49+1=50 The extra 1 is an extra year lying fallow. This year was spent in festivals and was called "Jubilee." If Mot won the battle on the seventh cycle, they would have two years of famine. Then they would have to look elsewhere for food, most likely in Egypt, because a bad year in Canaan usually meant a bad year in all of the Near East. This led to the Biblical story of Joseph's journey to Egypt and the seven years of famine, etc. In the year of Jubilee, Canaanites would greet each other by asking "'Yit Zebul?" which would be followed by the response "'Yi Zebul!" which translates: "Does the prince live? Yes, the prince lives!" Children born in the year of Jubilee were named appropriately. Queen Jezebel of Tyre was born in Jubilee. Her father Ethzebel must have been as well.
Home Page | Email Dynastic = historic Pre-dynastic = prehistoric (before 3200 B.C.). Egypt, the Upside-Down Country. Upper Egypt is dry. Lower Egypt is a fertile delta. The two kingdoms, Upper and Lower Egypt, feuded. Lower Egypt was more advanced than Upper Egypt because of Mediterranean connections. Lower Egyptians created writing systems, papyrus, etc. Hieroglyphics = sacred carvings. Hieratic = the legal writing system. Demotic = the writing of the people (shorthand). Most of our knowledge of Egypt comes from the occupation of the Greeks (i.e., Ptolemaic Dynasty). Alexander the Great and Ptolemy built Alexandria, which became the most cosmopolitan city of its time. People spoke and wrote Greek. There were 32 dynasties, listed by the Greeks. Pharaohs: 18th Dynasty - 1300 B.C. Amenhotep III, enamored of Amon, the ram-headed god. Amenhotep III built a huge city with statues of Amon called Karnak. Amenhotep IV destroyed the city because he hated Amon. He loved Ra, the sun god, and changed his name to Akhenaten ("Servant of the Sun"). He built a city for Ra in which he forbade the worship of other gods. He failed in his attempts to form a monotheism, but he tried. He was very unpopular. He was ugly. His wife was Nefertiti, the most beautiful queen in Egyptian history. Akhenaten's nephew came to the throne after his death. His advisors instructed him to restore all the gods and he did so. He became very popular but died at the age of 19. His name was Tutenkhamen. Egyptians liked sex. They were not uncomfortable with it. They practiced incest. The eldest son and daughter of the pharaoh married and became the next pharaoh and queen. Understandably, dynasties died out very quickly to infertility and feeblemindedness. But incest was only practiced in the dynastic house (this was also true of the Spanish court). There were many fine Egyptian poets, almost all women of high birth, who wrote beautiful erotic love poetry. Hatshepsut was the only female pharaoh. Egypt was invaded and occupied only twice. Once, c. 1700 B.C., the Hyksos moved in and occupied Egypt. They built a fortified area in Goshen. There were Hyksos pharaohs for 125 years. In 850 B.C. the people of Kush occupied Egypt, giving rise to the Kushite pharaohs, a magnificent black African kingdom. In 770 B.C., the Assyrians attempted to wrest Egypt from the Kushites and failed. Assyrians and Egyptians together eventually defeated the Kushites. When Egypt was conquered by Rome, it ceases to be Egypt any longer. Egypt was conquered by the Muslims in 600 A.D.
Nun, the great primeval chaotic ocean, a goddess. From that ocean came a mound of dry land, a hill. Ra, Atum, Amon, depending on where you hear about it -- ultimately all three merge into one god anyway. The Sun God. Ra, the sun god, is the first divine pharaoh. He creates Shu and Tefnut. (See Ra) Ptah, a god, is in one city considered to be the god who created Nun. When gods create other gods, they masturbate, thereby creating the next god. Shu, god of air, god of wisdom. In his headdress he wears a Ma'at feather, the feather of truth and wisdom. Shu was the second divine pharaoh. A cartouche appears beside the image of a person in Egyptian artwork or hieroglyphics to identify him or her. The Ma'at feather appears in Shu's name. Shu and Tefnut give birth to Geb and Nut. Geb is the earth (male), and Nut is the sky (female). This is a reversal of the archetype. Geb becomes the third divine pharaoh. Geb is usually shown with a green upper and a brown lower body, symbolizing vegetation and soil. Nut is portrayed a as beautiful woman, or as a cow, or as a woman with a cow's head. She has a flower vase on her head (even when she is a cow) which also appears in her name cartouche. Nut is inordinately gorgeous, and Ra is very attracted to her. Ra has aged and retired. He is a crotchety, whimsical, egocentric old man. Nut is true to her brother/husband and rejects Ra. Ra is furious. He sends his son Shu to separate Geb and Nut who splits them apart and holds them apart forever (a familiar archetype with roles shifted). Ra, in his anger, decrees that they may never have a child during any month of the year. Geb and Nut pray to an ancient god (Thoth) who decides to help them. He gambles with the moon and wins four intercalary days (days not on the calendar). Geb and Nut have four children, one on each day. Thoth becomes the god of the moon. Nut is shown stretched from horizon to horizon with stars on her belly and a vase on her head. Geb is shown lying beneath her, an arm and knee (representing mountains) reaching for her. Shu holds Nut up. [Note: Most gods are shown ithnaphallic (with erect penis), and it was the Egyptians who invented circumcision.] Geb and Nut's children are Osiris, Isis, Set, and Nephthys. Set comes from a god of Upper Egypt. He becomes considered a god of sterility. He is only shown with an animal head on a human body. Archaeologists have called the animal "the Typhonian animal" because they couldn't recognize the animal. It could be an okapi or an aardvark (earth pig). Set is a scheming unpopular character. His face has been chipped away and replaced in bas-reliefs. Nephthys is the goddess of mist, vapor, and fog. She is barren. One night she sneaks over to Osiris and seduces him in the dark. She has a son, Anubis, the jackal-headed god. He was abandoned at birth to be raised by Isis. He becomes the inventor of embalming and funeral ritual, the god of funerals. He dwells in the Underworld. In Egypt, bodies were eviscerated. The internal organs were placed in clay canopic jars whose lids were sealed with wax or paraffin. The jar of the heart and lungs bore the head of Anubis. Osiris is the fertility god (primarily of vegetation). He becomes pharaoh after Geb. When he was born, a voice spoke in the universe proclaiming him universal lord. As he grew up, his wisdom and sincerity were so clear that his epithets were "The Good One" and "True of Voice." When he becomes pharaoh, he institutes great changes. He outlawed cannibalism. He taught how to worship the gods by building temples and therefore towns and cities. He taught law (considered the father of civilization) and agriculture (primarily grain), and how to make bread and beer. Osiris decides to go out and conquer the world with gentleness (i.e., civilize). He leaves Isis on the throne to go out and achieve his goal. When he returns, he is murdered by his brother Set. Isis brings him back to life and feels he should retire to the Underworld and become king there. Osiris is almost always shown in a winding shroud with just his hands showing holding a shepherd's crook and a flail. Both are symbols of kingship. Osiris is green. Isis is very beautiful. She bears the maternal aspect of a goddess who is beautiful and loving but also dangerous to cross. She can also be shown as a cow. She has a throne on her head. She taught women how to grind grain, spin flax, and how to weave cloth. She taught men medicine. She is the goddess of healing. After she brings Osiris back to life, they have a son Horus. She wanted for her husband and son the powers of Ra. She knew that each day Ra went for a long stroll. She waits by his path, picks up some of the mud made by Ra's drool and makes a poisonous snake. The next day, she places the snake in the same place. It bites him and slithers away and he begins to die. He is unable to cure himself (because he doesn't know the source of the curse). The gods go to Isis. She talks privately with Ra and tells him he must tell her his true name. He does and she cures him. She now has his power. (Archetypes: (1) The Curing of the Curse (2) The True Name) Hathor, goddess of love, beauty, the arts. She is a terrifying warrior. A combination -- Isis and Hathor are two goddesses of the triple goddess. Hathor is patron goddess of single women, goddess of female graces (art, music, literature). She can also be shown as a cow. She has cow horns with a sistrum between them. She is very beautiful but can be unbelievably destructive. Ra became fed up with human beings so he sent Hathor to destroy humankind. So she came to Earth and began slaughtering. She went into a blood frenzy (battle hysteria). Ra changes his mind, but to stop her, he must destroy her or knock her out. She is shown with a sword in each hand (Anat), a smile on her face, and body parts flying about her. Ra plots her course and sees that she will eventually come to a gigantic field with a high wall surrounding it. So Ra fills the field with beer and turns the beer red. When she gets there, she thinks it is blood and drinks it all and passes out cold. When she awakens, the blood lust is gone -- replaced by a horrible headache. Ra - Before rising and just at setting, he is called Atum ("to be complete" or "to not exist"). As he is rising, he becomes Kheper ("scarab" - a dung beetle which laid its egg and encased it in its own feces and then rolled it along in front of itself to protect it. In reality, the beetle gathered food and rolled it back to its nest.) representing the principle of rebirth - new life encased in refuse. At this point, Ra is either shown as a scarab or as a man whose head is a scarab. Kheper also means the concept of coming into existence or rebirth. They liked to show this because they could show the solar disk of the sun being pushed by the scarab. Once the sun is fully past rising, he becomes Ra. Ra rides in the Man Jet Boat. He is, at this point, either a falcon or a man with a falcon's head. He sits in the boat, at the stern, with the solar disk in the boat in front of him. At the very front of the boat are Shu and Thoth. They are sailing across the celestial Nile River - the heavenly Nile (the Milky Way). There is a deadly peril in the form of a gigantic dragon/serpent called Apep. He hates the gods and waits for them in ambush. They are great warriors and Apep is seldom successful in ambushing them. But once in a while there is a battle with crashing weapons. We see the sparks and hear the crashes and a lot of the river's water splashes and falls on us (a rainstorm). Once in a very great while, Apep surprises them completely and devours them, but they battle until they get out again (an eclipse). Then Ra becomes Atum again because he is complete and he sets. He goes to a new boat and his name changes after setting to Auf ("meat" or "corpse"). As he sails through the Underworld, he has to pass twelve deadly perils (one per hour). One time very early in the universe, Ra wept and his tears fell to the ground and humans were created (in Egyptian, "tear" and "human" are the same word). One time Ra had an enormously powerful weapon: his right eye, the deadliest weapon in the universe (Archetype: The Evil Eye). The eye has a will of its own. One day it was out and it didn't come back when it was supposed to. Ra created a new one to put in its place. The eye then came back and was furious. Ra placed it in the center of his forehead, a place of great honor. The eye goes on to be identified as the Uraeus (the cobra on the front of a king's crown, representing the pharaoh). All pharaohs are thought to be descended from Ra. Ra is always shown with the solar disk on his head. Thoth is a very ancient god, dating back to the pre-dynastic period. The animals that represent him are the dog-headed ape (less common) or a human with the head of a dog-headed ape (baboon) or the ibis (more common) or as a man with an ibis's head, in which case he is shown wearing a necklace and headdress with the ibis's head in the headdress. This god was used to replace the face of Set. Thoth is a very wise and benevolent god. He is Osiris's counselor and that of the next pharaoh. Then Thoth becomes the last divine pharaoh. He is the god of magic and therefore the god of writing ("The Lord of the Holy Words"). He invented and taught hieroglyphics. When he retired from kingship, he became "The Heavenly Scribe," a very important position -- the recorder of all history. In heaven, he is the Arbiter of the Gods, a referee for minor squabbles. He is the Spokesman of the Gods and therefore the Ambassador as well. Horus comes from a god of Lower Egypt. He is very often shown as a 7-8 year old Egyptian prince. A prince would have his head shaved except for a single sidelock. If he is shown as an adult, like Ra, he is shown as a falcon or as a falcon-headed man. Horus, later in life, got control of the Eye of Ra and it began to be called the Eye of Horus. Some images depict Horus and Set working together even before the merging of the two kingdoms.
Death and the Underworld In the Underworld, the soul or sprit is represented as a small bird with a human head. The person's soul enters and immediately encounters Anubis, who is holding a balance scale. The heart is placed on one of the pans of the balance and the Ma'at feather is placed on the other pan. If they balance, the person has been good and is sent on to meet Osiris. Thoth records these proceedings. The spirit appears before Osiris on his throne with Isis behind him on his right and Nephthys behind him on his left. Osiris then relegates the soul to its proper place in the Underworld. If the heart does not balance with the feather, the soul is sent to a waiting creature in the ground, "The Devourer of Souls" (it has the hindquarters of a hippopotamus, the forequarters of a leopard, and the head of a crocodile), who then eats the heart. Sitting at the back of a huge hall on thrones are all of the gods (a reflection of the Anunaki).
Set Betrays Osiris Osiris is returning to Egypt after conquering the world by gentleness. Once he gets back, he immediately gets an invitation to come to a great dinner festival, alone, by Set. He feels he must accept. As he is sitting there waiting for dinner, Set's men bring in a long beautifully carved box and they begin laughing and climbing into it and jumping back out again. Whoever fits it perfectly gets to keep it. Osiris is invited to try. He climbs in, and Set slams it shut, nails it closed, and throws it into the Nile where Osiris drowns. But the box drifts out into the Mediterranean. It drifts across and lands on the shore of Byblos of Canaan. It comes to rest at the foot of a straggly tree. The tree grows like crazy, encloses the box, and grows very tall. The king of the city is building a palace so he sends men out to fell the tree. The moment the axe bites into it, a smell fills the air -- the sweetest smell ever. Isis hears about this and figures out what happened. She goes to Byblos and asks the king if they can cut the tree open because Osiris is inside. The king agrees. She takes Osiris back to Egypt. (This is an explanation for the existence of the cedars of Canaan.) She wants to bring Osiris back to life but must first return to the throne and tend to business. She decides to hide the body deep in the swamps of the Nile Delta to protect it from Set. Set sneaks into the delta, finds the body, chops it into fourteen pieces, and scatters them all over the world. Isis discovers what has happened. She patiently goes out and gathers all the pieces, finding the last one on the shore of China. [Alternate: Isis finds thirteen of the fourteen pieces. The piece not found was the phallus. It was not found because "it had fallen into the brackish water of the Nile Delta and was devoured by crabs." The crabs were then made so bitter that they could not be eaten, even today.] She brings him to life, and from that union comes Horus. Isis worries about Horus as he grows up because of the threat of Set and his desire to take the throne. Isis hides Horus in the swamps of the Nile Delta. Set immediately comes slithering in as a poisonous snake, bites Horus, and leaves. So Horus begins to die. Isis is unable to cure him because she doesn't know the source of the curse. Isis prays to Ra who is passing over head at that moment. Ra stops the sun for two hours, during which time he and Shu and Thoth come to Earth and the four of them stand around Horus and focus their powers and cure him (breaking the archetype). Horus safely grows up because Set doesn't know he is still alive. (In Biblical history, Joshua prays to God to stop the sun so that he can continue battle.) Horus becomes ready to claim the throne, but Set wants it, too. They battle one another in different forms of animals to no avail. Isis won't relinquish the throne until this is settled. The feud between Horus and Set was much too big for Thoth to resolve. So a tribunal was called. Ra presides. Set and Horus stand up one at a time and argue back and forth. The gods agree with whomever most recently spoke, or Ra inhibits the decisionmaking with his senility. The trial continues for eighty years. At one point, Isis is ejected because she is so vociferously on her son's side. She turns herself into a beautiful young woman, slips into the trial, and sits beside Set. She begins to weep heavily. Set asks her why she is weeping. She tells him and everyone hears what she says. She says that she and her husband have a flock of sheep, intended to be left to their son. But her husband's brother treacherously murdered her husband to steal the flock from her son. Set exclaims that this is horrible. "Your son deserves your flock. Your husband's brother should be punished." Isis immediately turns into a swallow, flies into the rafters, and screams out, "You have condemned yourself!" The gods agree. Set disagrees. Ra disagrees (because it wasn't his idea). And the trial has made no progress. The only way to resolve this is to call the only god who isn't there - "He Who Is True of Voice," Osiris who is in the Underworld. He comes and stands before them and tells them he has thought it over carefully and that Horus is best suited to the throne. The gods agree. But Ra says the decision is invalid because Osiris is Horus's father. Osiris steps up a second time and says that they can reach any conclusion they want, but that he has at his disposal savage-faced messengers who can drag down to the Underworld the heart of anyone Osiris commands. Horus becomes Pharaoh. Set is chained in the desert where he must be the god of sterility, where he must provide the wind which drives the Man Jet Boat. Thoth becomes Horus's counselor. Thoth eventually becomes the last pharaoh.
Home Page | Email c. 1700 B.C. Through the Levant travel a series of groups of people who are land pirates (mostly Canaanites, some Hittites, etc.) called by the Egyptians the Hyksos ("Shepherd Kings"), who conquered Egypt and ruled for 150 years. c. 1550 B.C. The Egyptians ousted them and forced them back eastward. It took 50-100 years to clear them all out. They returned to their nomadic existence. They were primarily goatherders, tribally divided. Among the Hyksos are a group of twelve tribes who consider themselves to be related by blood. Each tribe is named for its ancestors: twelve brothers, the sons of Israel (Jacob). They called themselves the Children of Israel. The Children of Israel They were called Habiru ('displaced people') which became 'Hebrew.' They wandered in the northern Arabian Desert for 50-100 years. While there, they knew the only way they could be safe was to emphasize their blood-related kinship. Each tribe was ruled by the oldest grandfather in the tribe who was the ruler and high priest (a patriarchy). This was known ast the Time of the Patriarchs. There was much tribal disunity. The elders of the tribes figured out a clever way to bring the tribes together. They took a Canaanite god from their past, an ancient god named Yaw, who might have been a fertility god, and developed Yhwh. They were not permitted to pronounce his name aloud. They used instead the name Tetragrammaton, "The Four-Letter Thing." Because they couldn't speak his name, they called him Elohim, or "Gods" (Canaanite), the Hebrew word for "lord," Adonai, and they used vowels to make Yahowah, which in English became Jehovah. This is wrong. The correct translation is Yahweh. Having wandered in the wilderness for a long time, once they developed this god figure, the first thing he did was to demand a temple. Because they were nomads, they built it out of a tent, a portable temple, the tabernacle. In the inner chamber ("The Holy of Holies," also called from the Latin, "The Inner Sanctum") was kept the Ark of the Covenant. Only priests could enter the Holy of Holies on pain of death. Yahweh spoke to the priests through the Ark of the Covenant which was built to his specifications. In the Ark were kept the two stone tablets of the Ten Commandments. The Children of Israel used the Ark as their secret weapon in battle. But they lost it in battle to the Philistines. The Philistines' punishment was an affliction of hemorrhoids. Their goldsmiths had to make gold hemorrhoids to cure them. After some time, the Hebrews decided to settle in Canaan. Yahweh directs them to it as the Promised Land. The Hebrews put villages "to the edge of the sword," killing every living thing, in order to occupy land they wanted. They moved into Canaan. They wanted to oust the Philistines (from present day Palestine), but the Philistines were bigger and fought with iron weapons. 1250 B.C. There was a southern group made up of one huge tribe called Judah and one small trive called Benjamin. The other ten tribes settled in the north and were simply called Israel. They didn't like each other. Once they get into Canaan, they decide they like a lot of the Canaanite gods, so they worship them until about 800 B.C. And they no longer needed patriarchs. Each local area was ruled by a judge. In general, they were ruled by prophets who warned them constantly about the Philistines and the Canaanites. 1100 B.C. Samuel the Prophet was ruling. People came to him and demanded tha they be ruled by a king. He chooses Saul because he is a very tall (VERY tall), strong man. Samuel anoints him king. He was a warrior, a simple man. He tried his best to be king. He tried to unify the tribes. Samuel generally gave much direction to Saul. One day Samuel said Yahweh commanded that he put a village to the edge of the sword. But Saul was trying to make a deal with a Philistine leader. Samuel comes and hacks the Philistine to bits with a sword and says the kingship is withdrawn. Samuel annoints David to be the next king. David was not related to Saul. Samuel had, by selecting David, cut off Saul's line. Saul becomes a manic-depressive. The Hebrews brought David before him to play music for him. They became friends. Saul gives David a daughter for a wife. One day, Saul throws a spear at David. He misses, but David leaves and goes into exile as a cutthroat and a robber, hiring himself and his followers out to a Philistine king. At this point, Samuel is dead. Saul is going to battle with the Philistines. Saul tells one of his generals he wants to speak to a witch. He goes to the Witch of Endor and asks to speak to the ghost of Samuel. She does call him up, although she is terrified of Saul. Samuel's ghost appears and rails at Saul, telling him he will lose. The next day, he loses. He commits suicide. His son Jonathan is killed as well. David becomes king. David is a true charismatic. People just WANT to follow him. David moves the capital of the nation to Jerusalem and builds an extra quarter called Zion. He begins to rule. He sees a woman called Bathsheba and invites her over. She becomes pregnant. She's married to a Hittite mercenary in David's army named Uriah. He is captain of 100 men. David sends for Uriah. He rewards him and says spend the night with your wife, hoping that they will sleep together and cover the shame of the pregnancy. But Uriah instead sleeps on David's doorstep. So David writes a letter to the general of the army. Uriah is to deliver it. He is honored. The letter says to place Uriah at the hottest point in the battle and just leave him there. He is killed. David marries Bathsheba. The baby she carries dies in a very short time. This is perceived to be their punishment. Later, Bathsheba becomes pregnant again and gives birth to Solomon. Things begin to go awry in the land. A prophet Nathan comes to court. Nathan says he is pleading a suit for another man who owned a single female ewe. His neighbor owned a whole flock of sheep. One day, his neighbor rose up and murdered this man just to steal the ewe. David rises up and asks where the man is and exclaims that he won't get away with such a deed. Nathan replies, "Thou art the man." David repents. He is from that point on a great king. David is doomed never to have a happy life. All of his children grow up to be rotten and rebellious. On his deathbed, he makes Solomon his co-ruler because Solomon is not in line for the throne. David dies. Solomon has both of the brothers who lay claim to the throne as well as a supporting general murdered. Solomon is king. Solomon was very wise and very wealthy -- the wealthiest king in the history of the Hebrews. He built the Temple of Solomon. He taxed his people to death. He put them into forced labor all to build his temple. The Queen of Sheba came to visit him . . . and from that union came a son Menelek. He founded a new dynasty called the Lion of Judah. The story of the baby which Solomon suggests should be cut in half to appease the two women who lay claim to him is a political allegory for Solomon's willingness to divide up Israel. The Song of Solomon and Proverbs were written long after his death. He had 300 wives and 600 concubines. He was not the best of kings. By the time of his death, the unification work was undone. He did not choose a successor. His death marks the end of the Golden Age of Israel (Saul, David, Solomon). This age is limited to the reign of David for the Hebrews. 700 B.C. Assyrians are in control. Israel's leaders and families were replaced by foreigners. Thus the "ten years of the lost tribes." Judah believed all of Israel was done away with. 600 - 500 B.C. Babylonian Captivity. King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon took all the people from Jerusalem to Babylon to build (700 - 615 B.C.). They were freed when the Persians defeated Babylon. Eventually, they went back to Jerusalem after having been heavily influenced by the Babylonians and the Persians. c. 1500 B.C. The Maccabees, led by Judas Macabee ("The Hammer"), revolted and regained Jewish independence then lost it to the Romans. The victory is celebrated at Chanukah. Jerusalem was destroyed by the Romans 70-72 A.D. The Hebrews dispersed throughout the world in what is called the Diaspora.
In the beginning . . . Yahweh was jealous, vengeful, mean, nasty, easily duped (not exceptionally bright) -- he bore all the faults of humans. He was the strongest of all the gods, signifying only that the Hebrews recognized "all the gods." The Tower of Babel was a tower being built to reach the gods. The gods realized the people were going to succeed, so the gods struck them with many languages, causing disunity. Language divided groups spread throughout the world. Then all the gods spread throughout the world and chose the groups they wanted to take. Yahweh, the strongest of all, CHOSE the Hebrews. Thus they are called the "Chosen People." When the Hebrews came to Babylon, they saw the ruins of a great ziggurat. The Babylonians called it Bab' El, "The Gate of God." They were referring to Marduk. The Hebrews altered this meaning. There was a contest, at one point, between Yahweh and Baal (Elisha and the Priests of Baal). The Two Altars. Yahweh is a mean god. Anyone who breaks the law is finished. A village was put to the sword. One man kept a small bag of gold. His punishment: he dies, his immediate family dies, all his relatives and all their descendants are cursed forever. Yahweh hardens Pharaoh's heart to NOT let the Hebrews go and then punishes him by killing the first born of all the Egyptian families. He is not omnipotent, not omniscient, not smart. Satan tricked God twice (with Job). Yahweh is very primitive, slow-witted. The Hebrews may have developed monotheism from Akhenaten (or vice versa). The Hebrews practiced temple prostitution. When the Hebrews returned from Babylon, they brought back ideas quickly absorbed by the Hebrew people. For instance, second and third level gods were introduced. After Yahweh, a top echelon of named gods, and then, millions of unnamed gods were added. They called those the Watchers (like guardian angels). c. 800 B.C. The Books of the Hebrews. Edited in 500 B.C. after the return from Babylon. c. 300 B.C. They created a canon called the Torah. Shortly thereafter, the Jewish ghetto in Alexandria could no longer speak or read in Hebrew. Alexandrians spoke Greek. The Greek translation of the holy scriptures is called the Septuagint (translated by 70 scholars, yielding a Greek translation of the Torah in 70 B.C.). Later, a new Torah was written, throwing out 14 books of scripture. The original Torah, from which the Septuagint was translated, is no more. From the Septuagint come the Old Testament of all Christian Catholic Bibles. In 1611, King James translated from the Torah, resulting in the Protestant Bible plus the Apocrypha. All the books that did not get into the Torah are called the Pseudepigraphia, "The False Books." Included among these is, for instance, the Book of Enoch. The Midrash, a written documentation of oral tradition, was written by the Hebrew priests and rabbis circa the Middle Ages. Talmud. Explanations and precedents. In 1946, a shepherd found the Dead Sea Scrolls at Kumran. They are now being translated. They are the oldest extant books we know of, circa 100 B.C. The Watchers. There is no English translation. We call them "messengers" instead. Messengers and Great Messengers. In Greek, these are the Angelloi and the Archangelloi. These were gods. The Hebrews loved lists and labels. A list of the four most commonly encountered of the lower gods is as follows (none of these four existed before the Babylonian Captivity): Michael. (Micha 'El) "He Who Is Like 'El' (God)." The leader of Yahweh's armies. He is known as the Prince of Peace. He stands on Yahweh's right. (There were no armchair generals and there were no left-handed people. The sword was carried in the right hand. The best warrior defends the vulnerable right side.) He is the scribe of the gods and a special champion of Israel. He is a very important figure. He did not exist before the return from Babylon. Gabriel. (Gabri 'El) "The Strength of El." He stands on Yahweh's left. He is the next in power. He is a great judge made of fire (derived from Shamash). The Announcer. He did not exist before the Babylonian Captivity. Raphael. (Rapha 'El) "The Healing Power of El." The god of healing and and medicine and the physical well-being of humans, their spiritual and physical welfare. He presides over the souls of humans. He appears in the Apocrypha. Uriel. (Uri 'El) "The Fire of El." Described as a divine emanation, divine radiance. He resides in the Underworld. He is also knwon as Nasargiel, which probably doesn't mean anything but is rather a Hebrewization of Nergal of the Babylonians. He is a psychopomp, a leader of souls. He leads spirits to the Underworld, and can also lead souls from the Underworld to the place of judgment. Sammael. (Samma 'El) "The Poison of El." God of death. He has a thousand eyes. You cannot escape him. He was sent to destroy the Egyptian firstborn at the first Passover, when the Hebrews were told to spread fresh lamb's blood over the doorway to protect their own children. The feast of Passover is actually a much more ancient Canaanite feast, the reason for which the Hebrews couldn't remember. Rahab. "The Arrogant One." God of the ocean. Among the lower echelon of gods were the Cherubim, looking like the Shedu, found on the top of the Ark of the Covenant. They hold up Yahweh's throne. The Seraphim are fiery serpents (actually made of fire) with six pairs of wings. Their role is to fly around the throne of Yahweh singing "Holy Holy Holy." Demons Demons are usually unpleasant. In three ways, they are like humans: (1) They take nourishment , (2) they propagate, and (3) they die. In three ways, they are like gods: (1) They know the future, (2) they can pass through solid objects unhindered, and (3) they can fly. They can be invisible. They can change size. They inhabit places humans avoid. They like to spread familial disunity and unhappiness. They steal things so people will accuse each other. But deoms have no power over anything which has been measured, counted, packaged, or sealed. The 1st Creation Story. In the beginning, there was the great primeval chaotic ocean and the spirit of Yahweh. The first thing he created was light (with the sound of his voice). There were six days of creation. He created man in his own image. The seventh day was the Sabbath (from Canaanites), and so he rested. Chapter 2 begins the 2nd Creation Story. All there is is desert. A flood comes up and waters the land. The first thing Yahweh does is create man. He creates the Garden of Eden with the Tree of Life and the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. Yahweh comes looking for Adam. Adam and Eve were hiding because they were ashamed of their nakedness. Yahweh asks, "Who told you you were naked?" When the serpent is discovered to be the culprit, snakes are cursed to crawl on their bellies. Enmity is established between man and snakes. Women will experience pain in childbirth and be subject to their husbands. Eve is the "Mother of All Living Things" (see the Sumerian Ki/Ninhursag). Yahweh says, "Man has become like us," and he sends man from the Garden of Eden to keep him from eating of the Tree of Life and living forever (Archetype: The Lying Messenger). The 4th Creation Story appears in Job Chapter 38. It is architectural and poetic. The 3rd Creation Story (there are references to it throughout the Old Testament) surrounds the character called Leviathan. Job 38:8 ". . .who shut in the sea with doors . . . imprisoned the pride of the ocean." Psalm 74:13 "Thou didst divide the sea by Thy might, break the heads of the dragons, crushed the head of Leviathan." (The ocean is a many-headed dragon.) Job 26 ". . . power stilled the sea, by understanding smote Rahab . . .his hand pierced the fleeing serpent." Isaiah 27 "Yahweh will punish Leviathan, the fleeing serpent . . .will slay the dragon." Job 41 Yahweh says, "Leviathan, the sea monster associated with chaos. Man cannot conquer Leviathan. He is king over all the sons of pride." Rahab is just a name for Leviathan. Yahweh imprisoned him and one day will go back and kill him. Leviathan comes from Lotan. In Hebrew, the word for "ocean" is Tehom, the plural is Tehomet (from Tiamat). The word was once a proper noun. Parallels: Ninurta imprisons Kur, Ea kills Apsu, Marduk kills Tiamat, Baal kills Lotan, and Yahweh defeats Leviathan.
Adam's First Wife Adamah ("the second layer of soil," "the red clay" [The clay looked like flesh, like blood. For Hebrews, life is in the blood.]). Sammael says to Yahweh, he's having difficulty getting a consort. He asks Yahweh to create one out of the same red clay. Yahweh creates Lilith. But |