What I wish to first show is that the flood story in
Gilgamesh XI is essentially the same version as that which once existed in the
Epic of Atra-hasis. This will aid us in seeing that the flood story in Genesis
may be interacting either with Gilgamesh XI or with Atra-hasis. After looking
at those elements that Atra-hasis and Genesis share, but do not share with
Gilgamesh XI, it can be deduced that the author of Genesis is interacting with
Atra-hasis specifically.
It must be first understood that the flood stories in the
ancient Near East are all a result of a single tradition. They are not separate
memories of a single event, but a single memory of a single event. That is an
important point to remember as we move along in our argument. The original
version is either to be found in the Sumerian text of Ziusudra, which is highly
fragmentary, or in the Old Babylonian version of Atra-hasis itself.
What must also be understood is that even though the
tradition is singular, it appears to be used for different purposes in terms of
what ideology the author of each individual text wished to convey. The
described event is very similar, but the message a particular author desired to
communicate through the event was very different from other accounts. For
instance, in the Old Babylonian version of Atra-hasis, it is clear that the
author wished to make an argument toward limiting population by supporting
reproductive habits that would limit the amount of children a couple had
(hence, limiting reproduction via unproductive
sexual acts and reducing the amount of available women by dedicating them to
the gods as priestesses). In the Assyrian version (as well as that found in Berossus),
the author attempts to argue that the people ought to maintain their upkeep of
the temples and continue seeking the guidance of the gods. In Gilgamesh XI, the
author adapts the account to the message of the Gilgamesh Epic, which has more
to do with escaping death and the nature of what it means to obtain immortality.
The flood tradition is thought to date as far back as the
beginning of the third millennium B.C. The Ziusudra Epic is dated to around the
same time as the Old Babylonian version of Atra-hasis (17th Century
B.C.). The account was added to the Gilgamesh Epic circa 1200 B.C. The Assyrian
version is dated to the seventh century B.C. Berossus’s version dates to the
third century B.C. Hence, the original literary tradition begins with either
the text of Ziusudra or the Old Babylonian Atra-hasis.
But discovering whether
Ziusudra begins the tradition is not important for this study. It is simply
necessary to show that the parallels between later versions and the Old
Babylonian Atra-hasis showcase the fact that the Old Babylonian version, rather
than the Sumerian version, stands as the antecedent to the others. What this
means is that the large amount of details lost from the Old Babylonian version
might be reestablished by one of its offspring. Hence, we must ask whether the
two closest texts to it, Gilgamesh XI or the Assyrian version, share enough
affinity with it as to reconstruct what it basically said. If this can be done,
the similarities between the text of Genesis and Gilgamesh XI may be found to
really be due, not to the author of Genesis’ familiarity with GE, but due to
his interaction with the Old Babylonian version and its ideology.
But these later versions can be seen as interpretive
renditions of the Old Babylonian flood story, and not just later independent
works as well. Atra-hasis already has elements within it that could cause one
to emphasize the need to worship all the gods, and not just one (polytheism
versus henotheism). It also contains the offering to Atra-hasis to become an
immortal. But although Gilgamesh XI, the Assyrian version of Atra-hasis, and
Berrossus can all be traced back to the Old Babylonian version in this way, the
same cannot be said in reverse. In other words, it is not merely the later date
of the texts that tells us that these later versions are drawn from Atra-hasis,
but the fact that they each clearly take elements within the original text and
emphasize, or deemphasize, certain aspects of that text in order to use the
flood tradition for its own ideological purposes. Yet, those later versions do
not have all of the elements that explain where Atra-hasis got its own ideological
emphasis. Hence, it is not simply that the texts we have are later, but the
versions found in those texts cannot be said to predate the Old Babylonian
version of Atra-hasis.
It is clearly my intention to springboard off of what
scholars, like Lambert and Millard have known for some time, namely, that
“Tablet XI of the Gilgameš Epic is in
fact largely derived from the account in Atra-hasīs.”[1]
As Tigay has also convincingly proven by his comparison of the texts that “in
the case of the flood story there is no question but that Atrahasis served as
the source for Tablet XI of the late version.”[2]
He sums up the evidence for the above statement nicely by
saying that “this is crystal clear from the following considerations: 1)
Certain lines in Gilgamesh and Atrahasis are virtually identical, and
the two are therefore textually related. 2) The flood story is an integral part
of the plot in Atrahasis, and it was
already part of the plot of that epic in the Old Babylonian period. In Gilgamesh, the story is only incidental
to the main theme, and, as we shall see, probably did not enter the epic until
its late version was created. 3) In Tablet XI, 15–18, Utnapishtim opens his
account of the flood with a list of gods (Anu, Enlil, Ninurta, and Ennugi) and
their offices which also appears at the beginning of the Old Babylonian Atrahasis. In Tablet XI, the list, along
with line 19 which may be based on the second tablet of Atrahasis, serves to identify the great gods who, according to line
14, decided to bring the flood, but it is really inappropriate for this
purpose. Not only does it omit Ishtar, who is explicitly mentioned in lines 119
and 121 as having taken part in the decision, but it mentions Ennugi, who plays
no role at all in Tablet XI, and Anu, who is mentioned only in passing, without
being involved in the events. In Atrahasis,
however, all of the gods mentioned in the list play a role in the events
surrounding the creation of man, and three of them play a role in the flood as
well. Therefore it appears that the editor of the Gilgamesh story simply took the list over bodily from Atrahasis, rather than composing a new
one of his own. 4) Finally—and this is the giveaway—although Gilgamesh usually calls the survivor of
the flood Utnapishtim, in the flood story he once calls him Atrahasis (XI,
187), the name he bears throughout The
Atrahasis Epic.[3]
However, it is only the flood narrative that the two have in
common. As Tigay points out, “while the flood story in GE XI comes from Atrahasis,
the rest of the narrative about Gilgamesh’s encounter with Utnapishtim (GE X, iv-vi and the rest of GE XI, i.e., 11.1–14 and 193–307) has no
counterpart in Atrahasis.”[4]
Now, the reason why I have gone to the trouble of pointing
out that the flood account in Gilgamesh XI is one and the same flood account in
Atra-hasis is twofold. (1) To establish what the flood account, which has been
largely lost in the Old Babylonian version, looked like; and therefore, (2)
that the similarities between the Genesis account are not similarities to
Gilgamesh, but to Atra-hasis. In other words, the author of Genesis is directly
interacting with the epic’s ideology, and thus, utilizes its flood story.
Now, the first of the two above have been sufficiently
proven by those who have come before me. Anyone familiar with the texts will
find the above arguments indisputable. It would be one thing to merely have
details that were similar when describing an historical event, but it is quite
another to have the wording and details mentioned in such a similar fashion as
to leave little doubt for one text’s reliance upon another. To be sure, if the
flood accounts were term papers turned in by two different students, expulsion
on the charge of plagiarism would be a sure result of it.
The second claim, however, is what this paper seeks to
prove. Hence, it is necessary to look at a couple of elements that are shared
by the Genesis account and that of Atra-hasis, but not with Gilgamesh XI. Since
the text in Gilgamesh XI provides us with the missing data from Atra-hasis, one
must assume that what is found in Gilgamesh XI was also similar or identical to
that in Atra-hasis. The following is a comparison of the similar elements the
accounts share with one another.
Genesis
|
Atra-hasīs
|
Gilgameš XI
|
Noah walked with God (6:9)
Then God said to Noah, “The end of all flesh has come before Me . . .
everything on the earth shall perish” (6:13, 17)
God said to Noah . . . “Behold, I Myself will bring a flood upon the
earth” (6:17)
“Construct for yourself an ark” (6:14)
“Cover it inside and out with pitch” (6:14)
“Make a roof for the ark” (6:16)
“For after seven more days, I will send rain upon the earth” (7:4)
“in order to preserve their seed alive upon the face of the earth”
(7:3)
“Go into the ark, you and all your household” (7:1)
clean animals [i.e., domestic] and animals that are not clean [i.e.,
wild] (7:8)
And YHWH closed him in (7:16)
I will send rain upon the earth for forty days and forty nights . . .
the rain fell upon the earth forty days and forty nights (7:4, 12) [the parallel here is not in the time
frame, which in Genesis is figurative, but the use of the same time frame in
the pattern X days and X nights, whereas Gilgamesh has X days and Y nights.]
Noah opened the window of the ark (8:6)
The ark came to rest upon the mountains (8:4)
Sent out the dove and the dove returned to him (8:10)
“offered burnt offerings on the altar”
YHWH smelled the sweet savor (8:21)
“I shall remember my covenant . . . I remember (9:15-16)
Whoever sheds the blood of man, by man his blood must be shed (9:6)
And God blessed Noah
|
[I lived in the temple of Ea, my lord]
(Enki presumably speaking to Atrahasis): The gods commanded total
destruction (II.viii.34)
He [i.e., Enki] told him of the coming flood (III.i.37)
“Construct a ship” (III.i.22)
[he poured pitch into the inside]
“Build a roof on it like the Apsu”(III.i.29)
He [Enki] announced to him the coming of the flood for the seventh
night
[“Bring into the ship the seed of all life”]
he sent his family on board (III.ii.42)
[the cattle of the field, the wild animal of the steppe]
Pitch was brought for him to close the door (III.ii.51)
For seven days and seven nights came the storm (III.iv.24)
[“he opened the window”]
[On Mt. Nimush the boat was grounded]
[The dove went out and returned]
He offered up a [sacrifice] (III.v.31)
[The gods smelled the sweet] savor (III.v.34)
“That I may remember it [every] day” (III.vi.4)
[upon the criminal] impose your penalty (III.vi.25)
[he touched our foreheads to bless us]
|
Went down to dwell with my lord, Ea (v. 42)
“Construct a ship” (v. 24)
I poured pitch into the inside
“Build a roof on it like the Apsu” (v. 31)
“Bring into the ship the seed of all life” (v. 27)
All of my family and relatives went into the ship (v. 84)
the cattle of the field, the wild animal of the steppe (v. 85)
I entered the boat and closed the door (v. 93)
Six days and seven nights the wind and storm blew (v. 127)
“I opened the window” (v. 135)
On Mt. Nimush the boat was grounded (v. 140)
The dove went out and returned (v. 147)
“I offered up a sacrifice” (v. 155)
The gods smelled the sweet savor (v. 160)
“I shall remember these days and never
forget” (v. 165)
Upon the criminal impose his crimes (v. 180)
he touched our foreheads to bless us (v. 173)
|
It is, however, not merely the similar phrases that point to
the author of Genesis’ intimate knowledge of the Atra-hasis text. For instance,
in the Babylonian flood account, there is a period of waiting seven days
between the rains subsiding and sending out a dove. In the Genesis account, the
period is between the first bird (a raven) sent out after the rains subside and
the second bird (a dove), the second bird and the third (a dove again), and the
third bird and the fourth (also a dove).
What is also interesting are the birds and the times they
are sent out. In Genesis, one raven and three doves are sent out. In the
Babylonian version, one dove, one swallow, one raven, and all kinds of birds
are sent out. It is interesting that Genesis retains the identity of two of the
birds (i.e., a raven and a dove) and the amount of times birds were sent out
(i.e., four). This may be an indication of where Gilgamesh XI and Atra-hasis
disagreed rather than the disagreement existing between the Genesis account
with Atra-hasis. In any case, the similarity is too striking to ignore, but the
dissimilarity with Gilgamesh may contribute to the overall picture that the
text with which Genesis is interacting is not Gilgamesh, but Atra-hasis (i.e.,
a text similar enough to Gilgamesh XI, but evidencing some variation).
Other elements exist in terms of themes. In the Babylonian
account, a necklace of flies that are worn around the neck, as though they are
the colorful jewel lapis lazuli, serves as a reminder of the flood to the remorseful
gods, but in Genesis it is the colorful rainbow in the sky that does so.
Where we see a significant detail that is only shared
between Atra-hasis and the Genesis account is when the flood hero is warned
seven days in advance before the flood occurs. This detail is left out of
Gilgamesh XI and every other flood account. Only Genesis and Atra-hasis share
the detail between them.
Jacobsen suggested that the Mesopotamian materials, such as
Atra-hasis may have been admired by the author(s) of Genesis and so mimicked by
him, or they may have simply served as a models for the P account.[5]
As I have argued above and will argue below, it seems clear that this
connection must be seen as one between Atra-hasis and Genesis, not simply a
generic Mesopotamian tradition.
Kikawada has argued in another article that Genesis, Enki
and Ninmah, and Atra-hasis all share doublets when describing the creation of
mankind,[6]
but it is clear that rather than suppose this to be a common ancient Near
Eastern method of constructing anthropogonies, as Kikawada suggests, the
evidence points to the uniqueness of this phenomenon, as no other anthropogony
outside of these three accounts do this, nor are Enki and Ninmah separate
traditions, but instead, as Millard pointed out, the Sumerian work known as “Enki and Ninmah clearly belongs to the
same tradition as Atrahasis."[7]
Hence, the uniqueness is shared only between Genesis and the tradition that
runs through the Atra-hasis Epic.
Millard notes some similarities between Genesis and Atra-hasis
as well, noting, among other things, that “the basic idea of disturbing deity
is surely common to both narratives as the provocation leading to the decision
to send the Flood.”[8]
This element is not shared by Gilgamesh XI, as Utnapishtim only states that the
gods sent the flood, but does not describe the reason for it.[9]
But beside the evidence of continuity, there is evidence of
a polemic that is just as convincing. One must remember that the purpose of incorporating
the flood account into the Gilgamesh Epic was to contribute to the overall
message concerning the pursuit of immortality. Gilgamesh wants to find out if
it is possible for a man to achieve it, so he seeks out a man who has. However,
this is not the subject matter of Genesis. Instead, Genesis evidences that it
is concerned with procreation as a continuation of the work of God in creation.
A human being is truly His image when that human thwarts chaos by being
fruitful and multiplying and subduing and ruling over the land. Hence, the Genesis
account in 1–11 begins and ends with a command to do just that. But why does it
do this?
It is clear from the text of Atra-hasis that humans are to
keep their numbers down in order to prevent such a tragic event as the flood
from happening ever again. In order to keep their numbers down, of course, this
entails that they are to limit their children through various means. If the
preceding epic did not scare them enough, we are told that a demon will come
and steal children away, supposedly, if a woman has too many. Women are to be
divided into groups that can bear children and priestesses who are reserved for
the service of the deity and not to be touched (although they were often used
as a sexual outlet for men who did not wish to get their wives pregnant because
they employed contraceptive methods and practices that thwarted childbirth).
But if all of these clues are too vague for the reader to comprehend, the
account states explicitly that the goal of all of these restrictions concerning
sexual practice are to “stop childbearing.”
In other words, the argument that Atra-hasis seeks to make
is that the flood event came about because there were too many humans whose
lives were becoming too burdensome to the gods, specifically to Enlil. Although
Enki is on the side of humanity, he has worked out a compromise that all people
should obey; and that compromise needs to be kept by humans by limiting their
childbirth and hindering population growth. The text, therefore, is an early
form of overpopulation propaganda that told people the gods are not favorable
toward a couple who has too many children.
In contrast to this, Genesis presents God as not only
favorable toward a couple having many children, but as commanding it Himself.
In fact, He considers the seed of the woman, the offspring born in His image
and a representative of mankind according to the genealogy of Seth, who He made
to co-create human life with Him, to be those who “walk with Him.” He preserves
them and they show themselves to be His people. Where the line of Abel/Seth
continues the image by having, not only a
child, but “other sons and daughters” (the only characteristic of each person
in Seth’s line) the line of Cain is characterized only by a single heir and
their anticreational acts of murder and self-exalting pursuits as gods who
build city centers and fill their days with entertainment (a pastime of the gods)
in order to provide a human-centered answer to chaos.
In other words, it is no coincidence that after the flood in
the Atra-hasis Epic humans are told to stop childbearing, and after the flood
in the Genesis account, humans are told, even more emphatically than before I
might add, to increase childbearing. It is also no coincidence that the entire
section of Genesis 1–11 ends with the building of Babylon, the very place where
the author of Genesis likely first interacted with the text of Atra-hasis and
saw it as a product of that society, an argument, the author seems to think,
that is only made in an overcrowded area, such as a city, since population
growth is not usually an issue if people continue to spread out and use the
amount of land available.
Hence, the polemic of Genesis is made by presenting God as
favorable toward childbearing and population growth, by displaying it as a
command given by God at creation and after the flood, the structuring of the
book by the tōlĕdôt “birthing”
formula, by presenting that man as a singular human rather than a larger
population is “not good,” and presenting his wife as made specifically for the
purpose of increasing his numbers, by implying that the command that is broken
was a misuse of the sexual act that was non-procreative, that continually
arguing that it is YHWH who creates children, not just the human body, by
presenting the righteous line of the woman’s seed as those who have many sons
and daughters, by explaining that the flood did not occur because of
overpopulation, but because the population was corrupt and had become chaotic
agents rather than agents of life fulfilling their roles as God’s co-creating
images (i.e., people practicing hamas which
is a word that describes violence to human life and preservation which includes
unproductive sexual acts), and by continuing to argue beyond the first half of
the book on through the patriarchal narratives that God’s desire is to increase
the number of His people upon the earth in a population explosion, and that He
is the One to be credited with opening and closing the womb, as well as
condemning unproductive sexual acts that do violence to the creation principle
of filling up the earth with human beings (e.g., the citizens of Sodom who wish
to have sex with the men/angels who visit the city and the cases of killing Er
and Onan).
If overpopulation is a problem, it is only a problem for the
cities that do not spread out. Hence, dispersion is the answer the author of
Genesis provides to the problem of overpopulation, not limiting population
through contraceptive practices and the engaging in unproductive sexual acts.
The author of Genesis seeks to make a monumental polemical
argument against the one made in Atra-hasis by using the same flood tradition
but altering its original purpose to the degree of saying the exact opposite of
the ideology it was once used to convey. But Genesis goes far beyond merely
using the flood account as polemic, and instead uses the entire early history
of the world and Israel’s origins as the framework upon which the polemic is
built. Hence, it is not merely the flood account in Genesis, nor even merely
the primeval history alone, but the entirety of the book that provides Israel
with an understanding, not only of its physical origins, but of its theological
and ethical ones as well. And these latter theological and ethical origins
stand in direct opposition to those presented within the Atra-hasis Epic.
Thus, as Kikawada noted in his structural study between the
two texts, both are concerned with solutions to overpopulation, but Atra-hasis
argues for “the urban solution,” which
is birth control. Genesis, however, “offers dispersion, the nomadic way.”[10]
As Tsumura sums up the argument, “Kikawada, following Kilmer’s view of
‘overpopulation’, suggests that ‘Genesis 1–11 may be a polemic against urban
life and its solution to overpopulation, birth control.”[11]
Likewise, Moran suggests that the postdiluvian instructions
to be fruitful and multiply by teeming upon the earth, where the instructions
in Atra-hasis to stop childbearing would be expected, is a “conscious
rejection” of the argument made in the Atra-hasīs Epic.[12]
Hence, there is no doubt. The elements found in Genesis are
not a part of some generic tradition, but are specifically elements from
Atra-hasis that the author of Genesis has marshaled in order to turn the message
of Atra-hasis on its head, and “set the record straight,” so to speak.
[1] W.
G. Lambert and A. R. Millard, Atra-Hasīs:
The Babylonian Story of the Flood (Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 1999) 11.
They conclude that “Ku-Aya’s text is the main source” of the Assyrian version
as well.
[2]
Jeffrey Tigay, The Evolution of the
Gilgamesh Epic (Wauconda, IL: Bolchazy-Carducci Publishers, Inc., 2002)
216.
[3]
Ibid., 216–217.
[4]
Ibid., 217.
[5]
Thorkild Jacobsen, “The Eridu Genesis,” ISIBF
141.
[6]
Isaac M. Kikawada, “The Double Creation of Mankind in Enki and Ninmah, Atrahasis I
1–351, and Genesis 1–2,” in ISIBF 169–74.
[7] A.
R. Millard, “A New Babylonian ‘Genesis’ Story,” in ISIBF 119. For support of this claim, also see S. N. Kramer, Sumerian Mythology 69–70 and J. J. van
Dijk, Acta Orientalia 28 (1964)
24–31. Also see my thesis, “The Labor of the Gods: Ancient Near Eastern
Creation Accounts and the Purpose of Genesis 1,”
[8]
Millard, “A New Babylonian,” 123.
[9]
Ibid., 122.
[10]
I. M. Kikawada, “Literary Convention of the Primaeval History,” AJBI 1 (1975) 3–21; also see A. D.
Kilmer, “The Mesopotamian Concept of Overpopulation and Its Solution as
Reflected in Mythology,” Or 41 (1972)
160–77.
[11]
David T. Tsumura, “Genesis and Ancient Near Eastern Stories of Creation and
Flood,” in I Studied Inscriptions from
Before the Flood: (Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, ) 46
[12]
W. L. Moran, “Atrahasis: The Babylonian Story of the Flood,” Bib 52 (1971) 51–61. Also see T.
Frymer-Kensky, “The Atrahasis Epic and Its Significance for Our Understanding
of Genesis 1–9,” BA 40 (1977)147–55,
who concludes the same.
Sorry for the messy chart. It was perfectly aligned in Word, but blogger messed it up for some reason in the conversion.
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