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Reconstructing Babylon: Recycling Mythological Traditions Toward A New Theology
Reconstructing Babylon: Recycling Mythological Traditions Toward A New Theology
Reconstructing Babylon: Recycling Mythological Traditions Toward A New Theology
Reconstructing Babylon:
Recycling Mythological Traditions Toward a New Theology
Many scholars agree that Enūma eliš, “When above,” was formulated during the reign of
Nebuchadnezzar I.,1 to celebrate the renewal of Marduk’s cult in Babylon after his statue
was brought back from captivity.2 The statue is the god himself, and a god in exile leaves his
community divested of divine grace and humiliated, a traumatic religious and political
event. The return of the statue signifies a return of divine grace, which in the life of a nation
can be, or can be made to be, a constituting event. The return of Marduk to Babylon could
have been such a constituting event, and Enūma eliš may have been an ideological testi-
mony of it.3 Enūma eliš is not merely a religious principle; it is also a political statement. Be-
cause Marduk and Babylon are inseparable the text institutes Babylon as the religious
center of Babylonia instead of ancient Nippur.4
The historical background of the text, however, is not quite decided, and associating
it with the return of Marduk from captivity, although likely, is uncertain.5 For example,
1 The most comprehensive support for this date is advanced by W.G. Lambert, The Reign of Nebuchadnezzar I:
A Turning point in the History of Ancient Mesopotamian Religion, in: W.S. McCullough (ed.), The Seed of Wis-
dom, Essays in Honour of T.J. Meek, Toronto 1964, 3–13. (Henceforth, Fs. Meek), Idem, “Studies in Marduk”, Bull-
etin of the School of Oriental and African Studies 47 (1984), 1–9.
2 There were several statues of Marduk in Babylon, but that does not immediately mean that if one was captured
another could simply replace it and that the cult could continue without interruption. If it were just a simple ques-
tion of quantity and statues could conveniently replace one another then a text like “The Prophecy of Marduk”
would be meaningless in every respect and would probably have never been composed. Texts referring to gods in
exile, kings boasting about looting or retrieving divine statues and a city lamenting a god who has left his city, in-
dicate that even when there are several statues of a god in the city each one had a life and significance of its own. It
is not impossible that in cultic functions there was a hierarchy of statues which may have influenced their location.
On the statues of Marduk in Babylon see now A.R. George, Marduk and the Cult of the Gods of Nippur at Babylon,
OrNS 66 (1997), 65–70, with previous bibliography.
3 Tablet VII:145–end, but particularly ll. 145–148 suggest that the idea of a constituting event was not alien to the
author and may have been in his purpose. Learning the events repeatedly and passing them on from generation to
generation is a means to create a framework for a national identity. Compare: “And thou shalt relate to thy son on
that day …,” in the “Hagada of Passover”, the celebration of Exodus in the Jewish tradition, performed literally
every year for generations.
4 Enūma eliš is very clear about it. Unlike the Old Babylonian sources that indeed proclaim the superiority of
Marduk over the Igigi and Anunaki (who here made Marduk their king) in Enūma eliš Enlil gave up his own name
“Lord of the Lands” and thereby his position, and bestowed it on Marduk, because Marduk is the creator of the uni-
verse. He is not equal to Enlil but his successor and substitute; Enlil became Marduk. As for Nippur, it is not even
mentioned (see below).
5 S. Dalley, Statues of Marduk and the Date of Enūma Eliš, Altorientalische Forschungen 24 (1997), 163–171,
especially pp. 165–166.
6 Tablet VI:101.
7 The greatness that was Babylon at the time of Hammurabi made the city the political power centre of South-
ern Mesopotamia and gave its chief god Marduk the same prominence, but not yet to the extent that he would re-
place Enlil. In that case, the political and religious horizons of Enūma eliš may have been merely illusory pro-
paganda for internal purposes. More suitable to that period is the so called “Weidner Chronicle” (Grayson’s
chronicle 19) which focuses on Marduk and his cult in Esagil, but still leaves undiminished the status of Enlil,
Anu and Ea. The date of the text, however, is unknown. The contents suggest the Old Babylonian period but liter-
ary features point to a later date, not before the Kassite period. The claim that Esagil, and therefore Marduk,
existed since the dawn of history, and the concept that kingship moved around according to the god’s will (the pat-
tern of the Sumerian King List) suggest the time of Hammurabi in connection with the rise of Marduk. But the
linkage between the exercise of kingship and the care for Esagil lends the text a sense of admonition which fa-
vours the time of Hammurabi’s successors, when Babylon was still big but its political influence was gradually de-
creasing.
8 Dalley, op. cit.
9 A case in point is the text of Ištar’s descent to the Netherworld, which is clearly dependent on the Sumerian
tale of Inana’s descent. However, against the common view, the two compositions differ on the most important
issue, the subject: Inana’s descent is a tale about Inana, while Ištar’s descent is a story about the Netherworld. The
long repetitions and symmetrical structure which are typical for later compositions create the impression that
Enūma eliš is an expanded Old Babylonian narrative, particularly in combination with some historical evidence
that can be dated to that period. However, since no author writes a text in a vacuum, Enūma eliš, whenever it was
created, will naturally include elements of earlier materials. Therefore, the features that have roots in the Old Baby-
lonian period do not necessarily indicate that an earlier version of Enūma eliš was written at that time. Indeed, in
the Old Babylonian period Marduk was raised to kingship among the gods, a status that befitted the size and status
of the Babylonian kingdom. However, then he was elevated next to Enlil, not as his substitute. Yet, the very essence
of Enūma eliš was to establish Marduk as the substitute of Enlil, as the sole creator of the universe and as the
founder of Babylon – the first and only holy city. Towards these goals the text was structured from the very first line.
To date, this ideology has no precedent in the Old Babylonian material. Therefore, more compelling evidence is
necessary to secure an Old Babylonian date for the origin of the text.
10 On the possible historicity of Agum-Kakrime see now A.H. Podany, The Land of Hana, Bethesda CDL 2002,
58–9, with previous literature.
11 A.L. Oppenheim, Ancient Mesopotamia, Portrait of a Dead Civilization, Chicago 1964, 264.
12 W. Sommerfeld, Der Aufstieg Marduks, Neukirchen-Vluyn 1982, 174ff. But see the review in W.G. Lambert,
Studies in Marduk, Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies 47 (1984), 3–4.
13 Th. Jacobsen, The Treasures of Darkness, New Haven and London 1976, 189–90. In JAOS 88 (1968),
104–108 Jacobsen discussed the properties of Marduk and Tiāmat, and the West-Semitic origin of the motif of the
battle between the sea and the storm god. In p. 107 Jacobsen dated Enūma eliš to “around the middle of the second
millennium B.C.” His assumption that the motif travelled eastwards into Mesopotamia in the Old Babylonian
period is now confirmed by a text from Mari which suggests that in Mari it was integrated in a coronation ritual.
See J.-M. Durand, Le mythologème du combat entre le Dieu de l’orage et la Mer en Mesopotamie, MARI 7 (1993),
41–61 and idem, Le Culte d’Addu d’Alep et l’affaire d’Alahtum, Florilegium marianum VII, Mémoires de NABU 8,
Paris 2002, n°38. That the Mari text has Têmtim rather than the Ugaritic term Yam, suggests that the model for
the duel with Tiāmat was borrowed from Mari, rather than directly from Ugarit. On the other hand, the attestation
of A.AB.BA ta-ma-tum DAGAL-tum in a letter from Ugarit (Ras-Shamra – Ougarit XIV, 2001, p. 261, text no. 8),
perhaps contemporary to Enūma eliš may indicate an Ugaritic influence. Whereas the model for the fight was con-
veniently borrowed from the west, the details of the description are well rooted in South Mesopotamian traditions,
as is the other face of Tiamat, a motherly creation goddess. Note that a-ab-ba – tâmtu appears as a divine compo-
nent in personal names as early as the Ur III period. The personal names suggest that this Tiāmat had a positive
image, particularly the names A.AB.BA-simti and A.AB.BA-bašti. One Tiāmat-bašti was a lukur of King Šu-dSîn
(RIME: 338, 3/2.1.4.29, with previous bibliography).
14 Lambert, Fs. Meek. The list of Marduk’s names in An=Anum could have been the strongest argument for dat-
ing Enūma eliš to the Kassite period, but it is uncertain whether the extant sources of An=Anum tablet II reflect
the earliest version of the text. The list is the subject of A. Seri, The Fifty Names of Marduk in Enūma eliš, Journal
of the American Oriental Society 126 (2006), who advocates a later date.
15 P. Michalowski, Presence at the Creation, in: T. Abusch et al. (eds.), Lingering Over Words, Studies in Ancient
Near Eastern Literature in Honor of William L. Moran, Atlanta 1990, 381–396. Henceforth Fs. Moran.
16 J. A. Brinkman, A Political History of Post-Kassite Babylonia, Roma 1968, 104–109.
17 E.g. En. el. I:1–2: “When the sky above was not yet named, the earth below was not mentioned by name”.
18 It appears, therefore, that the combat between the sea and the storm god, be it Adad or Tišpak, serves as a
framework only. The Ninurta motifs are the subject of W.G. Lambert, Ninurta Mythology in the Babylonian Epic of
Creation, in: Keilschriftliche Literaturen. Ausgewählte Vorträge der XXXII. Rencontre Assyriologique Inter-
nationale, Bonner Beiträge zum Vorderen Orient, Band 6, K. Hecker, W. Sommerfeld (eds.), Berlin 1986, 55–60
(Henceforth “Ninurta Mythology”).
19 One may argue that also this image of Tiāmat was borrowed from the West Semitic mythology like the motif of
the battle, i.e. that Tiāmat is a reflection of At-irat “lady of the sea, creatress of the gods”, KTU 1.4 iii:25 (translation:
D. Pardee, in W.W. Hallo et al. (eds.), The Context of Scripture, Leiden 1997, 258). Moreover, a letter from Dagan-
ba’ali to Urtenu, RS 92.2006 count among the guardian gods Ea bēlu kabtu and A.AB.BA ta-ma-tum DAGAL-tum,
“Sea, the wide sea,” see Ras-Shamra – Ougarit vol. XIV (2001) p. 261 text no. 8. However, this is also an old Su-
merian concept, as in Namma, the ancient Sumerian goddess in Eridu and the mother of Enki, attested since the
ED III period (Reallexikon der Assyriologie 9, 136–7). Her name is written with the sign ENGUR indicating a body
of water, and in the ES vocabulary her name was interpreted as the female sexual organ (MSL IV, 4:24). The re-
lation between the Ugaritic letter and the Sumerian sources is difficult to assess.
20 There does not appear to be any earlier representation of Apsû personified and acting as the creation force.
21 dnamma-ke4 ama palil ù-tud diĝir šár-šár-ra-ke4-ne.
22 J.J. Glassner kindly drew my attention to the Theogony of Dunnu, for which I thank him. I agree with his ob-
servation that the image of the plough is a metaphor for the male organ and penetrating the earth one for copu-
lation, and that the sea, their daughter, has nothing to do with plain, salty sea-water. The Theogony of Dunnu is
known from a single Late Babylonian copy of tablets from Babylon and Aššur, CT 46 no. 43. For text and trans-
lation, see Th. Jacobsen, The Harab Myth, SANE 2/3 (1984). Note that sea is written as Sumerian a-ab-ba rather
than the expected Akkadian tâmtu. Presumably, the personal names with the a-ab-ba as divine component refer to
that image of the sea, rather than to the monstrous Tiāmat.
23 Especially Tablet I:41–46.
24 See particularly YOS 11, 86; V. Dijk, OrNS 42 (1973), 503; M. Stol, Birth in Babylonia and the Bible, its Medi-
terranean Setting, Groningen/Styx 2000, 11, especially ll. 5 and 7: “In the water of intercourse the bone is created;
in the flesh of muscles the baby was created. In the ocean waters (l. 5 me-e a.ab.ba), fearsome raging, in the far-off
waters of the sea (l. 7 i-na me-e ti-a-am-tim ru-qu-ú-tim): where the little one is – his arms are bound …”.
25 Note that the Theogony of Dunnu preserves the old tradition that the sea is the material of creation, which pro-
creates by itself. But it also explains how the sea came into being, in a bisexual act of copulation, a contradictory
concept.
26 In Mesopotamian literature creation stories, such as the first lines of Enūma eliš, are usually used to introduce
a chronological framework to the narrated events. But the creation of the universe by Marduk is another matter be-
cause it has everything to do with the ideological objective of the text. I can agree with Michalowski that the cre-
ation is not the focus of the text (Fs. Moran, 383). But the victory over Tiāmat is certainly not enough by itself to
make Marduk superior to Enlil, which is the objective of the text. Therefore the creation story, which is indeed
unique to Enūma eliš, is a central pillar in the argumentation of the author. That the gods put Marduk to a test for
creation, Tablet IV:21–28, indicates how important this qualification was.
27 Adad/Addu in Mari letters, Tišpak in Ešnuna, Ba’al in Ugarit, but not yet Ninurta in Babylonia.
28 Already emphasized by Lambert in: Studies Marduk, Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies 47
(1984), 5.
29 The classic example for parricide in Mesopotamian literature is still the Theogony of Dunnu.
30 Noise was treated extensively by Michalowki in: Fs. Moran, 385–389.
31 The monsters that Tiāmat created and Kingu are, actually, much at home in Babylonia. Thereby the author
blended her into the mythological landscape of southern Mesopotamia.
32 Lambert, Ninurta Mythology; C. Wilke, Vom altorientalischen Blick, in: Anfang und Ursprung, Colloquium
Rauricum Bd. 10, Berlin/New York 2007, 36ff.
33 Note that in these examples the opponents of the creators were used as the material for the creation.
34 es· emtu – frame of the body, CAD E, 343b with references.
35 The literary nature of the list of 50 names was treated in A. Seri, The Fifty Names of Marduk in Enūma eliš,
Journal of the American Oriental Society 126 (2006), 507–519, with previous bibliography.
36 Perhaps because permanence is intrinsic to the practice of magic. Any change, even the slightest modification
of the procedure might endanger the efficacy of its power.
37 So also Lambert in: Studies in Marduk, 5.
38 E.g. “Nippur was not built, Ekur was not constructed”. The negation was a typical method to describe not yet
existing matters.
39 One should infer, therefore, that the city of Nippur was built long after Marduk created the universe.
40 The structure of the plot, the conscious choice of the mythological materials that were used, adapted to the
purpose of the text and interwoven with the flow of the narration, suggest that the text of Enūma eliš was carefully
thought-out and constructed according to a plan. The deviation of the text from established traditions as of its very
beginning, and the political value of its theological objective suggest that it was commissioned. The end of the text
supports this possibility, especially VII:157–8 which state that the narrated events were disclosed to the writer per-
sonally by an old witness and he wrote it down for the future generations. Thus, the text did not exist before,
neither orally nor in writing, and therefore it claims the authority of an ancient original source. A case in point may
be the religious reform of the Judean king Josia (640–609 BC), described in 2 kings 23. An allegedly ancient scrip-
ture found in the temple of Jerusalem was used by the king as a pretext to consolidate the cult of Yahweh in the
capital and to outlaw any cultic activity whatsoever outside Jerusalem. This reform was a success, and ever since Je-
rusalem is the only holy city for the Jewish people.