The Religion of Babylonia and Assyria

Ardi-Ea carries out these instructions and Gilgamesh at last is healed. The hero is now ready to return to his land. But though returning in restored health, he is not proof against death. Parnapishtim, at the suggestion of his wife, reveals the 'secret of life' to Gilgamesh just before the latter's departure. The ship is brought nearer to the shore, and Parnapishtim tells Gilgamesh of a plant that wounds as a thistle, but which possesses wonderful power. Gilgamesh departs on the ship, and with the help of Ardi-Ea finds this plant, which is called 'the restoration of old age to youth.' It is a long journey to the place. The plant grows at the side or at the bottom of a fountain. Gilgamesh secures it, but scarcely have his hands grasped the plant when it slips out of his hand and is snatched away by a demon that takes on the form of a serpent. All is lost! Gilgamesh sits down and weeps bitter tears. He pours out his woe to Ardi-Ea, but there is nothing left except to return to Uruk. He reaches the city in safely. His mission—the search for immortality—has failed. Though healed from his disease, the fate of mankind—old age and death—is in store for him. With the return to Uruk the eleventh tablet ends. It but remains, before passing on, to note that the narrative of the deluge in this tablet is connected with the character of the eleventh month, which is called the 'month of rain.' We may conclude from this that the mythological element in the story—the annual overflow—predominates the local incident of the destruction of Shurippak.

In the twelfth tablet—which is in large part obscure—we find Gilgamesh wandering from one temple to the other, from the temple of Bel to that of Ea, lamenting for Eabani, and asking, again and again, what has become of his companion. What has been his fate since he was taken away from the land of the living? The hero, now convinced, as it seems, that death will come to him, and reconciled in a measure to his fate, seeks to learn another secret,—the secret of existence after death. He appeals to the gods of the nether world to grant him at least a sight of Eabani. Nergal, the chief of this pantheon, consents.

He seems to feel that Gilgamesh could not endure the description. The life after death, as will be shown in a subsequent chapter, is not pictured by the Babylonians as joyous. Eabani reveals glimpses of the sad conditions that prevail there. It is the domain of the terrible Allatu, and Etana[993] is named among those who dwell in this region. Eabani bewails his fate.[994] He curses Ukhat, whom, together with Sadu, he holds responsible for having brought death upon him. In Genesis, it will be recalled, death likewise is viewed as the consequence of Adam's yielding to the allurements of Eve. Special significance, too, attaches to the further parallel to be drawn between Adam's punishment and Eabani's fate.

applies to Eabani as well as to Adam. He was formed of clay, as we have seen,[995] and when he dies he is 'turned to clay.'[996] Still the fortunes awaiting those who die are not alike. Those who die in battle seem to enjoy special privileges, provided, however, they are properly buried and there is some one to make them comfortable in their last hour and to look after them when dead. Such persons are happy in comparison with the fate in store for those who are neglected by the living. The one who is properly cared for, who

With this sentiment the epic closes. Gilgamesh must rest content with the unsatisfactory consolation that Eabani offers him. Man must die, and Gilgamesh cannot escape the universal fate. Let him hope for and, if possible, provide for proper burial when death does overtake him. He will then, at least, not suffer the pangs of hunger in the world of spirits to which he must go.

The twelfth tablet exhibits somewhat more traces of the theology of the schools than the others. Eabani's speech, while conveying sentiments that thoroughly represent the popular beliefs of Babylonia, is couched in terms that give to the address the character of a formal declaration of doctrines. The conjuring up of the spirit of Eabani is also a feature that appears to be due to theological influences, and the whole episode of Gilgamesh's wandering from place to place seeking for information appears to be a 'doublet' suggested by the hero's wanderings, as narrated in the ninth and tenth tablets.

The problem propounded in the earlier tablets—the search for immortality—is, as has been shown, a perfectly natural one and of popular origin, but the problem with which Gilgamesh wrestles in the twelfth tablet,—the secret of the life after death,—while suggested by the other, belongs rather to the domain of theological and mystic speculation. This aspect of the twelfth tablet is borne out also by the fact that the problem is not solved. The epic ends as unsatisfactorily as the Book of Job or Ecclesiastes. There is a tone of despair in the final speech of Eabani, which savors of the schools of advanced thought in Babylonia. For the problem of immortality, a definite solution at least is offered. Man can reach old age; he may be snatched for a time from the grasp of death, as Gilgamesh was through the efforts of Parnapishtim, but he only deludes himself by indulging in hopes of immortal life. 'Man must die' is the refrain that rings in our ears. The plant of 'eternal youth' slips out of one's hand at the very moment that one believes to have secured it.

The Gilgamesh epic, as we have it, thus turns out to be a composite production. Gilgamesh, a popular hero of antiquity, becomes a medium for the perpetuation of various popular traditions and myths. The adventures of his career are combined with the early history of man. Of actual deeds performed by Gilgamesh, and which belong to Gilgamesh's career as a hero, warrior, and ruler, we have only four,—the conquest of Erech, his victory over Khumbaba, the killing of the divine bull, and the strangling of the lion.[1001] The story of Eabani, Ukhat, and Sadu is independent of Gilgamesh's career, and so also is the story of his wanderings to Mashu and his encounter with Parnapishtim. Gilgamesh is brought into association with Eabani by what may be called, a natural process of assimilation. The life of the hero is placed back at the beginning of things, and in this way Gilgamesh is brought into direct contact with legends of man's early fortunes, with ancient historical reminiscences, as well as with nature-myths that symbolize the change of seasons and the annual inundations.

Popular philosophy also enters into the life of the hero. Regarded as a god and yet of human origin, Gilgamesh becomes an appropriate illustration for determining the line that marks off man's career from the indefinite extension of activity that is a trait of the gods. Gilgamesh revolts against the universal law of decay and is punished. He is relieved from suffering, but cannot escape the doom of death. The sixth tablet marks an important division in the epic. The Ishtar and Sabitum episodes and the narrative of Parnapishtim—itself a compound of two independent tales, one semi-historical, the other a nature-myth—represent accretions that may refer to a time when Gilgamesh had become little more than a name,—a type of mankind in general. Finally, scholastic speculation takes hold of Gilgamesh, and makes him the medium for illustrating another and more advanced problem that is of intense interest to mankind,—the secret of death. Death is inevitable, but what does death mean? The problem is not solved. The close of the eleventh tablet suggests that Gilgamesh will die. The twelfth tablet adds nothing to the situation—except a moral. Proper burial is essential to the comparative well-being of the dead.

The fact that Gilgamesh is viewed as a type in the latter half of this remarkable specimen of Babylonian literature justifies us in speaking of it, under proper qualification, as a 'national epic.' But it must be remembered that Gilgamesh himself belongs to a section of Babylonia only, and not to the whole of it; and it is rather curious that one, of whom it can be said with certainty that he is not even a native of Babylonia, should become the personage to whom popular fancy was pleased to attach traditions and myths that are distinctively Babylonian in character and origin.

The story of Gilgamesh was carried beyond the confines of Babylonia.[1002] Gilgamesh, to be sure, is not identical with the Biblical Nimrod,[1003] but the Gilgamesh story has evidently influenced the description given in the tenth chapter of Genesis of Nimrod, who is viewed as the type of Babylonian power and of the extension of Babylonian culture to the north.

The Gilgamesh epic is not a solar myth, as was once supposed,[1004] nor is the Biblical story of Samson a pure myth, but Gilgamesh becomes a solar deity, and it is hardly accidental that Samson, or to give the Hebrew form of the name, Shimshon, is a variant form of Shamash[1005]—the name of the sun in Babylonian and Hebrew. The Biblical Samson appears to be modelled upon the character of Gilgamesh. Both are heroes, both conquerors, both strangle a lion, and both are wooed by a woman, the one by Delila, the other by Ishtar, and both through a woman are shorn of their strength. The historical traits are of course different. As for the relationships of the Gilgamesh epic to the Hercules story, the authority of Wilamowitz-Möllendorf[1006] is against an oriental origin of the Greek tale, and yet such parallels as Hercules' fight with a lion, his conquest of death, his journey and search for immortality (which in contrast to Gilgamesh he secures), certainly point to an influence exercised by the oriental tale upon the Greek story.

It is not surprising that the elements contributed through this influence have been so modified in the process of adaptation to the purely Greek elements of the Hercules story, and, above all, to the Greek spirit, as to obscure their eastern origin.[1007] Most curious as illustrating the continued popularity of the Gilgamesh story in the Orient is the incorporation of portions of the epic in the career of Alexander the Great.[1008] In Greek, Syriac, and Rabbinical writings, Alexander is depicted as wandering through a region[1009] of darkness and terror in search of the 'water of life.' He encounters strange beings, reaches the sea, but, like Gilgamesh, fails to secure immortality. Such were the profound changes wrought by Alexander's conquests that popular fancy, guided by a correct instinct of appreciation of his career, converted the historical Alexander into a legendary hero of vast dimensions.[1010] The process that produced the Gilgamesh epic is repeated, only on a larger scale, in the case of Alexander. Not one country, but the entire ancient culture world,—Babylonia, Persia, Egypt, Arabia, Judea, and Syria,—combine to form the legendary Alexander. Each country contributes its share of popular legends, myths, and traditions. Babylonia offers as her tribute the exploits of Gilgamesh, which it transfers in part to Alexander. The national hero becomes the type of the 'great man,' and as with new conditions, a new favorite, representative of the new era, arises to take the place of an older one, the old is made to survive in the new.