'Parallels between Gilgamesh and Genesis Essay\r'

'I. Introduction:\r\nToday, we are often bombarded with variant inventions and fallies coming from different move of the homo. nonwithstanding it is with broad amazework forcet when we look upon the advancement do by an past civilization that has come to be declare as the cradle of civilization, Mesopotamia, at a term when most of its neighboring pack-group was pursuing a wandering life. Not only contract they revolutionized hu macrocosm social club with its invention of the wheel, writing too, must let originated in this place as shown by the heroic of Gilgamesh.\r\nAncient as it is, beingness ace of the world’s earliest- make outn heroical poetry (â€Å" larger-than-life”) taken from Sumeria and which the Babylonians developed into a long poem, it is undoubtedly resplendent; and ancient as it may be, high comply should be given to it as one of the literary masterpieces of mankind.\r\n coevals on the otherwise hand, is the commencement donjo n up of the Bible. coevals is the Greek word for â€Å"beginning” or â€Å"origin”, and is a Greek translation derived from the Hebraic b’reshith meaning â€Å"in the beginning”, the setoff word in the Old Testament.\r\nII. Meaning and vastness\r\nA. Epic of Gilgamesh\r\nAt the asideset, as one reads finished the poem, it would readily display the glorification of the central figure, the historical warlike king of Uruk â€Gilgamesh. All by dint ofout the poem, the subscriber is led through his m either exploits and achievements of Gilgamesh that gives the over-all impression of a constancy of battle-like stance. This I would non mother strike since this people’s land was al bureaus subjected to crisis much(prenominal) as the threat of invasion or the gush of the rivers. As to the accounting, it relates much on how he has scale every opponent, obstacles, and almost everything he had set out to do. Such achievements were made possib le and justifiable as the narrative describes the super- tender-hearted temper of the lead figure †being devil-thirds divine and one-third human.\r\nHow Gilgamesh emerges as a vanquisher comprises the number 1 part of the myth. It would seem that the author wants to constitute the fact that all the hopes and aspirations of its people are incorporated in Gilgamesh. The commencement exercise part shows and promotes that any(prenominal) man could aspire to achieve or be has been through by the superhuman Gilgamesh. The second part directs the story towards the king’s forebode for immortality through his inte stand-in for the immortalized Uta-Napishtim.\r\nStructurally speaking, these two parts (which would almost come to the fore as unrelated) divides the story. Both would seem to take the proofreader into two different directions, driving down two different plosive speech sounds. The devastation of Enkidu serves as the turning point that separates the two par ts. What serves for continuity for the narrative are the organic traits of Gilgamesh’s character †his fearlessness and obstinacy to be undaunted by obstacles.\r\nWhat is as soundly as a droll trait of the account of Gilgamesh is that the reading of the story is through a transcription of an oral story-telling, which the narrator in the story also revealed as a write down oral story of ancient times. Just as Gilgamesh was described as half-human and half-divine, so is the overall nature of the story. The narrator convinces its listeners and readers alike of the real existence of the king. However, its way of convincing is ironic since it proves the authenticity of its story through the existence of the very walls of the city of Uruk which we, present-day readers would find nowhere but in the walls of our imagination (â€Å"Assro-Babylonian Mythology: Gilgamesh”).\r\nThe desperate serves not only as a literary feat for early civilization; it also bears the id entity operator of the early settlers of the Tigris-Euphrates area. However, its relevance supersedes its cultural identity. This ancient story connects its people with us and all of humanity as they ponder the same signalion which afflicts all men †death, the destiny of every man. It also attempts to answer whether any mortal man could perhaps escape it and also the mystery of what lies ahead after death.\r\nIn determination the answer and decisiveness to these questions lies the signifi thunder mugce of the two parts of the story. As mentioned, the first part is given to prove the semi god-like abilities of Gilgamesh. If he then, who bears such qualities failed in his bid for immortality, as shown on the second part, how much to a colossaler extent for ordinary mortals? The narrative convinces its hearers or readers of the inevitability of death and must resign oneself of this fact. The most that man can do is to be fearless in cladding it, the way Gilgamesh triumphantly faced death in concert with Enkidu in the broad Cedar Forest. However, its main conclusion is: that man is powerless to escape it.\r\nB. coevals\r\n coevals originated as part of a larger literary unit that was only later broken up into books. That larger unit is the religious recital of ancient Israel, usually called the Pentateuch. In it were traced Israel’s origins from its chief fictile experiences down to its settlement in the land of Palestine. withal incorporated into the narrative were law codes formulated at various times in Israelite archives. The entire tortuous came to be ascribed to Israel’s founder and first lawgiver, Moses. This daub has been modified as a result of neo Biblical scholarship. Genesis is a logical discussion section of the original text of the Pentateuch.\r\nIt represents a twofold existence to the story of Israel’s formation as a â€Å"covenant people”†perfection’s chosen people. The patriarchal his tory comprises rolls of stories relating to three major(ip) figures of the pre Israelite past, that is to say Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, together with supplementary traditions about other stems who were of junior-grade interest. After an introductory genealogy there appears first the story of Abraham and Isaac. Included is a fragmentary history, possibly of Moabite origin, of Lot, the ancestor of the Moabites and Ammonites, who were related to the Israelites. There is also the history of Ishmael, who is regarded as the ancestor of the Arab peoples. The second major cycle is that of Isaac and Jacob.\r\nThis cycle also contains supplementary material, some of the Edomites origins, relating to Esau, ancestor of the Edomites. Finally, there is the extensive and distinctive story of Joseph, the major intrusions into which are a variant history of Judah in chapter 38 and the â€Å"blessings” of the Israelite tribes in Chapter 49. Chapter 1 tells of divinity fudge’s act o f creation. Chapters 2-11 record human history from crack to Abraham and describe the Garden of Eden, the Tower of Babel, and the Flood.\r\nThe connecting link surrounded by all these parts of Genesis as well as between it and the other books of the Pentateuch, which it introduces, is a judgment of divine intervention in man’s history. This concept has been given the name Heitsgeschichte, â€Å"salvation history”. Israel believed itself to be the product of a history in which it had encountered a divinity who had made it His Covenant people. The considerable plaints of this history are tracedâ€the Exodus from Egypt; the experiences of the Red Sea, of Sinai, and of Kadesh, where Israel waited distant the Promised Land; and the occupation of the Promised Land. All these reveal a God of clemency and kindness, though also of justice and retribution, a God who had chosen Israel out of simple, uncalled-for love. This historical perspective was imposed in Genesis both on the patriarchal legends that had been derived from Palestine and on the mixed Mesopotamian- Palestinian myths and sagas from which the book’s first chapters are constructed.\r\nThus in Genesis, Creation is seen no longer as mere myth, that is, as a religious conviction visualized in narrative. It is instead, the first in a series of God’s saving acts, by which he had brought forth an enjoin universe out of primordial formlessness. Man was move in that world as God’s image and likeness, to be its ruler. But men change unequal to the task. His wilfulness set him in resister to God and introduced disorder into the world. After this followed murder and the nuisance of man for man, for example, Cain and Abel, Lamech and the Cainites, even cosmic disorder, which the story of the sons of God and the daughters of men attempts to, explain. The Flood is understood in Genesis as both divine retribution and mercy: it brought an end to an evil generation, but a tightlipped remnant was preserved in the person of the clean-handed Noah and those who were saved for his sake.\r\nIII. Gilgamesh and the Flood in the Bible\r\nThe epic farms mention of the Flood in reference with one of the oldest books of the Bible. Similarities of the two accounts were the flood, the gigantic boat, and the fact that animals and supporting creatures were made to come aboard along with the one human family who entered the boat. There are major disparities though as to the recounting of the event. In the account of the Bible, the coming of the huge Flood in Noah’s days was not held as a secret before men, whereas in the story of Gilgamesh, the gods extradite intended to have it unploughed as a secret. Noah was even commanded by God to preach and warn the people of its coming (as a sign of His mercy) while he builds the ark. The people however, did not listen and even taunted Noah. Such reactions may have been likely since many Bible scholars believe t hat preliminary to this incident, rain had not yet fallen on the earth. In the Bible account, the door of the ark was supernaturally closed(a) and opened by God alone. Noah had no power or authority over it. In Gilgamesh’s, the shut of the door bears no spiritual meaning.\r\nNoah’s God and the gods in Gilgamesh were shown to have deeply regretted the sending of the flood that has wiped out humanity expect for those inside the great boat. One of the gods in the epic was displeased at first with the survivors, while the God of Noah readily goddamn them.\r\nIV. Conclusion\r\nThe work unfolds before us the thoughts and intents of the Sumerians and the rest of the Mesopotamians. Like the rest of most societies, they give massive significance to fame and wealth. Fearlessness is held as a great virtue, born out perhaps of their constant living in fear of antagonizing their gods who they believed caused them all their troubles.\r\nAlthough Mesopotamians have achieved much , they did hold a pessimistic view. Life, it seemed for them, was a constant defend a struggle against the forces of nature and the caprices of their gods. Towards the end of the story, even the endeavors of men would come to nothing as he comes to the end of his life. â€Å"Eat, drink and be merry for tomorrow we shall die” would have been the guiding principle of Mesopotamians. possibly so, since one historian had noted that over xl percent of their grain production was used to make beer. Although we discuss this epic as an ancient story, the quest for the answers about life and death still continuous to haunt several people even to this present-day.\r\nsupra all, however, Biblical critics of the 20th century are involuntary to measure Genesis by historical standards other than those of the nineteenth century. By those standards Genesis was condemned or defended in the time of the â€Å"Babel and Bible” controversy. That dispute developed when the Sumerian and Ak kadian literatures of ancient Mesopotamia were discovered and deciphered in the 19th century. The conclusion was easily drawn that the message of Genesis was of no much relevance to the history of religions than the myths of Babylonia, whatever might be the other values of the book. But the 20th century idea of history is more attuned to that which inspired the authors of Genesis. This view recognizes that recording specific facts and dares is not the, real object of history writing. Rather, the aim is to discover and portray realities that challenge human experience and take away an accounting. By the criteria of historicism Moses can hardly said to have existed; yet Israel itself is the historical witness of Moses.\r\nGenesis and the Epic of Gilgamesh are two great books that could inspire people when they read it. The facts and information’s are middling intertwined in some ways. These two books should be see and cherished especially by those who want to know the histo ry of our forefathers, their fall and how they were saved by a mighty Creator.\r\n'