This post complements my previous one about the Ham “seeing his father’s nakedness” story developing in three stages: Originally the story was an adaption of the myths of the youngest son castrating his father (the motive: to maintain an inheritance) Then it was more delicately shifted to a story of illicit sex And finally […]
Mesopotamia
Asherah – pdf
The Babylonian Genesis – Alexander Heidel – pdf
The Gilmesh Epic and Old Testament Parallels – Alexander Heidel – pdf
Gods & Goddesses of Ancient Egypt – A Brief History – Joshua J. Mark
The land of ancient Egypt was alive with the spirit of the gods. The sun god Ra broke from the darkness every morning in his great boat, bringing the light, and many of the gods watched over the people by night as the stars. Osiris caused the Nile River to flood its banks and fertilize […]
The Mesopotamian Pantheon – Joshua J. Mark
by Joshua J. Mark The gods of the Mesopotamian region were by no means uniform in name, power, provenance or status in the hierarchy. Mesopotamian culture varied from region to region, from city-state to city-state and, because of this, Marduk should not be regarded as King of the Gods in the same way Zeus ruled […]
Nanshe – Joshua J. Mark
Nanshe (also known as Nanse, Nazi) is the Sumerian goddess of social justice and divination, whose popularity eventually transcended her original boundaries of southern Mesopotamia toward all points throughout the region in the 3rd millennium BCE. She watched over orphans and widows, oversaw fairness, fresh water, birds and fish, fertility, and favored prophets, giving them […]
Utu-Shamash – Joshua J. Mark
Utu (also known as Shamash, Samas, and Babbar) is the Sumerian god of the sun and divine justice. He is the son of the moon god Nanna and the fertility goddess Ningal in the Sumerian tradition but was known as Shamash (Samas) to the Akkadians who claimed Anu or Enlil as his father. In the […]
Noah’s Ark and the Flood
Points of similarity between the Babylonian and Noachian flood stories Comparing the stories The Chaldean Flood Tablets from the city of Ur in what is now Southern Iraq contain a story that describes how the Babylonian god Enlil had been bothered by the incessant noise generated by humans. He convinced the other gods to […]