Good question--is Genesis merely a rip-off of other ANE lit?

[Series Index: gilgymess.html // Last update: to this piece Oct 16/ 2005]

Part11: Flood Traditions (gilgy09.html)

If you have been following this series, you have probably seen by now that the case of Genesis borrowing from other ANE cosmogonies is fairly weak. What few similarities there are are grossly overshadowed by differences, often simple 'banal' commonalities, or so minor as to render the suspicion of borrowing very dubious.

But when we come to the Flood traditions, we seem to be on different footing. Borrowing is almost 'canonical' in this field, although the evidence is—oddly enough—concentrated around only a handful of data points. Consider these statements, describing the current consensus:

“The account of the flood presents us with a different situation than the creation accounts. We would expect most cultures to have some tradition or account of how the cosmos came to be. Once the question of origins is addressed, there are a limited number of typical directions that can be followed. Therefore, chance and coincidence may be invoked much more readily as an explanation of similarities.

“In contrast, however, Flood accounts are not essential to a complete cosmology (though the pervasiveness of such traditions has been noted); the very existence of such an account in different cultures is suggestive. Furthermore, however, the parallels between the biblical and Babylonian flood accounts are more significant than the parallels found in the creation accounts. Most notable here is the sending out of the birds. This is an action incidental to the main thrust of the story-yet both Noah and Utnapishtim send out birds to determine the situation outside of the ark. This does not appear to be a detail that two different cultures would just happen to include independently of one another. Heidel expresses the consensus: 'That the Babylonian and Hebrew versions are genetically related is too obvious to require proof.'

“We should not be surprised, then, to find that in the flood story, more than in any other literary tradition, it is assumed by scholarship that the Mesopotamian and biblical accounts cannot be thought of as having been independently composed. And again, since even the copies of the flood traditions in Mesopotamia date from the early second millennium (The Eridu Genesis), the biblical account is usually judged to be secondary. So, as stated by Finkelstein, 'the dependence of the Biblical story upon the Babylonian to some degree is granted by virtually all schools of thought.'” [AILCC:38]

and

“One of the more important finds in Mesopotamia is the Epic of Gilgamesh. This is the story of a king and his lonely travels as he seeks to uncover the meaning of life. As the tale unfolds, Gilgamesh's best friend Enkidu dies by decree of the gods. Gilgamesh is crushed, and he becomes obsessed with the awful reality that he too must die. So he searches for a way to escape the fate of all humankind. He eventually hears of one who did escape, a certain Utnapishtim, the only survivor of a great flood. After finding Utnapishtim, Gilgamesh inquires about the secret of eternal life. Utnapishtim tells him about the flood, how he built an ark, loaded it with animals, and survived a torrential rain. Before leaving the ark, he sent forth a dove and a raven, and upon emerging he sacrificed to the gods. The many similarities between the biblical account of the flood and the Gilgamesh Epic suggest a definite relationship between the two. “ [OT:AEOT:27]

and

“As Heidel commented, 'The most remarkable parallels between the Old Testament and the entire corpus of cuneiform inscriptions from Mesopotamia ... are found in the deluge accounts of the Babylonians and Assyrians, on the one hand, and the Hebrews, on the other.' After forty years the situation remains the same, with even more information about the story of the Flood being available from ancient Mesopotamia, though in recent years literatures from ancient Syria, especially from Ugarit and Ebla, have been providing enormous amounts of material in other topics for comparative studies...According to Lambert, who is extremely careful with regard to the Mesopotamian influence on the Genesis Creation story and does not admit the Hebrew borrowing from the Babylonian "Creation" story, "Enuma elish," too easily, 'the flood remains the clearest case of dependence of Genesis on Mesopotamian legend. While flood stories as such do not have to be connected, the episode of the birds in Gen 8:6-12 is so close to the parallel passage in the XIth tablet of the Babylonian Gilgamesh Epic that no doubt exists.'” [ISI:52,53]

Now, what is interesting about this assumption of dependence is that it is never asserted to be literary dependence—all scholars agree that the differences in detail and content between Genesis and Mesopotamian precursors are just way too determinative against it. Even while assuming/asserting dependence, authors are quick to point out that this is NOT literary dependence:

“The derivative nature of the Biblical Flood narrative or rather the existence of an antecedent Mesopotamian tradition for the early forms of the Biblical story is undeniable. However, the extent to which the later narrative is derived from the earlier tradition remains uncertain. A direct form of literary influence cannot be asserted, as the distinctive features of the respective narratives are too plentiful to allow such an affirmation. All one can say is that the Biblical accounts must have been influenced by the Mesopotamian oral tradition or by a pre-existing series of such orally transmitted traditions.” [HI:IF, 4]

“It is safe to conclude that the parallels between the biblical account of the Flood and the Mesopotamian stories, being so numerous and detailed, are much more than the result of mere coincidence. Yet it cannot be claimed that any version presently known is the direct source of the biblical narrative, for the latter has points of contact with each version while it also contains items independent of them all.” [JPS Torah Commentary: Genesis, Sarna]

"However, it has yet to be shown that there was borrowing, even indirectly. Differences between the Babylonian and the Hebrew traditions can be found in factual details of the Flood narrative (form of the Ark; duration of the Flood, the identity of the birds and their dispatch) and are most obvious in the ethical and religious concepts of the whole of each composition. All who suspect or suggest borrowing by the Hebrews are compelled to admit large-scale revision, alteration, and reinterpretation in a fashion that cannot be substantiated for any other composition from the ancient Near East or in any other Hebrew writing. If there was borrowing then it can have extended only as far as the "historical" framework, and not included intention or interpretation." [ISI, "A New Babylonian 'Genesis' Story", p.126f]

“..it is obvious that the differences are too great to encourage belief in direct connection between Atra-hasis and Genesis, but just as obviously there is some kind of involvement in the historical traditions generally of the two peoples.” [OT:AHBSF, 24]

One thing we need to be clear on here at the outset though, is that this issue is not as 'inflammatory' as might be assumed in certain contexts. When an modern writer asserts that:

“Then begins the famous episode of the birds, famous because it is one of those details held in common that proved the shared origin of the tales of Uta-napisti and Noah.” [OT:BGE, 516]

...it is easy to read this as a statement of literary dependence. But notice the quote actually says “shared origin” of both tales. “Literary dependence” and the weaker “tradition dependence” are substantially different from “shared origins”. A “shared origin” can be the very event (e.g., a historical flood) about which the two different authors write, but this would not imply ANY literary dependence, and could easily not require any tradition (i.e., a culturally-shared interpretive belief about that event) dependence either.

For example, Walton can rightly point this out, in the example of the accounts of the battle of Qadesh:

“This suggests that we are not dealing with a literary dependence or even a tradition dependence as much as we are dealing with two literary perspectives on a single actual event. To illustrate from another genre, we expect that the Hittite and Egyptian accounts of the battle of Qadesh will exhibit similarities, for they report about the same battle. Their differing perspectives will also produce some differences in how the battle is reported. The similarities do not lead us to suggest literary or tradition dependence. We accept the fact that they are each reporting in their own ways an experience they have in common.” [AILCC, 40]

Note that this is only a case of 'shared origin'--and it has a pattern of similarities AND differences.

To further illustrate this—with something more 'theological'--let's take the story of Israel's Exodus from Egypt. We are generally familiar with the Biblical version, but there is another version from the Egyptian historian Manetho. Josephus describes and attacks Manetho's interpretation of the Hebrews leaving Egypt, as being an 'expulsion of lepers'(!). Manetho and the Bible both agree (a similarity/parallel) that the Hebrews left Egypt under 'strained relations' (smile), but they disagree (a difference) on the 'why'. There should not be any doubt that neither the Bible nor Manetho are independent traditions of the same historical event—no borrowing whatsoever is needed to explain the 'similarities'.

In other words, the further apart the details in two accounts are, the less likely there is ANY literary dependence. And, since we only know about 'traditions' from actual 'texts' ('traditions' being the 'shared elements' or sometimes, 'family resemblances', between a multiplicity of disparate, but commonly-themed, texts), the further apart the details the specific text (the 'alleged borrower') are from the 'shared elements' of divergent-but-shared-theme texts, the less likely there is ANY tradition dependence. This only leaves two options: independent tradition about the same event(s); or independent events altogether.

Note: The interested reader can also look at the abduction of the statue of Ishtar from the Eanna temple in Uruk. There are FIVE independent sources describing that event--in differing terms and from differing value perspectives. No one would suggest that the five accounts were in 'literary dependence' to one another! They merely go back to a common event, and PERHAPS polemically interact among themselves. [HI:HCW, 29-40]

[One exception to this is the important category of 'polemical inversion'. This is where the framework, structure, and details are in deliberate opposition (and it is obvious to the ancient reader) to some literary text or tradition. Spoofs require enough similarity to create the allusion-base. In this case, literary dependence is assured—the polemic only works if you know the passage—but it falls into the strong category of 'anti-borrowing'. We have already noted that scholars suspect that elements of polemical inversion might exists in Genesis 1, in the minimalist/marginalizing way the author treats stars and sea monsters—important mythic figures in Mesopotamia. We will look at this possibility for the Flood story, if we get enough data suggesting that the Genesis Flood author had enough familiarity with the alleged ANE 'sources.]

One more methodological observation: the more generic the commonalities are which define a 'tradition' (remember, tradition is the set of 'shared elements' between a multiplicity of disparate, but commonly-themed, texts), the more likely they will be thematic, genre-defining, and therefore 'banal' in Kitchen's sense. The more generic these elements are (e.g., “there was a flood”, “the gods were angry”, “people escaped a disaster”) the more likely they are not borrowed—they are part of ANY such story. It is only 'specific, unusual correspondences' that suggest borrowing.

So, we will first look at the non-biblical documents under consideration here, then try to find common elements [to find the 'tradition' elements], and then compare these to the Biblical account (and each other) so see if borrowing (literary-direct, tradition-indirect, or possible literary-indirect-through-intermediate-translation) is the best explanation for the details. There are three documents: The Gilgamesh Epic (GE), the Atrahasis Epic (AE), and the Sumerian Eridu Genesis (EG).

Let's first look at the documents being referred to:

First is Gilgamesh XI.

“About 120 years ago, in 1872, George Smith of the British Museum read the paper "The Chaldean Account of the Deluge" before the Society of Biblical Archaeology. There for the first time he presented a translation and a discussion of a number of fragments of the "Gilgamesh Epic;' especially of tablet XI, where the Flood story is narrated. This was so similar to the biblical Flood story that it created immediate enthusiasm for studies in parallels between the two stories. Certainly, as Millard says, 'No Babylonian text provides so close a parallel to Genesis as does the Flood story of Gilgamesh XI” ... Thorough comparisons have been made between the Flood stories of Genesis and the "Gilgamesh Epic,' tablet XI, and their interrelationship and priority have been discussed. Heidel discusses the problem of dependence and summarizes three main possibilities that have been suggested: (1) the Babylonians borrowed from the Hebrew account, (2) the Hebrew account is dependent on the Babylonian, (3) both are descended from a common original. The first explanation, according to him, finds "little favor among scholars today," while "the arguments which have been advanced in support of [the second view] are quite indecisive." As for the third way of explanation, Heidel thinks that "for the present, at least, this explanation can be proved as little as the rest."” [ISI:52f]

The plot of the Gilgamesh Epic (henceforth GE) is really not about a flood—the story is fairly 'incidental' to it:

“When applied to Gilgames the term 'epic' is a coinage of convenience, for the word has no counterpart in the Akkadian language - By it is meant a long narrative poem describing heroic events that happen over a period of time. The Babylonian Gilgames fits this definition well. The poem tells the story of a great king, the hero Gilgames, who so tyrannizes the people of the city of Uruk that the gods create his counterpart, the wild man Enkidu, to divert him. Enkidu is brought up by animals but seduced by a prostitute and civilized. Gilgames and Enkidu fight, become inseparable companions and go together on a risky adventure to fell timber in the far Cedar Forest. On the way Gilgames has a series of terrifying nightmares but nevertheless they slay the forest's guardian, the divinely appointed Humbaba, and fell the cedar. On their return Gilgames repudiates the overtures of the goddess Mar and, with Enkidu's help, dispatches the monstrous Bull of Heaven that she sends to exact vengeance. For these twin misdemeanours the gods sentence Enkidu to death and he falls sick. He has a vision of the Netherworld and dies, whereupon his friend is distraught with grief. After a magnificent funeral Gilgames is consumed by the fear of death and sets off on a quest to the ends of the earth. The journey takes him where no mortal has been before, along the Path of the Sun and across the Waters of Death. He comes at last to the realm of the wise Uta-napisti who survived the great flood sent by the gods in time immemorial and was granted immortality as a result. Under his instruction Gilgames learns that there is no secret of everlasting life and is made to recognize his own human frailties. He returns home a wiser man and sets down his story for the benefit of future generations.” [OT:BGE:3; Note how unlike Genesis this plot is.]

The flood story for GE actually comes from a previous Flood story, Atra-Hasis (which we have already examined in gilgy04.html for cosmogonic material), and the flood story in GE was NOT a part of its own pre-history:

“The outstanding example of material taken from elsewhere into The Gilgamesh Epic is the account of the flood in Tablet XI of the late version [tanknote: 'late version' is dated 1000 BC-600 BC roughly], lines 15 through 196. There is no evidence that the whole story was recounted in the Old Babylonian version [tanknote: OB is dated 2000-1600 BC] as it is in the late version. Although the Old Babylonian version told how Gilgamesh journeyed to Utnapishtim, the survivor of the flood (see Gilg. Me. iv), the actual retelling of the flood story is not attested in Old Babylonian fragments of the epic, and, as we shall see, there is good reason to believe that the full story was not a part of the epic before the late version.

“The discovery of the flood story in GE XI in 1872 created a sensation because of the similarity of this story to the biblical account in Genesis, Chapters 6 through 9. The story may have arisen from a specific historical flood that took place in parts of southern Mesopotamia around 2900. The flood came to be regarded as a major turning point in human history and the story about it was popular enough to appear in several different versions in ancient Mesopotamia and neighboring areas. The classic Akkadian version of the story was The Atrahasis Epic, known in several versions from the Old Babylonian period on . Although the final lines of Atrahasis speak of the flood as its main theme ("I have sung of the flood to all the peoples. Hear it!" OB A& III, viii, 18-19), this epic was actually a history of the human race, beginning with the events leading up to the creation of man and continuing through several calamities down to the flood and its aftermath. A Sumerian counterpart to Atrahasis is found in the text named The Deluge by modern scholars, although it, too, is really a history of man from his creation through the flood . The story had reached Ras Shamra on the Syrian coast by the Middle Babylonian Period [tanknote: MB is dated 1600-1000 BC], in an Akkadian version which was probably part of neither Atrahasis nor Gilgamesh . The story eventually became part of The Gilgamesh Epic, and its popularity in this context could be indicated by the fact that, at least for the present, the tablet of the late version in which the story appears (XI) is the tablet of which the largest number of copies has been found, although this could be a coincidence. The story survived into the Hellenistic period and was included in the third-century B.C.E. work Babyloniaka, a history of Babylonia written in Greek by the Babylonian priest Berossus."

“Unlike the episodes we studied in Chapters 9 through 11, where we were unable to point to a specific composition on which Gilgamesh was dependent, 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. 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 through 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 flood 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.” [HI:EGE, 214f]

Our earliest copy, however, of GE with the flood story in it is from the seventh-century copy:

“The 'Gilgamesh Epic,' as is well known, is a seventh-century neo-Assyrian copy of an older original, and the Flood story built into it was taken from a much older independent story of the Flood. We now have several Old Babylonian versions (seventeenth century B.C.E.) of the Flood story, the 'Atra-Hasis Epic,' as well as the Sumerian Flood story, thus pushing the Mesopotamian Flood tradition back at least a thousand years earlier than 'Gilgamesh[' XI. From Ugarit, a fourteenth-century copy of the Flood story, 'the only version of the Babylonian Flood story found outside Mesopotamia so far' , has been unearthed.” [ISI:53]

Tigay has argued that the GE we have today included elements from versions of Atrahasis later than the Old Babylonian:

“The Atrahasis flood story has thus been incorporated into The Gilgamesh Epic in a form which differs considerably, in wording, style, content, and apparently ideology, from the Old Babylonian version of that story. At least some of these changes are due to the editor of the late version of Gilgamesh having relied upon a late version (or versions) of Atrahasis. We have noted a few cases where the changes assimilate the story to the needs and interests (and, in one case [sec. b, 5, p. 219] vocabulary) of The Gilgamesh Epic, but even some of these cases may have been based on late versions of Atrahasis or other flood traditions. We have also noted areas where the editor has failed to adapt the flood narrative to the style and formulation of the rest of the late version of Gilgamesh. On the whole, there is very little evidence for changes on the part of the editor of the late version of Gilgamesh, and one gets the impression that he incorporated the story largely as he found it in one or more versions that were available to him...We must therefore infer that prior to the late version of Gilgamesh, the flood narrative was not part of the Utnapishtim section and that it was taken into Gilgamesh from a late version of Atrahasis, one dating from a time when the late formula was in vogue.” [OT:EGE, 237,239]

There seems to be a fairly substantial difference between the first-millennium and second-millennium versions:

“... 'late version,' upon which the summary in the preceding section is based, was the first version to become known to scholars in the second half of the nineteenth century. It was deciphered from tablets found in the remains of the library of Ashurbanipal, the Assyrian king (668-627) who assembled the greatest library of the pre-Hellenistic Near East in his capital, Nineveh . Other subsequently discovered first-millennium copies from the earlier capitals at Assur and Calah, from Babylonia in the south, and from Sultantepe in the far north of Mesopotamia (southern Turkey today), are substantially identical to the Nineveh texts, whereas those from the second millennium, although textually related to the Nineveh texts, differ from them considerably. The latest of these second-millennium texts, from the Middle Babylonian Period (ca. 1600-1000), stem from Ur in southern Mesopotamia, from Megiddo in Canaan, and from the Hittite capital Hattusha (Boghazkoi) in Asia Minor; the latter site has also yielded translations into the Indo-European Hittite language and into Hurrian, the language of the Mitanni empire in Central Mesopotamia (ca. 1400). The earliest Akkadian copies from the Old Babylonian Period (ca. 2000-1600), when (as we shall see) the earliest version of the epic appears to have been composed, come from several sites in and around Babylonia .” [OT:EGE:11]

And more recent scholars place this SB/flood version even LATER (much too late for relevance to us):

"Most scholars, therefore, see this section (the eleventh tablet) as the work of the seventh-century editor [tn: 700-600BC!] who based the addition upon an earlier source known as the 'Atrahasis Epic'... ” [Scott B. Nagel, "Mesopotamian Epic" in A Companion to Ancient Epic, John Miles Foley (ed). Blackwell:2005, p.240]]

What this implies is that GE is not going to be an adequate source for biblical Flood traditions, for reasons of timing: (a) GE's which are early enough to influence Gen 6-9 [i.e., the second-millennium versions] do not even have a flood narrative; and (b) the GE with the Flood narratives derived from AtraHasis is probably written too late [i.e., post 1000 BC] to work its way over/through/into monarchic/ semi-imperialistic Israel.

You have to remember that in canonical Hebrew literature, there are allusions and/or references to Noah and the flood in Isaiah (Is 24.18 -> Gen 7.11; 25.5 -> Gen 9, 16,12; Is 54.9 -> covenant with Noah), Ezekiel (14.14,20 -> Gen 6), and Zephaniah (1.2-3 -> Gen 6.7). The imagery in Isaiah 24 requires significant textual familiarity on the part of the audience to work—this would require the relevant Flood passage to have been around (and circulated among the leadership) for some time. Isaiah begins his ministry around 740 BC, so this pushes the Flood text much earlier. The Davidic Psalm 29 (v 10) makes an apparent reference to the Flood, and this would push the tradition back to the 1000BC mark at the latest. If we accept the Book of Job as a product of the Solomonic literary expansion, then Job 22.16 – if it refers to the Deluge – would fall into the same turn-of-the-millennium time frame. Most or all of these essentially preclude a literary dependence on the Late Versions of GE.

This, of course, is an argument from the internal history of Israelite traditions, but there is another, extra-biblical line of argument as well. The influence of Babylonian literature (all cuneiform, btw) throughout the West is well documented. The GE is found in third and second millennia BC sites as far west as Cappadocia / Anatolia. There is no doubt it had spread into all the lands Israel would later come to live. But it was a cuneiform literature, and this type of literature 'died' in the West about the time Israel exoduses Egypt and enters Canaan:

“The picture that emerges from the Middle Babylonian tables of Gilgames fits what we know of the spread of Babylonian culture in the second millennium. The diaspora of the traditional literature of lower Mesopotamia was the result not of a single act of borrowing but of a steady process over many centuries. The written culture of southern Mesopotamia was already exported to the West in the Early Bronze Age, as we know from the finds of third-millennium tablets at Ebla, Mari and Tell Beydar. A small proportion of these tablets were inscribed with literary texts that originated in south Mesopotamia. In the Middle Bronze Age the cuneiform writing system continued to be used as far afield as, for example, Qatna and Alalakh in Transeuphratine Syria and Kanis (Kultepe) in Anatolia. New evidence shows that Babylonian culture continued to make an impact wherever the cuneiform script was used in this period... The considerable prestige that attached to the Akkadian language in the Late Bronze Age, as seen in the diplomatic correspondence of the Amarna period, meant that Babylonian texts traditionally associated with the teaching curriculum were much copied in the West in the two centuries before life was interrupted by the catastrophes that overtook the eastern Mediterranean in the twelfth century.” [OT:BGE, 26f]

“It would be nice if such written evidence were available from the immediate neighborhood of Israel during the first millennium, but it is not. At the end of the Bronze Age, shortly after 1200, there came a devastating disruption of the old societies that also paved the way for Israel's rise. The old powers were weakened or removed. Use of cuneiform virtually disappeared in the regions west of Mesopotamia proper. By the time the Assyrians could realistically expand their power in the west, the alphabet was firmly entrenched, never to be replaced. The older system had never been based on political authority, and the Assyrians would never have imagined imposing a cuneiform written culture on its provinces and vassals.” [OT:MAB, 224]

“At the beginning of the 10^th century BCE local use of the cuneiform writing system in Syria was discontinued.” [OT:AS, 168]

Without going into the details, the GE has a history essentially like this:

1. It is written early and circulated widely throughout Bible lands, although in variant versions.

2. There are no versions in the 3^rd/2^nd centuries which contain Flood stories or ANY material paralleled in the Hebrew bible [i.e., IF the Hebrews were exposed to GE, in its without-a-flood story version, then they didn't find it worth 'borrowing anything else from'.]

3. It is influential (and paraphrased/translated) in many lands of the East/West during this period, but not in Egypt. (There was a version of it in Megiddo, which was 'owned' by Egypt at the time, but the version is fairly remote from the SB version with the flood in it. [OT:BGE, 342])

4. The Hebrew patriarchs could have encountered early versions in their move from Ur (finding copies in Emar and Ebla?) and interactions with kinfolk in the Haran area, but again, there is no trace of any pre-flood versions in ANY of the Genesis text.

5. Toward the end of the 2nd millennium, there is a 'preserve our history' movement which attempts to standardize many ancient Old Babylonian and Middle Babylonian texts/documents. From these efforts, a 'Standard Babylonian” version emerges in the 1000BC-800BC time frame, and it quickly assumes canonical status in the world that still uses cuneiform. They even invent a 'non-spoken' language (Standard Babylonian) for it, as a classical form. [I.e., only the scribes interested in legacy and nostalgia—and sometimes court use—know this language. It is NOT a language of common interaction at all.]

6. This standardization process emanates from Babylonia, but variants (without the flood tradition) and abridgments still show up in the regions to the West [OT:BGE:351ff]

7. [In the 1200 BC timeframe, there are major upheavals in the Levant, with one consequence being the 'death of cuneiform' skills. Assyria and Mesopotamia continue to use cuneiform, but the land in which Israel shows up does NOT. ]

8. In the process of producing the 'epitome' of the GE, the scribe [Sin-legqi-unninni?] adds a flood story (from Atrahasis), polishes up the story for posterity, and 'canonizes' that version. This process seems to occur a couple of centuries after the upheaval in Palestine, and too late to make an influence—being written in the 'dead language' Standard Babylonian, and in cuneiform.

The bottom 'borrowing' line is this:

1. The most probable 'entry point' into Hebrew thought life is via the 3^rd millennium interactions between the Patriarchs and Babylonian culture, but there are (a) no flood traditions in OB GE at this point; and (b) there is no evidence of non-flood influence of OB GE on ANYTHING in Hebrew literature.

2. The next most probable entry point into the Hebrews is through Moses in the libraries of Egypt, but there is no evidence GE was known there, the timeframe is STILL in that 'no flood story version' period, and there is STILL no evidence of it in Moses' lit. [Note: we do know that cuneiform was known by the Egyptian scribes, from the Amarna archives of the 14^th century. This archive was mostly letters between nations and city-states of the day, but there is a small cache of Akkadian literary texts, most notably the stories of Adapa and of Nergal and Ereskigal. But there are no flood stories in these either.]

3. The next possibility is when Israel enters the land and starts interacting with the locals, but by this time cuneiform is not a live force there. It is too late for the newly-created-in-Babylonia “Standard Version” of GE to impact the Land. The original language is 'dead' and the newly created 'classical version' is essentially confined to legacy scholars in Assyria/Babylonia.

4. The final possibility is during the interaction exchanges under Solomon. His alliances with all the nations around him COULD have opened the door to access (via a translator, though) to the cuneiform SB version, but the kingdoms of Assyria/Babylonia at that time had essentially no contacts southward (they were fighting major challenges form nomadic tribes at the time): “Both kingdoms were in decline for most of the [10^th] century, Assyria beginning to recover from about 925, and neither had contacts so far to the west and south because they were harassed by Aramean tribes moving east from the Euphrates.” [OT:AS, 47]. Solomon had explicit links with Egypt and theoretically could have gotten a copy from Egypt, I suppose, but once again, we have no evidence whatsoever that Egypt had a copy [the previous copy in Megiddo did not have a flood tradition], nor that they had translated it from cuneiform to hieroglyphic, nor that the relationship between Egypt and Assyria/Babylonia at the time was conducive to such a thing. Of course, no OTHER aspects of any GE document shows up in Solomonic area literature either.

So, there are decidedly difficult challenges to believing that the SB GE version (with the flood) could have influenced Hebrew literature to begin with.

This conclusion is not very 'startling' but there is one important implication we should understand clearly. This means that any parallels between Genesis and GE which are unique to GE (i.e., not present in pre-GE source docs, such as Atrahasis) cannot be used as evidence for borrowing. If the parallel did not exist in pre-1000 BC exemplars, then it cannot be cited/defended/assumed as being a from-Meso-to-Hebrew borrowing. It will—in the absence of any precursor data—have to be relegated to a 'late innovation'.

So, we have to go back one more step, to the Flood tradition which GE borrowed from—the Atrahasis story.

We have already looked at the cosmogonic content of Atrahasis earlier (gilgy04.html), but here we need to trace the history of the Flood tradition content. Let's start with this long description of the Flood background and plot:

“We now pass from myth to legends about early times. The human race multiplied and their noise became such that Enlil--still on the earth--could not sleep. He therefore resolved to reduce their numbers by plague, and Namtara, the god of plague, was commissioned to put this plan into effect. Enki, no doubt fully insulated from the noise in his subterranean abode, and in any case sympathetic to his own creation, was petitioned by Atra-hasis, who, unless he was mentioned in the earlier missing section, is introduced very abruptly in line 364. To understand the narrative properly one needs to know that he was king. Enki gave him instructions for averting the plague. The normal custom of the Babylonians in time of need was to petition their personal gods, just as in the story Atra-hasis approached his personal god Enki. For most Babylonians the personal deity was very minor, but it was his duty, if suitably provided with offerings by his client, to look after the latter as need arose. However, under the divinely sent plague special measures were needed, which were mediated by Atra-hasis to the city elders, and by them to the people. They were all to direct their devotions to Namtara in person, who would be pleased by the unwonted attention and would relax the plague. All this happened and, at the beginning of Tablet ii, mankind multiplied once more, Enlil again lost his sleep, and having failed with plague, he now tried famine to reduce the human population. Adad, the storm god, was instructed to withhold his rain. This was done and in the ensuing famine Atra-hasis once more entreated Enki, who repeated his previous advice, which was again successful, and Adad discreetly watered the earth without attracting Enlil's attention.

“This second attempt of Entil covered the first column and the top half of the second column of Tablet ii, and the gap between the preserved portions in the main recension can be filled from the Assyrian Recension. From this point onwards to the end the difficulty arises that frequent gaps obscure the development of the story, and especially for the remainder of Tablet ii. The Assyrian Recension is as incomplete as the Old Babylonian text, and the use of the two Late Babylonian pieces does not fully restore the narrative. The following reconstruction seems reasonably sure to the present writers. With the relaxation of the drought mankind presumably multiplied (with its noise) so that for the third time Enlil lost his sleep. The only surviving account of what he then ordered is x rev. i, which can be compared with column v of the Assyrian Recension (which contains some of this material conflated with other things) and with backward allusions in later parts of the story. It appears that Enlil was now thoroughly suspicious that some god was deliberately frustrating his plans. He did not, therefore, think up a third method for diminishing the numbers of the human race, but instituted a rigorous renewal of the drought. Since previously the earth had been watered without his knowledge, he set guards at each level of the universe to watch that no breach of his rules occurred. Anu and Adad guarded the heavens. He himself (one Late Babylonian copy substitutes Sin and Nergal) guarded the earth, while Enki supervised the regions below. Thus the drought was resumed. This much was probably contained in the bottom half of Tablet ii, column ii, of the main recension, and when, in column iii, we find Atra-hasis absorbed in devotions to Enki, we may be sure that he is disturbed that the renewal of the drought seemed to imply that Enki no longer cared for the human race. Enki, however, did respond to his petitions and communicated with him. The text is very damaged, and breaks off at this point (ii. iii and x rev. i), and when it resumes again in ii. iv the rigours of the famine are being described. It is possible that the gap between the preserved parts of columns iii and iv of the main recension contained an account of Enki's interrupting the famine a second time, but this seems unlikely. For the moment Enki saw no way out and communicated only his benevolent intentions to Atra-hasis. Just as column iv (and Tablet i of the Assyrian Recension) breaks off it appears that Atra-hasis is making a final desperate plea. Enki did then act, though what he did we can only surmise from his explanation when called to account by Enlil in ii. v and x rev. ii. It appears from the Late Babylonian x that a cosmic sea was conceived to exist at the very bottom of the universe, a kind of primeval monster that had been subdued and was held in place by a cosmic bar. The lines describing the actual happening as explained by Enki are broken and very obscure, but perhaps there was some kind of tussle down there and as a result the bar was broken. Somehow in connection with this fish were apparently caught up in a whirlwind and released on starving humanity. Whatever the exact details Enki excused himself to Enlil for this escapade, but the latter was far from satisfied with the course of events and held a council of war in which he laid down that no god must again rescue humanity. Enki's hilarious outburst at this solemn warning (ii. vi) hardly reassured Enlil, so a new plan was formed. Enki had used water to frustrate Enlil's plan, so now water would be used to further it. The human race was to be wiped out by a flood, and Enki was bound by an oath, against his wishes, to co-operate. At this point Tablet ii ends.

“Tablet iii contains the flood story and the version known to George Smith from Tablet xi of the Gilgames Epic is in fact largely derived from the account in Atra-hasis. One piece of the Assyrian Recension dealing with the flood also survives, and a few small pieces of uncertain connections, but Ku-Aya's text is the main source. As the tablet begins Enki and Atra-hasis are in communication. Apparently the king had received a dream on which he sought more light. (Enki had already found a way around his oath!) In reply Enki addressed the reed hut with the instruction to pull down the house and build a boat. We are to conceive Atra-hasis as living in a reed house such as are still found in southern Mesopotamia, where reeds grow to an enormous height. No doubt the wind might whistle through the reed walls, and Enki seems to have whispered to his devotee in the same way, since it was no longer himself but the wall that transmitted the message. Since reed boats were as common as reed houses, the obvious course was to pull up the bundles of reeds which composed the walls of the house and to fasten them to a wooden framework as a boat. To make it watertight it was thoroughly coated with pitch. The Old Babylonian Atra-hasis does not have the midrashic elaboration of Gilgames xi, where the boat is a veritable Titanic with six floors. Indeed, in Atra-hasis Enki gives the hero only seven days in which to prepare for the onset of the flood, and, interestingly, sets his water-clock for the seventh night. Atra-hasis now has to explain his actions to the elders. He told them quite truthfully that Enki and Enlil had fallen out, so he, a protege of the former, could no longer live on the latter's earth. He must, then, be off in his boat to live with his own god. With this explanation the boat was built and loaded with the hero's possessions, and with animals and birds. Before embarking with his family he held a banquet, in which he could not participate, being overcome with horror at the impending destruction. Once aboard, the flood came, and save for those inside, the human race was wiped out. In the event the gods were not pleased. Enki and the mother goddess were sorely grieved at the loss of their creation. The other gods began to find the disadvantages of a world without humans. The toil which men had taken over, digging the rivers and canals, for example, was part of the agricultural process, and, with this interrupted, supplies of food and drink were cut off. The mother goddess wondered how she could have consented to such a scheme, and bitterly blamed Enlil.

“The flood lasted for seven days and seven nights, and in the gap at the end of column iv and the beginning of column v the rain must have ceased and the boat come to rest wherever it did. This gap is particularly unfortunate in one respect, that the Gilgames Epic at this point inserts the episode of sending out three birds to ascertain if the waters were subsiding. This is the closest parallel of any Mesopotamian flood story with the Book of Genesis. It would be interesting to know if the Old Babylonian version already contained this item, but while there is room for it, there is no certainty that other items did not fill all the space.

“On disembarking, Atra-hasis promptly instituted an offering for the gods, psychologically a good move, since this would powerfully remind them of the advantages of living mortals, and in this condition they would be less likely to take a severe view of the survival of this remnant from what was planned as total destruction. The mother goddess was emphatic in her condemnation of Anu and Enlil and wished to exclude them from partaking of the offering. Using her grief as a pretext, she appropriated some lapis lazuli flies which had been Anu's and insisted that she would wear them as a perpetual reminder of the time when her offspring were floating on the surface of the waters like flies. This is aetiological, to explain actual necklaces of fly-shaped beads around the necks of statues of this goddess in the author's experience. When Enlil discovered what had happened he was furious at yet another frustration of his plans. Of course Enki was blamed, but he excused himself and in the damaged portion of column vi Enlil was presumably prevailed upon to accept the continuance of the human race. He required, however, that Enki and the mother goddess organize them better, no doubt to spare him the noise. Enki accordingly set forth proposals, in which the mother goddess shared. The only preserved portion occurs at the top of column vii, and this concerns women who do not bear children, that is, certain categories of priestesses. It so happens that we know these women best from Old Babylonian Sippar,' where Ku-Aya probably worked. Save for the concluding epilogue the rest (perhaps nothing very essential to the plot) is missing.” [OT:AHBSF, pp9-13]

Atrahasis clearly contains a flood story, clearly does so early enough (c. 1600 BC), and is even represented (somewhat?) outside Babylonia (there is a tiny fragment of it in Ras Shamra, in the 1300's BC). So, we will work with this.

[I have pointed out earlier that the Eridu Genesis is not actually earlier than Atrahasis, and, according to Bottero, the Flood is “a literary and mythological theme that was unknown up until then (Atrahasis)” [OT:RIAM :102].]

So, let's start with a comparative chart [From WBC, Genesis, at 6.7], add a few items, and put in it Genesis, GE XI, (from OT:BGE) , and Atrahasis (from OT:AHBSF). [When there is no parallel in AE, but there is one from the Eridu Genesis, I will put it in the Atrahasis column and clearly mark it so, as EG.]

Divine Decision to Destroy Mankind

Okay, so this is the raw data to work with...The plan is to go through this point by point and ask the following questions:

1. What are the major points of contact/parallels?

2. What are the major points of difference?

3. If there ARE points of contact, are there non-ANE flood traditions with the SAME points of contact (showing that dependence is not 'required' by the parallel)?

4. Are the major points of contact 'unusual enough' to warrant dependence (of any type: literary or 'tradition', 'friendly' or polemical)?

5. Of the 2 or 3 accounts, which would 'seem' to be closer to a presumed historical point of origination? (I.e., if the 'shared-ness' looks like one of shared-event and not one of shared-tradition, which of the accounts looks most 'historical' or event-descriptive?)

Then we will tally up our observations/conclusions and see where it leads...

Now, before we start, I want to give two examples of 'arguing about borrowing' that I find rigorous and use them as a 'baseline' of comparison when we examine OUR 'similarities'.

First, from Tigay, is the argument he makes that GE XI borrows from Atrahasis:

“...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. 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 through 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 flood 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.” [HI:EGE, 216f]

To state these as 'principles':

1. If there are lines which are textually identical, we may assume literary dependence.

2. If a event/passage appears in two texts, the text in which it is more 'causally relevant' [i.e., non-incidental to the story] would be the source of the borrowing (if borrowing occurred)

3. If a cast of characters (or items) is fully explained and utilized in one account and not in another—yet still fully included in the latter account—it is best explained by borrowing.

4. Scribal 'slips' in which a character is 'accidentally' called by the name of the character in the earlier/other text, would suggest a borrowing with a 'global search/replace of names' editing process, but which missed one occurrence.

Second, is Lambert's argument about Enuma elish and Anzu, as summarized by Clifford [OT:CAANEB, 85]:

“Lambert has clearly demonstrated direct dependence of Enuma elish on the Old Babylonian version of Anzu by pointing to specific borrowings: in Anzu three gods turn down the invitation to fight Anzu before Ninurta accepts, and in Enuma elish Ea and Anu refuse to march before Marduk accepts; in Sumerian traditions eleven monsters oppose Ninurta, and the same number appear in Enuma elish 1.146 even though Enuma elish 1.133-146 names only eight, indicating that the number eleven is a borrowing; the Tablet of Destinies fits awkwardly in Enuma elish but not in Anzu, where its disappearance initiates the dramatic action; the stock epithet of Ninurta mutir gimilli abisu ("renderer of the service of his father"), which is applied to Marduk in Enuma elish II.123, is unnatural Akkadian and best explained as a wooden rendering of a Sumerian original; Marduk's net (IV-95) is not a natural weapon against the monster Tiamat but perfectly appropriate against the birdlike Anzu; the blood borne on the north wind that signals victory over Tiamat (Enuma elish IV.131-2) is an awkward adaptation of wind-borne feathers from the defeated birdlike Anzu ("let the winds carry the feathers to give the news," in Old Babylonian Anzu II 70 = 72). The direct borrowing in Enuma elish from the Myth of Anzu in effect makes Marduk not only the new Anu, Enlil, and Ea, but the new Ninurta as well.”

To state these as 'principles':

1. [The first argument is too weak for this: the appearance of a refusal-by-other-before-the-Hero is too generic in literature to warrant a borrowing claim.]

2. Inconsistency of numbers (even implied) within a text, with one of the numbers being in common with a proposed literary exemplar, would argue for borrowing.

3. If a event/passage appears in two texts, the text in which it is more 'causally relevant' would be the source of the borrowing (if borrowing occurred) [Same as Tigay's above]

4. If a textual formulation is 'odd' in a later text, and is best explained as a 'wooden' rendering' of a linguistic original, then that counts as evidence of borrowing.

5. If some important prop in the text makes perfect sense in an exemplar, but little sense in the latter text, this would suggest literary borrowing.

6. [The last argument is a bit subjective for me—I will not use it here.]

So, let's keep an eye out for these, as we go through our points...

...............................................................................................................

Point One: Divine decision to destroy mankind

One: What are the major points of contact/parallels?

Well, the only commonality here is the topic itself—the decision to destroy humanity through a flood by (a) divinity.

Two: What are the major points of difference?

The pervasive one (through all the points, obviously) is that of theology: one God versus many gods; disagreement and subterfuge/intrigue among the gods.

A more important issue (for the issue of borrowing) is that the flood is an 'afterthought' in A: the gods had already (unsuccessfully) tried a couple of other means of killing off the noisy humans, before coming up with the idea of a flood. The idea of a flood is therefore NOT unique in the AE (which is the basis for GE), since it follows plague and drought, and precedes other methods of population control (e.g., infant death, celibacy).

Three: If there ARE points of contact, are there non-ANE flood traditions with the SAME points of contact (showing that dependence is not 'required' by the parallel)?

Yes, there is a ton of data from non-ANE with this motif in it, arguing that there is no NEED to postulate borrowing at all.

Lambert had noted that “ flood stories as such do not have to be connected”, but what about the punitive aspect of it? Wouldn't that aspect of it be something that would likely have to be borrowed? In other words, if the Babylonian sources ('traditions') uniquely (and perhaps, 'uniformly'? A separate issue...) identify the Flood with divine judgment, then one is on firmer ground to assert 'content dependence' between Genesis and the Mesopotamian Flood traditions.

Unfortunately for the borrowing thesis, this element is (a) widespread throughout the entire world; and (b) not even consistent in Mesopotamian Flood traditions. If Flood-as-punishment motifs show up in all the continents of the world, there is hardly any 'uniqueness' to Babylonian versions, nor is there any reason to assume the requirement of borrowing.

And, indeed, not only are flood traditions ubiquitous, they frequently have our elements 1, 2, and 3 in them—rendering those 'similarities' useless as supports for borrowing. Consider just a few statements by mythographers:

“It often happens in creation myths that the creator becomes disappointed or even disgusted with his work. Usually it is the behavior of his human subjects that disturbs him (or her), and he can think of nothing better than to wash them away and begin again. Thus deluge appears in many mythologies. In most cases the creator spares one man to preserve life for the new creation that will follow the flood. Usually the flood hero takes his wife and a set of animals with him to ride out the disaster in a boat made to the creator's specifications. Among some Algonquians it is the animals who save the humans.

“The flood hero represents the positive seed of the original creation, which we hope lies within us all. Whether he is called Ziusudra (Sumerian), Utnapishtim (Babylonian), Noah (Hebrew), Manus (Indian), or Deucalion (Greek), he is the representative of the craving for life that makes it possible for us to face the worst adversities.

“As the second stage of creation myths, the flood is one of humankind's earliest "memories." We cannot remember the events of the world creation itself because we were not yet there, but we were there, as it were, for the flood. The persistence of this "memory," expressed so universally in myth, suggests an important aspect of humanity's vision of both its own imperfections and the possibility of redemption in a new beginning...

“The Native American flood follows the universal pattern, with certain cultural variations. Sometimes it is the creator's culture-hero assistant who instigates the world punishment. In the Zuni version the punishment is a response to incest. There are cases in which giants cause the flood. The Navajo Water Monster causes the flood when his child is hidden from him. Simple mistakes can bring about the flood, as when the Yavapai Indians of Arizona forgot to close the emergence hole. Among the Ute of western Colorado and eastern Utah, Tavwots, a version of the Great Hare, makes a deluge when his head explodes after being burned by the sun. Among the Cherokee and others, tears become the flood.” [WR:MNNA:104f]

and

“In an equally awkward way, the gods began several times to create humanity on several occasions; floods are one of the means that they used to destroy the unfortunate results of their initial endeavors. After creating the heavens and the earth in darkness, say the Quechua peoples of South America, the god Viracocha made human beings too big; he turned some into statues and destroyed the rest with a flood. In the Popul Vuh, the sacred book of the Maya, formative or progenitor spirits create the first animated mannequins. These lived and procreated, but "this was only a trial, an attempt at humanity." They disappeared in the course of a complex series of events, in a vast inundation (Popol Vuh 3-4). Instead of annihilating an imperfect humanity, sometimes the creator god tries to improve it; he eliminates the defective humans by use of a flood. When everything seemed to be complete. say the Desdna of South America, a number of plagues overcame the world, and evil beings ravaged humankind. Seeing the suffering of those he had created, Sun brought on a flood that drowned all the living, and then a fire that burned everything. There were survivors, however, and the god had them brought up.

“In most of the myths, the flood occurs after a more complex series of events in which human behavior plays a decisive role, although humans are not necessarily at fault. In one Philippine story, the god of the sky causes a flood to destroy humanity because it was becoming too numerous. In a Mesopotamian myth, the growth of humanity is accompanied by a perturbation that tires out the gods; to destroy it, they unleash several catastrophes, the last of which is a flood (Lambert and Millard, 1969)...

“In myths where the flood is supposed to destroy the original, defective humankind, sometimes the latter disappears completely. In other cases, there are one or ore survivors.”

“It has been seen that when the flood destroys a world and all of humanity, it sometimes precedes the creation of a new universe. It appears to separate two successive eras within a cyclical time... In some cases, the gods, after completely destroying the original human species, create another one; in other cases, the survivors themselves must ensure the survival of the human race...

“When only one person escapes death, a miracle is needed to provide that person with offspring. In a Jivaroan myth, the solitary man plants a part of his own flesh in the earth; from this a woman is born, with whom he couples. Other South American Indians relate that the woman came from bamboo. After the destruction of the world in Hindu myth, Manu feels the desire for posterity. He gives himself over to ascetic practices and offers a sacrifice. In the year that follows, a woman is born, approaches him, and says, "I am your daughter." He begets upon her the race of his descendants by practicing more spiritual austerities.

“Things are less unusual when either a couple or numerous individuals escape death; in this case the conditions of natural procreation are fulfilled. However, it may be observed that the salvation of the survivors is in itself a marvel; in many cases, they owe their survival to divine intervention. In Australian Aboriginal myth, only the ancestors survive the flood: By eliminating their evil descendants, the inundation permits a return to origins, from which humankind will be able to start anew. Many myths attribute qualities to the survivors that set them apart: Their descendants will be the products of a process of selection. In short, even when the present humanity issues from antediluvian mankind, it constitutes a second race.

“Thus, in the history of humankind, just as it sometimes happens in the history of the cosmos, a destructive flood precedes a sort of new creation.”

“The influence peoples have exercised over each other in the course of history is not enough to explain why myths of the flood are present on every continent.” [Ency of Religion, 2^nd Edition, Lindsay Jones (ed), s.v. “Flood, the”]

and (from Indian cultures):

“Given the strength of these arguments, it can be assumed that the two versions of the flood story in the Satapatha Brahmana and the Mahabharata were likely influenced by Mesopotamian traditions. Such is not, however, the case for all the traditional flood narratives in India. The folk tales of the orally transmitted tribal and regional tales and the flood narratives associated with the shrine of Dvaraka contain such important deviations from the above mentioned parallels that independent traditions must be postulated. In some cases, the myth of the golden age and of the flood are combined with the question of guilt. For the Santals, the world begins with an act of incest between a brother and sister to whom Maran Buru gives rice beer to drink and who, after taking the drink, engage in sexual intercourse. As they then learn about shame, they are consoled by Maran Buru. Their progeny are, however, wicked and corrupt. They neither heed Thakur's (the creator's) warnings nor his calls to conversion. When a rain of fire lasting seven days and nights lays everything to waste, alone the original siblings, Pilcu Haram and Pilcu Budhi, are given shelter in a mountain cave. As all the humans and the animals are killed and only the two of them survive, it is noteworthy that the couple who were responsible for degrading creation in the first place are precisely the two beings who are later granted salvation. This symmetry of events makes the condemnation of sexuality or incest into a secondary motif, even though the negative consequences of this act are clearly illustrated by the behaviour of the descendants,

“This mixture of motifs can also be found in other tribal cultures. The Kols tell how the flood was caused by human wickedness, incest and the renunciation of the gods . Another set of regional tales deals with overpopulation, a theme which plays a major role in Ancient Near Eastern myths and which is connected in those accounts with the original immortality of mankind. For its part, the Indian narrative tradition recounts how all humans were originally immortal, but they became too numerous; they fought among themselves and acted wickedly until one day, when Khazangpa was angered, he said, "All men in the world must die". Only two individuals survived, and with them a new human race was begun . The Karias tell a similar tale. Ponomosor, the highest being, created the world and its human inhabitants. The human populations grew to be abundant and soon there was too little to eat. Pomosor gave them more food, but they deeply offended him by cutting some fruit trees down. In response, he sent a flood in order to destroy humanity. When humanity annoyed him yet again, he dispatched a rain of fire. This time only a few survived The narrative associates overpopulation with a food shortage that leads humanity to desecrate the forbidden mythical trees. The flood is sent to punish this sacrilege.” [HI:IF, 12-14]

Four: Are the major points of contact 'unusual enough' to warrant dependence (of any type: literary or 'tradition', 'friendly' or polemical)?

I think we just answered that with a firm 'no'. It's a fairly basic, common motif in most/all cultures, and there is nothing 'odd' in the way Genesis expresses its version that ties it to GE or AE. Even the monotheistic thrust of Genesis wouldn't imply polemic inversion—it could more easily be explained by a simple belief system.

Five: Of the 2 or 3 accounts, which would 'seem' to be closer to a presumed historical point of origination? (I.e., if the 'shared-ness' looks like one of shared-event and not one of shared-tradition, which of the accounts looks most 'historical' or event-descriptive?)

Nothing noteworthy here. I don't think I could make a case that the “monotheo-sobriety” of Genesis was more historical in tone or expression.

Conclusion: No evidence of borrowing here. Too generic, too worldwide.

.......................................................................................................................................

Point Two: Reason for the Flood

One: What are the major points of contact/parallels?

Significantly, there are ZERO parallels here...unless

“In the Atrahasis Epic’s account of the flood the reason that the gods decide to send the flood is the “noise” of mankind. This is not necessarily different from the biblical reason in that “noise” can be the result of violence. Abel’s blood cries out from the ground (4:10) and the outcry against Sodom and Gomorrah is great (Gen 18:20). The noise could be generated either by the number of petitions being made to the gods to respond to the violence and bloodshed or by the victims who cry out in their distress. [BBCOT]

But this is a very, very 'charitable' reading of AE, and it is clear that there is no explicit mention of human guilt in AE: “...in this literary work no human fault is mentioned...In short, the weight of evidence strongly suggests that the human race committed no other fault than expanding beyond the capacity of the land to support it.” [OT:CAANEB, 82]

Two: What are the major points of difference?

The differences here are radical: Genesis judges humanity for their crimes (and intents) of violence, while AE judges humanity as being too 'noisy' and disturbing the sleep of the gods. This is so massively different—and not in even a polemical way—that borrowing (in either direction) would make no sense of these particulars. But the noise of humanity was the cause of all the attempts to kill us—the flood attempt was caused (actually) by the incompetence (or at least the internal politics) of these gods. So, WBC:

“The opening of the story in Genesis brings immediately to the fore the difference between the monotheistic theology that informed the approach of the Hebrew writer and the polytheistic mythology of his contemporaries. According to the extrabiblical accounts, the heavenly council of the gods led by Anu and Enlil decided to destroy mankind, for multiplying too much and making too much noise. However, this decision was not unanimous, and the god Ea or Enki went so far as to tip off the flood hero about the divine decision. This was how he managed to escape, much to Enlil’s subsequent annoyance.... The plurality of divinities creates uncertainty about the future as far as mortals are concerned, and the pettiness of the gods’ motives in destroying mankind contrasts starkly with the stern moral tone of the biblical account. Man is damned in the latter not for making noise but because of his incorrigible evil for ruining the earth and committing violence. The divine decree admits of no exception but Noah, who was delivered not because he happened to worship a god sympathetic to his plight, but because of his perfect righteousness.”

Now, there IS a possibility that one of the differences is a 'polemical response':

“Finally, it has been argued that Gen 6–9 is opposing the Babylonian belief in population control. According to Atrahasis, the flood was sent to destroy man who was breeding too fast and making too much noise. After the flood the gods decreed that certain women should be celibate, others infertile, and some infants should die soon after birth [A 3:7:1–8). The thrice-repeated divine command to “be fruitful and multiply” (Gen 8:17; 9:1, 7) echoing the earlier commands in 1:26, 28 “makes it probable that the Bible consciously rejected the underlying theme of the Atrahasis Epic, that the fertility of man before the flood was the reason for his near destruction” (T. Frymer-Kensky BA 40 [1977] 150). Cf. A. D. Killmer, Or 41 (1972) 174–75; W. L. Moran, Bib 52 (1971) 51–61.” [WBC]

But this, of course, is “anti-borrowing”-not 'ripping off ANE stories'...

Three: If there ARE points of contact, are there non-ANE flood traditions with the SAME points of contact (showing that dependence is not 'required' by the parallel)?

We have already cited research showing that flood traditions occur on all the continents, and we should also note that the the theme of flood-as-moral-judgment is a very frequent story line, but there are flood-as-population-control cases as well (e.g. the Philippine and Indian stories, in the quotes above). So, once again, there is no 'need' for borrowing [for either text, btw]

Four: Are the major points of contact 'unusual enough' to warrant dependence (of any type: literary or 'tradition', 'friendly' or polemical)?

Not applicable.

Five: Of the 2 or 3 accounts, which would 'seem' to be closer to a presumed historical point of origination? (I.e., if the 'shared-ness' looks like one of shared-event and not one of shared-tradition, which of the accounts looks most 'historical' or event-descriptive?)

To modern, western sensibilities, the notion of flood-as-noise-abatement seems a bit 'sub-divine' (if not 'sub-human'), when compared to a flood-as-violence-a