Pre-Flood Kings and Flood Survivors

 

Taken from: http://www.nwcreation.net/articles/ancientsknew.html

 

Ancient Babylonian legend speaks of a pre-Flood series of ten kings, the ancient Hindus (N.W India) spoke about a series of Ten Pitris who ruled before the global Flood, and the ancient Egyptians described Ten Shining Ones who ruled consecutively before the Deluge. Like the Bible also says, these pre-Flood patriarchs lived much longer than we do, and this was confirmed by the ancient historians Berosus, Nicolaus of Damascus, Hesiod, Plato, Hecataeus, Mochus, Hieronymus, and Manetho. 

 

The last of these kings in the aforementioned lists was the hero who led seven others aboard a vessel in which they survived the global Flood. In ancient Babylon, the hero's name was Zisudra who spear-headed the survival on the Ark of seven other humans, the Seven Apkallu. In ancient Egypt, the Flood hero was Toth who survived the Deluge along with the Seven Sages. In ancient N.W. India, the hero was Manu who survived the global-Flood "pralaya" with the Seven Rishis. The odds are astronomically long that these supposedly distinct civilizations would have the same legend of a global Flood with eight people surviving from the pre-Flood population that was led by a series of ten kings if it were not real history that happens to corroborate the Genesis account.

 

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The Flood Hero at the End of Genesis 5

Taken from: http://www.grisda.org/origins/18010.htm

 

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Each ancient Near Eastern flood story has a hero: the biblical hero is Noah, the Old Babylonian hero is Atra-Hasis, the Sumerian hero is Ziusudra, and the Neo-Assyrian hero is Utnapishtim. Because their names cannot be connected linguistically, it may appear that Noah's name is unknown outside the Bible. In this regard, one other flood story from Mesopotamia or Anatolia should be considered: the Hurrian Flood story, the tablet for which was found in the archive at Boghazkoy, the ancient Hittite capital of Hattushash. Fortunately, though the tablet is badly damaged so that very little of the text is legible, enough can be read to recognize that the text presents a flood story whose hero is named na-ah-ma-su-le-el.¹¹ Assyriologists have observed that the name has a general resemblance to Noah, but they have not gone further with the comparison. E. A. Speiser has observed about this name: "Comparison with Noah has been suggested; such a possibility cannot be ruled out, but neither can it be relied upon."¹² I would suggest a more detailed comparison between this name and Noah's. Is it possible that the names of two antediluvian patriarchs were joined here? The first name would be na-ah, which corresponds quite directly with Noah. The most likely candidate for the second name, ma-su-le-el, would be Methuselah, or ma-(tu)-su-le-el. The final element or sign in this name, -el, is the word for God or god. It might have functioned as a determinative or phonetic complement for "god" from a Semitic (non-Hurrian) language. As Methuselah was the longest-lived, antediluvian patriarch, it would not be surprising that some memory of him would also be preserved.

 

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Ancient Adapa Epic Based on Biblical Adam

 

 

Taken from: http://www.grisda.org/origins/18010.htm

 

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The Fall

 

The biblical story of mankind's fall (Genesis 3) is well known and does not need repeating. Are there any parallels in ancient Near Eastern sources? Yes: the Adapa Epic.2
While the Adapa Epic contains elements of myth in which humans interact with the gods, the story concentrates upon a human hero and thus qualifies better as an epic. For the purposes of this discussion, we need only a summary of this epic as it relates to the Genesis 3 account of mankind's fall.

Adapa was a wiseman (not a king) of Eridu, the first antediluvian city in the Sumerian king list. As such, he belonged to the first "significant" generation of mankind. On one occasion while he was fishing in the Persian Gulf, the south wind capsized his boat. In anger he cursed and broke the wing of the south wind. For this offense he was summoned to heaven to appear before Anu, the great high god. There he was offered the bread and water of life. Unfortunately, following the advice of Enki, the god of wisdom and the patron god of his city, Adapa refused the gods' offer of nourishment, thereby inadvertently passing up his opportunity to gain immortality. Instead, he was sentenced to return to earth and live out the life-span of an ordinary mortal. Moreover, because of his offense and his refusal, certain consequences, such as diseases, passed upon mankind.

While some elements in this story have been mythologized, some basic points are similar to the biblical story of the fall. These are summarized as follows:

 

Both subjects underwent a test before the deity.

The test was based upon something that the subjects were to consume.

Both failed the test and thereby forfeited their opportunity for immortality.

As a result of their failure, certain consequences passed upon mankind.

According to their respective sources, both subjects qualify as members of the first generation of mankind.3

 

A significant difference between these two stories is that Adam violated the moral law of God, while Adapa violated the physical laws of nature.

 

A final point of comparison requires a brief examination of the linguistics involved; specifically, the labial letters — b - w - m - p — the phonemes which are pronounced especially with the lips. In different dialects within the larger language family, words containing these phonemes differ in pronunciation. A modern example of labial shifts is found in the name of the Korean city which is now pronounced Busan instead of Pusan. An example from antiquity was the word for sun and the sun-god. In Hebrew it was Shemesh (cf., the town of Beth-Shemesh, the town of the temple of the sun-god). The Akkadian pronunciation differed only in vowels to produce Shamash. In Canaanite, however, this word was pronounced Shapsh (or Shapash if fully vocalized), i.e., the middle consonant simply shifted from an M to a P. I believe that the same phonetic shift occurred between the names of the heroes of these two epics, which phonetically at least, are the same. The M in Hebrew Adam has shifted to the final P in Akkadian, and the Akkadian retains or employs a final vowel which the Hebrew did not. To the above list of similarities between these two stories we may add a sixth detail: they carry the same name when a minor phonetic shift is recognized. Thus, both the biblical Hebrews and the ancient Mesopotamians had a knowledge of this representative from the first generation of mankind: he had the same name, and his deeds resulted in similar consequences.

 

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Why was Lamech blind?



J. L. Kugel

The biblical story of Cain and Abel was one that was retold and elaborated with great relish by the Bible's earliest interpreters. This was so not only because of the tale's intrinsic interest-it concerned, after all, the children of the very first human beings, Adam and Eve, and recounted a brutal crime, indeed, the world's first murder-but as well because, like so many of the early narratives in Genesis, the biblical account itself seemed here and there to cry out for further explanation and detail. One such detail, missing in the Genesis account itself, is the manner in which Cain himself ultimately died. This lacuna was obviously of some concern, if only because early readers of the Bible were curious to know the circumstances under which the archetypal murderer had met his own demise, and specifically whether his death bore some relationship to the crime he had earlier committed. A narrative expansion eventually came to fill in this blank, according to which Cain was accidentally killed by his own descendant Lamech ill a hunting accident.

The details of various versions of this expansion will be examined below; but it is worth noting initially that this story is one that has not suffered from inattention among modern students of the history of biblical exegesis. Lamech's killing of Cain eras, for example, a favorite subject of Louis Ginzberg, who treated it at the beginning of his scholarly career, discussed its sources in detail in his Legends of the fouls, and turned to it again in a later essay on Jewish folklore.1 It was also treated at length by Victor Aptowitzer in his book-length study on the Cain and Abel tradition;2 nor has the story' been neglected in more recent times.3 Indeed, some of this interest among modern scholars was no doubt stirred up by the many depictions of the death of Cain that survive from the h/fiddle Ages, for the legend in question was prized by sculptors and illustrators.4 No other such tale, observed one recent writer on the subject, "seems to have had such persistent appeal in the literature and art of West and East."5

As noted, the story in question relates how Lamech, Cain's great-great-great-grandson, ends up killing his ancestor quite by accident. Lamech is in fact blind in both eyes, but despite this handicap, he has become a very proficient hunter, by which means he succeeds in supporting himself and his family. He manages this by having himself led through the woods by a guide-his son Tubal-Cain, or an unnamed boy, or a shepherd, according to various sources-who both helps him along and points his hands in the direction of any potential prey. La-mech is an excellent shot, and, thus guided, is able to dispatch animals with arrow, stone, or other instrument. But on the day in question, Lamech's guide mistakes Cain (in some versions: by seeing Cain's horns, the "sign" that God granted him in Gen. 4:16, protruding from behind a bush or tree) for a wild animal. Lamech's aim is true, and the "animal" falls, only to be discovered to be Lamech's own ancestor, Cain. In his grief Lamech then blindly claps both hands together and inadvertently kills his guide as well. Although he is thus the author of two deaths, Lamech nonetheless protests that both killings were accidental and begs forgiveness, exclaiming, "Have I killed a man for my hurt-so that I be hurt on his account? Or a boy for a bruise-that I be bruised on his account?"6

 

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For complete article, go to: http://www.herzog.ac.il/vtc/0064100.html