Gilgamesh

“ The Pennsylvania tablet begins with two dreams recounted by Gilgamesh to his mother, which the latter interprets as presaging the coming of Enkidu to Erech. In the one, something like a heavy meteor falls from heaven upon Gilgamesh and almost crushes him. With the help of the heroes of Erech, Gilgamesh carries the heavy burden to his mother Ninsun. The burden, his mother explains, symbolizes some one who, like Gilgamesh, is born in the mountains, to whom all will pay homage and of whom Gilgamesh will become enamoured with a love as strong as that for a woman. ”

“ The kneeling attitude of prayer is an interesting touch. It symbolizes submission, as is shown by the description of Gilgamesh’s defeat in the encounter with Enkidu (Pennsylvania tablet, l. 227) , where Gilgamesh is represented as forced to “kneel” to the ground. Again in the Assyrian version, Tablet V, 4, 6, Gilgamesh kneels down (though the reading ka-mis is not certain) and has a vision. ”

“ The object of his narrative in the Gilgamesh epic seems to be to point out to the hero that only the most exceptional circumstances—unique circumstances, indeed—can save man from his doom.
Other distinct portions of the epic are the battle with the monster Khumbaba, the episode of Ishtar's love for Gilgamesh, the fight with the sacred bull of Anu, and the search for the plant of life. These, whatever their origin, have become naturally incorporated with the story of Gilgamesh. ”

“ There follows an interesting description of the forging of the weapons for the two heroes in preparation for the encounter.33 The elders of Erech when they see these preparations are stricken with fear. They learn of Ḫuwawa’s threat to annihilate Gilgamesh if he dares to enter the cedar forest, and once more try to dissuade Gilgamesh from the undertaking.
“Thou art young, O Gish, and thy heart carries thee away,
Thou dost not know what thou proposest to do.” (lines 190–191)
They try to frighten Gilgamesh by repeating the description of the terrible Ḫuwawa. ”

“ Popular philosophy also enters into the life of the hero. Regarded as a god and yet of human origin, Gilgamesh becomes an appropriate illustration for determining the line that marks off man's career from the indefinite extension of activity that is a trait of the gods. Gilgamesh revolts against the universal law of decay and is punished. He is relieved from suffering, but cannot escape the doom of death. ”

“ Gilgamesh, in fact, accuses Enkidu of cowardice and boldly declares that he will proceed even though failure stare him in the face.88 Traces of the older view, however, in which Gilgamesh is the one for whom one fears the outcome, crop out; as, for example, in the complaint of Gilgamesh’s mother to Shamash that the latter has stirred the heart of her son to take the distant way to Ḫu (m) baba,
“To a fight unknown to him, he advances,
An expedition unknown to him he undertakes.”89
Ninsun evidently fears the consequences when her son informs her of his intention and asks her counsel. ”

“ He represents, in fact, the fusion of a great national hero with a mythical being. Throughout the epic there are indications that Gilgamesh is partly divine by nature, though nothing specific is said on that head. His identity with the solar god is veiled in the popular narrative, but it is evident that he has some connexion with the god Shamash, to whom he pays his devotions and who acts as his patron and protector. ”

“ The representation of Gilgamesh on very ancient seal cylinders [866] warrants us in passing beyond the third millennium, but more than this can hardly be said.
Gilgamesh is a hero of irresistible power. The inhabitants of Uruk appeal for help to Aruru, who has created Gilgamesh:
He has no rival.... ”

“ Gilgamesh, as a popular hero, is brought into association by popular traditions with Ishtar, as he is brought into relationships with Eabani and Ukhat. A factor in this association was the necessity of accounting for Gilgamesh's death. As a hero, the favorite of the gods and invincible in battle, he ought to enjoy the privilege of the gods—immortality. ”

“ Meskingasher is entered in the list as "son of the Sun-god", (2) and no divine parentage is recorded on the mother's side. On the other hand, the human father of Gilgamesh is described as the high priest of Kullab, and we know from other sources that his mother was the goddess Ninsun. (3) That this is not a fanciful interpretation is proved by a passage in the Gilgamesh Epic itself, (4) in which its hero is described as two-thirds god and one-third man. We again find ourselves back in the same stratum of tradition with which the Hebrew narratives have made us so familiar. ”

“ The hero is engaged in mortal combat with a lion, whom he is endeavouring to throw. Gilgamesh is represented full-face and with the various peculiarities which appear to have been proper to his unique person—the long, curly beard, the equally long hair parted in the centre with the three characteristic ringlets on either side, and the body entirely naked but for a narrow girdle. ”

“ The reference to the killing of a panther in the tenth tablet (Haupt, p. 71, 6) is too obscure to be taken into consideration. Gilgamesh's fight with a 'buffalo' (so Ward, "Babylonian Gods in Babylonian Art," Proc. Amer. Or. Soc., May, 1890, p. xv) is pictured on seal cylinders. No doubt, various deeds of Gilgamesh were recounted in the missing portions of the epic, and it is also quite likely that besides the stories in the epic, others were current of Gilgamesh to which a literary form was never given. ”

“ But Gilgamesh, encouraged by a dream sent him by Sha-mash, the Sun-god, pressed on with his friend, and, having entered the wood, succeeded in slaying Khumbaba and in cutting off his head. This legend is doubtless based on episodes in early Babylonian and Elamite history. Khumbaba may not have been an actual historical ruler, but at least he represents or personifies the power of Elam, and the success of Gilgamesh no doubt reflects the aspirations with which many a Babylonian expedition set out for the Elamite frontier. ”

“ Man can reach old age; he may be snatched for a time from the grasp of death, as Gilgamesh was through the efforts of Parnapishtim, but he only deludes himself by indulging in hopes of immortal life. 'Man must die' is the refrain that rings in our ears. The plant of 'eternal youth' slips out of one's hand at the very moment that one believes to have secured it.
The Gilgamesh epic, as we have it, thus turns out to be a composite production. Gilgamesh, a popular hero of antiquity, becomes a medium for the perpetuation of various popular traditions and myths. ”

“ In reply, the father advises his son to take a woman with him when next he goes out on his pursuit, and to have the woman remove her dress in the presence of Enkidu, who will then approach her, and after intercourse with her will abandon the animals among whom he lives. By this device he will catch the strange creature. Lines 14–18 of column 3 in the first tablet in which the father of the hunter refers to Gilgamesh must be regarded as a later insertion, a part of the reconstruction of the tale to connect the episode with Gilgamesh. ”

“ Gilgamesh increases in strength as does the sun approaching the zenith. At the VIIth tablet, however, his good fortune begins to wane. Eabani dies, slain doubtless by the wrath of Ishtar, whose love Gilgamesh has rejected with scorn; and the hero, mourning the death of his friend, and smitten with fear that he himself will perish in like manner, decides to go in search of his ancestor, Ut-Napishtim (who, as sole survivor of the deluge, has received from the gods deification and immortality) , and learn of him the secret of eternal life. ”

“ Gilgamesh now begins a series of wanderings in search of the restoration of his vigor, and this motif is evidently a continuation of the nature myth to symbolize the sun’s wanderings during the dark winter in the hope of renewed vigor with the coming of the spring. Professor Haupt’s view is that the disease from which Gilgamesh is supposed to be suffering is of a venereal character, affecting the organs of reproduction. This would confirm the position here taken that the myth symbolizes the loss of the sun’s vigor. The sun’s rays are no longer strong enough to fertilize the earth. ”

“ Gilgamesh’s fear of death marks the approach of the winter season, when the sun appears to have lost its vigor completely and is near to death. The entire episode is, therefore, a nature myth, symbolical of the passing of spring to midsummer and then to the bare season. The myth has been attached to Gilgamesh as a favorite figure, and then woven into a pattern with the episode of Enkidu and the bull. The bull episode can be detached from the nature myth without any loss to the symbolism of the tale of Ishtar and Gilgamesh. ”

“ After a long conversation discussing the inevitable and invincible mortal fate of man, Gilgamesh comes to his point and asks his ancestor how he had attained to his own happy lot. Then this favourite of the gods—no other than the Babylonian Noah—tells Gilgamesh, as he listens from his boat, the story of the Flood, which, as is well known, coincides in parts almost verbally with the biblical narrative of the Deluge, but concludes with the removal of the rescued couple to a distant land, at the mouth of the rivers, where they live as the gods. ”

“ The narrative goes on: "Gilgamesh saw a well of fresh water, he went down to it and offered a libation. A serpent smelled the odour of the plant, advanced ... and carried off the plant. Gilgamesh sat down and wept, the tears ran down his cheeks." He lamented bitterly the loss of the precious plant, seemingly predicted to him when he made his offering at the end of twenty kasbu. At length they reached Erech, when Gilgamesh sent Adad-Ea to enquire concerning the building of the city walls, a proceeding which has possibly some mythological significance. ”

“ They grew jealous and frustrated men's attempt to win immortality, for men would be gods if they got the priceless prize. The hero Gilgamesh passionately longed for immortal life and went in search of an escape from death. He was informed by the shade of his heroic compatriot whom death had taken away from him that death was the final fate of man and he was indulging in futile hopes. Immortal life was for gods only. Death was the lot of mankind and even a hero like Gilgamesh with all his marvellous achievements could not escape it. ”

“ Men built houses, sealed contracts, disputed one with another, and sowed seeds in the earth, but as long as they did so and the rivers rose in flood, so long would their fate endure. Nor could any man tell when his hour would come. The god of destiny measured out the span of life: he fixed the day of death, but never revealed his secrets.
Gilgamesh then asked Pir-napishtim how it chanced that he was still alive. "Thou hast suffered no change," he said, "thou art even as I am. Harden not thy heart against me, but reveal how thou hast obtained divine life in the company of the gods." ”

“ In the 1st tablet, after a general survey of the adventures of Gilgamesh, his rule at Erech is described, where he enlists the services of all the young able-bodied men in the building of the great wall of the city. The people sigh under the burden imposed, and call upon the goddess Aruru to create a being who might act as a rival to Gilgamesh, curb his strength, and dispute his tyrannous control. The goddess consents, and creates Eabani, who is described as a wild man, living with the gazelles and the beasts of the field. ”

“ The purpose in the two cosmogonic poems—to explain the reduction of the world to order and the existing constitution of earth and sky—is one that is found everywhere in ancient systems of thought. The Gilgamesh epic, a collection of popular usages and tales without definite unity, is contaminated with legend; Gilgamesh is now a god, now a national hero; at the end, however, there is a bit of speculation concerning the future state of men. Ishtar's descent to the Underworld is a pure nature myth ”

“ The sixth tablet marks an important division in the epic. The Ishtar and Sabitum episodes and the narrative of Parnapishtim—itself a compound of two independent tales, one semi-historical, the other a nature-myth—represent accretions that may refer to a time when Gilgamesh had become little more than a name,—a type of mankind in general. Finally, scholastic speculation takes hold of Gilgamesh, and makes him the medium for illustrating another and more advanced problem that is of intense interest to mankind,—the secret of death. Death is inevitable, but what does death mean? ”

“ Poebel’s publication of a Sumerian text which embodies the tale, [122] and without any reference to Gilgamesh. Similarly, Scheil and Hilprecht have published fragments of deluge stories written in Akkadian and likewise without any connection with the Gilgamesh Epic. [123]
In the Epic the story leads to another episode attached to Gilgamesh, namely, the search for a magic plant growing in deep water, which has the power of restoring old age to youth. Utnapishtim, the survivor of the deluge, is moved through pity for Gilgamesh, worn out by his long wanderings. ”

“ In the light of the Pennsylvania tablet, this scene is clearly the conflict between the two heroes described in column 6, preliminary to their forming a friendship. Even in the realm of myth the human experience holds good that there is nothing like a good fight as a basis for a subsequent alliance. The fragment describes this conflict as a furious one in which Gilgamesh is worsted, and his wounded pride assuaged by the generous victor, who comforts his vanquished enemy by the assurance that he was destined for something higher than to be a mere “Hercules.” ”