The Hymn to Enlil, Enlil and the Ekur (Enlil A), Hymn to the Ekur, Hymn and incantation to Enlil, Hymn to Enlil the all beneficent or Excerpt from an exorcism is a
Sumerian myth
Myth is a folklore genre consisting of Narrative, narratives that play a fundamental role in a society, such as foundational tales or Origin myth, origin myths. Since "myth" is widely used to imply that a story is not Objectivity (philosophy), ...
, written on
clay tablet
In the Ancient Near East, clay tablets (Akkadian ) were used as a writing medium, especially for writing in cuneiform, throughout the Bronze Age and well into the Iron Age.
Cuneiform characters were imprinted on a wet clay tablet with a stylu ...
s in the late third millennium BC.
Compilation
Fragments of the text were discovered in the
catalogue of the
Babylonian section (CBS) from their excavations at the
temple
A temple (from the Latin ) is a building reserved for spiritual rituals and activities such as prayer and sacrifice. Religions which erect temples include Christianity (whose temples are typically called churches), Hinduism (whose temples ...
library
A library is a collection of materials, books or media that are accessible for use and not just for display purposes. A library provides physical (hard copies) or digital access (soft copies) materials, and may be a physical location or a vir ...
at
Nippur
Nippur (Sumerian language, Sumerian: ''Nibru'', often logogram, logographically recorded as , EN.LÍLKI, "Enlil City;"The Cambridge Ancient History: Prolegomena & Prehistory': Vol. 1, Part 1. Accessed 15 Dec 2010. Akkadian language, Akkadian: '' ...
. The
myth
Myth is a folklore genre consisting of Narrative, narratives that play a fundamental role in a society, such as foundational tales or Origin myth, origin myths. Since "myth" is widely used to imply that a story is not Objectivity (philosophy), ...
was first published using tablet CBS 8317, translated by
George Aaron Barton
George Aaron Barton (12 November 1859 – 28 June 1942) was a Canadian author, Episcopal clergyman, and professor of Semitic languages and the history of religion.
Biography
Barton was born on 12 November 1859 in East Farnham, Canada East, Cana ...
in 1918 as "Sumerian religious texts" in "
Miscellaneous Babylonian Inscriptions
''Miscellaneous Babylonian Inscriptions'' is a 1918, Sumerian linguistics and mythology book written by George Aaron Barton.
It was first published by Yale University Press in the United States and deals with commentary and translations of twe ...
", number ten, entitled "An excerpt from an
exorcism
Exorcism () is the religious or spiritual practice of evicting demons, jinns, or other malevolent spiritual entities from a person, or an area, that is believed to be possessed. Depending on the spiritual beliefs of the exorcist, this may be ...
".
The tablet is at its thickest point. A larger fragment of the text was found on CBS tablet number 14152 and first published by Henry Frederick Lutz as "A hymn and incantation to Enlil" in "Selected Sumerian and Babylonian Texts", number 114 in 1919.
Barton's tablet had only containted lines five to twenty four of the reverse of Lutz's, which had already been translated in 1918 and was used to complete several of his damaged lines.
Edward Chiera
Edward Chiera (August 5, 1885 – June 20, 1933) was an Italian-American archaeologist, Assyriologist, and scholar of religions and linguistics.
Born in Rome, Italy, in 1885, Chiera trained as a theologian at the Crozer Theological Seminary (B. ...
published tablet CBS 7924B from the hymn in "Sumerian Epics and Myths".
He also worked with
Samuel Noah Kramer to publish three other tablets CBS 8473, 10226, 13869 in "Sumerian texts of varied contents" in 1934. The name given this time was "Hymn to the
Ekur
Ekur ( ), also known as Duranki, is a Sumerian term meaning "mountain house". It is the assembly of the gods in the Garden of the gods, parallel in Greek mythology to Mount Olympus and was the most revered and sacred building of ancient Sumer. ...
", suggesting the tablets were "parts of a composition which extols the ekur of Enlil at Nippur, it may, however be only an extract from a longer text".
Further tablets were found to be part of the myth in the
Hilprecht collection at the
University of Jena
The University of Jena, officially the Friedrich Schiller University Jena (german: Friedrich-Schiller-Universität Jena, abbreviated FSU, shortened form ''Uni Jena''), is a public research university located in Jena, Thuringia, Germany.
The un ...
,
Germany
Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwe ...
, numbers 1530, 1531, 1532, 1749b, 2610, 2648a and b, 2665, 2685, 1576 and 1577.
Further tablets containing the text were excavated at
Isin
Isin (, modern Arabic: Ishan al-Bahriyat) is an archaeological site in Al-Qādisiyyah Governorate, Iraq. Excavations have shown that it was an important city-state in the past.
History of archaeological research
Ishan al-Bahriyat was visited b ...
, modern Ishan al-Bahriyat, tablet 923.
Another was found amongst the texts in the
Iraq Museum
The Iraq Museum ( ar, المتحف العراقي) is the national museum of Iraq, located in Baghdad. It is sometimes informally called the National Museum of Iraq, a recent phenomenon influenced by other nations' naming of their national museum ...
, tablet 44351a. Others are held in the collections of the
Abbey of Montserrat
Santa Maria de Montserrat () is an abbey of the Order of Saint Benedict located on the mountain of Montserrat in Monistrol de Montserrat, Catalonia, Spain. It is notable for enshrining the image of the Virgin of Montserrat. The monastery was f ...
in
Barcelona
Barcelona ( , , ) is a city on the coast of northeastern Spain. It is the capital and largest city of the autonomous community of Catalonia, as well as the second most populous municipality of Spain. With a population of 1.6 million within ci ...
and the
Ashmolean
The Ashmolean Museum of Art and Archaeology () on Beaumont Street, Oxford, England, is Britain's first public museum. Its first building was erected in 1678–1683 to house the cabinet of curiosities that Elias Ashmole gave to the University o ...
in
Oxford
Oxford () is a city in England. It is the county town and only city of Oxfordshire. In 2020, its population was estimated at 151,584. It is north-west of London, south-east of Birmingham and north-east of Bristol. The city is home to the ...
.
Other translations were made from tablets in the Nippur collection of the
Museum of the Ancient Orient
The Museum of the Ancient Orient (Turkish language: ''Eski Şark Eserleri Müzesi'') is a museum in Istanbul, and part of the group of Istanbul Archaeology Museums, located just in front of the main Archaeology Museum building. The building of the ...
in
Istanbul
Istanbul ( , ; tr, İstanbul ), formerly known as Constantinople ( grc-gre, Κωνσταντινούπολις; la, Constantinopolis), is the List of largest cities and towns in Turkey, largest city in Turkey, serving as the country's economic, ...
(Ni).
Samuel Noah Kramer amongst others worked to translate several others from the Istanbul collection including Ni 1039, 1180, 4005, 4044, 4150, 4339, 4377, 4584, 9563 and 9698.
More were found at
Henri de Genouillac
Henri Pierre Louis du Verdier de Genouillac, called Abbé Henri de Genouillac, (15 March 1881, Rouen – 20 November 1940, in his clergy house in Villennes-sur-Seine) was a French Roman catholic priest, epigrapher and archaeologist specializing in ...
's excavations at
Kish
Kish may refer to:
Geography
* Gishi, Nagorno-Karabakh, Azerbaijan, a village also called Kish
* Kiş, Shaki, Azerbaijan, a village and municipality also spelled Kish
* Kish Island, an Iranian island and a city in the Persian Gulf
* Kish, Iran, ...
(C 53).
Another tablet of the myth (Si 231) was excavated at
Sippar
Sippar ( Sumerian: , Zimbir) was an ancient Near Eastern Sumerian and later Babylonian city on the east bank of the Euphrates river. Its '' tell'' is located at the site of modern Tell Abu Habbah near Yusufiyah in Iraq's Baghdad Governorate, some ...
in the collections of the
Istanbul
Istanbul ( , ; tr, İstanbul ), formerly known as Constantinople ( grc-gre, Κωνσταντινούπολις; la, Constantinopolis), is the List of largest cities and towns in Turkey, largest city in Turkey, serving as the country's economic, ...
Archaeological Museum.
[Falkenstein, Adam., Sumerische Götterlieder (Volume 1 of 2): Abhandlungen der Heidelberg Akademie der Wissenschaften - philosophisch-historische Klasse Jahrgang 1959, 1, 1, pl. 1f, 2f and 4, Abhandlung, Carl Winter Universitätsverlag, 1959.] Sir
Charles Leonard Woolley
Sir Charles Leonard Woolley (17 April 1880 – 20 February 1960) was a British archaeologist best known for his Excavation (archaeology), excavations at Ur in Mesopotamia. He is recognized as one of the first "modern" archaeologists who excavat ...
unearthed more tablets at
Ur contained in the "Ur excavations texts" from 1928.
Other tablets and versions were used to bring the myth to its present form with the latest translations presented by
Thorkild Jacobsen
Thorkild Peter Rudolph Jacobsen (; 7 June 1904 – 2 May 1993) was a renowned Danish historian specializing in Assyriology and Sumerian literature. He was one of the foremost scholars on the ancient Near East.
Biography
Thorkild Peter Rudolph Ja ...
, Miguel Civil and Joachim Krecher.
Composition
The hymn, noted by Kramer as one of the most important of its type,
starts with praise for Enlil in his awe-inspiring dais:
The hymn develops by relating Enlil founding and creating the origin of the city of Nippur and his organization of the earth.
In contrast to the myth of
Enlil and Ninlil
Enlil and Ninlil or the Myth of Enlil and Ninlil or Enlil and Ninlil: The begetting of Nanna is a Sumerian creation myth, written on clay tablets in the mid to late 3rd millennium BC.
Compilation
The first lines of the myth were discovere ...
where the city exists before creation, here Enlil is shown to be responsible for its planning and construction, suggesting he surveyed and drew the plans before its creation:
The hymn moves on from the physical construction of the city and gives a description and veneration of its
ethics
Ethics or moral philosophy is a branch of philosophy that "involves systematizing, defending, and recommending concepts of right and wrong behavior".''Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy'' The field of ethics, along with aesthetics, concerns m ...
and moral code:
The last sentence has been compared by R. P. Gordon to the description of
Jerusalem
Jerusalem (; he, יְרוּשָׁלַיִם ; ar, القُدس ) (combining the Biblical and common usage Arabic names); grc, Ἱερουσαλήμ/Ἰεροσόλυμα, Hierousalḗm/Hierosóluma; hy, Երուսաղեմ, Erusałēm. i ...
in the
Book of Isaiah
The Book of Isaiah ( he, ספר ישעיהו, ) is the first of the Latter Prophets in the Hebrew Bible and the first of the Major Prophets in the Christian Old Testament. It is identified by a superscription as the words of the 8th-century BC ...
(), "the city of justice, righteousness dwelled in her" and in the
Book of Jeremiah
The Book of Jeremiah ( he, ספר יִרְמְיָהוּ) is the second of the Latter Prophets in the Hebrew Bible, and the second of the Prophets in the Christian Old Testament. The superscription at chapter Jeremiah 1:1–3 identifies the boo ...
(), "O habitation of justice, and mountain of holiness."
The myth continues with the city's inhabitants building a temple dedicated to Enlil, referred to as the
Ekur
Ekur ( ), also known as Duranki, is a Sumerian term meaning "mountain house". It is the assembly of the gods in the Garden of the gods, parallel in Greek mythology to Mount Olympus and was the most revered and sacred building of ancient Sumer. ...
. The priestly positions and responsibilities of the Ekur are listed along with an appeal for Enlil's blessings on the city, where he is regarded as the source of all prosperity:
A similar passage to the last lines above has been noted in the Biblical Psalms () "The voice of the Lord makes hinds to calve and makes goats to give birth (too) quickly".
The hymn concludes with further reference to Enlil as a farmer and praise for his wife,
Ninlil
Ninlil ( DINGIR, DNIN (cuneiform), NIN.LÍL; meaning uncertain) was a Mesopotamian goddess regarded as the wife of Enlil. She shared many of his functions, especially the responsibility for declaring destinies, and like him was regarded as a senio ...
:
Andrew R. George suggested that the hymn to Enlil "can be incorporated into longer compositions" as with the
Kesh temple hymn and "the hymn to temples in Ur that introduces a
Shulgi hymn."
Discussion
The poetic form and laudatory content of the hymn have shown similarities to the
Book of Psalms
The Book of Psalms ( or ; he, תְּהִלִּים, , lit. "praises"), also known as the Psalms, or the Psalter, is the first book of the ("Writings"), the third section of the Tanakh, and a book of the Old Testament. The title is derived f ...
in the
Bible
The Bible (from Koine Greek , , 'the books') is a collection of religious texts or scriptures that are held to be sacred in Christianity, Judaism, Samaritanism, and many other religions. The Bible is an anthologya compilation of texts of a ...
, particularly Psalm 23 () "The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want, he maketh me to lie down in green pastures."
Line eighty four mentions:
and in line ninety one, Enlil is referred to as a shepherd:
The shepherd motif originating in this myth is also found describing
Jesus
Jesus, likely from he, יֵשׁוּעַ, translit=Yēšūaʿ, label=Hebrew/Aramaic ( AD 30 or 33), also referred to as Jesus Christ or Jesus of Nazareth (among other names and titles), was a first-century Jewish preacher and religious ...
in the
Book of John
The Gospel of John ( grc, Εὐαγγέλιον κατὰ Ἰωάννην, translit=Euangélion katà Iōánnēn) is the fourth of the four canonical gospels. It contains a highly schematic account of the ministry of Jesus, with seven "sig ...
().
Joan Westenholz noted that "The farmer image was even more popular than the shepherd in the earliest personal names, as might be expected in an agrarian society." She notes that both Falkenstein and Thorkild Jacobsen consider the farmer refers to the king of Nippur; Reisman has suggested that the farmer or 'engar' of the Ekur was likely to be
Ninurta.
The term appears in line sixty
Wayne Horowitz discusses the use of the word
abzu
The Abzu or Apsu ( Sumerian: ; Akkadian: ), also called (Cuneiform:, ; Sumerian: ; Akkadian: — ='water' ='deep', recorded in Greek as ), is the name for fresh water from underground aquifers which was given a religious fertilising qual ...
, normally used as a name for an abzu temple, god, cosmic place or cultic water basin. In the hymn to Enlil, its interior is described as a 'distant sea':
The foundations of Enlil's temple are made of
lapis lazuli
Lapis lazuli (; ), or lapis for short, is a deep-blue metamorphic rock used as a semi-precious stone that has been prized since antiquity for its intense color.
As early as the 7th millennium BC, lapis lazuli was mined in the Sar-i Sang mines, ...
, which has been linked to the ''"soham"'' stone used in the
Book of Ezekiel
The Book of Ezekiel is the third of the Latter Prophets in the Tanakh and one of the major prophetic books, following Isaiah and Jeremiah. According to the book itself, it records six visions of the prophet Ezekiel, exiled in Babylon, during ...
() describing the materials used in the building of ''"
Eden, the
Garden of god"'' perched on ''"the mountain of the lord"'',
Zion
Zion ( he, צִיּוֹן ''Ṣīyyōn'', LXX , also variously transliterated ''Sion'', ''Tzion'', ''Tsion'', ''Tsiyyon'') is a placename in the Hebrew Bible used as a synonym for Jerusalem as well as for the Land of Israel as a whole (see Names ...
, and in the
Book of Job
The Book of Job (; hbo, אִיּוֹב, ʾIyyōḇ), or simply Job, is a book found in the Ketuvim ("Writings") section of the Hebrew Bible (Tanakh), and is the first of the Poetic Books in the Old Testament of the Christian Bible. Scholars ar ...
() ''"The stones of it are the place of sapphires and it hath dust of gold"''.
Moses
Moses hbo, מֹשֶׁה, Mōše; also known as Moshe or Moshe Rabbeinu (Mishnaic Hebrew: מֹשֶׁה רַבֵּינוּ, ); syr, ܡܘܫܐ, Mūše; ar, موسى, Mūsā; grc, Mωϋσῆς, Mōÿsēs () is considered the most important pro ...
also saw God's feet standing on a ''"paved work of a sapphire stone"'' in (). Precious stones are also later repeated in a similar context describing decoration of the walls of
New Jerusalem in the
Apocalypse
Apocalypse () is a literary genre in which a supernatural being reveals cosmic mysteries or the future to a human intermediary. The means of mediation include dreams, visions and heavenly journeys, and they typically feature symbolic imager ...
().
Along with the
Kesh Temple Hymn, Steve Tinney has identified the Hymn to Enlil as part of a standard sequence of
scribal
A scribe is a person who serves as a professional copyist, especially one who made copies of manuscripts before the invention of automatic printing.
The profession of the scribe, previously widespread across cultures, lost most of its promi ...
training scripts he refers to as the
Decad. He suggested that "the Decad constituted a required program of literary learning, used almost without exception throughout Babylonia. The Decad thus included almost all literary types available in Sumerian."
[Tinney, Steve., On the Curricular Setting of Sumerian Literature, Iraq 61: 159-172. Forthcoming Elementary Sumerian Literary Texts. MC.]
See also
*
Barton Cylinder
*
Debate between Winter and Summer
*
Debate between sheep and grain
The "Debate between sheep and grain" or "Myth of cattle and grain" is a Sumerian creation myth, written on clay tablets in the mid to late 3rd millennium BC.
Disputations
Seven "debate" topics are known from the Sumerian literature, falling in ...
*
Enlil and Ninlil
Enlil and Ninlil or the Myth of Enlil and Ninlil or Enlil and Ninlil: The begetting of Nanna is a Sumerian creation myth, written on clay tablets in the mid to late 3rd millennium BC.
Compilation
The first lines of the myth were discovere ...
*
Old Babylonian oracle
The Old Babylonian oracle is a Sumerian myth, written on clay tablets dated to between 2340 and 2200 BC.
The myth was discovered on the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, catalogue of the Babylonian section (CBS) ...
*
Kesh temple hymn
*
Self-praise of Shulgi (Shulgi D)
Self-praise of Shulgi (Shulgi D) is a Sumerian myth, written on clay tablets dated to between 2100 and 2000 BC.
Compilation
The myth was discovered on the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, catalogue of the Ba ...
*
Lament for Ur
The Lament for Ur, or Lamentation over the city of Ur is a Sumerian lament composed around the time of the fall of Ur to the Elamites and the end of the city's third dynasty (c. 2000 BC).
Laments
It contains one of five known Mesopotamian " ...
*
Sumerian creation myth
The earliest record of a Sumerian creation myth, called The Eridu Genesis by historian Thorkild Jacobsen, is found on a single fragmentary tablet excavated in Nippur by the Expedition of the University of Pennsylvania in 1893, and first recognized ...
*
Sumerian religion
Sumerian religion was the religion practiced by the people of Sumer, the first literate civilization of ancient Mesopotamia. The Sumerians regarded their divinities as responsible for all matters pertaining to the natural and social orders.
Ove ...
*
Sumerian literature
References
Further reading
* Falkenstein, Adam, Sumerische Götterlieder (Abhandlungen der Heidelberger Akademie der Wissenschaften, Phil.-hist. Kl., Jahrgang 1959, 1. Abh.). Carl Winter UniversitätsVerlag: Heidelberg, 5-79, 1959.
* Jacobsen, Thorkild, The Harps that Once ... Sumerian Poetry in Translation. Yale University Press: New Haven/London, 151-166: translation, pp 101–111, 1987.
* Reisman, Daniel David, Two Neo-Sumerian Royal Hymns (Ph.D. dissertation). University of Pennsylvania: Philadelphia, 41-102, 1970.
* Römer, W.H.Ph., 'Review of Jacobsen 1987', Bibliotheca Orientalis 47, 382-390, 1990.
External links
Barton, George Aaron., Miscellaneous Babylonian Inscriptions, Yale University Press, 1918. Online Version* [http://www.worldcat.org/title/sumerian-epics-and-myths/oclc/603121805?title=&detail=&page=frame&url=http%3A%2F%2Fcatalog.hathitrust.org%2Fapi%2Fvolumes%2Foclc%2F3715558.html%26checksum%3D1f85ff56f13de2855f343a0f0ce63661&linktype=digitalObject Cheira, Edward., Sumerian Epics and Myths, University of Chicago, Oriental Institute Publications, 1934. Online Version]
Chiera, Edward and Kramer, Samuel Noah., Sumerian texts of varied contents, Number 116, University of Chicago Oriental Institute Publications Volume XVI, Cuneiform series - volume IV, 1934. - Online Version*
ttp://etcsl.orinst.ox.ac.uk/section4/c4051.htm Enlil A - ETCSL composite text* [https://web.archive.org/web/20110928222457/http://www.cdli.ucla.edu/cdlisearch/search/index3.php?SearchMode=Browse&ResultCount=25&txtContent=&txtPrimaryPublication=&txtAuthor=&txtDate_publication=&txtOther_Publication=&txtCitation=&txtCollection=&txtAccession_Number=&txtMuseum_no=CBS+08317&txtProvenience=&txtProvenienceRemarks=&txtExcavation_Number=&txtPeriod=&txtPeriodRemarks=&txtDates_Referenced=&txtDateRemarks=&txtDateOrigin=&txtID_Txt=&order=object_id&txtATFSource=&txtCatalogueSource=&txtTranslationSource=&txtObjectType=&txtObjectRemarks=&txtMaterial=&txtSealID=&txtLanguage=&txtGenre=&txtSubGenre=&txtSubgenreRemarks=&txtCDLIComments=&requestFrm=+++Search+++ Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative - CBS 08317]
*
Enlil in the Ekur - set to music on Youtube
{{DEFAULTSORT:Hymn to Enlil
3rd-millennium BC literature
1918 archaeological discoveries
Hymns
Sumerian literature
Clay tablets
Mesopotamian myths
Mythological mountains
Creation myths
Religious cosmologies
Comparative mythology