Chapter VI
A BABYLONIAN ACCOUNT OF THE FLOOD, FROM A TABLET WRITTEN AT NINEVEH IN THE SEVENTH CENTURY B. C.[396]
TRANSLATION OF THE TEXT. COMPARISON WITH GENESIS 6-9. ANOTHER BABYLONIAN VERSION.
=1. Translation of the Text.=
1. Gilgamesh said to him, to Utnapishtim, the far-away:
2. “I look upon thee, O Utnapishtim,
3. Thy appearance is unchanged; thou are like me;
4. Thou art not at all different, thou art like me.
5. Thy courage is unbroken, to make combat,
6. On thy side thou liest down--on thy back.
7. [Tell me] how hast thou advanced and in the assembly of the gods hast found life?”
8. Utnapishtim spoke to him, to Gilgamesh:
9. I will reveal to thee, O Gilgamesh, the secret story,
10. And the decision of the gods to thee will I relate.
11. Shurippak, a city which thou knowest,
12. Is situated on the bank of the Euphrates.
13. That city was old and the gods in it--
14. Their hearts prompted them--the great gods--to make a deluge.
15. [There drew near] their father Anu,
16. Their councillor, the warrior Ellil,
17. Their herald, Enmashtu,
18. Their hero, Ennugi.
19. The lord of wisdom, Ea, counselled with them;
20. Their words he repeated to the reed-hut:
21. “O reed-hut, reed-hut, O wall, wall,
22. O reed-hut, hearken; O wall, give heed!
23. O man of Shurippak, son of Ubaratutu,
24. Pull down thy house, build a ship,
25. Leave thy possessions, take thought for thy life,
26. Leave thy gods, thy life save!
27. Embark seed of life of all kinds on a ship!
28. The ship which thou shalt build,
29. Measure well its dimensions,
30. Make to correspond its breadth and its length;
31. Upon the ocean thou shalt launch it.”
32. I understood and spoke to Ea, my lord:
33. “[I understand], my lord; what thou hast thus commanded
34. I will honor and will do.
35. [But] what shall I say to the city, the people, and the elders?”
36. Ea opened his mouth and spake,
37. He said unto me, his servant:
38. “Thus shalt thou say unto them:
39. Know that me--Ellil hates me.
40. I may not dwell in your city,
41. On Ellil’s soil I may not lift my face.
42. I must go down to the ocean with Ea, my lord, to dwell.
43. Upon you will he (Ellil) then rain abundance--
44. [A catch] of birds, a catch of fishes,
45. ................ a rich (?) harvest.
46. [A time Shamash[397] appointed, at evening] the senders of rain
47. [Shall rain upon] you a mighty rainstorm.
48. When the grey of dawn brightens,
(Lines 49-55 are broken away.)
56. The strong ...... brought what was needed.
57. On the fifth day I raised its frame.
58. According to its plan (?) its walls were 120 cubits high;
59. 120 cubits correspondingly was the extent of its roof.
60. I laid down its hull; I enclosed it.
61. I constructed it in storys, up to six;
62. I divided it [without (?)] into seven parts.
63. Its interior I divided into nine parts.
64. .......... I fastened in its midst.
65. I looked out a rudder, and prepared what was necessary.
66. 6 sars of bitumen I poured over its outside (?);
67. 3 sars of bitumen I poured over its interior.
68. 3 sars of oil the people who carry jars brought.
69. Besides a sar of oil which was used as a libation,
70. 2 sars of oil the ship’s captain stowed away.
71. For the people I slaughtered bullocks.
72. I slaughtered lambs daily.
73. Must, beer, oil, and wine,
74. I gave the people to drink like river-water.
75. I made a feast, like a new year’s festival.
76. I opened (?) [a box of ointment]; I put ointment in my hand.
77. [By the setting] of great Shamash, the ship was finished.
78. [To move it from the stocks] was difficult.
79. The men cleared the ship’s ways above and below.
80. .............................. two-thirds of it.
81. With all that I had I laded it (the ship);
82. With all the silver I had I laded it.
83. With all the gold I had I laded it.
84. With all the living things I had I laded it.
85. I embarked on the ship all my family and kindred.
86. Cattle of the field, beasts of the field, craftsmen, all, I embarked.
87. A fixed time Shamash had appointed, [saying]:
88. “When the senders of rain shall rain upon you a mighty rainstorm at evening,
89. Embark upon the ship and close thy door.”
90. The appointed time approached,
91. The senders of rain sent at evening a heavy rainstorm.
92. I observed the appearance of the day,
93. The day was terrible to look upon.
94. I embarked upon the ship, I closed my door.
95. To the master of the ship, to Puzur-Amurru, the sailor,
96. I entrusted the structure together with its contents.
97. When dew-dawn began to brighten,
98. There arose from the horizon a black cloud;
99. The god Adad thundered in its midst,
100. While Nebo and Sharru marched before;
101. They went as heralds over mountain and country.
102. Nergal tore away the anchor,
103. Enmashtu advanced, the floods he poured down;
104. The Anunnaki raised their torches,
105. At their brightness the land trembled.
106. The raging of Adad reached to heaven;
107. All light was turned to darkness
108. .......... the land like ...............
109. One day [raged the storm (?)]
110. Swiftly it raged [and the waters covered] the mountains,
111. Like a battle array over the people it swept.
112. No one could see his fellow;
113. No more were people recognized in heaven;
114. The gods were frightened at the deluge,
115. They fled, they climbed to the highest heaven;
116. The gods crouched like dogs, they lay down by the walls.
117. Ishtar cried like a woman in travail,
118. Wailed the queen of the gods with her beautiful voice:
119. “Those creatures are turned to clay,
120. Since I commanded evil in the assembly of the gods;
121. Because I commanded evil in the assembly of the gods,
122. For the destruction of my people I commanded battle.
123. I alone bore my people;
124. Like spawn of fishes they fill the sea.”
125. The gods along with the Anunnaki wept with her,
126. The gods bowed, sat as they wept;
127. Closed were their lips; [silent their] assembly.
128. Six days and seven nights
129. Blew the wind, the deluge the flood overpowered.
130. When the seventh day approached, the deluge was prolonging the battle
131. Which, like an army, it had waged.
132. The sea calmed, the destruction abated, the flood ceased.
133. I looked upon the sea, the roaring was stilled
134. And all mankind was turned to clay;
135. Like logs all were floating about.
136. I opened the window, the light fell on my cheek;
137. I was overcome, I sat down, I wept;
138. Over my cheek streamed the tears.
139. I looked in all directions--a fearful sea!
140. After twelve days an island appeared;
141. Toward mount Nizir the ship stood off;
142. Mount Nizir held it fast, that it moved not.
143. One day, two days, mount Nizir held it that it moved not,
144. Three days, four days, mount Nizir held it that it moved not,
145. Five days, six days, mount Nizir held it that it moved not,
146. When the seventh day approached,
147. I brought out a dove and let her go;
148. The dove went out and returned;
149. There was no resting-place and she came back.
150. I brought out a swallow and let it go;
151. The swallow went out and returned.
152. There was no resting-place and it came back.
153. I brought out a raven and let it go;
154. The raven went out, the diminution of the waters it saw;
155. It alighted, it waded about, it croaked, it did not come back.
156. I disembarked [all]; to the four winds I poured a libation.
157. I appointed a sacrifice on the top of the mountain peak;
158. Seven by seven I arranged the sacrificial vessels;
159. Beneath them I piled reeds, cedar wood, and myrtle.
160. The gods smelled the savor,
161. The gods smelled the sweet savor,
162. The gods above the sacrificer collected like flies.
163. When at length the queen of the gods drew near,
164. She raised the great bows (?) which Anu at her wish had made.
165. “O ye gods, as I shall not forget the jewel of my neck
166. These days I shall not forget--to eternity I shall remember!
167. Let the gods come to the sacrifice,
168. But let Ellil not come to the sacrifice,
169. For he was not wise; he sent the deluge,
170. And numbered my people for destruction.”
171. When at last Ellil drew near,
172. He saw the ship, Ellil was angry,
173. His heart was filled against the gods and the Igigi.[398]
174. “Who then has come out alive?
175. No man must escape from destruction.”
176. Then Enmashtu opened his mouth and spake,
177. He said to the warrior Ellil:
178. “Who but Ea accomplished the thing?
179. Even Ea knows every undertaking.”
180. Ea opened his mouth and spake,
181. He said to the warrior Ellil:
182. “O thou, leader of the gods, warrior,
183. How, how couldst thou without thought send a deluge?
184. On the sinner let his sin rest,
185. On the wrongdoer rest his misdeed.
186. Forbear, let it not be done, have mercy, [that men perish not].
187. Instead of thy sending a deluge
188. Had the lion come and diminished the people!
189. Instead of thy sending a deluge
190. Had a wolf come and diminished the people!
191. Instead of thy sending a deluge
192. Had a famine come and the land [depopulated!]
193. Instead of thy sending a deluge
194. Had a pestilence come and the land [depopulated!]
195. I have not divulged the decisions of the great gods.
196. I caused Adrakhasis to see a dream and the decisions of the gods he heard.
197. Now take counsel concerning him.”
198. Then went Ea on board the ship,
199. He took my hand and brought me forth,
200. He brought forth my wife and made her kneel at my side;
201. He turned us toward each other and stood between us; he blessed us:
202. “In former time Utnapishtim was a man;
203. Now let Utnapishtim and his wife be like gods--even like us;
204. Let Utnapishtim dwell afar off at the mouth of the rivers!”
205. He took me and caused me to dwell afar off at the mouth of the rivers.
=2. Comparison with Genesis 6-9.=
The above account of the deluge so closely resembles that in the Bible (Gen. 6:9-9:19), that nearly all scholars recognize that they are two versions of the same narrative.[399] In each case there is a divine revelation to the hero of the deluge that a catastrophe is coming of which every one else is ignorant. They both relate the building of the vessel, the “pitching it within and without with pitch,” the embarkation, the flood in which other men are destroyed, the resting of the ship on a mountain, the sending out of the birds, the disembarkation, the sacrifice, and the intimation that in future a deluge shall not be.
When the Babylonian account is compared with the Biblical, there are two striking differences. 1. The Babylonian story makes the flood local; the Biblical, general. 2. The Babylonian story, fascinating poetry though it is, has a conception of deity in strong contrast with the dignity of the Biblical monotheism. The Babylonian gods disagree; they blame each other; they crouch with fear like dogs; they come swarming about the sacrifice like hungry flies! Nothing could more strikingly illustrate the inspiration of the Biblical story than to measure it against the background of this Babylonian poem, which is clearly a variant version of it.
=3. Another Babylonian Version.=
From the library of Ashurbanipal there has come another version of the deluge, which represents the purpose of its coming as different. According to this version, men had sinned and had been afflicted with famine, after which they reformed for a time. The famine was removed, but soon, apparently, they sinned again. Pestilence was then sent upon them. An appeal brought mitigation of their sufferings, but soon they plunged into sin again. This time they were punished with unfruitfulness of the land and of their race, but soon sinned as before. When all other punishments had failed, as a last resort the flood was sent.
As this account does not so closely resemble that in Genesis, it is not translated here. Those who wish to read it are referred to Rogers, Cuneiform Parallels to the Old Testament, New York, 1912, p. 114, ff.
Chapter VII
AN ACCOUNT OF THE CREATION AND FLOOD, FROM A TABLET WRITTEN AT NIPPUR BEFORE 2000 B. C.
TRANSLATION. COMPARISON WITH THE OTHER VERSION.
=1. Translation.=
This tablet was published by Dr. Arno Poebel, of Breslau. It was apparently written in the time of the dynasty of Nisin, but at any rate not later than the period of the first dynasty of Babylon. Only a part of the tablet has been found, so that the narrative is incomplete both at the beginning and at the end. Possibly the remaining portion may some time be found in the museum at Constantinople. The tablet is inscribed on both sides, and there are three columns to the side. The portions that are still extant read as follows:[400]
Column I (about three-fourths of the column missing)
.......................................... .......................................... “My human-kind from its destruction I will [raise up]; With the aid of Nintu my creation .......... I will raise up; The people in their settlements I will establish; The city, wherever man creates one--indeed its protection--therein I will give him rest. Our house--its brick may he cast in a clean spot! Our places in a clean place may he establish!” Its brilliant splendor, the temple platform, he made straight, The exalted regulations he completed for it; The land he divided; a favorable plan he established. After Anu, Enlil,[401] Enki,[402] and Ninkharsag The black-headed[403] race had created, All that is from the earth, from the earth they caused to spring, Cattle and beasts of the field suitably they brought into being.
Here the first column ends. The passage opens in the midst of the speech of some deity--perhaps Ninkharsag (a Sumerian name of Ishtar) or possibly Enlil, the god of Nippur. First the deity tells how mankind, which has been overthrown, shall be raised up again. Then we are told how he perfected plans for the accomplishment of this purpose, and lastly how four deities called into being men and animals.
Column II (about three-fifths of the text is missing)
...................................................... ................. I will ............................... ............. I will turn my eye upon him ............. The ......... creator of the land ............................... ................ of royalty ...................... ................ of royalty by him was determined; The exalted palace of the royal throne was by him set apart, The exalted precepts .......... he made perfect, In clean places .......... cities .......... he founded, Their names were named, they were allotted to guardian-spirits (?) Of these cities Eridu--the chief command to Nudimmud he gave, Unto the second the nisag-priests of Umma (?) he gave, Thirdly, Larak to Pabilkharsag he gave, Fourthly, Sippar as the dwelling of Shamash he gave, Fifthly, Shurippak unto Lamkurru he gave. Their names were assigned; to guardian-spirits (?) they were allotted; Its rampart (?), a wall (?) he raised up, he established; Small rivers, canals (?), and water-courses (?) he established.
The last part of this column relates how five cities were established by some deity. Of what the first part treated we cannot make out from the few fragments of lines that are still legible.
Column III
.......................................... .......................................... The land the sway of Anu .................. The people .................... A deluge ........................ ......................................... Their land (?) it entered .................... Then Nintu [cried out] like [a woman in travail] .......... The brilliant Ishtar [uttered] a groan on account of her people. Enki with himself held communion in his wisdom; Anu, Enlil, Enki, and Ninkharsag, The gods of heaven and earth, invoked the names of Anu and Enlil, At that time Ziugiddu was king, the priest of .......... The chief deity he made of wood .......... In humility prostrating himself, in reverence .......... Daily at all times was he present in person .......... Increasing dreams which had not come [before], Conjuring by the name of heaven and earth ..........
In this column the narrative has passed to the story of the deluge. The gods have determined to send a deluge; Ziugiddu in consequence constructed an idol from wood (compare Isa. 40:20), and earnestly worshiped it, seeking oracles for his guidance.
Column IV
For the settlement (?) the gods a wall (?) .......... Ziugiddu stood by its side, he heard .......... “At the wall at my left side stand .......... At the wall I will speak a word to thee O my brilliant one, let there enter thy ear .......... By our hand a deluge .......... will be sent. The seed of mankind to destroy .......... Is the momentous decision of the assembly (of the gods); The words of Anu and Enlil .......... Their kingdom, their rule .......... To them ....................”
It is clear from these fragmentary lines that Ziugiddu is being informed of the approaching deluge. It is also clear that some of the elements of the narrative are identical with some of the elements of the one discussed in Chapter VI. Ziugiddu is commanded to stand by a wall, where some deity will speak to him. This appears in the other version in the form:
“O reed-hut, reed-hut, O wall, wall,[404] O reed-hut, hearken; O wall, give heed! O man of Shurippak, son of Ubartutu, Pull down thy house, build a ship,” etc.
In that account, too, the assembly of the gods is also referred to in line 120, ff. These are examples of the way the same theme, differently treated, turns up in different forms.
Column V
The evil winds, the wind that is hostile, came; all of them descended, The deluge .......... came on with them Seven days and seven nights The deluge swept over the land, The evil wind made the huge boat tremble. Shamash[405] came forth, on heaven and earth he shone; Ziugiddu the ship at the top uncovered, The peace of Shamash, his light, entered into the boat. Ziugiddu, the king Before Shamash bowed his face to the earth. The king--an ox he sacrificed, a sheep offered as oblation. .........................................
In this column we have a fragment which relates some details similar to those told in lines 128, 129, and 136-138 of the account given in Chapter VI.
Column VI
By the life of heaven and the life of earth ye shall conjure him, That he may raise up from you; Anu and Enlil by the soul of heaven and the soul of earth ye shall conjure, That they may raise up from you The curse that has come upon the land, that they may remove it. Ziugiddu the king Before Anu and Enlil bowed his face to the earth. Life like a god’s he gave to him, An immortal spirit like a god’s he brought to him. Then Ziugiddu the king, Of the seed that was cursed, lord of mankind he made; In the fruitful land, the land of Dilmun .......... they made him dwell .........................................
At this point the last column is hopelessly broken. It is clear, however, from the part which remains that Ziugiddu is in this narrative translated to the Isle of the Blest as was Utnapishtim in the account translated in Chapter VI, lines 202-205.[406] Indeed there is reason to believe that the two accounts of the flood are divergent versions of the same story. In addition to the likenesses already mentioned, the names of the two heroes, though they appear so different, are the same in meaning. Utnapishtim (or Unapishtim) means “day of life,” or “day-life,” while Ziugiddu means “Life-day prolonged.”
=2. Comparison with the Other Version.=
Although this tablet is much broken, so that we have not the whole of the story, it is clear from the parts that we have that in this version preserved at Nippur the story was much shorter than in the form translated in Chapter VI, which was preserved in the library of Ashurbanipal. It was also combined with a briefer account of the creation than that translated in Chapter I from Ashurbanipal’s library.
Of this Nippurian version of the creation story we have in this tablet only the small fragments preserved in Columns I and II. It is, however, probable that the Nippurian version of the creation was in its main features similar to that preserved in the library at Nineveh, only more brief.
If this be so, the conquest of the dragon Tiâmat is here attributed to Enlil of Nippur, as in the other version it is attributed to Marduk of Babylon, and as in Psa. 74:13, 14, it is attributed to Jehovah. This older account from Nippur agrees in one respect more nearly with the Biblical account than the one from the library at Nineveh does, for it represents Ziugiddu as a very pious man, who was apparently saved from destruction on account of his piety, and in blessing him God removed the curse as Jehovah did in Gen. 8:21.
Chapter VIII
AN ACCOUNT OF THE ORIGIN OF A CITY AND THE BEGINNING OF AGRICULTURE, FROM A TABLET WRITTEN AT NIPPUR BEFORE 2000 B. C.
TRANSLATION. COMPARISON WITH BIBLICAL MATERIAL.
This tablet begins with a description of a place the name of which is not identified; it is, accordingly, indicated in the translation by X. Possibly it was Eridu; possibly Dilmun.
=1. Translation.=
Column I[407]
1. They that are lofty, they that are lofty are ye,
2. O X, pure;
3. They that are holy, they that are lofty are ye.
4. O X, pure,
5. X is pure, X is bright,
6. X is splendid, X is resplendent.
7. Alone were they in X; they lay down.
8. Where Enki and his consort lay,
9. That place is splendid, that place is pure.
10. Alone [in X they lay down].
11. Where Enki with Ninella lay down,
12. That place is splendid, [that place is pure].
13. In X the raven cried not,
14. The kite gave not his kite-call,
15. The deadly lion destroyed not,
16. The wolf a lamb seized not,
17. The dog the weak kid worried not,
18. The ewes the food-grain destroyed not,
19. Offspring increased not ..........
20. The birds of heaven their offspring ..... not;
21. The doves were not put to flight (?).
22. Of eye-disease, “it is eye-disease,” one said not;
23. Of headache, “it is headache,” one said not.
24. To a mother, “mother,” one said not,
25. To a father, “father,” one said not.
26. In the holy place a libation was poured not; in the city one drank not;
27. The river-man “cross it?” said not;
28. Fear one’s couch troubled not;
29. The musician “sing,” said not;
30. The prince of the city spoke not.
31. Ninella to her father Enki said:
32. “A city thou hast founded, a city thou hast founded, its destiny thou hast fixed;
33. In X a city thou hast founded,
34. .......... thou hast founded a city,
35. ............ a canal there is not
36. .............. thou hast founded a city.”
The rest of the first column is broken away; probably about nine lines are missing.
All the first column is descriptive of a place inhabited only by a god and goddess. Many activities are absent, because there is no one there to carry them on. Lines 16-21 remind one a little of Isa. 11:6-9.
After the break the text continues:
Column II
1. “From the bright covering of thy great heaven may the waters flow,
2. May thy city be refreshed with water, may it drink,
3. May X be refreshed with water, may it drink,
4. May thy well of bitter water flow as a well of sweet water.
5. May thy city be a resting, an abode of the people,
6. May X be a resting, an abode of the people.
7. Now, O sun-god, shine forth,
8. O sun-god, stand in heaven;
9. Bring the festal-grain from its place
10. [And] fish, O moon-god, from the water.
11. Along the face of the earth on the road with earth’s sweet water come.”
12. From the bright covering of the great heavens the waters flowed,
13. His city was refreshed with water, it drank;
14. X was refreshed with water, it drank,
15. His well of bitter water became a well of sweet water.
16. The fields and meadows with moisture caused grain to sprout (?);
17. His city was a resting, an abode of the people;
18. X was a resting, an abode of the people.
19. Then the sun-god shone forth; this verily was so,
20. The brilliant one, creator of intelligence.
21. To Nintu, the mother of the people
(Lines 22-30 describe with a frankness common among primitive people a marital union of the god and goddess. In many parts of the world it has been thought that acts of creation proceed from such unions.)
31. Enki, the father of Damgalnunna, his word spoke.
32. Ninkharsag flooded the fields,
33. The fields received the waters of Enki.
34. It was the first day whose month is first;
35. It was the second day whose month is second;
36. It was the third day whose month is third;
37. It was the fourth day whose month is fourth;
38. It was the fifth day whose month is fifth;
39. It was the sixth day whose month is sixth;
40. It was the seventh day whose month is seventh;
41. It was the eighth day [whose month is eighth];
42. It was the ninth day whose month is ninth, the month of fertility.
43. Like fat, like fat, like abundant sweet oil,
44. [Nintu], mother of the land,
45. .......... had brought them forth.
In the first part of the above column the description of the city is continued. As a consequence of the union of the gods, water flowed to irrigate the land. Lines 34-42 tell in a quaint way how the waters continued to come for nine months and nine days.
Column III
1. Ninshar on the bank of the river cried (?):
2. “O Enki, for me are they filled! they are filled!”
3. His messenger, Usmu himself the word repeated.
4. The sons of men his favor did not understand,
5. Ninshar his favor did not understand.
6. His messenger, Usmu himself, answered;
7. The sons of men his favor did not understand,
8. Ninshar his favor did not understand.
9. “My king, a storm-cloud! A storm-cloud!”
10. With his foot on the boat he stepped,
11. Two strong men as watchers he stationed,
12. The command they received, they took.
13. Enki flooded the fields,
14. The fields received the waters of Enki.
15. It was the first day whose month is first;
16. It was the second day whose month is second;
17. It was the ninth day whose month is ninth, the month of the height of the waters.
18. Like fat, like fat, like abundant sweet oil,
19. [Ninshar] like fat,
20. Ninshar had brought them forth.
21. Ninkurra[408] [on the bank of the river] c[ried (?)]
22. “O Enki, for me they are filled! they are filled!”
23. His messenger, Usmu, the word repeated.
24. The sons of men his favor did not understand,
25. Ninkurra his favor did not understand.
26. His messenger, Usmu himself answered;
27. The sons of men did not understand,
28. Ninkurra did not understand.
29. “My king, a storm-cloud! A storm-cloud!”
30. With his foot on the boat he stepped,
31. Two strong men as watchers he stationed;
32. The command they received, they took.
33. Enki flooded the fields
34. The fields received the waters of Enki.
35. It was the first day whose month is first;
36. It was the ninth day whose month is ninth, the month of the height of the waters.
37. Like fat, like fat, like abundant sweet oil,
38. Ninkurra like fat had brought them forth.
39. The god Tagtug and his wife she received;
40. Ninkurra to Tagtug [and his wife] spoke:
41. “Verily I will help (?) thee, my upright one, ..........
42. With favorable words I speak ..........
43. One man for me shall be counted ..........
44. Enki for me shall ..........
The rest of the column, consisting of two or three lines, is missing. The repetition in this column is characteristic of early poetry. Primitive peoples are fond of iteration, and in the description of the way the waters came it was to them very effective.
Column IV (about twelve lines are broken from the tablet at the beginning)
13. [To Tagtug and] his wife spoke ..........
14. ........................................
15. ......................................
16. ................ in the garden ....................
17. ........................................
18. [Eba]raguldu let him found,
19. Erabgaran let him found,
20. At the temple let my fettered oxen stand,
21. For Enki let my fettered oxen be sacrificed,
22. Let two strong men pour out water,
23. Abundant water let them pour out,
24. Reservoir-water let them pour out,
25. The barren land let them irrigate,
26. As gardeners for the little plants let them go forth,
27. On the bank, along the bank let them (i. e., the plants) extend.
28. Who art thou? The garden ....................
29. For Enki the gardener ............................
(Five lines are here broken away.)
35. Ebaraguldu he founded,
36. Erabgaran he founded, on its foundation he set it.
37. Enki turned his eyes unto him; his scepter he lifted up;
38. Enki to Tagtug directed the way.
39. At the temple he cried: “Open the door, open the door;”
40. “Who is it that thou art?”
41. “I am a gardener, with gladness ..........
42. With .......... the price (?) of milk will I present thee.”
43. Tagtug with joyful heart at the temple opened the door,
44. Enki spoke to Tagtug and his wife,
45. With joy his possessions he gave to him;
46. That Ebaraguldu he gave him;
47. That Erabgaran he gave him.
48. Tagtug and his wife bowed down; with the left hand they covered the mouth; with the right they did obeisance.
From the parts of Column IV, which are still legible, it appears that the messenger was revealing to Tagtug the secrets of agriculture. This corresponds to the statement in Gen. 9:20, that “Noah began to be a husbandman.”
At the beginning of Column V some seven lines have crumbled away, and the beginnings of eight more have also become illegible.
Column V
...........................................
...........................................
8. [The .......... plant] was green,
9. [The .......... plant] was green,
10. [The .......... plant] was green,
11. [The .......... plant] was green,
12. [The .......... plant] was green,
13. [The .......... plant] was green,
14. [The .......... plant] was green.
15. “O Enki, for me they are counted,”
16. His messenger, Usmu himself, the word repeated;
17. “Plants I have called forth, their abundance ordained,
18. The water shall make them bright, the water shall make them bright;”
19. His messenger, Usmu himself, answered:
20. “My king, as to the woody plants,” he said,
21. “He shall prune, he shall [eat].”
22. “As to the tall plants,” he said,
23. “He shall pluck, he shall eat.”
24. “My king, as to the .......... plants,” he said,
25. “He shall prune, he shall eat.”
26. “As to the plants of the watered garden (?),” he said,
27. “He shall pluck, he shall eat.”
28. “[My king], as to the .......... plants,” he said,
29. “[He shall prune], he shall eat.”
30. “[My king, as to the .......... plants],” he said,
31. “[He shall pluck, he shall eat].”
32. [“My king, as to the .......... plants”], he said,
33. “[He shall prune, he shall] eat.”
34. [“My king, as] to the cassia plant,” he said,
35. “He [shall pluck] ........ he shall eat.”
36. [“Enki] for [me] the plant of his wisdom has plucked, his heart has spoken.”
37. Of Ninkharsag the name Enki uttered in curse:
38. “The face of life when he dies he shall not see.”
39. Then Anunnaki in the dust sat down.
40. The rebellious one to Enlil said:
41. “I, Ninkharsag, brought forth for thee people; what is my reward?”
42. Enlil, the begetter, answered the rebellious one:
43. “Thou, Ninkharsag, hast brought forth people,”
44. “‘In my city let two creatures be made,’ shall thy name be called.”
45. As a dignitary his head alone he exalted,
46. His heart (?) alone he made impetuous,
47. His eye alone he filled with fire (?).
Langdon takes the portion of the narrative which we find in this column to be an account of the fall of man, since line 36, as he rendered it, speaks of Tagtug’s plucking and eating, and the next line speaks of the uttering of a curse. This view the writer does not share. If the above translation is correct, there is no allusion to anything of the kind.
Column VI (perhaps five lines are broken away)
6. .......... the lord Enlil ..........
7. ........ the lord of life ..........
8. To .......... they went, ..........
9. To .......... they went, the lord of the gods ..........
10. Spoke to him, the water of life ..........
11. ..............................
12. Ninkharsag ....................
13. ..............................
14. ..................................
15. ..............................
16. ..........................
17. ............................
18. Ninkharsag ....................
19. Enlil ...... his .......... they founded,
20. Priests (?) they ordained,
21. Fate they determined,
22. With power established it.
23. Ninkharsag in her temple granted his life to him:
24. “My brother, what of thee is ill?”
25. “My herd (?) is ill.”
26. “The god Absham have I brought forth for thee.”
27. “My brother, what of thee is ill?”
28. “My herd is ill.”
29. “The goddess ‘Queen of the herd’[409] have I brought forth for thee.”
30. “My brother, what of thee is ill?” “My face is ill.”
31. “The goddess Ninkautu have I brought forth for thee.”
32. “My brother, what of thee is ill?” “My mouth is ill.”
33. “The goddess ‘Queen who fills the mouth’[410] have I brought forth for thee.”
34. “My brother, what of thee is ill?” [“My ...... is ill”].
35. “The goddess Nazi have I brought forth for thee.”
36. “My brother, what of thee is ill?” “My hand [is ill.”]
37. “My goddess ‘Living hand’[411] have I brought forth for thee.”
38. “My brother, what of thee is ill?” “My health is ill.”
39. “The goddess ‘Queen of health’[412] have I brought forth for thee.”
40. “My brother, what of thee is ill?” “My intelligence is ill.”
41. “The god who makes the intelligence clear[413] have I brought forth for thee.”
42. “Grandly are they brought forth, they are created.
43. Let Absham be lord of vegetation,
44. Let Nintulla be lord of Magan,
45. Let Ninkautu choose Ninazu as a spouse,
46. May Ninkasi be the full heart’s possession,
47. May Nazi become mistress of weaving (?),
48. May Dazima the house of strong life take,
49. May Nintil become mistress of the month,
50. May Enshagme become lord of X.
51. Glory!”
=2. Comparison with the Bible.=
Here the tablet concludes. This last column, which tells how the goddess Ninkharsag came to favor the hero and to create a number of divine helpers for him, has no parallel in the Biblical account. As Tagtug received the especial protection of Ninkharsag who created for him all these divine helpers, it seems certain that this tablet had no reference to the fall of man, as Langdon supposes. It appears rather to be a mythical account of the beginnings of agriculture and the medicinal use of plants in Babylonia. Agriculture implies irrigation. “From the first day whose month is first” to the ninth month, is the period when Babylonia is watered. The Tigris begins to rise in March, the first month, the overflow of the Euphrates does not subside till the sixth month, and the winter rains are at their height in the ninth month.
As Adam was driven from Eden to eat of the fruits of the earth (Gen. 3:18, 24; compare Gen. 1:29), and Noah became a husbandman (Gen. 9:20), the story of Tagtug presents a remote similarity to both of them. Langdon[414] compares the list of divine beings with which the tablet ends with the antediluvian patriarchs of Gen. 4 and 5, and suggests the possibility that here we have the original names of those patriarchs. Beyond the fact that Absham somewhat resembles the name Abel and was, like Abel, an agriculturist, there is no apparent connection. The names in no way correspond. It is more probable that we have the names of those patriarchs in the list of kings translated in Chapter V.
IX. ABRAHAM AND ARCHÆOLOGY
ABRAHAM HIRED AN OX. ABRAHAM LEASED A FARM. ABRAHAM PAID HIS RENT. WHO WAS THIS ABRAHAM? TRAVEL BETWEEN BABYLONIA AND PALESTINE. HAMMURAPI, KING OF THE WESTLAND. KUDUR-MABUG. KINGS SUPPOSED BY SOME TO BE THOSE OF GENESIS 14.
Archæological investigation has brought to light a number of texts believed by scholars to illumine the Biblical accounts of Abraham. It is the purpose of this chapter to translate and discuss these.
The documents which naturally attract us first are some contracts from Babylonia in which an Abraham was one of the contracting parties. They are as follows:
=1. Abraham Hired an Ox.=[415]
1. One ox broken to the yoke,
2. an ox from Ibni-Sin, son of Sin-imgurani,
3. from Ibni-Sin
4. through the agency of Kishti-Nabium,
5. son of Eteru,
6. Abarama, son of Awel-Ishtar,
7. for one month has hired.
8. For one month
9. one shekel of silver
10. he will pay.
11. Of it ½ shekel of silver
12. from the hand of
13. Abarama
14. Kishti-Nabium
15. has received.
16. In the presence of Idin-Urash, son of Idin-Labibaal,
17. in the presence of Awêlê, son of Urri-bani,
18. in the presence of Beliyatum, scribe.
19. Month of the mission of Ishtar (i. e., Ulul), day 20th,
20. The year Ammizadugga, the king (built)
21. the wall of Ammizadugga, (i. e., Ammizadugga’s 11th year).
22. Tablet of Kishti-Nabium.
This tablet shows how Abarama (Abraham), a farmer, hired an ox for a month. The tablet, as the last line shows, is the copy made for Kishti-Nabium, the agent. In such business transactions three copies were often made, one for each of the contracting parties and one for the scribe. The date of this tablet is 1965 B. C. Ammizadugga was the tenth king of that first dynasty of Babylon, of which Hammurapi was the sixth.
=2. Abraham Leased a Farm.=[416]
1. To the patrician
2. speak,
3. saying, Gimil-Marduk (wishes that)
4. Shamash and Marduk may give thee health!
5. Mayest thou have peace, mayest thou have health!
6. May the god who protects thee thy head in luck
7. hold!
8. (To enquire) concerning thy health I am sending.
9. May thy welfare before Shamash and Marduk
10. be eternal!
11. Concerning the 400 shars of land, the field of Sin-idinam,
12. which to Abamrama
13. to lease, thou hast sent;
14. the land-steward (?) and scribe
15. appeared and
16. on behalf of Sin-idinam
17. I took that up.
18. The 400 shars of land to Abamrama
19. as thou hast directed
20. I have leased.
21. Concerning thy dispatches I shall not be negligent.
It appears from this document that Abamrama, who is none other than a Babylonian Abraham, was a small farmer, who leased a small tract of land.
=3. Abraham Paid His Rent.=[417]
1. 1 shekel of silver
2. of the rent (?) of his field,
3. for the year Ammizadugga, the king,
4. a lordly, splendid statue (set up),
5. brought
6. Abamrama,
7. received
8. Sin-idinam
9. and Iddatum.
10. Month Siman, 28th day,
11. The year Ammizadugga, the king,
12. a lordly, splendid statue (set up).
(This was Ammizadugga’s 13th year.)
This document, dated two years after that in which the ox was hired, shows how Abamrama (Abraham) paid a part of his rent.
The name Abamrama (Abraham) occurs in two other documents published in the same volume (no. 101, and no. 102), where, in defining the boundaries of other fields of Sin-idinam, they are said to be bounded on one side by the field of Abamrama. As these documents mention the name of Abamrama only incidentally, they are not translated here.
=4. Who Was This Abraham?=
These documents, which relate to the business of a Babylonian Abraham, come from Dilbat, about eight miles south of Borsippa, which was just across the Euphrates from Babylon. It is clear that this Abraham was a small farmer, who hired a tract of land from a larger land-owner. He also hired an ox wherewith to work his land, and paid the rent of the land and the hire of the ox as a good citizen should. This Abraham was not the Biblical patriarch. The patriarch’s father was Terah and his brother Nahor; the father of this Babylonian Abraham was Awel-Ishtar, and his brother Iddatum (ibid., no. 101, 9). The Abraham of the Bible was a monotheist according to Genesis; the ancestors of the Babylonian Abraham worshiped the goddess Ishtar, who corresponded to the Canaanitish Ashtoreth. The Bible connects the patriarch with Ur and Haran; this Abraham lived about half-way between these two cities.
Up to the present time this Babylonian Abraham is the only person known to us other than the Biblical patriarch, who, in that period of history, bore the name. He is the only one known to us outside the Biblical record.[418] The only other occurrence of the name outside the Bible is in the name of a place in Palestine, probably near Hebron, which Sheshonk I, the Biblical Shishak, calls “The Field of Abram.”[419] As Shishak lived much later (945-924 B. C.), being a contemporary of Rehoboam the son of Solomon, this Egyptian place name is not so significant. The Babylonian Abraham mentioned in the documents just translated is welcome proof that Abraham was a personal name in Babylonia near the time in which the Bible places the patriarch. With these documents Gen. 11:27-25:10 should be compared.
Another Babylonian contract is of interest in connection with the migration of Abraham.
=5. Travel between Babylonia and Palestine.=
1. A wagon[420]
2. from Mannum-balum-Shamash,
3. son of Shelibia,
4. Khabilkinum,
5. son of Appani[bi],
6. on a lease
7. for 1 year
8. has hired.
9. As a yearly rental
10. ⅔ of a shekel of silver
11. he will pay.
12. As the first of the rent
13. ⅙ of a shekel of silver
14. he has received.
15. Unto the land of Kittim
16. he shall not drive it.
17. In the presence of Ibku-Adad,
18. son of Abiatum;
19. in the presence of Ilukasha,
20. son of Arad-ilishu;
21. in the presence of Ilishu ..........
22. Month Ululu, day 25,
23. the year the king Erech from the flood
24. of the river as a friend protected.
The date of the above interesting document has not been identified with certainty. It is thought by some to belong to the reign of Shamsu-iluna, the successor of Hammurapi. The writing clearly shows that at any rate it comes from the period of this dynasty. That is, it comes from the period to which Gen. 14 assigns the migration of Abraham. Kittim in the contract is the word used in the Hebrew of Jer. 2:10 and Ezek. 27:6 for the coast lands of the Mediterranean. It undoubtedly has that meaning here. This contract was written in Sippar, the Agade of earlier times, a town on the Euphrates a little to the north of Babylon. It reveals the fact that at the time the document was written there was so much travel between Babylonia and the Mediterranean coast that a man could not lease a wagon for a year without danger that it might be driven over the long route to Syria or Palestine. Against such wear upon his vehicle the particular wagon-owner of our document protected himself.
When, therefore, Abraham went out from his land and his kindred, he was going to no unknown land. The tide of commerce and of emigration had opened the way. Apparently it was no more remarkable for him to do it than for an Irishman to come to America half a century ago, or for a south European to come today.
=6. Hammurapi, King of the Westland.=
It is thought by many scholars that Hammurapi was the Amraphel of Genesis 14. The following inscription[421] relates to this king:
1. To [Shar]ratum,
2. the bride of Anu
3. who has come to lordship,
4. lady of strength and abundance,
5. of the mountain-temple,
6. faithful lady, of exalted counsel,
7. lady who binds the heart,
8. who for her spouse
9. makes favorable her open oracle;
10. to his lady,
11. for the life of Hammurapi,
12. king of the Westland (MAR-TU),
13. Ibirum ..........
14. governor of the river-[district] ..........
15. son of Shuban ...........,
16. a guardian-deity appropriate to her divinity,
17. in the land which she loves,
18. for her service (?)
19. before her beloved temple has set up.
This inscription is quoted here for two reasons: 1. It was erected “for the life of Hammurapi,” who is supposed by many to be the Amraphel of Gen. 14:1. Amraphel is supposed to be a corruption of Hammurapi, thus Amrapi. The final l of Amraphel is a difficulty. While many Assyriologists, from Schrader onward, have recognized the equivalence, it is now seriously questioned by Jensen and Eduard Meyer, and absolutely rejected by Bezold. It must be said that, if Amraphel is intended for Hammurapi, the name had undergone corruption before it was placed in the Biblical record.[422] 2. In this inscription Hammurapi is called “king of MAR-TU,” or the Westland, a name by which the Babylonians often designated Syria and Palestine. MAR-TU simply means “sunset,” but was used like the Arabic magrib as the designation of a region. There is no reason to doubt that here it designates Syria and Palestine, so that, if Amraphel is Hammurapi, this is confirmatory of his connection with the West.
=7. Kudur-Mabug.=
The following inscription[423] has also often been brought into the discussion of Genesis 14:
1. To Nannar,
2. his king,
3. Kudur-Mabug,
4. “Father” of the Westland (MAR-TU),
5. son of Simti-shilkhak,
6. when Nannar
7. his prayer
8. had heard,
9. Enunmakh,
10. belonging to Nannar,
11. for his life
12. and the life
13. of Arad-Sin, his son,
14. king of Larsa,
15. he built.
This inscription has often been brought into connection with Abraham, partly because some have seen in Kudur-Mabug the Chedorlaomer of Gen. 14:1, and partly because Kudur-Mabug in it calls himself “Father” or governor of the Westland. If, however, Kudur-Mabug was intended by the name Chedorlaomer, the name had been corrupted beyond all recognition in the Biblical tradition before Gen. 14 was written. In reality there is no reason to suppose that Kudur-Mabug and Chedorlaomer are the same. As to the term “Westland,” it probably does not here designate Palestine, but either the western part of Elam or the southern part of Babylonia. Babylonia lay to the west of Elam, and Kudur-Mabug placed on the throne of Larsa, a city of South Babylonia, first his son, Arad-Sin, and then his son, Rim-Sin, and apparently maintained an over-lordship over both of them. “Westland” accordingly means in his inscription, not Palestine, but Babylonia. One of Kudur-Mabug’s sons calls his father “Father” (or governor) of Emutbal, a region of Elam. It is a mistake, therefore, to bring Kudur-Mabug into connection with Abraham and Gen. 14.[424]
=8. Kings Supposed by Some to be Those Mentioned in Gen. 14.=
Some fragmentary tablets from the Persian period, not earlier than the fourth century B. C., contain references which have been brought by some scholars into connection with Abraham and the fourteenth of Genesis. The texts read as follows:
I[425]
1. ....................
2. ..............................
3. .................... his work not ..........
4. .................. su-ḫa-am-mu ..........
5. ................ before the gods the creation of ..........
6. ............ day .......... Shamash, who illumines ..........
7. .......... the lord of the gods, Marduk, in the satisfaction of his heart,
8. .......... his servant, the region, all of it, a counsel not fulfilled,
9. .......... by force of arms he overthrew. Dursirilani, son of Arad-Malaku (Eri?-..aku)
10. ............ goods (?) he carried off, took as spoil, waters over Babylon and Esagil
11. ........ his with the weapon of his hand like a lamb he killed him,
12. .......... spoke to her, father, and son; with the weapon
13. [Great] and small he cut off, Tudkhula, son of Gazza ..........
14. ...... goods he took as spoil, waters over Babylon and Esagil
15. ...... his son with the weapon of his hands upon him fell.
16. ........ of his dominion before the temple of Annunit ..........
17. ........ Elam, the city Akhkhi to (?) the city Rabbatu he spoiled.
18. ...... like a deluge, he made the cities of Akkad, all of Borsippa (?)
19. ...... ended.[426] Kukukumal, his son pierced his heart with a girdle-dagger of iron.
20. ........ the enemy took and the destruction of these kings, participators in wrong (?),
21. .......... bondage for which the king of the gods, Marduk, was angry with them
22. .......... with sickness their breast was oppressed ........
23. ........ unto ruins were reduced (?). All of them to the king, our lord
24. ...... knowing (?) the hearts of the gods, the gracious Marduk, for the commemoration of his name
25. ........ and named Esagil--to his place may he return.
26. .......... thy ...... may he make. This, O king, my lord we ......
27. .......... his evil his heart the gods, his fathers ..........
28. ............ a participator in sin shall not be (?).
II
1. ..................... gods (?) ..........
2. .......... in the city feared day (?) [and night (?)]
3. .......... Larsa (?), the bond of heaven which unto the four winds ....
4. he decreed them the park (?) which is in Babylon, the city of [his] majesty (?);
5. he decreed them the possessions of Babylon, small and great.
6. In their faithful counsel unto Kukukumal, King of Elam,
7. they established the fixed advance which to them [seemed] good.
8. In Babylon, the city of Karduniash, kingship he assumed ..........
9. In Babylon, the city of the gods, Marduk set his throne (?),
10. All, even the Sodomites of the plundered temples, obeyed [him].
11. Ravens build nests; birds dwell [therein];
12. The ravens croak (?), shrieking they hatch their young [in it].
13. To the dog crunching the bone the lady .......... is favorable.
14. The snake hisses (?), the evil one who spits [poison].
15. Who is the king of Elam who the great building of Esagil de[stroyed],
16. which the Babylonians made, and their work was ..........?
17. This is what thou hast written, saying: “I am a king, the son of a king” ....
18. Who is the son of a daughter of a king, who on the royal throne will sit? ...
19. He is Dursil-ilâni, son of Arad-Malkua, who the throne ..........
20. on the royal throne he sat and before his warriors [he marched].
21. Now let the king march who from ancient days .........
22. has been proclaimed lord of Babylon; the work of ........ shall not endure.
23. In the month Siman and the month Tammuz in Babylon there was done ..........
24. the work of the son of the magician. The bull (i. e., warrior) who devastates the land ..........
25. The elders in their faithful counsel ..........
26. [gave] the son of the magician the place instead of his father
27. ................. 1 maid ....................
Two other similar fragmentary texts belonging to the series are published as noted above, but it is unnecessary to quote them here. The two fragments which we have translated contain the most important references, and are sufficient to enable the reader to make up his mind as to the bearing of these texts upon the fourteenth of Genesis.
Pinches and Sayce read the name of the Elamite king, Kukukumal, Kudurlakhmal, and identify it with Chedorlaomer. Pinches so reads it, hesitatingly; Sayce, confidently. There is no reason for so reading it, except the desire to discover Chedorlaomer. The first three syllables are represented in the cuneiform by the same sign--a sign the most frequent value of which is ku. It does sometimes have the value dur, but never lakh. King reads it Kukukumal, and there is really no reason for reading it otherwise.
Another name which occurs twice is written in the two places with a slight difference of spelling. It is according to the most natural reading of the signs, Arad-Malkua, or Arad-Malaku. Sayce and Pinches read Eri-eaku and identified him with “Arioch, king of Elassar,” (Gen. 14:1). While this is a possible reading, it is only secured by giving to the signs their Sumerian, instead of their Semitic values, and, as the documents are in Semitic, this is probably wrong. The name is to be read Arad-Malkua. Another name, Tudkhula, which occurs in the first document, has been identified by the same scholars with “Tidal, king of the nations” (Gen. 14:1), but in this text there is no evidence that Tudkhula was a king at all, and the identification is purely fanciful. It should be noted also that Arad-Malkua, the supposed Eri-eaku, does not himself take any part in the wars here recorded; it is his son, Dursil-ilâni, who is represented as a contemporary of Kukukumal, the supposed Chedorlaomer.
It should be further noted that these documents represent a complete conquest of Babylon by Elam--a conquest in which Babylon itself is laid desolate. It is not certain just what part Dursil-ilâni played in the story. He may have been a vassal king under Kukukumal, or the Babylonian upon whom the hopes of the people centered, to free them from the yoke of Elam. It is clear, however, that the events mentioned in these documents are not in harmony with the supposition that these monarchs acted as allies of Hammurapi in the invasion of Palestine. Hammurapi is excluded from the account. Kukukumal conquered and desolated the very city in which Hammurapi had his throne. Kukukumal must, accordingly, have lived at some other period of the history, and the supposed confirmation of the account of the fourteenth chapter of Genesis has not yet been found.
As already stated, these tablets are not earlier than the fourth century B. C. The events which they record were probably much later than the time of Abraham. Babylon is called by its Cassite name, Kar-duniash, a name which it did not bear until some hundreds of years after the time of Hammurapi. Many times in the course of Babylonian history was the country overrun by Elam, and there is no real reason to suppose that the war here referred to belongs to the age of Hammurapi.
X. JACOB AND JOSEPH
APPEARANCES OF THESE NAMES IN BABYLONIAN AND EGYPTIAN RECORDS. “THE TALE OF THE TWO BROTHERS”; ITS BEARING ON THE STORY OF JOSEPH IN GENESIS. LETTERS TO A RULER LIKE JOSEPH. THE SEVEN YEARS OF FAMINE. INSCRIPTION SHOWING PREPARATION FOR FAMINE.
=1. Jacob.=
Three different men in Babylonia at the time of the Hammurapi dynasty bore the name Jacob-el. Thus, in the reign of Apil-Sin, the fourth king of the dynasty (2161 to 2144 B. C.), two witnesses, Shubna-ilu and Yadakh-ilu gave their father’s name as Yakub-ilu, or Jacob-el.[427] In the same reign a witness to another document, one Lamaz, had a Jacob-el as his father.[428] In the reign of Sin-muballit, the next king, a witness named Nur-Shamash was also the son of a Jacob-el.[429] In the reign of the great Hammurapi, the next king, a witness named Sin-erbiam gave his father’s name simply as Yakub,[430] or Jacob. This last is clearly a shortening of Jacob-el. These men all lived from 75 to 190 years before the Babylonian Abraham, whose documents are discussed in Chapter IX.
In connection with these names it should be noted that Thothmes III of Egypt, who made extensive conquests in Asia between 1478 and 1446 B. C., records the name of a city which he captured in Palestine as Ya-‘-k-b’-ra, the Egyptian equivalent of Jacob-el.[431] It does not seem a rash guess to suppose that in the period when intercourse between Babylonia and Palestine was frequent and immigration from the former country to the latter was in progress, some Babylonian bearing this name migrated to Palestine, settled there and that a city was named after him. Many parallels to this may be found in the names of places in the United States and Canada. That this place name in Canaan had some connection with the name of the Patriarch Jacob is probable, though just what that connection was it is impossible in the present state of our knowledge to say.
=2. Joseph.=
A Babylonian business document of the time of the first dynasty of Babylon has among its witnesses a man named Yashub-ilu, or Joseph-el.[432]
In the list of places which Thothmes III of Egypt conquered in Palestine there is one Ya-sha-p’-ra, which many scholars have taken to be Joseph-el, though Prof. W. Max Müller[433] thinks it rather is equivalent to Yesheb-el, meaning “where God dwells.” In view of the clear Babylonian equivalence, however, it seems probable that it is Joseph-el. If so, it probably became a place-name in Palestine because some important Babylonian who bore the name settled there, just as we have supposed Jacob-el did. Some scholars hold that it is connected with the name of the Patriarch Joseph in some way, but what that connection was, we cannot now say.
=3. The Tale of the Two Brothers.=[434]
Once there were two brethren, of one mother and one father; Anpu was the name of the elder, and Bata was the name of the younger. Now, as for Anpu, he had a house, and he had a wife. But his little brother was to him, as it were, a son; he it was who made for him his clothes; he it was who followed behind his oxen to the fields; he it was who did the plowing; he it was who harvested the corn; he it was who did for him all the matters which were in the field. Behold his younger brother grew to be an excellent worker; there was not his equal in the whole land; behold the spirit of a god was in him.
Now after this the younger brother followed his oxen in the daily manner; and every evening he turned again to the house, laden with all the herbs of the field, with milk and with wood, and with all things of the field. And he put them down before his elder brother who was sitting with his wife; and he drank and ate, and he lay down in his stable with the cattle. And at the dawn of day he took bread which he had baked, and laid it before his elder brother; and he took with him his bread to the field, and he drave his cattle to pasture in the fields. And as he walked behind his cattle, they said to him, “Good is the herbage which is in that place”; and he listened to all that they said, and he took them to the good place which they desired. And the cattle which were before him were exceeding excellent, and they multiplied greatly.
Now at the time of plowing his elder brother said unto him, “Let us make ready for ourselves a goodly yoke of oxen for plowing, for the land has come out from the water; it is fit for plowing. Moreover, do thou come to the field with corn, for we will begin the plowing in the morrow morning.” Thus said he to him; and his younger brother did all things as his elder brother had spoken unto him to do them.
And when the morn was come, they went to the fields with their things; and their hearts were pleased exceedingly with their task in the beginning of their work. And it came to pass after this that as they were in the field they stopped for corn, and he sent his younger brother, saying, “Haste thou, bring to us corn from the farm.” And the younger brother found the wife of his elder brother, as she was sitting tiring her hair. He said to her, “Get up, and give to me corn, that I may run to the field, for my elder brother hastened me; do not delay.” She said to him, “Go open the bin, and thou shalt take to thyself according to thy will, that I may not drop my locks of hair while I dress them.”
The youth went to the stable; he took a large measure, for he desired to take much corn; he loaded it with wheat and barley; and he went out carrying it. She said to him, “How much of the corn that is wanted, is that which is on thy shoulder?” He said to her, “Three bushels of barley, and two of wheat, in all five; these are what are upon my shoulder:” thus said he to her. And she conversed with him, saying, “There is great strength in thee, for I see thy might every day.” And her heart knew him with the knowledge of youth. And she arose and came to him, and conversed with him, saying, “Come stay with me, and it shall be well for thee, and I will make for thee beautiful garments.” Then the youth became like a panther of the south with fury at the evil speech which she had made to him; and she feared greatly. And he spake unto her, saying, “Behold thou art to me as a mother, thy husband is to me as a father, for he who is elder than I brought me up. What is this wickedness that thou hast said to me? Say it not to me again. For I will not tell it to any man, for I will not let it be uttered by the mouth of any man.” He lifted up his burden, and he went to the field and came to his elder brother; and they took up their work, to labor at their task.
Now afterward, at eventime, his elder brother was returning to his house; and the younger brother was following after his oxen, and he loaded himself with all the things of the field; and he brought his oxen before him, to make them lie down in their stable which was in the farm. And behold the wife of the elder brother was afraid for the words which she had said. She took a parcel of fat, she became like one who is evilly beaten, desiring to say to her husband, “It is thy younger brother who has done this wrong.” Her husband returned in the even as was his wont of every day: he came unto his house; he found his wife ill of violence; she did not give him water upon his hands as he used to have, she did not make a light before him, his house was in darkness, and she was lying very sick. Her husband said to her, “Who has spoken with thee?” Behold she said, “No one has spoken with me except thy younger brother. When he came to take for thee corn he found me sitting alone; he said to me, ‘Come, let us stay together, tie up thy hair’: thus spoke he to me. I did not listen to him, but thus spake I to him: ‘Behold, am I not thy mother, is not thy elder brother to thee as a father?’ And he feared, and he beat me to stop me from making report to thee, and if thou lettest him live I shall die. Now behold he is coming in the evening; and I complain of these wicked words, for he would have done this even in daylight.”
And the elder brother became as a panther of the south; he sharpened his knife; he took it in his hand; he stood behind the door of the stable to slay his younger brother as he came in the evening to bring his cattle into the stable.
Now the sun went down, and he loaded himself with herbs in his daily manner. He came, and his foremost cow entered the stable, and she said to her keeper, “Behold thy elder brother standing before thee with his knife to slay thee; flee from before him.” He heard what his first cow had said; and the next entering, she also said likewise. He looked beneath the door of the stable; he saw the feet of his elder brother; he was standing behind the door, and his knife was in his hand. He cast down his load to the ground, and betook himself to flee swiftly; and his elder brother pursued after him with his knife. Then the younger brother cried out unto Rā Harakhti,[435] saying, “My good lord! thou art he who divides the evil from the good.” And Rā stood and heard his cry; and Rā made a wide water between him and his elder brother, and it was full of crocodiles; and the one brother was on one bank, and the other on the other bank; and the elder brother smote twice on his hands at not slaying him. Thus did he. And the younger brother called to the elder brother on the bank, saying, “Stand still until the dawn of the day; and when Rā ariseth, I shall judge with thee before him, and he discerneth between the good and the evil. For I shall not be with thee any more forever; I shall not be in the place in which thou art; I shall go to the valley of the acacia.”
We need not follow the story further. Those who wish to do so are referred to Petrie’s Egyptian Tales. From this point onward, it contains many mythological features.
This story, in the form in which we have it, was written for Seti II (1209-1205 B. C.) of the nineteenth Egyptian dynasty, while that monarch was still crown prince. Scholars of all shades of opinion have recognized in it a striking parallel to the story of Joseph in the house of Potiphar, in Genesis 39:1-20. Joseph, like the younger brother of this tale, was trusted with everything about his master’s place; Potiphar’s wife, like the sister-in-law of the tale, tempted Joseph; Joseph, like the younger brother, resisted temptation; and Potiphar’s wife, like the sister-in-law, charged him with the crime which he had been unwilling to commit.
Scholars of the critical school regard this as the original of the story in Genesis. While they recognize that it is a theme which is not confined to Egyptians and Hebrews (compare for other parallels Lang, Myth, Ritual, and Religion, II, 303, ff.), the fact that the theme of the Biblical story is laid in Egypt leads them to think it extremely probable that there is a connection between the two.
Conservative scholars on the other hand hold that in all probability there was more than one such scandal in Egypt, and account for the likeness by the similarity which would naturally present itself in such cases, holding that the Egyptian tale has no bearing on the credibility of that in Genesis.
=4. Letters to a Ruler Like Joseph.=
Among the letters in the Babylonian language and script found at El-Amarna in Egypt in the winter of 1887-1888,[436] many of which were written to Amenophis III and Amenophis IV, Kings of Egypt, 1411-1357 B. C., by Egyptian vassals in Palestine and Syria, there are two which were written to a Semite named Dûdu (David), which show that this Semite held at the Egyptian court a position analogous to that which Joseph, as ruler of Egypt, is said to have held (Gen. 41:39, f.; 50:26). These letters are as follows:
I[437]
1. To Dûdu, my lord, my father,
2. speaks Aziru, thy son, thy servant:
3. at the feet of my father I fall.
4. Unto my father may there be health!
5. O Dûdu, truly I have given (i. e., done)
6. the wish of the king, my lord,
7. and whatever is the wish
8. of the king, my lord, let him send
9. and I will give (do) it.
10. Further: see, thou art there,
11. my father, and whatever is the wish
12. of Dûdu, my father, send it
13. and I will indeed give (do) it.
14. Behold, thou art my father and my lord
15. and I am thy son. The lands of the Amorites
16. are thy lands, and my house is thy house,
17. and whatever thy wish is,
18. send, and I
19. shall behold, and verily will give (do) it.
20. And see, thou in the presence of
21. the king, my lord, sittest.
22. ............ enemies
23. words of slander
24. before my father, before
25. the king, my lord, have spoken,
26. but do thou not count them just!
27. And behold thou in the presence
28. of the king, my lord, as a dignitary (?)
29. sittest ....................
30. and the words of slander
31. against me do not count true.
32. Also I am a servant of the king, my lord,
33. and from the words of the king, my lord,
34. and from the words of Dûdu, my father,
35. I shall not depart forever.
36. But when the king, my lord, does not love me,
37. but hates me,
38. then I--what shall I say?
II[438]
1. To Dûdu, my lord, my father,
2. speaks Aziru, thy servant:
3. at the feet of my lord I fall.
4. Khatib has come
5. and has brought the words
6. of the king, my lord, important and good,
7. and I am very, very glad,
8. and my land and my brethren,
9. the servants of the king, my lord,
10. and the servants of Dûdu, my lord,
11. are very, very glad,
12. when there comes
13. the breath of the king, my lord,
14. unto me. From the words
15. of my lord, my god, my sun-god,
16. and from the words of Dûdu,
17. my lord, I shall not depart.
18. My lord, truly Khatib
19. stands with me.
20. I and he will come.
21. My lord, the king of the Hittites
22. has come into Nukhashshi,
23. so that I cannot come.
24. Would that the king of the Hittites would depart!
25. Then truly I would come,
26. I and Khatib.
27. May the king, my lord, my words
28. hear! My lord, I fear
29. on account of the face of the king, my lord,
30. and on account of the face of Dûdu.
31. And now by my gods
32. and my angels verily I have sworn,
33. O Dûdu and nobles
34. of the king, my lord, that truly I will come.
35. And so, Dûdu
36. and the king, my lord, and the nobles,
37. “Truly we will not conceive anything
38. against Aziru that is unfavorable,”--
39. even thus may ye swear
40. by my gods and the god A!
41. And truly I
42. and Khatib are faithful servants of the king.
43. O Dûdu, thou shalt truly know
44. that I will come to thee.
The Aziru of these letters was the chieftain or petty king of the Amorites, who were living at the time to the eastward of Phœnicia, between the Lebanon and Anti-Lebanon mountains. The way in which he addresses Dûdu is significant. Dûdu is classed continually with the king. Aziru fears to offend Dûdu as he fears to offend the king; the words of Dûdu are of equal importance with those of the king. Dûdu clearly occupied a position of power with the king of Egypt similar to that ascribed to Joseph in Genesis 41. Moreover, Dûdu is a Semitic name; vocalized a little differently, it becomes David.
The king to whom this letter was written was Amenophis III or Amenophis IV, in whose reigns Semitic influence was especially strong in Egypt. Amenophis III took as his favorite wife a woman named Tiy, daughter of Yuaa and Tuau, whose mummies, discovered a few years ago, show, some think, that they were Semitic. Queen Tiy was very influential during the reign of her son, Amenophis IV, and was in part the cause of the remarkable religious reform which he undertook (Part I, Chapter I, § 6 (vii)). It is not, accordingly, strange to find that the chief minister of one of these kings was a Semite. Of course, Dûdu cannot be identified with Joseph, but his career shows that such careers as that of Joseph were not impossible at this period of Egyptian history.
=5. The Seven Years of Famine.=
The following inscription was found cut on a rock between the island of Elephantine and the First Cataract, and was first published by Brugsch in 1891. It is written in hieroglyphic characters, and was apparently inscribed in the reign of Ptolemy X, 117-89 B. C. It relates how King Zoser, of the third dynasty, who began to reign about 2980 B. C., nearly 2,800 years before the inscription was written, appealed to Khnum, the god of Elephantine, because of a famine. The part of the text which interests us is as follows:[439]
“I am very anxious on account of those who are in the palace. My heart is in great anxiety on account of misfortune, for in my time the Nile has not overflowed for a period of seven years. There is scarcely any produce of the field; herbage fails; eatables are wanting. Every man robs his neighbor. Men move (?) with nowhere to go. The children cry, the young people creep along (?). The aged heart is bowed down; their limbs are crippled; they sit (?) on the earth. Their arms are ........ The people of the court are at their wits’ end. The store-houses (?) were built, but .......... and all that was in them has been consumed.”
As Brugsch[440] saw, this inscription gives a graphic account of the suffering caused by seven such years of famine as are said to have occurred in the time of Joseph (Gen. 41:30, 54, ff.). It cannot be the same seven-year famine as that referred to in Genesis, as it is placed several centuries too early to coincide with the time of Joseph. As the inscription is about 2,800 years later than the event it describes, its historical accuracy might be questioned, but it is probable that it was a renewal of an earlier inscription. But even if its historical accuracy be impugned, it witnesses to a native Egyptian tradition that such famines were possible.
=6. Inscription Showing Preparation for Famine.=
Inscription of Baba of El-Kab[441]
“The chief at the table of the sovereign, Baba, the risen again, speaks thus: I loved my father; I honored my mother; my brothers and sisters loved me. I went out of the door of my house with a benevolent heart; I stood there with refreshing hand; splendid were my preparations of what I collected for the festal day. Mild was (my) heart, free from violent anger. The gods bestowed upon me abundant prosperity upon earth. The city wished me health and a life of full enjoyment. I punished the evil-doers. The children who stood before me in the town during the days which I fulfilled were--great and small--60; just as many beds were provided for them, just as many chairs (?), just as many tables (?). They all consumed 120 ephahs of durra, the milk of 3 cows, 52 goats, and 9 she-asses, a hin of balsam, and 2 jars of oil.
“My words may seem a jest to the gainsayer, but I call the god Mut to witness that what I say is true. I had all this prepared in my house; in addition I put cream in the store-chamber and beer in the cellar in a more than sufficient number of hin-measures.
“I collected corn as a friend of the harvest-god. I was watchful in time of sowing. And when a famine arose, lasting many years, I distributed corn to the city each year of famine.”
The Baba who wrote this inscription lived under the eighteenth Egyptian dynasty, about 1500 B. C., or a little before. Brugsch pointed out many years ago that Baba’s concluding statement forms an interesting parallel to the conduct of Joseph as told in Gen. 41:47-57. Baba claims to have done for his city, El-Kab, what Joseph is said to have done for all Egypt. His statement affords striking evidence of the historical reality of famines in Egypt, and of such economic preparation for them.
XI. PALESTINE IN THE PATRIARCHAL AGE
THE TALE OF SINUHE. COMMUNICATION BETWEEN EGYPT AND PALESTINE.
=1. The Tale of Sinuhe.=
In the year 1970 B. C., when Amenemhet I died and was succeeded by Sesostris I, an Egyptian of high rank, named Sinuhe, for some reason now unknown to us, fled from Egypt to Asia. The details of his escape from Egypt are not of interest to the Biblical student, but his description of the hardships encountered in the desert and of his experiences in eastern Palestine are of great value, as they afford us our earliest description of that country outside the Bible. The following extract begins just after Sinuhe had told how he escaped the guards in the fort which stood at the eastern frontier of Egypt.[442]
I went on at the time of evening, As the earth brightened, I arrived at Peten. When I had reached the lake of Kemwer,[443] I fell down for thirst, fast came my breath, My throat was hot, I said: “This is the taste of death.” I upheld my heart, I drew my limbs together, As I heard the sound of lowing cattle, I beheld the Bedawin. That chief among them, who had been in Egypt, recognized me. He gave me water, he cooked for me milk. I went with him to his tribe, Good was that which they did (for me). One land sent me on to another, I loosed for Suan,[444] I arrived at Kedem;[445] I spent a year and a half there. Emuienshe,[446] that sheik of Upper [Ru]tenu,[447] brought me forth saying to me: “Happy art thou with me, (for) thou hearest the speech of Egypt.” He said this (for) he knew my character, He had heard of my wisdom; The Egyptians, who were there with him, bare witness of me.
The Amorite chieftain then questioned Sinuhe concerning his flight. He gave evasive answers, merging with his reply a long hymn in praise of the king. After this Emuienshe said to him:
“Behold, thou shalt now abide with me; Good is that which I shall do for thee.” He put me at the head of his children, He married me to his eldest daughter, He made me select for myself of his land, Of the choicest of that which he had, On his boundary with another land. It was a goodly land, named Yaa;[448] There were figs in it and vines, More plentiful than water was its wine, Copious was its honey, plenteous its oil; All fruits were upon its trees. Barley was there and spelt, Without end all cattle. Moreover, great was that which came to me, Which came for love of me, When he appointed me sheik of the tribe, From the choicest of his land. I portioned the daily bread, And wine for every day, Cooked flesh and fowl in roast; Besides the mid goats of the hills, Which were trapped for me, and brought to me; Besides that which my dogs captured for me. There was much--made for me, And milk in every sort of cooked dish. I spent many years, My children became strong, Each the mighty man of his tribe. The messenger going north, Or passing southward to the court, He turned in to me. For I had all men turn in (to me).
The tale goes on concerning the personal prowess of Sinuhe, who, in his old age, returned to Egypt and made his peace with the king.
=2. Communication between Egypt and Palestine.=
This document from the early patriarchal age reveals a close relationship between Egypt and Palestine. There was frequent communication between Kedem and Egypt; messengers went to and fro. The Egyptian language was understood at the court of the Amorite chieftain. These conditions throw light on the narratives of the descent of Abraham and Jacob to Egypt. Sinuhe’s description of his life necessarily reminds one of the description of Palestine so often met with in the Pentateuch, Joshua, and the prophets, “a land flowing with milk and honey.” (See, for example, Exod. 3:8, 17.)
(For an addition to this chapter, see Appendix.)
XII. MOSES AND THE EXODUS
THE LEGEND OF SARGON OF AGADE; ITS RESEMBLANCE TO THE STORY OF MOSES. THE PILLAR OF MERNEPTAH; THE ONLY APPEARANCE OF THE NAME “ISRAEL” OUTSIDE OF THE BIBLE.
=1. The Legend of Sargon of Agade.=
The following legend[449] contains a story of the exposure of an infant on a river, strikingly like that told of Moses.
1. Sargon, the mighty king, king of Agade am I,
2. My mother was lowly; my father I did not know;[450]
3. The brother of my father dwelt in the mountain.
4. My city is Azupiranu, which is situated on the bank of the Euphrates.
5. My lowly mother conceived me, in secret she brought me forth.
6. She placed me in a basket of reeds, she closed my entrance with bitumen,
7. She cast me upon the river, which did not overflow me.
8. The river carried me, it brought me to Akki, the irrigator.
9. Akki, the irrigator, in the goodness of his heart lifted me out,
10. Akki, the irrigator, as his own son ...... brought me up;
11. Akki, the irrigator, as his gardener appointed me.
12. When I was a gardener the goddess Ishtar loved me,
13. And for four years I ruled the kingdom.
14. The black-headed[451] peoples I ruled, I governed;
15. Mighty mountains with axes of bronze I destroyed (?).
16. I ascended the upper mountains;
17. I burst through the lower mountains.
18. The country of the sea I besieged three times;
19. Dilmun[452] I captured (?).
20. Unto the great Dur-ilu I went up, I ..........
21. .......... I altered ..........
22. Whatsoever king shall be exalted after me,
23. ..............................
24. Let him rule, let him govern the black-headed peoples;
25. Mighty mountains with axes of bronze let him destroy;
26. Let him ascend the upper mountains,
27. Let him break through the lower mountains;
28. The country of the sea let him besiege three times;
29. Dilmun let him capture;
30. To great Dur-ilu let him go up.
The rest is too broken for connected translation.
It is thought by some scholars of the critical school that the parallelism between the secret birth, the exposure, the rescue and adoption of Sargon, and the account of the secret birth, exposure, rescue, and adoption of Moses in Exod. 2:1-10 is too close to be accidental. Conservative scholars, on the other hand, hold that, if the legend of Sargon is historical, it merely affords an example of a striking coincidence of events in two independent lives.
=2. The Pillar of Merneptah.=
In the fifth year of King Merneptah, who ruled from 1225-1215 B. C., and who is thought to be the Pharaoh of the exodus, he inscribed on a pillar an account of his wars and victories. The inscription concludes with the following poetic strophe:[453]
The kings are overthrown, saying: “salaam!” Not one holds up his head among the nine bows.[454] Wasted is Tehenu,[455] Kheta[456] is pacified, Plundered is the Canaan[457] with every evil, Carried off is Askelon, Seized upon is Gezer, Yenoam[458] is made as a thing not existing. Israel is desolated, his seed is not; Palestine has become a widow for Egypt. All lands are united, they are pacified; Every one that is turbulent is bound by King Merneptah, who gives life like Rā every day.
This inscription contains the only mention of Israel in a document of this age outside the Bible. It is, for that reason, of great importance. It should be noted that Israel is mentioned along with peoples and places in Palestine and Phœnicia. The Israel here referred to was not, accordingly, in Egypt. Israel, on the other hand, may not have been more than a nomadic people. The Egyptians used a certain “determinative” in connection with the names of settled peoples. That sign is here used with Tehenu, Kheta, Askelon, Gezer, and Yenoam, but not with Israel.
As Merneptah has been supposed by many to be the Pharaoh in whose reign the exodus occurred, the mention of Israel here has somewhat puzzled scholars, and different explanations of the fact have arisen. At least one scholar holds that the exodus occurred in Merneptah’s third year, and that he afterward attacked the Hebrews. Others have supposed that not all the Hebrews had been in Egypt, but only the Joseph tribes. Still others have thought that the Leah tribes had made their exodus during the eighteenth dynasty, and that it was these with whom Merneptah fought, while the Rachel tribes made their exodus under the nineteenth dynasty. Opinions vary according to the critical views of different writers. All scholars would welcome more information on these problems.
XIII. THE CODE OF HAMMURAPI AND THE PENTATEUCH
THE TEXT OF THE CODE; RESEMBLANCE TO AND CONTRAST WITH THE MOSAIC CODE. THE MOSAIC CODE NOT BORROWED FROM THE BABYLONIAN; DIFFERENT UNDERLYING CONCEPTIONS.
=1. The Text of the Code; Comparison with the Mosaic Code.=
The following code of laws was inscribed by order of Hammurapi, of the first dynasty of Babylon (2104-2061 B. C.), on a block of black diorite nearly eight feet in height and set up in Esagila, the temple of Marduk, in Babylon, so that the people might have the laws in the mother-tongue. As this last statement implies, the laws are written in Semitic Babylonian; before the time of Hammurapi the laws had been written in Sumerian. At some later time an Elamite conqueror, who was overrunning Babylonia, took this pillar away to Susa as a trophy. In course of time the pillar was broken into three parts, which were found by the French expedition under de Morgan in December, 1901, and January, 1902, while excavating at Susa. As the code is the oldest known code of laws in the world, being a thousand years older than Moses, and as it affords some interesting peculiarities as well as some striking parallels to the laws in Exodus 21-23 and in Deuteronomy, a translation of it, with some comparison of Exodus and Deuteronomy, is here given:
Against Witches
§ 1. If a man brings an accusation against a man, that he has laid a death-spell upon him, and has not proved it, the accuser shall be put to death.[459]
§ 2. If a man accuses another of practising sorcery upon him, but has not proved it, he against whom the charge of sorcery is made shall go to the sacred river; into the sacred river he shall plunge, and if the sacred river overpowers him, his accuser shall take possession of his house. If the sacred river shows that man to be innocent, and he is unharmed, he who charged him with sorcery shall be killed. He who plunged into the sacred river shall take the house of his accuser.
With these laws we should compare Exod. 22:18, which imposes the death penalty upon witches, and Deut. 18:10, ff., which declares that there shall be no sorcerer, diviner, magician, or charmer in Israel and promises a line of prophets to render these unnecessary. Magic is banished from Israel; its presence in Babylonia is taken for granted, and only some of its exercises, which were supposed to be especially deadly, were forbidden. In § 2 the man accused of sorcery is to be tried by ordeal. He is to plunge into the river and if he can swim in its current, he is innocent. Trial by ordeal is found but once in the Hebrew laws (Num. 5:11-28). There both the crime and the ordeal are very different from this.
Note that in these sections the false accuser suffers in just the way he has tried to bring suffering to the other. This is the law of retaliation, which appears in Deut. 19:16-21, where it is applied to false witnesses in the same way as here. It will be found underlying many of the penalties of this code.
Laws Concerning False Witness
§ 3. If in a case a man has borne false witness, or accused a man without proving it, if that case is a capital case, that man shall be put to death.
§ 4. If he has borne witness in a case of grain or money, the penalty of that case he shall himself bear.
Hebrew law was similar; a false witness was to be visited with the penalty which he had purposed to bring upon his brother (Deut. 19:18, 19).
Against Reversing a Judicial Decision
§ 5. If a judge has pronounced a judgment, made a decision, caused it to be sealed, and afterward has altered his judgment, that judge they shall convict on account of the case which he decided and altered; the penalty which in that case he imposed he shall pay twelvefold, and in the assembly from the seat of his judgment they shall expel him; he shall not return; with the judges in a case he shall not sit.
Hebrew law presents no parallel to this.
Against Theft
§ 6. If a man steals the goods of a god (temple) or of a palace, that man shall be put to death, and he by whose hand the stolen goods were received shall be put to death.
§ 7. If a man purchases or receives on deposit either silver, gold, man-servant, maid-servant, ox, sheep, ass, or anything whatever from the hand of a minor or a slave without witnesses or contracts, that man is a thief; he shall be put to death.
§ 8. If a man has stolen ox, or sheep, or ass, or pig, or a boat, either from a god (temple) or a palace, he shall pay thirtyfold. If he is a poor man, he shall restore tenfold. If the thief has nothing to pay, he shall be put to death.
§ 9. If a man, who has lost anything, finds that which was lost in a man’s hand, (and) the man in whose hand the lost thing was found says: “A seller sold it; I bought it before witnesses”; and the owner of the lost thing says: “I will bring witnesses who know that the lost thing is mine”; if the purchaser brings the seller who sold it to him and the witnesses in whose presence it was bought, and the owner of the lost thing brings the witnesses who know that the lost thing is his, the judges shall examine their testimony. The witnesses before whom the purchaser purchased it, and the witnesses who know the lost thing, shall give their testimony in the presence of a god. The seller is a thief; he shall be put to death. The owner of the lost thing shall take that which was lost. The purchaser shall take from the house of the seller the money which he had paid.
§ 10. If the purchaser does not produce the seller who sold it to him and the witnesses before whom he bought it, and the owner of the lost thing produces the witnesses who know that the lost thing is his, the purchaser is the thief; he shall be put to death. The owner of the lost thing shall take that which he lost.
§ 11. If the owner of the lost thing does not bring the witnesses who know that the lost thing is his, he is one who has attempted fraud; he shall be put to death.
§ 12. If the seller has died, the purchaser shall recover from the house of the seller the damages of that case fivefold.
§ 13. If that man has not his witnesses near, the judges shall set an appointed time within six months; and if, within six months, his witnesses he does not produce, that man is a liar; the penalty of that case he shall himself bear.
The Hebrew laws comparable to these are found in Exod. 22:1-4, 9, and Lev. 6:3-5. Exodus directs (v. 1) that, if a man steals an ox or a sheep and kills it or sells it, he shall restore live oxen for an ox and four sheep for a sheep. In case it is not sold he shall restore double (v. 9). No highly organized courts appear in the Biblical codes. The thief was brought before God and his guilt determined by some religious test. The law of Leviticus required a man guilty of theft to restore the lost property, adding to it a fifth more, and to offer a ram in sacrifice. (See Exod. 18:13-26. Cf. 2 Chron. 19:5-7 with 1 Chron. 23:4 and Deut. 16:18-20.)
The Babylonian laws presuppose a much more highly organized social community than the Hebrew.
Against Stealing Children and Slaves
§ 14. If a man steals the son of a man who is a minor, he shall be put to death.
§ 15. If a man causes a male or female slave of a palace, or the male or female slave of a workingman to escape from the city gate, he shall be put to death.
§ 16. If a man harbors in his house either a male or a female slave who has escaped from a palace or from a workingman, and does not bring him out at the summons of the officer, the owner of that house shall be put to death.
§ 17. If a man finds in a field a male or a female slave who has escaped and restores him to his owner, the owner of the slave shall pay him 2 shekels of silver.
§ 18. If that slave will not name his owner, he shall bring him unto the palace and they shall investigate his record and restore him unto his owner.
§ 19. If he shall detain that slave in his house and afterward the slave is found, that man shall be put to death.
§ 20. If the slave escapes from the hand of his captor, that man shall declare it on oath to the owner of the slave and shall be innocent.
These laws are analogous to Exod. 21:16 and Deut. 23:15. The former inflicts the death penalty for stealing a man and selling him, and the latter prohibits one in whose house a fugitive slave has taken refuge from returning the slave to his master. Slavery was not in Israel such a firmly established institution as in Babylonia. (See Exod. 21:2-6; Deut. 15:12-18; Lev. 25:25-46.)
Housebreaking and Brigandage
§ 21. If a man breaks into a house, before that breach he shall be put to death and thrown into it.
§ 22. If a man practices brigandage and is caught, that man shall be put to death.
§ 23. If the robber is not caught, the man who is robbed shall declare his loss, whatever it is, in the presence of a god, and the city and governor in whose territory and jurisdiction the robbery was committed shall compensate him for whatever was lost.
§ 24. If it is a life, that city and governor shall pay to his relatives 1 mana of silver.[460]
Hebrew law presents an analogy to the last of these sections in Deut. 21:1-9, though in Israel no compensation was offered to the heirs of the man who was slain, but a sacrifice was performed by the elders of the nearest city, to purge it of innocent blood.
Stealing at a Fire
§ 25. If a fire breaks out in a man’s house, and a man who has come to extinguish it shall cast his eye upon the furniture of the owner of the house, and the furniture of the owner of the house shall take, that man shall be thrown into that fire.
The Duties and Privileges of Soldiers, Constables, and Tax-collectors
§ 26. If a soldier or a constable[461] who is ordered to go on a journey for the king does not go, but hires a substitute and dispatches him instead, that soldier or constable shall be put to death; his hired substitute shall appropriate his house.
§ 27. If a soldier or a constable is detained in a royal fortress and after him they give his field or garden to another and he takes it and carries it on, if the first one returns and reaches his city, they shall restore to him his field and garden, and he shall take it and carry it on.
§ 28. If a soldier or a constable who is detained in a royal fortress has a son who is able to carry on his business, they shall give to him his field and garden and he shall carry on the business of his father.
§ 29. If his son is small and not able to carry on the business of his father, they shall give one-third of his field and garden to his mother and she shall rear him.
§ 30. If a soldier or a constable from the beginning of his appointment neglects his field, garden, and house and leaves them uncared for, another after him shall take his field, garden, and house, and carry on his business for three years. If he returns and desires his field, garden, and house, they shall not give them to him. He who has taken them and carried on the business shall carry it on.
§ 31. If he leaves it uncared for but one year and returns, they shall give him his field, garden, and house, and he shall carry on his own business.
§ 32. If a merchant ransoms a soldier (?) or a constable who, on a journey of the king, was detained, and brings him back, to his city, if in his house there is sufficient ransom, he shall ransom himself. If in his house there is not sufficient to ransom him, by the temple of his city he shall be ransomed. If in the temple of his city there is not a sufficient ransom, he shall be ransomed by the palace. His field, garden, and house shall not be given for ransom.
§ 33. If a governor or a magistrate harbors a deserting soldier or accepts and sends a hired substitute on an errand of the king, that governor or magistrate shall be put to death.
§ 34. If a governor or a magistrate takes the property of a soldier, plunders a soldier, or hires out a soldier, has defrauded a soldier in a suit before a sheik, or takes the present which the king has given to a soldier, that governor or magistrate shall be put to death.
§ 35. If a man buys the cattle or sheep which the king has given to a soldier, he shall forfeit his money.
§ 36. One shall not sell the field, garden, or house of a soldier, constable, or tax-collector.
§ 37. If a man has bought the field, garden, or house of a soldier, constable, or tax-collector, his tablet shall be broken, he shall forfeit his money; the field, house, or garden shall return to its owner.
§ 38. A soldier, constable, or tax-collector shall not deed to his wife or daughter the field, house, or garden, which is his perquisite, nor shall he assign them for debt.
§ 39. A field, garden, or house which he has purchased and possesses he may deed to his wife or daughter, or may assign for debt.
§ 40. A priestess, merchant, or other creditor may purchase his field, garden, or house. The purchaser shall conduct the business of the field, garden, or house which he has purchased.
§ 41. If a man has bargained for the field, garden, or house of a soldier, constable, or tax-collector and has given sureties, the soldier, constable, or tax-collector shall return to the field, house, or garden, and the sureties which were given him he shall keep.
No such officers as these are mentioned in the laws of the Old Testament, though some of them appear in earlier times in the records of Babylonia. The tax-collectors mentioned here remind us of Solomon’s tax-collectors mentioned in 1 Kings 4:7, ff.
Laws of Agriculture
§ 42. If a man rents a field for cultivation and produces no grain in that field, they shall call him to account for doing no work in that field, and he shall give to the owner of the field grain similar to that of adjacent fields.
§ 43. If he does not cultivate that field and neglects it, he shall give the owner of the field grain similar to that of adjacent fields, and the field which he neglected he shall break up with mattocks, he shall harrow, and return it to the owner of the field.
§ 44. If a man rents an uncultivated field for three years for improvement and neglects its surface and does not develop the field, in the fourth year he shall break up the field with mattocks, he shall hoe and harrow it, and return it unto the owner of the field, and for every Gan of land he shall measure out 10 Gur of grain.
§ 45. If a man lets his field for pay on shares to a farmer and receives his rent, and afterward the storm-god inundates the field and carries off the produce, the loss is the farmer’s.
§ 46. If the rent of his field he has not received, and he has let the field for one-half or one-third (of the crop), the farmer and the owner of the field shall divide the grain which is in the field according to agreement.
§ 47. If the farmer, because he has not in a former year received a maintenance, entrusts the field to another farmer, the owner of the field shall not interfere. He would cultivate it, and his field has been cultivated. At the time of harvest he shall take grain according to his contracts.
§ 48. If a man has a debt against him and the storm-god inundates his field and carries away the produce, or if through lack of water grain has not grown in the field, in that year he shall not make a return of grain to his creditor; his contract he shall change, and the interest of that year he shall not pay.
§ 49. If a man borrows money from a merchant, and has given to the merchant a field planted with grain or sesame, and says to him: “Cultivate the field and harvest and take the grain or sesame which it produces”; if the tenant produces grain or sesame in the field, at the time of harvest the owner of the field shall take the grain or sesame which was produced by the field, and shall give to the merchant grain for the money which he borrowed from the merchant with its interest, and for the maintenance of the farmer.
§ 50. If the field was already planted [with grain or] sesame, the owner of the field shall receive the grain or the sesame which is produced in the field, and the money and its interest he shall return to the merchant.
§ 51. If there is not money to return, he shall give to the merchant [the grain or] sesame for the money and its interest which he had received from the merchant, according to the scale of prices fixed by the king.
§ 52. If the farmer does not produce grain or sesame in his field, he shall not alter his contract.
§ 53. If a man the side of his strong dyke has neglected and has not strengthened it, and in his dyke a break occurs, and the water destroys the farm-land, the man in whose dyke the break occurred shall restore the grain which was destroyed.
§ 54. If he is not able to restore the grain, they shall sell him and his possessions for money, and the owners of the fields whose grain was destroyed shall share it.
§ 55. If a man has opened his sluice for watering and has left it open and the water destroys the field of his neighbor, he shall measure out grain to him on the basis of that produced by neighboring fields.
§ 56. If a man opens the water and the water destroys the work[462] of a neighboring field, he shall measure out 10 Gur of grain for each Bur of land.
§ 57. If a shepherd causes his sheep to eat vegetation and has not made an agreement with the owner of the field, and without the consent of the owner of the field has pastured his sheep, the owner of the field shall harvest that field, and the shepherd who without the consent of the owner of the field caused his sheep to eat the field, shall pay the owner of the field in addition 20 Gur of grain for each Bur of land.
§ 58. If, after the sheep have come up out of the fields and are turned loose on the public common by the city gate, a shepherd turns his sheep into a field and causes the sheep to eat the field, the shepherd shall oversee the field which he caused to be eaten, and at harvest-time he shall measure to the owner of the field 60 Gur of grain for each Bur of land.
The Hebrew land laws are found in Exod. 22:5, 6; 23:10, 11; Lev. 19:9, and Deut. 24:19-22; 23:24, 25. An examination of these passages reveals a wide difference between Babylonia and Israel. In Babylonia it seems to have often been the rule that a landlord let out the fields to tenants to work; among the Hebrews the law presupposes that each man shall work his own land. Many of the Babylonian laws are designed to secure the respective rights of landlord and tenant. Naturally, there is nothing in the Old Testament to correspond to these. Hebrew law (Exod. 22:5), like the Babylonian, provides that one who causes a neighbor’s crop to be eaten shall make restitution, but the regulations are of the most general character. In Babylonia a larger social experience had made much more specific regulations necessary.
The characters of the respective countries are reflected in the dangers from which crops might be threatened. In waterless Palestine a fire started by a careless man might burn his neighbor’s crop (Exod. 22:6); in Babylonia, where irrigation from canals was conducted to fields lower than the surface of the water, one might flood his neighbor’s field and destroy his crop by carelessly leaving his sluice open.
The Hebrew legislation presupposes a poorer community. It provides that the land shall lie fallow, and whatever it produces shall belong to the poor (Exod. 23:10, 11). At harvest-time, too, one must not reap the corners of his field; that was left to the poor (Lev. 19:9). If one forgot a sheaf in his field, he must not return to take it; that should be left to the poor (Deut. 24:19). Rich Babylonia made no such provision for the poor; it felt no such social sympathy.
Again, even these agricultural laws show that commerce was highly developed in Babylonia, with its necessary concomitant, the right to charge interest for money. The uncommercial Hebrews regarded interest as unlawful (Exod. 22:25), and it was Hillel, the contemporary of Herod the Great, who invented an interpretation known as the Prosbūl, which practically did away with this law and permitted Jews to take interest.
Horticultural Laws
§ 59. If a man shall cut down a tree in a man’s orchard without the consent of the owner, he shall pay ½ mana of silver.
§ 60. If a man gives a field to a gardener to plant as an orchard, the gardener shall plant the orchard and cultivate it for 4 years. In the fifth year the owner of the orchard and the gardener shall share it together. The owner of the orchard shall mark off his share and take it.
§ 61. If the gardener in planting does not complete it, but leaves a part of it waste, unto his portion they shall count it.
§ 62. If the field which is given to a gardener he does not plant, if vegetation is the produce of the field for the years during which it is neglected, the gardener shall measure out to the owner of the field on the basis of the adjacent fields, and shall perform the work on the field and restore it to the owner of the field.
§ 63. If the field is [left] waste land, he shall perform the work on the field and shall restore it to its owner, and 10 Gur of grain for each Bur of land he shall measure out.
§ 64. If a man lets his orchard to a gardener to manage, as long as the gardener is in possession of the garden he shall give to the owner of the garden two-thirds of the produce; one-third he shall take himself.
§ 65. If the gardener does not manage the garden and diminishes its produce, the gardener shall measure out the produce of the orchard on the basis of adjacent orchards.[463]
§ 66. If a man has received money from a merchant, and his merchant puts him under bonds and he has nothing to give, and he gives his orchard for management unto the merchant and says: “The dates as many as are in my orchard take for thy money,” that merchant shall not consent; the owner of the orchard shall take the dates that are in the orchard and the money and its interest according to the tenor of his agreement he shall bring to the merchant. The remaining dates from the orchard shall belong to the owner of the orchard.
As in Palestine, there was no system of rental; the Bible contains almost no horticultural laws. “Orchards” in Babylonia were, as the last section shows, date orchards. The corresponding fruit in Palestine was the grape. Hebrew laws deal with vineyards as with fields. If a man destroys the crop in another’s vineyard, he is to give the best of his own (Exod. 22:5). He is to leave his crop unpicked every seventh year for the poor (Exod. 23:11). He is not, when he gathers it, to glean it carefully, but leave some for the poor (Lev. 19:10). When one goes into his neighbor’s vineyard, he may pick what he wishes to eat, but must carry nothing away. Horticulture among the Hebrews was not so highly developed as in Babylonia.
Five columns of writing have been erased after § 65 from the column on which the laws are written. This erasure was probably made by the Elamite conqueror, who carried the column as a trophy to Susa, in order to inscribe his own name on it, but unfortunately, if that was the intention, it was never carried out. We are accordingly in ignorance of his name. It is estimated that 35 sections of laws were thus lost. As already noted, one can be supplied from a fragment found at Susa, and from other tablets fragments of two or three other sections can be made out. One of these incomplete fragments refers to the rights of tenants of houses. It reads:
[If] a man rents a house for money, and pays the whole rent for a year to the owner of the house, and the owner of the house orders that man to vacate before the expiration of his lease, the owner of the house from the money that he received shall ............
Unfortunately, the tablet is broken and the penalty for breaking the lease is unknown. It is interesting to know that Babylonian tenants were protected from avaricious landlords, even though no parallel law exists in the Old Testament.
Two other sections of laws that once stood in this lacuna can now be supplied from a considerably defaced tablet from Nippur in the University Museum in Philadelphia, which once contained a part or all of the code of Hammurapi. These sections are as follows:
A Bankrupt Law[464]
If a man borrows grain or money from a merchant and for the payment has no grain or money, whatever is in his hand he shall in the presence of the elders give to the merchant in place of the debt; the merchant shall not refuse it; he shall receive it.
A Partnership Law[465]
If a man gives money to a man for a partnership, the gain and profit that accrue are before the gods; together they shall do business.
The phrase “before the gods” means that the division shall be made on oath. Commercial life was not sufficiently developed among the Hebrews so that they needed such a law, consequently the Pentateuch contains no parallel to this.
After the erasure of five columns the laws have to do with agents or traveling salesmen.
Agents and Merchants
§ 100. [If an agent has received money from a merchant, he shall write down the amount and the amount of] the interest on the money, and, when the time has expired, he shall repay the merchant as much as he has received.
§ 101. If where he goes he does not meet with success, the agent shall double the amount of the money he received and return it to the merchant.
§ 102. If a merchant gives money to an agent as a favor, and where he goes he meets with misfortune, he shall restore the principal unto the merchant.
§ 103. If on the road as he travels an enemy robs him of anything he carries, the agent shall give an account of it under oath and shall be innocent.
§ 104. If a merchant has given to an agent grain, wool, or oil, or anything whatever to sell, the agent shall write down the price and shall return the money to the merchant. The agent shall take a receipt for the money which he gives to the merchant.
§ 105. If the agent is careless and does not take a receipt for the money he gave the merchant, money not receipted for shall not be placed to his account.
§ 106. If an agent receives money from a merchant and has a dispute with his merchant about it, that merchant shall put the agent on trial on oath before the elders concerning the money he received and the agent shall pay the merchant three times as much as he received.
§ 107. If a merchant lends to an agent and the agent returns to the merchant whatever the merchant had given him, if the merchant has a dispute with him about it, that agent shall put the merchant on trial on oath in the presence of the elders, and the merchant, because he had a dispute with his agent, whatever he received he shall give to the agent six times as much.
The Hebrews of the Old Testament time were not a commercial people and had no such laws. Men today are inclined to think that the drummer, or traveling salesman, is a modern invention, but these laws show that he was an old institution in Babylonia four thousand years ago.
Wine Merchants
§ 108. If a woman who keeps a wine-shop does not receive grain as the price of drink, but takes money of greater value, or makes the measure of drink smaller than the measure of grain, that mistress of a wine-shop they shall put on trial and into the water shall throw her.
§ 109. If the mistress of a wine-shop collects criminals in her house, and does not seize these criminals and conduct them to the palace, that mistress of a wine-shop shall be put to death.
§ 110. If the wife of a god (i. e., a consecrated temple-woman), who is not living in the house appointed, opens a wine-shop or enters a wine-shop for a drink, they shall burn that woman.
§ 111. If the mistress of a wine-shop gives 60 Qa of sakani-plant drink on credit at the time of harvest, she shall receive 50 Qa of grain.
The Old Testament affords no parallel. There were no wine-shops in Israel so far as we know, and such consecrated women were prohibited by Deut. 23:17.
Deposits and Distraints
§ 112. If a man continually traveling has given silver, gold, precious stones, or property to a man and has brought them to him for transportation, and that man does not deliver that which was for transportation at the place to which it was to be transported, but has appropriated it, the owner of the transported goods shall put that man on trial concerning that which was to be transported and was not delivered, and that man shall deliver unto the owner of the transported goods five times as much as was entrusted to him.
§ 113. If a man has grain or money deposited with a man and without the consent of the owner he takes grain from the heap or the granary, they shall prosecute that man because he took grain from the heap or the granary without the consent of the owner, and the grain as much as he took he shall return, and whatever it was he shall forfeit an equal amount.
§ 114. If a man does not have against a man [a claim] for grain or money and secures a warrant against him for debt, for each warrant he shall pay ⅓ of a mana of money.
§ 115. If a man holds against a man [a claim] for grain or money and secures a warrant against him for debt and the debtor dies through his fate in the house of the creditor, that case has no penalty.
§ 116. If the debtor dies through violence or lack of care, the owner of the debtor shall prosecute the merchant; if it was the son of a man, his son shall be put to death; if the slave of a man, he shall pay ⅓ of a mana of money, and whatever [the debt] was, he shall forfeit as much.
Among the Hebrews, as among other ancient peoples, the poor at times deposited their valuables with the more powerful for safekeeping. This was natural before the invention of banks and safe deposit vaults.
The Hebrew law in Exod. 22:7-10 provides that if goods are given to another man to keep and are stolen out of his house, the thief should, if found, restore double the amount taken. If the thief was not found, the owner of the house should be brought to God (so American R. V.)[466], i. e., to the temple, where in some way (probably by lot) it was determined whether he was guilty. If guilty, the owner of the house had to restore twofold.
Somewhat parallel to the Babylonian laws which permit the imprisonment of a debtor in one’s house is the Hebrew law that a poor debtor might become a slave for six years (Exod. 21:2-6; Deut. 15:7-18). The Old Testament laws are not quite uniform. In reality it is only that of Deuteronomy which contemplates slavery in consequence of indebtedness; Exodus speaks as though the slave might not be bought in any way. The important point is that in Babylonia a man might be imprisoned for debt; in Israel he might become a temporary slave.
As to the deposit of valuable property with a creditor for security, the Hebrew law, while it shows that there were other kinds of pledges (Deut. 24:10, ff.), mentions but one kind. This was in the case of a man so poor that he had to give his outer garment as security. The law provided that this should be returned to him at night, since the poor peasants had no other blankets than these garments. A hard-hearted creditor might, by keeping the garment at night, risk the life of the debtor (Exod. 22:26, 27; Deut. 24:11-13).
Debts
§ 117. If a man is subjected to an attachment for debt and sells his wife, son, or daughter, or they are given over to service, for three years they shall work in the house of their purchaser or temporary master; in the fourth year they shall be set free.
§ 118. If he binds to service a male or a female slave, and the merchant transfers or sells him, he can establish no claim.
§ 119. If a man is subjected to an attachment for debt and sells a maid-servant who has borne him children, the owner of the maid-servant shall pay and shall release his maid-servant.
These laws are quite similar to Exod. 21:2-11 and Deut. 15:12-18.
The main differences are that the Hebrew law contemplates that a man may enter slavery himself; the Babylonian only that he shall permit his wife, son, or daughter to do it. The Hebrews released such slaves at the end of six years;[467] the Babylonians at the end of three. Hebrew law recognized, too, that a man might sell his daughter into slavery (Exod. 21:7-11), but it stipulated that her treatment should be different from that of men. It recognizes that either her master or his son would be likely to make her a real or a secondary wife. She was not to be released at the end of seven years, but in case her master did not deal with her in certain specified ways she regained her freedom regardless of her period of service.
Storage of Grain
§ 120. If a man has stored his grain in heaps in the building of another and an accident happens in the granary, or the owner of the building has disturbed the heap and taken grain, or has disputed the amount of grain that was stored in his building, the owner of the grain shall give an account of his grain under oath, the owner of the building shall double the amount of grain which he took and restore it to the owner of the grain.
§ 121. If a man stores grain in a man’s building, he shall pay each year 5 Qa of grain for each Gur of grain.
These laws have no Biblical parallel.
Deposits and Losses
§ 122. If a man gives to another on deposit silver or gold or anything whatever, anything as much as he deposits he shall recount to witnesses and shall institute contracts and make the deposit.
§ 123. If without witnesses and contracts he has placed anything on deposit and at the place of deposit they dispute it, that case has no penalty.
§ 124. If a man gives to another on deposit silver or gold or anything whatever in the presence of witnesses and he disputes it, he shall prosecute that man and he shall double whatever he disputed and shall repay it.
§ 125. If a man places anything on deposit and at the place of deposit either through burglary or pillage anything of his is lost, together with anything belonging to the owner of the building, the owner of the building who was negligent and lost what was given him on deposit shall make it good and restore it to the owner of the goods. The owner of the house shall institute a search for whatever was lost and take it from the thief.
§ 126. If a man has not lost anything, but says he has lost something, or files a claim as though he had lost something, he shall give account of his claim on oath, and whatever he brought suit for he shall double and shall give for his claim.
There is no mention in the laws of the Old Testament of this kind of deposit, though, as already noted, it probably was sometimes practised.
Against Slandering Women
§ 127. If a man causes the finger to be pointed at the woman of a god or the wife of a man and cannot prove it, they shall bring him before the judges and they shall brand his forehead.
The nearest parallel to this in the Old Testament is in Deut. 22:13-21, which is really quite a different law, for it applies only to cases where men, when just married, slander their wives by charging them with previous impurity. The Hebrew law provides a method of trial, a punishment for the man, if guilty, and a much severer one for the woman, if the charge is true. The two codes belong to quite a different legal development, as is shown by the fact that the Babylonian law refers to “a woman of a god,” i. e., one of the temple-women who, under certain religious rules, represented in a concrete way the procreative power of the god.
This code recognizes several classes of these, as will appear later, but Hebrew law forbade the existence of such women in Israel (Deut. 23:17).
Chastity, Marriage, and Divorce
§ 128. If a man takes a wife and does not execute contracts for her, that woman is no wife.
§ 129. If the wife of a man is caught lying with another man, they shall bind them and throw them into the water. If the husband of the woman would let her live, or the king would let his subject live, he may do so.
§ 130. If a man forces the betrothed wife of another who is living in her father’s house and has not known a man, and lies in her loins and they catch him, that man shall be put to death and that woman shall go free.
§ 131. If the wife of a man is accused by her husband, and she has not been caught lying with another man, she shall swear her innocence and return to her house.
§ 132. If the finger has been pointed at the wife of a man because of another man and she has not been caught lying with the other man, for her husband’s sake she shall plunge into the sacred river.
§ 133. If a man is taken captive and there is food in his house, his wife shall not go out from his house, her body she shall guard, into the house of another she shall not enter. If that woman does not guard her body and enters into the house of another, that woman they shall prosecute and throw her into the water.
§ 134. If a man is taken captive and in his house there is no food, and his wife enters into the house of another, that woman is not to blame.
§ 135. If a man is taken captive and there is no food in his house and his wife has openly entered into the house of another and borne children, and afterwards her husband returns and reaches his city, that woman shall return to her husband and the children shall follow their father.
§ 136. If a man deserts his city and flees and after it his wife enters into the house of another, if that man returns and would take his wife, because he deserted his city and fled, the wife of the fugitive shall not return to the house of her husband.
§ 137. If a man sets his face against a concubine who has borne him children or a wife that has presented him with children, to put her away, he shall return to that woman her marriage portion, and shall give her the income of field, garden, and house, and she shall bring up her children. From the time that her children are grown, from whatever is given to her children, a portion like that of a son shall be given to her, and the husband of her choice she may marry.
§ 138. If a man would put away his spouse who has not borne him children, he shall give her silver equal to her marriage gift, and the dowry which she brought from her father’s house he shall restore to her and may put her away.
§ 139. If she had no dowry, he shall give her one mana of silver for a divorce.
§ 140. If he belongs to the laboring class, he shall give her one-third of a mana of silver.
§ 141. If the wife of a man who is living in the house of her husband sets her face to go out and act the fool, her house neglects and her husband belittles, they shall prosecute that woman. If her husband says: “I divorce her,” he may divorce her. On her departure nothing shall be given her for her divorce. If her husband does not say: “I divorce her,” her husband may take another wife; that woman shall dwell as a slave in the house of her husband.
§ 142. If a woman hates her husband and says: “Thou shalt not hold me,” they shall make investigation concerning her into her defects. If she has been discreet and there is no fault, and her husband has gone out and greatly belittled her, that woman has no blame; she may take her marriage-portion and go to her father’s house.
§ 143. If she has not been discreet, and has gone out and neglected her house and belittled her husband, they shall throw that woman into the water.
§ 144. If a man takes a priestess and that priestess gives a female slave to her husband, and she has children; if that man sets his face to take a concubine, they shall not favor that man. He may not take a concubine.
§ 145. If a man takes a priestess and she does not present him with children and he sets his face to take a concubine, that man may take a concubine and bring her into his house. That concubine shall not rank with the wife.
§ 146. If a man takes a priestess and she gives to her husband a maid-servant and she bears children, and afterward that maid-servant would take rank with her mistress; because she has borne children her mistress may not sell her for money, but she may reduce her to bondage and count her among the female slaves.
§ 147. If she has not borne children, her mistress may sell her for money.
§ 148. If a man takes a wife and she is attacked by disease, and he sets his face to take another, he may do it. His wife who was attacked by disease he may not divorce. She shall live in the house he has built and he shall support her as long as she lives.
§ 149. If that woman does not choose to live in the house of her husband, he shall make good to her the dowry which she brought from her father’s house and she may go away.
§ 150. If a man presents his wife with field, garden, house, or goods, and gives to her sealed deeds, after her husband’s death her children shall not press a claim against her. The mother after her death may leave it to her child whom she loves, but to a brother she may not leave it.
§ 151. If a wife who is living in the house of a husband has persuaded her husband and he has bound himself that she shall not be taken by a creditor of her husband; if that man had a debt against him before he took that woman, the creditor may not hold that woman, and if that woman had a debt against her before she entered the house of her husband, her creditor may not hold her husband.
§ 152. If they become indebted after the woman enters the man’s house, both of them are liable to the merchant.
§ 153. If a woman causes the death of her husband on account of another man, that woman they shall impale.
§ 154. If a man has known his daughter, the city shall drive out that man.
§ 155. If a man has betrothed a bride to his son and his son has known her and he afterward lies in her loins and they catch him, they shall bind that man and throw him into the water.
§ 156. If a man has betrothed a bride to his son and his son has not known her and he lies in her loins, he shall pay her half a mana of silver and restore to her whatever she brought from the house of her father, and the man of her choice may marry her.
§ 157. If a man after his father’s death lies in the loins of his mother, they shall burn both of them.
§ 158. If a man after his father’s death is admitted to the loins of his chief wife who has borne children, that man shall be expelled from the house of his father.
§ 159. If a man who has brought a present unto the house of his father-in-law and has given a bride-price looks with longing upon another woman, and says to his father-in-law: “Thy daughter I will not take,” the father of the daughter shall keep whatever was brought to him.
§ 160. If a man brings a present to the house of a father-in-law and gives a bride-price, and the father of the daughter says: “I will not give thee my daughter,” whatever was brought him he shall double and restore it.
§ 161. If a man brings a present to the house of his father-in-law and gives a bride-price, and his neighbor slanders him, and the father says to the groom: “Thou shalt not take my daughter,” whatever was brought he shall double and restore to him.
These Babylonian laws present numerous points of contact and of divergence, when compared with the Biblical laws on the same subject. There is no Biblical parallel to § 128. The law (§ 129) which imposes the death penalty upon a man who commits adultery with another man’s wife and upon the woman, finds an exact parallel in Lev. 20:10 and Deut. 22:22, though the Biblical law, unlike the Babylonian, provides no way in which clemency could be extended to the offenders.
The laws in §§ 130, 156, concerning the violation of betrothed virgins, are in a general way paralleled by Lev. 19:20-22 and Deut. 22:23-26, though there are such differences that, while the underlying principles are the same, it is clear that there was entire independence of development. A religious element enters into Leviticus that is entirely absent from the Babylonian code. The Bible contains two laws on this subject that are without parallel in the Babylonian code. These are found in Exod. 22:16, 17 and Deut. 22:28, 29, and impose penalties for the violation of virgins who were not betrothed. In both codes the principle is manifest that the loss of a girl’s honor was to be compensated by money, though Deut. 22:28, 29 recognizes that it has a value that money cannot buy.
The laws relating to a wife whose fidelity is suspected (§§ 131, 132) find a general parallel in Num. 5:11-28. The provision at the end of § 132 that the wife should plunge into the sacred river is in the nature of trial by ordeal. The law in Numbers imposes on such a woman trial by ordeal, though it is of a different sort. She must drink water in which dust from the floor of the sanctuary is mingled--dust surcharged with divine potency--and if she does not swell up and die, she is counted innocent.
The laws which provide that a wife may present her husband with a slave-girl as a concubine (§§ 137, 144-147) are without parallel in the Biblical codes, but are strikingly illustrated by the patriarchal narratives. Sarah gave Hagar to Abraham (Gen. 16); Rachel and Leah gave Bilhah and Zilpah to Jacob (Gen. 30:1-13). The law (§ 146) which deals with such a slave-girl who would rank with her mistress is closely parallel to the story of the treatment of Hagar in Gen. 16:5-7 and 21:9, 10.
The laws on divorce (§§ 138-141) are really in advance of the one Biblical law on the subject (Deut. 24:1-4). The law in Deuteronomy permits a husband to put away a wife, who in any way does not please him, without alimony, while to the wife no privilege of initiating divorce proceedings is granted at all. The Babylonian laws secure to the divorced woman a maintenance, and, while by no means according her equal rights with the man, provide (§ 142) that she may herself initiate the proceedings for divorce. The ordeal must have been an unpleasant one, but in Israel’s law a woman had no such rights.[468]
The law concerning adultery with a daughter-in-law (§ 155) is identical in purpose and severity with Lev. 20:12. The laws in §§ 157, 158, which prohibit immorality with one’s mother or the chief wife of one’s father, just touch upon the great subject of incest and the prohibited degrees of marriage which are treated at considerable length in Lev. 18:6-18; 20:11, 19-21, and Deut. 22:30. The Babylonian laws touch but two specific cases, which may be said to be covered by Deut. 22:30, while the laws of Leviticus treat the whole subject of the prohibited degrees of marriage in a broad and comprehensive way. The main idea pervading Leviticus is holiness. Israel is to be kept free from the pollution of incest in any form. The religious motive exhibited here is foreign to the Babylonian code.
Inheritance
§ 162. It a man takes a wife and she bears him children and that woman dies, her father may not lay claim to her dowry. Her dowry belongs to her children.
§ 163. If a man takes a wife and she does not present him with children and that woman dies; if his father-in-law returns unto him the marriage-settlement, which that man brought to the house of the father-in-law, unto the dowry of that woman her husband may not lay claim. Her dowry belongs to the house of her father.
§ 164. But if his father-in-law does not return the marriage-settlement unto him, he shall deduct from her dowry the amount of the marriage-settlement, and then return the dowry to the house of her father.
§ 165. If a man has presented to his son, the first in his eyes, field, garden, or house, and written for him a sealed deed, and afterward the father dies; when the brothers divide, he shall take the present which his father gave him, and over and above they shall divide the goods of the father’s house equally.
§ 166. If a man takes wives for the sons which he possesses, but has not taken a wife for his youngest son, and afterward the father dies; when the brothers divide, for their younger brother who does not have a wife they shall present over and above his portion money for a marriage-settlement, and shall enable him to take a wife.
§ 167. If a man takes a wife and she bears him children and that woman dies, and after her he takes a second and she bears him children, after the father dies, the children shall not share according to their mothers. They shall receive the dowries of their respective mothers, and the goods of their father’s house they shall share equally.
§ 168. If a man has set his face to cut off his son, and says to the judges: “I will cut off my son,” the judges shall make investigation concerning him; if the son has not committed a grave crime which cuts off from sonship, the father may not cut off his son from sonship.
§ 169. If he has committed against his father a grave crime which cuts off from sonship, he shall pardon him for the first offense. If he commits a grave crime the second time, the father may cut off his son from sonship.
§ 170. If a man’s wife bears him children and a slave-girl bears him children, and the father during his lifetime says to the children which the slave-girl bore him: “My children,” and counts them with the children of the wife, after the father dies the children of the wife and the children of the slave-girl shall divide equally the goods of their father’s house. The sons that are sons of the wife shall at the sharing divide and take.
§ 171. But if the father during his lifetime has not said unto the children which the slave-girl bore him: “My children,” after the father dies the children of the slave-girl shall not share with the children of the wife. The slave-girl and her children shall be given their freedom; the children of the wife may not put a claim upon the children of the slave-girl for service. The wife shall receive her dowry and a gift which her husband gave her and wrote upon a tablet and may dwell in the dwelling of her husband as long as she lives and eat. She may not sell it. After her it belongs to her children.
§ 172. If her husband has not given her a gift, they shall restore to her her dowry and she shall receive from the goods of the house of her husband the portion of one son. If the children abuse her in order to drive her from the house, the judges shall investigate concerning her and if they find the children in the wrong, that woman shall not go from the house of her husband. If that woman sets her face to go out, she shall leave with her children the gift which her husband gave her; the dowry from the house of her father she shall receive and the husband of her choice may take her.
§ 173. If that woman, where she has entered, bears children to her later husband, after that woman dies the children of her first and her later husband shall share her dowry.
§ 174. If she did not bear children to her later husband, the children of her first husband shall receive her dowry.
§ 175. If a slave of the palace or the slave of a workingman takes the daughter of a patrician and she bears children, the owner of the slave shall have no claim for service on the children of the daughter of a patrician.
§ 176. But if a slave of the palace or the slave of a workingman takes the daughter of a patrician, and when he takes her she enters together with the dowry from her father’s house into the house of the slave of the palace or the slave of the workingman; if after they are united they build a house and acquire property and afterward the slave of the palace or the slave of the workingman dies, the daughter of the patrician shall receive her dowry and they shall divide into two parts whatever her husband and herself had acquired after their union. Half the owner of the slave shall take, and the daughter of the patrician shall receive half for her children. If the daughter of the patrician had no dowry, whatever her husband and herself had acquired after their union they shall divide into two parts. The owner of the slave shall take half and the daughter of the patrician shall receive half for her children.
§ 177. If a widow whose children are minors sets her face to enter the house of a second husband, she shall not do it without the consent of the judges. When she enters the house of a second husband, the judges shall inquire into the estate of her former husband, and the estate of the former husband they shall entrust to the second husband and to that woman, and shall cause them to leave a tablet (receipt). The estate they shall guard and rear the minors. The household goods they may not sell. The purchaser of household goods belonging to the children of a widow shall forfeit his money. The goods shall revert to their owners.
§ 178. If there is a wife of a god, priestess, or sacred harlot, whose father has given her a dowry and written her a record of gift, and in the record of gift he has not written, “after her she may give it to whomsoever she pleases,” and has not given her full discretion; after her father dies her brothers shall take her field and garden, and according to the value of her share they shall give her grain, oil, and wool, and shall content her heart. If her brothers shall not give her grain, oil, and wool, according to the value of her share, and shall not content her heart, she may let her field and garden unto any tenant she pleases and her tenant shall maintain her. Her field, garden, or whatever her father gave her she may enjoy as long as she lives. She may not sell it for money or transfer it to another. Her heritage belongs to her brothers.
§ 179. If there is a wife of a god, priestess, or sacred harlot, whose father has given her a dowry and written a record of gift; and in the record of gift he has written, “after her she may give it to whomsoever she pleases,” and has granted her full discretion; after her father dies she may give it after her to whomsoever she pleases. Her brothers have no claim upon her.
§ 180. If a father does not give a dowry to his daughter, a priestess living in the appointed house, or a sacred harlot, after the father dies she shall receive from the goods of her father’s house the same share as one son, and as long as she lives she shall enjoy it. After her it belongs to her brothers.
§ 181. If the father of a priestess, sacred harlot, or temple maiden gives her to a god and does not give her a dowry, after the father dies she shall receive from the goods of her father’s house a third of the portion of a son and shall enjoy it as long as she lives. After her it belongs to her brothers.
§ 182. If a father does not give a dowry to his daughter, a priestess of Marduk of Babylon, and does not write a record of gift for her; after her father dies she shall receive from the goods of her father’s house one-third of the portion of a son, and shall pay no tax. A priestess of Marduk after her death may leave it to whomsoever she pleases.
§ 183. If a father presents a dowry to his daughter who is a concubine, and gives her to a husband and writes a record of gift; after the father dies she shall not share in the goods of her father’s house.
§ 184. If a father does not present a dowry to his daughter who is a concubine and does not give her to a husband; after her father’s death her brothers shall give her a dowry according to the value of the father’s estate and shall give her to a husband.
In comparison with these Babylonian laws of inheritance those in the Old Testament are comparatively simple. We learn from Deut. 21:15-17, that a man’s firstborn son received a “double portion” of his father’s estate, i. e., twice as much as any other son. The inference is that the other sons shared equally. This law also provides that, when a man has two wives, the sons of the favorite wife shall have no advantage as to inheritance over the sons of the less loved wife. In Num. 27:8-11 it is provided that if a man has no son, his estate (i. e., real estate) may go to his daughter; if he has no daughter, it may go to his brothers; if no brothers, it goes to his father’s brothers. If his father has no brothers, the estate is to go to the next of kin. In Num. 36:2-12 the law that a daughter may inherit her father’s estate is supplemented by the provision that such a daughter must marry within the tribe, so that the landed property may not in the next generation pass out of the tribe.
Such were the Hebrew laws of inheritance. They apply to a much less complexly organized society than the Babylonian.
§§ 168, 169 of Hammurapi’s code deal with the cutting off of a son. This is paralleled in Deut. 21:18-21, though punishment inflicted by the law in Deuteronomy is quite different from the Babylonian, since the Hebrew boy, whose parents have proved him before the elders to be unworthy of sonship, was not cast out and sent away, but stoned to death. Another form of this law appears in Exod. 21:17.
Adoption
§ 185. If a man takes a young child in his name unto sonship and brings him up, one may not bring a claim for that adopted son.
§ 186. If a man takes a young child unto sonship, and when he has taken him he rebels against his [adopted] father and mother, that foster-child shall return to his father’s house.
§ 187. One may not bring claim for the son of a temple-servant, a palace guard, or of a sacred harlot.
§ 188. If an artisan takes a son to sonship and teaches him his handicraft, one may not bring claim for him.
§ 189. If he does not teach him his handicraft, that foster-son may return to the house of his father.
§ 190. If a man does not count among his sons a young child whom he has taken to sonship and reared, that foster-child may return to his father’s house.
§ 191. If a man who takes a young child to sonship and rears him and establishes a house and acquires children, afterward sets his face to cut off that foster-son, that son shall not go his way. The father who reared him shall give him from his goods one-third the share of a son and he shall go. From field, garden, or house, he shall not give him.
In the codes of the Old Testament there are no laws of adoption. The story of the adoption of Ephraim and Manasseh by Jacob in Gen. 48 shows that the idea was not unknown to the Hebrews, among whom the ceremony of adoption would seem to have consisted of the act of acknowledging the children as one’s own by placing one’s hands on their heads and giving them a paternal blessing.
Renunciation of Sonship
§ 192. If the son of a temple-servant or the son of a sacred harlot says to the father that brought him up or to the mother that brought him up, “Thou art not my father,” or, “Thou art not my mother,” they shall cut out his tongue.
§ 193. If the son of a temple-servant or the son of a sacred harlot has identified his father’s house and hated the father who brought him up or the mother who brought him up and goes back to his father’s house, they shall pluck out his eye.
The Old Testament has no laws with which to compare these. The two classes of persons whose children are mentioned were banished from Israel by Deut. 23:17, 18.
Wet-nurses or Foster-mothers
§ 194. If a man gives his son unto a nurse and his son dies in the hands of the nurse and the nurse substitutes another child without the consent of the father or the mother, they shall prosecute her; because she substituted another child without the consent of his father or his mother they shall cut off her breast.
This law also is without Biblical parallel.
Assault and Battery
§ 195. If a son strikes his father, they shall cut off his hand.
§ 196. If a man destroys the eye of the son of a patrician, they shall destroy his eye.
§ 197. If he breaks a man’s bone, they shall break his bone.
§ 198. If one destroys the eye of a workingman or breaks the bone of a workingman, he shall pay 1 mana of silver.
§ 199. If one destroys the eye of a man’s slave or breaks the bone of a man’s slave, he shall pay half his value.
§ 200. If a man knocks out the tooth of a man of his own rank, they shall knock his tooth out.
§ 201. If one knocks out the tooth of a workingman, he shall pay ⅓ of a mana of silver.
§ 202. If a man shall strike the private-parts of a man who is of higher rank than he, he shall receive sixty blows with an ox-hide scourge in the assembly.
§ 203. If a patrician strikes the private-parts of a patrician of his own rank, he shall pay 1 mana of silver.
§ 204. If a workingman strikes the private-parts of a workingman, he shall pay 10 shekels of silver.
§ 205. If the slave of a patrician strikes the private-parts of the son of a patrician, they shall cut off his ear.
§ 206. If a man strikes a man in a quarrel and wounds him, he shall swear, “I did not strike with intent,” and shall pay for the physician.
§ 207. If from the stroke he dies, he shall swear [as above], and if it was a patrician, he shall pay ½ mana of silver.
§ 208. If it was a workingman, he shall pay ⅓ of a mana of silver.
§ 209. If a man strikes a man’s daughter and causes a miscarriage, he shall pay 10 shekels of silver for her miscarriage.
§ 210. If that woman dies, they shall put his daughter to death.
§ 211. If through a stroke one causes a miscarriage of the daughter of a workingman, he shall pay 5 shekels of silver.
§ 212. If that woman dies, he shall pay ½ mana of silver.
§ 213. If one strikes the slave-girl of a man and causes a miscarriage, he shall pay 2 shekels of silver.
§ 214. If that slave-girl dies, he shall pay ⅓ of a mana of silver.
These laws are strikingly parallel to Exod. 21:18-27, to which Exod. 21:12-14 should be prefixed. The Babylonian code, like the Hebrew, imposes the death penalty for wilful murder. Both codes provide that one who is an accidental homicide shall escape the penalty, but they do it in different ways. Hammurapi provides that the killer may take an oath that he did it without intent to kill. Exod. 21:13, 14 provides that the homicide may find sanctuary at the altar of God. In place of this Deut. 19:4, ff., provides that he may flee to a city of refuge.
If a man injures another in a fight, the Bible (Exod. 21:18, 19) provides that he shall pay for the lost time and, as does Hammurapi, the cost of healing the injured man. Exod. 21:22 provides, as does Hammurapi, for the payment of a fine for causing a woman to miscarry, but Exodus does not, like the Babylonian code, fix the amount of the damage; that is left to the judges. In the laws concerning the injury of slaves the two codes differ. Exodus provides (21:20, 21, 26, 27) for cases in which owners injure or kill their own slaves; Hammurapi, for cases in which the injury is done by others. A mere reading of the penalties imposed by the parts of the Babylonian code translated above impresses vividly upon the mind the fact that underlying many of them is the principle so forcibly expressed in Exod. 21:21-25: “life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, burning for burning, wound for wound, stripe for stripe.” The details of application are different, but the principle is the same. Many of the differences were caused by the more complex nature of Babylonian society, in which three classes, patricians, workingmen (or semi-serfs), and slaves, existed. Hebrew law recognizes but two classes--freemen and slaves.
Physicians
§ 215. If a physician operates upon a man for a severe wound with a bronze lancet and saves the man’s life, or if he operates for cataract with a bronze lancet and saves the man’s eye, he shall receive 10 shekels of silver.
§ 216. If it is a workingman, he shall receive 5 shekels of silver.
§ 217. If it is a man’s slave, the owner of the slave shall give the physician 2 shekels of silver.
§ 218. If a physician operates upon a man with a bronze lancet for a severe wound, and the man dies; or operates upon a man with a bronze lancet for cataract and the man’s eye is destroyed, they shall cut off his hand.
§ 219. If a physician operates with a bronze lancet upon the slave of a workingman and causes his death, he shall restore a slave of equal value.
§ 220. If he operates for cataract with a bronze lancet and destroys his eye, he shall pay ½ his price.
§ 221. If a physician sets a broken bone for a man or has cured of sickness inflamed flesh, the patient shall pay 5 shekels of silver to the physician.
§ 222. If he is a workingman, he shall give 3 shekels of silver.
§ 223. If he is the slave of a patrician, the owner of the slave shall give 3 shekels of silver to the physician.
§ 224. If an ox-doctor or an ass-doctor treats an ox or an ass for a severe wound and saves its life, the owner of the ox or the ass shall pay to the physician ⅙ of a shekel of silver as his fee.
§ 225. If he operates upon an ox or an ass for a severe wound and it dies, he shall give unto the owner of the ox or the ass ¼ of its value.
These laws about physicians have no parallel in the Old Testament, the laws of which did not take account of the existence of doctors. They are of interest, since they show the antiquity of physicians in Babylonia, not only for men, but for animals. They also reveal the fact that the practice of medicine in Babylonia was attended by some risks!
Herodotus (I, 197) declares that the Babylonians had no physicians, but brought their sick out into the streets and asked of each passer-by whether he had had a like sickness and what he had done for it. Possibly, as among ourselves, there were many who did not wish to incur the expense of a doctor, and who did as Herodotus reports, but these laws, and the existence of physicians at Nineveh at the time of the later Assyrian kings, make it probable that Herodotus was wrong as to their non-existence at Babylon in his day.
Laws of Branding
§ 226. If a brander without the consent of the owner of a slave cuts a mark on a slave, making him unsalable, they shall cut off the hands of that brander.
§ 227. If a man deceives a brander and he brands a slave with a mark, making him unsalable, they shall put that man to death and cause him to perish in the gate of his house. The brander shall swear: “I did not brand him knowingly” and shall go free.
These laws have no parallel in the Old Testament. Evidently the simpler organization of Hebrew society made them unnecessary.
Responsibility of House-builders
§ 228. If a builder builds a house for a man and completes it, he shall give him as his wages 2 shekels of silver for each Shar of house.
§ 229. If a builder builds a house for a man and does not make its work strong and the house which he made falls and causes the death of the owner of the house, that builder shall be put to death.
§ 230. If it causes the death of the son of the owner, the son of that builder shall be put to death.
§ 231. If it causes the death of a slave of the owner of the house, a slave like the slave he shall give to the owner of the house.
§ 232. If it destroys property, he shall restore whatever was destroyed, and because he did not build the house strong and it fell, he shall rebuild the house that fell from his own property.
§ 233. If a builder builds a house for a man and does not make his work strong and a wall falls, that builder shall strengthen that wall at his own expense.
These laws have no parallel in the Bible. Among the agricultural population of Palestine builders were not a separate class. The penalties inflicted by the Babylonian code were severe, and yet, if modern legislators would put upon the house-builders of our time a similar responsibility for good work, fewer lives would be sacrificed by falling buildings.
Responsibility of Boatmen
§ 234. If a boatman builds a boat of 60 Gur for a man, he shall give him 2 shekels of silver as his wages.
§ 235. If a boatman builds a boat for a man and does not make his work sound and in that year the boat is sent on a voyage and meets with disaster, that boatman shall repair that boat and from his own goods shall make it strong and shall give the boat in sound condition to the owner of the boat.
§ 236. If a man gives his boat to a boatman for hire and the boatman is careless and sinks or wrecks the boat, the boatman shall restore a boat to the owner of the boat.
§ 237. If a man hires a boatman and a boat and loads it with grain, wool, oil, dates, or any other kind of freight, and that boatman is careless and sinks the boat or destroys its freight, the boatman shall replace the boat and whatever there was in it which he destroyed.
§ 238. If a boatman sinks a man’s boat and re-floats it, he shall give money for ½ its value.
§ 239. If a man hires a boatman, he shall give him 6 Gur of grain a year.
The Hebrews were not a maritime people, and had no such laws as these or the following.
The Collision of Ships
§ 240. If a boat that is floating downstream strikes a boat that is being towed and sinks it, the owner of the boat that was sunk shall declare in the presence of a god everything that was in that boat and [the owner] of the boat floating downstream, which sunk the boat that was being towed, shall replace the boat and whatever was lost.
There is, naturally, nothing similar to this in the Old Testament.
Laws Concerning Cattle
§ 241. If a man levies a distraint upon an ox as security for debt, he shall pay ⅓ of a mana of silver.
§ 242. If a man hires for a year, the wages of a working ox is 4 Gur of grain.
§ 243. The hire of a milch cow, 3 Gur of grain for a year he shall give.
§ 244. If a man hires an ox or an ass and a lion kills it in the field, the loss falls on the owner.
§ 245. If a man hires an ox and causes its death through neglect or blows, he shall restore to the owner an ox of equal value.
§ 246. If a man hires an ox and crushes its foot or cuts the cord of its neck, he shall restore to the owner an ox of like value.
§ 247. If a man hires an ox and destroys its eye, he shall pay to the owner of the ox money to ½ its value.
§ 248. If a man hires an ox and breaks off its horn, or cuts off its tail or injures the flesh which holds the ring, money to ¼ of its value he shall pay.
§ 249. If a man hires an ox and a god strikes it and it dies, the man who hires the ox shall take an oath in the presence of a god and shall go free.
§ 250. If an ox when passing along the street gores a man and causes his death, there is no penalty in that case.
§ 251. If the ox of a man has the habit of goring and they have informed him of his fault and his horns he has not protected nor kept his ox in, and that ox gores a man and causes his death, the owner of the ox shall pay ½ mana of money.
§ 252. If it is the slave of a man, he shall pay ⅓ of a mana of money.
§ 253. If a man hires a man and puts him over his field and furnishes him with seed-grain and intrusts him with oxen and contracts with him to cultivate the field, if that man steals the seed-grain or the crop and it is found in his possession, they shall cut off his hands.
§ 254. If he takes the seed-grain, but enfeebles the cattle, from the grain which he has cultivated he shall make restoration.
§ 255. If he shall let the cattle to a man for hire, or steal the seed-grain so that there is no crop, they shall prosecute that man, and he shall pay 60 Gur of grain for each Gan.
§ 256. If he is not able to meet his obligation, they shall tear him in pieces in that field by means of the oxen.
The Biblical legislation corresponding to this is found in Exod. 21:28-35, but it covers only a portion of the cases of which the Babylonian law treats. It provides that, if an ox gores a man or a woman to death, the ox shall be stoned. If the ox was wont to gore and the owner had not kept it in, but it had been permitted to kill a man or a woman, the owner as well as the ox should be stoned. At the discretion of the tribunal a fine or ransom might be laid on the owner. In case the ox gored a slave, the owner of the ox was to pay 30 shekels of silver and the ox was to be stoned. If a man opened a pit and a neighbor’s ox or ass fell into it, the digger of the pit must make good the loss to the owner of the animal, and the dead beast became the property of the digger of the pit. If one man’s ox killed the ox of another man, the two men were to sell the live ox and divide the price. If it were known that the ox was wont to gore in the past, and its owner had not kept it in, he was to pay ox for ox, and the dead animal should be his.
It thus appears that the exigencies of Hebrew agricultural life were different from those of Babylonia, and were naturally met in different ways.
Wages of Laborers
§ 257. If a man hires a field-laborer, he shall pay him 8 Gur of grain per year.
§ 258. If a man hires a herdsman, he shall pay him 6 Gur of grain per year.
Hebrew law did not regulate wages.
On Stealing Farming-tools
§ 259. If a man steals a watering-machine from a field, he shall pay to the owner of the watering-machine 5 shekels of silver.
§ 260. If a man steals a watering-bucket or a plow, he shall pay 3 shekels of silver.
As the Hebrews did not systematically irrigate their land, the Old Testament contains no similar laws.
Laws Concerning Shepherds
§ 261. If a man hires a herdsman to tend cattle or sheep, he shall pay him 8 Gur of grain per year.
§ 262. If a man, oxen, or sheep ..............
(The rest is broken away.)
§ 263. If he loses an ox or a sheep that is intrusted to him, he shall restore ox for ox and sheep for sheep.
§ 264. If a herdsman who has had cattle or sheep intrusted to him receives his full pay and is satisfied, and he causes the cattle or the sheep to diminish in number or lessens the birth-rate, he shall give increase and produce according to his contracts.
§ 265. If a shepherd to whom cattle or sheep have been given to tend is dishonest and alters the price or sells them, they shall prosecute him, and he shall restore to their owner 10 times the oxen or sheep which he stole.
§ 266. If in a fold there is a pestilence of a god, or a lion has slain, the shepherd shall before a god declare himself innocent, and the owner of the fold shall bear the loss of the fold.
§ 267. If the shepherd is careless and causes a loss in the fold, the shepherd shall make good in cattle or sheep the loss which he caused in the fold and shall give them to the owner.
The nearest approach in the Old Testament to laws of this character is in Exod. 22:10-13, which provides that, if a man deliver to his neighbor an ox, or ass, or sheep, or any beast to keep, and it dies, or is injured or is carried off when no one sees the deed, the oath of Jehovah shall be between them that the keeper has not put his hand to his neighbor’s goods. The owner was to accept this, and no restitution was necessary. If the animals were stolen from the keeper, he must make restitution. If they were torn in pieces by beasts of prey, he must bring the pieces for witness, and need not make restitution.
The same general principles of the limits of responsibility underlay the two codes in these cases, though they differ in details. In Israel the shepherding of the flocks and herds of other people was not, as in Babylonia, a distinct occupation.
On Wages of Animals and Men
§ 268. If a man hires an ox for threshing, 20 Qa of grain is its hire.
§ 269. If he hires an ass for threshing, 10 Qa of grain is its hire.
§ 270. If he hires a kid for threshing, 1 Qa of grain is its hire.
§ 271. If he hires cattle, a wagon and a driver, he shall pay 180 Qa of grain per day.
§ 272. If a man hires a wagon only, he shall pay 40 Qa of grain per day.
§ 273. If a man hires a field-laborer from the beginning of the year until the fifth month, he shall pay him 6 She of silver per day; from the sixth month to the end of the year, 5 She of silver per day he shall pay.
§ 274. If a man hires an artisan, he shall give per day as the wages of a ..... 5 She; as the wages of a brick-maker, 5 She of money; as the wages of a tailor, 5 She of silver; as the wages of a stone-cutter, ...... She of silver; ............ She of silver; ............ She of silver; ............ of a carpenter, 4 She of silver; as the wages of a ...... 4 She of silver; as the wages of a ...... She of silver; the wages of a builder, ...... She of silver.
§ 275. If a man hires a boat (?) to go upstream (?), its hire is 3 She of silver per day.
§ 276. If he hires a boat to float downstream, he shall pay as its hire 2½ She of silver per day.
§ 277. If a man hires a boat of 60 Gur burden, he shall pay ⅙ of a shekel of money per day.
There are no parallels to these laws in the Bible, as the Old Testament does not attempt to regulate prices. When one considers the customs of trade all over the Orient, and the time fruitlessly consumed in making bargains, one does not wonder that the practical sovereign of a great commercial people, such as the Babylonians were, should regulate prices by law. As a rule, to this day, a purchaser begins by offering only a fraction of what he is willing to give, and the seller by asking at least twice as much as he is willing to take. A long psychological battle follows, during which there are many victories and capitulations on each side. This law was designed to put an end to this time-consuming custom.
When the Sales of Slaves are Void
§ 278. If a man buys a male or a female slave and before a month is past he has an attack of rheumatism (?), he shall return to the seller, and the purchaser shall receive back the money that was paid.
§ 279. If a man buys a male or a female slave, and another has a legal claim upon him, the seller shall be responsible for that claim.
§ 280. If a man, while in a foreign country, purchases a male or a female slave of a man, and, when he returns home, the former owner of the male or the female slave recognizes his slave, if that male or female slave is a native of the land, he shall give it its freedom without recompense.
§ 281. If they are natives of another country, the purchaser shall declare in the presence of a god the price that he paid, and the former owner of the male or female slave shall pay the price to the merchant, and shall receive back his slave.
No laws similar to these are found in the Old Testament.
The Penalty for Renouncing a Master
§ 282. If a slave shall say to his owner: “Thou art not my owner,” they shall make him submit as his slave, and shall cut off his ear.
This penalty reminds one of the boring of a slave’s ear (Exod. 21:6; Deut. 15:17) in token of perpetual slavery.
=2. The Mosaic Code not Borrowed from the Babylonian; Different Underlying Conceptions.=
A comparison of the code of Hammurapi as a whole with the Pentateuchal laws as a whole, while it reveals certain similarities, convinces the student that the laws of the Old Testament are in no essential way dependent upon the Babylonian laws. Such resemblances as there are arose, it seems clear, from a similarity of antecedents and of general intellectual outlook; the striking differences show that there was no direct borrowing. The primitive Semitic custom of an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth (Exod. 21:24; Lev. 24:20; Deut. 19:21) is made the basis of many penalties in the Babylonian code. (See §§ 196, 197, 200, 229, 230, etc.) The principle underlying it is found also in many other sections. These similarities only show that Babylonia had a large Semitic element in its population. Again, Hammurapi pictured himself at the top of the pillar on which these laws are written as receiving them from the sun-god (Fig. 292). The Bible tells us that Moses received the laws of the Pentateuch from Jehovah. The whole attitude of the two documents is, however, different. Hammurapi, in spite of the picture, takes credit, both in the prologue and in the epilogue of his code, for the laws. He, not Shamash, established justice in the land. Moses, on the other hand, was only the instrument; the legislation stands as that of Jehovah himself.
This difference appears also in the contents of the two codes. The Pentateuch contains many ritual regulations and purely religious laws, while the code of Hammurapi is purely civil. As has been already pointed out, the code of Hammurapi is adapted to the land of the rivers, and to a highly civilized commercial people, while the Biblical laws are intended for a dry land like Palestine, and for an agricultural community that was at a far less advanced stage of commercial and social development.
Religion is, however, not a matter of social advancement only. In all that pertains to religious insight the Pentateuch is far in advance of Hammurapi’s laws.
Chapter XIV
AN ALLEGED PARALLEL TO LEVITICUS--A CARTHAGINIAN LAW CONCERNING SACRIFICES[469]
THE TEXT OF THE CARTHAGINIAN LAW. COMPARISON WITH THE LEVITICAL LAW.
=1. The Text of the Carthaginian Law.=
Temple of Baal[zephon], Tar[iff of d]ues, which [the superintendents of d]ues fixed in the time [of our rulers, Khalas]baal, the judge, son of Bodtanith, son of Bod[eshmun, and of Khalasbaal], the judge, son of Bodeshmun, son of Khalasbaal, and their colleagues.
For an ox as a whole burnt-offering[470] or a prayer-offering, or a whole peace-offering,[471] the priests shall have 10 (shekels) of silver for each; and in case of a whole burnt-offering, they shall have in addition to this fee [300 shekels of fle]sh; and, in case of a prayer-offering, the trimmings, the joints; but the skin and the fit of the inwards[472] and the feet and the rest of the flesh the owner of the sacrifice shall have.
For a calf whose horns are wanting, in case of one not castrated (?), or in case of a ram as a whole burnt-offering, the priests shall have 5 shekels of silver [for each; and in case of a whole burnt-offering they shall have in addit]ion to this fee 150 shekels of flesh; and, in case of a prayer-offering, the trimmings and the joints; but the skin and the fat of the inwards and the fe[et and the rest of the flesh the owner of the sacrifice shall have].
In case of a ram or a goat as a whole burnt-offering, or a prayer-offering, or a whole peace-offering, the priests shall have 1 shekel of silver and 2 zars for each; and, in case of a prayer-offering, they shall [have in addition to this fee the trimmings] and the joints; but the skin and the fat of the inwards and the feet and the rest of the flesh the owner of the sacrifice shall have.
For a lamb, or a kid, or the young (?) of a hart, as a whole burnt-offering, or a prayer-offering, or a whole peace-offering, the priests shall have ¾ (of a shekel) and ...... zars of silver [for each; and, in case of a prayer-offering, they shall have in addition] to this fee the trimmings and the joints; but the skin and the fat of the inwards and the feet and the rest of the flesh the own[er of the sacrifice] shall have.
For a bird, domestic or wild, as a whole peace-offering, or a sacrifice-to-avert-calamity (?) or an oracular (?) sacrifice, the priests shall have ¾ (of a shekel) of silver and 2 zars for each; but the f[lesh shall belong to the owner of the sacrifice].
For a bird, or sacred first-fruits, or a sacrifice of game, or a sacrifice of oil, the priests shall have 10 g[erahs] for each; but ......................
In case of every prayer-offering that is presented before the gods, the priests shall have the trimmings and the joints; and in the case of a prayer-offering ....
For a cake, and for milk, and for every sacrifice which a man may offer, for a meal-offering[473] ..........
For every sacrifice which a man may offer who is poor in cattle, or poor in birds, the priests shall not have anything ..........
Every freeman and every slave and every dependent[474] of the gods and all men who may sacrifice .........., these men [shall give] for the sacrifice at the rate prescribed in the regulations ..........
Every payment which is not prescribed in this table shall be made according to the regulations which [the superintendents of the dues fixed in the time of Khalasbaal, son of Bodtani]th, and Khalasbaal, son of Bodeshmun, and their colleagues.
Every priest who shall accept payment beyond what is prescribed in this table shall be fi[ned] ............
Every person who sacrifices, who shall not give ............ for the fee which ..............
=2. Comparison with the Levitical Law.=
This document is not earlier than the fourth or fifth century B. C. The Carthaginians, from whom it comes, were an offshoot of the Phœnicians, who were, in turn, descended from the Canaanites. They were accordingly of kindred race to the Hebrews. One can, therefore, see from this document something of how the Levitical institutions of Israel resembled and how they differed from those of their kinsmen. It will be seen that the main sacrifices bore the same names among both peoples. We find the “whole burnt-offering,” the “peace-offering,” and the “meal-offering.” The Carthaginians had no “sin-offering,” while among the Hebrews we find no “prayer-offering.” The ways of rewarding the priests also differed with the two peoples. The Hebrews had no such regular tariff of priests’ dues as the Carthaginians, but parts of certain offerings and all of others belonged to them. Leviticus assigns from the peace-offering the “heave-thigh” and the “wave-breast” to the priests (Lev. 7:14, 34; Num. 5:9, 10; 31:29, 41). Meal- or flour-offerings belonged to the priests (Lev. 5:13; 7:9, 10), as did the sin- and trespass-offerings (Lev. 6:18, 29; 7:9, 10). Of the burnt-offerings the priests had the skin (Lev. 7:8).
The interesting thing is that in the ritual, as in the social laws, we find that the heathen Semites had a considerable number of regulations similar to those of the Hebrews.
XV. SOME LETTERS FROM PALESTINE
LETTERS OF RIB-ADDA OF GEBAL. OF EBED-HEPA OF JERUSALEM. THEIR LIGHT ON CONDITIONS IN THE PERIOD OF THE EGYPTIAN DOMINATION OF PALESTINE.
Many of the El-Amarna[475] Letters were written from Palestine and Phœnicia. Some scholars think these letters come from the Patriarchal period; others hold that they are contemporary with the Hebrew conquest, and give us additional information concerning it. Some of those who hold this last view believe that the conquest of Palestine by the Hebrews was not made all at once. They think that the tribes descended from Leah entered the land before those descended from Rachel. Such scholars hold that these letters give us contemporary evidence of the wars of the Leah tribes. Whichever view one takes, the letters are most interesting, as they open to us a previously unknown chapter in the history of Jerusalem.
=1. Some Letters of Rib-Adda of Gebal.=[476]
I[477]
To the king, my lord, the king of the countries, speak, saying, Rib-Adda, thy servant, the footstool of thy feet; at the feet of the sun, my lord, eight times and seven times I prostrate myself. Again, there is clear to the king, my lord, the deed of Ebed-Ashera, the dog, when all the lands of the king, my lord, are made over unto him and are subservient to his land. And now behold the city of Sumur has been won over--a fold of my lord and a temple of his shrine--to him, and he has encamped in the temple of my shrine and has opened the place of the curse of my lord and won it. What is he, a man ......... and dog that he should judge? Again, when men say in the presence of the king, my lord: “Learn that Gebal is ..........,” then know that he has not taken Gebal ............... and it is difficult for the lands of the king, my lord. Again, let the king, my lord, send his inspector who may judge ................ and may protect the city of the king, my lord. And I ........ and will serve my lord, the king of the lands. And may my lord send people and let them bring whatever belongs to my .............. into the presence of the king, my lord, and let not that dog take anything that belongs to thy gods. And is it clear now that he would take Gebal? See, Gebal is like Memphis, loyal to the king. A second time, see Ebed-Ninib, the man whom I sent with Buhiya, is a .......... So send unto thy servant. Again see, Ummahnu is a maid-servant of the Baal-goddess of Gebal; her husband is Ishkur .......... send! ..........
(The tablet is broken off at this point.)
II[478]
To the king, my lord, my sun, say: Rib-Adda, thy servant; at the feet of my lord, my sun-god, seven times and seven times I prostrate myself. May the king, my lord, listen to the words of his faithful servant! It is going very hard for me! The hostility has become strong. The sons of Ebed-Ashera have become great in Amurru; theirs is the whole land. The city of Sumur and the city of Irkata are left to the princes. And behold in Sumur I am strong. When it was difficult for the princes on account of the enmity, I left Gebal and ........ Zimridda and .......... Yapa-Addi ........ with me. Behold, then wrote the prince unto them; but they did not hearken unto him. And may the king, my lord, hearken to the words of his faithful servant! Send aid very quickly unto the city Sumur for its protection until the arrival of the mercenaries of the king, the sun. And may the king, the sun, drive out the enemy from his land. Again may the king, my lord, hearken to the word of his servant and send men as guards to the city of Sumur and to the city of Irkata, in case that all the guards flee from Sumur. And may it seem good to my lord, the sun of the countries, to give to me 20 pairs of horses. And may he send help very quickly to the city of Sumur to guard it. All the guards who remain are in straits and few are the men in the city. If mercenaries thou dost not send, then there will be no city remaining to thee. If there are mercenaries, we will take all the lands for the king.
These letters mention a certain Ebed-Ashera and claim that his sons are gaining possession of all the land of Amurru. If the “Ebed” were dropped out of the phrase, “sons of Ebed-Ashera,”[479] there would remain “sons of Ashera,” or, “sons of Asher.” The “land of Amurru,” or, “land of the Amorites,” lay, at the time these letters were written, in the later home of the tribe of Asher, and a little to the north of it, between the Lebanon and Anti-Lebanon mountains. Some scholars hold that we have in these letters references to the coming of the “sons of Asher,” or the tribe of Asher into this region, but it is a theory which in the present state of our knowledge we can neither prove nor disprove. If it should prove to be true, these tablets would reflect a part of the Hebrew conquest of this region.
=2. Letters of Ebed-Hepa of Jerusalem.=
I[480]
[To the king, my lord, speak, saying, E]bed-H[epa thy servant--at] the feet [of the king, my lord,] seven times and seven times [I prostrate myself]. Behold I am not a [prefect]; a vassal am I unto [the king, my lord]. Why did not the king, [my lord], send a messenger [quickly]? In similar circumstances sent Ienhamu .................. I. [May] the king [hearken unto Ebed]-Hepa, his servant. [Behold] there are no mercenaries. [May] the king, my lord, s[end a governor] and let him take [the prefects] with him .......... lands of the king ......... and people .......... who are .......... [and Addaya], the governor of the king [has] their house .......... So may the king care for them and send a messenger quickly. When ..........
II[481]
To the king, my lord, speak, saying, Ebed-Hepa, thy servant--at the feet of my lord, the king, seven times and seven times I prostrate myself. What have I done to the king, my lord? They slander and misrepresent me before the king, my lord, [saying]: Ebed-Hepa is disloyal to the king, his lord. Behold I--neither my father nor my mother set me in this place; the arm of the mighty king caused me to enter into the house of my father. Why should I commit rebellion against the king, my lord? As long as the king, my lord, lives I will say unto the governor of the king, my lord: “Why dost thou love the Habiri and hate the prefects?” But thus he misrepresents me before the king, my lord. Now I say, “Lost are the lands of the king, my lord.” So he misrepresents me to the king, my lord. But let the king, my lord, know (that) after the king, my lord, set guards, Ienhamu took them all .................... Egypt .......... of the king, my lord; [there are no] guards there. Then may the king care for his land! May the king care for his land! Separated are all the lands from the king. Ilimilku has destroyed all the country of the king; so may the king, my lord, care for his land! I say: “I will enter the presence of the king, my lord, and I will behold the eye of the king, my lord,” but the enemy is more mighty than I, and I am not able to enter into the presence of the king, my lord. So may it seem right to the king .......... may he send guards, and I will enter in and will behold the eyes of the king, my lord! And so long as the king, my lord, lives, so long as the governors are withdrawn, I will say: “Perished are the lands of the king.” Thou dost not hearken to me! All the prefects have perished; there is left no prefect to the king, my lord! May the king turn his face toward mercenaries, so that there may come forth mercenaries of the king, my lord. There are no lands left to the king, my lord. The Habiri plunder all the countries of the king. If there are mercenaries in this year, then there will be left countries of the king, my lord. If there are no mercenaries, the countries of the king will be lost. Unto the scribe of the king, my lord, saying: “Ebed-Hepa, thy servant. Take beautiful words to the king, my lord! Lost are all the lands of the king, my lord.”
III[482]
[To the king, my lord, [speak,] saying, Eb]ed-Hepa, thy servant. [Unto the feet] of my lord seven [times and seven times I prostrate myself]. [I have heard all] the words [which the king, my lord,] has sent to me .......... Behold the deed which .......... has done .......... Copper .......... word ........ He has brought [into the city Keilah]. [Cf. Josh. 15:44.] May the king know that all the lands are gone and there is enmity against me. So may the king care for his land! Behold the land of the city Gezer, the land of the city Askelon and the city of Lakish have given them food, oil, and all kinds of herbs. So may the king give attention to the mercenaries! May he send mercenaries against the people who commit outrages against the king, my lord! If there are in this year mercenaries, then there will remain lands and prefects to the king, my lord. But if there are no mercenaries, there will be no lands and prefects to the king. Behold this land of the city of Jerusalem--neither my father nor my mother gave it to me; the mighty hand, the arm of the king gave it to me. Behold this deed; it is the deed of Malkiel and the deed of the sons of Labaya, who have given the land of the king to the Habiri. Behold, O king, my lord, right is on my side as regards the Kashi-people. Let the king ask the governors whether that house is very mighty and they have committed a grievous, a great sin; they have taken their weapons and have cut off the horsemen (?) .......... And may he send into that land .......... who .......... with .......... servants. May [the king] care for them ................ the lands in their hands [and] may the king provide for them much food, much oil, much clothing until Paru, the governor of the king, comes up to the country of the city of Jerusalem. Gone is Addaya, together with the guards of the vassals whom the king appointed. Let the king know that Addaya said to me: “Behold, I am going away; do not thou abandon it” (the city). This year send me men as guards and a governor, O king! Send us .......... I have sent to the king, my lord .........., people, five thousand .......... three hundred and eighteen porters for the caravans of the king. They were indeed captured in the fields near the city Aijalon. (Cf. Josh. 10:12.) Let the king, my lord, know that I am not able to send a caravan to the king, my lord. Indeed thou knowest it. Behold the king has set his name in the country of the city of Jerusalem forever and he ought not to abandon the lands of the city of Jerusalem.
To the scribe of the king, my lord, has Ebed-Hepa, thy servant spoken, saying: At the feet I, thy servant, prostrate myself. Take beautiful words to the king, my lord! A vassal of the king am I, exceedingly loyal (?) as regards thee. Also an evil deed has been done against me by the men of Kashi. I was all but killed by the men of Kashi in my house. May the king make investigation concerning them. Seven times and seven times, O king, justice is on my side.
IV[483]
To the king, my lord, my sun-god, speak, saying, Ebed-Hepa, thy servant. At the feet of the king, my lord, seven times and seven times I prostrate myself. Behold the king, my lord, has set his name at the rising of the sun and the setting of the sun. It is slander which they have multiplied against me. Behold I am not a prefect; a vassal of the king, my lord, am I. Behold I am a shepherd of the king and one who brings tribute to the king, am I. Neither my father nor my mother, but the arm of the mighty king set me in the house of my father ........ There came unto me ....... I gave 10 slaves into his hand. Shuta, the governor of the king, came unto me. Twenty-one female slaves and eighty prisoners I gave into the hand of Shuta as a present to the king, my lord. Let the king take counsel for his land! Lost is the land of the king. All of it is taken from me. Enmity is against me. As far as the lands of Seir and as far as Gath-Carmel there is peace among all the prefects, but enmity against me is practised. When I sent a man, then he said: “I do not see the eyes of the king, my lord, for hostility is against me.” I set once a ship on the sea when the mighty arm of the king took Naharina and Kapasi, but, behold the Habiri take the cities of the king. There is no prefect to the king, my lord; all are lost. Behold Turbazu was killed in the city gate of Zilû and the king is inactive! Behold Zimridda of Lakish; his servants were enraged at him; he adhered to the Habiri. Yapti-Adda was killed in the city gate of Zilû and there is no action! Concerning it the king makes no inquiry! Let the king care for his land and let the king turn his face to mercenaries for the land of tribute! For if there are no mercenaries in this year, lost, perished are all the lands of the king, my lord. Let not one say in the presence of the king, my lord, that the land of the king, my lord, is lost and all the prefects are lost. If there are no mercenaries in this year, then let the king send a governor to bring me and my brothers unto thee and we will die with the king, our lord.
To the scribe of the king, my lord, saying, Ebed-Hepa, thy servant. At thy feet I prostrate myself. Bring beautiful words to the king. Emphatically thy servant and thy son am I.
V[484]
To the king, my lord, speak, saying, Ebed-Hepa, thy servant. At the feet of my lord I prostrate myself seven times and seven times. Behold Malkiel, he has not separated himself from the sons of Labaya and from the sons of Arzaya that they may seek the hand of the king for themselves. A prefect who has done this deed--why does not the king call him to account? Behold Malkiel and Tagi--the deed which they have done is this: formerly they took Rabuda and now they seek Jerusalem. If this land belongs to the king, why is it oppressed? Gaza has sided with the king. Behold the land of Gath-Carmel belongs to Tagi and the people of Gath are on guard in Beth-shean, and verily it will happen to us when Labaya and the land of Shechem have been given to the Habiri. Malkiel has written to Tagi and his sons: “Let our two forces grant all their desire to the people of Keilah.” Shall we indeed throw open Jerusalem? The guards, whom thou didst send by the hand of Haya, son of Miare, Addaya took, stationing them in his house in Gaza and twenty men has he sent to Egypt. Let the king know that there are no royal guards with me! It is so as the king lives! Verily Puru is beaten. He has gone from me and is in Gaza. May the king remember it and may the king send fifty men as guards to protect the land! All the lands of the king are in revolt. Send Yinhenhame and let him care for the land of the king. To the scribe of the king, my lord, say: Ebed-Hepa, thy servant. Beautiful words give to the king. Ever emphatically am I thy servant.
VI[485]
To the king, my lord, speak, saying, Ebed-Hepa, thy servant. At the feet of the king, my lord, seven times and seven times I prostrate myself. Behold the deed which Malkiel and Shuardatu have done against the country of the king, my lord! They have won over the soldiers of Gezer, the soldiers of Gath, and the soldiers of Keilah; they have seized the country of the city of Rubute. The country of the king is fallen away to the Habiri. And now also a city of the country of Jerusalem (its name is Beth-shemesh),[486] a city of the king, has gone over to the men of Keilah. May the king hearken unto Ebed-Hepa, thy servant, and send mercenaries that the land of the king may remain unto the king. If there are no mercenaries, lost is the land of the king to the Habiri. This is the deed which Malkiel and Shuardatu have done .......... May the king care for his land!
=3. Their Light upon Conditions in the Period of the Egyptian Domination of Palestine.=
These letters are among the most interesting of the many fascinating documents which have come to us from ancient times. They give us our first historical glimpse of Jerusalem, giving us a view of it 350 years before its capture by David. At this time its ruler was one Ebed-Hepa, a vassal of Amenophis IV, King of Egypt. Jerusalem was at the time the capital of a considerable territory. If the places mentioned have been rightly identified by scholars, its dominion extended to Mount Carmel on the northwest and as far as Rabbith in Issachar on the north. At the time these letters were written, Jerusalem was hard pressed by some invaders called Habiri, and Ebed-Hepa again and again appeals to the Egyptian king to send mercenaries in that year or all the territories of the king would be lost. Already the Egyptian army was composed in part of hired soldiers. We know from Egyptian sources that Amenophis was much more interested in religious reform than in statecraft. The desired troops were not sent, and apparently Ebed-Hepa was overcome, for his letters cease.
The condition of Palestine, as revealed by these letters, is the same as that of Phœnicia as revealed by the letters of Rib-Adda. Egyptian authority was breaking up; each ruler was doing his best to look after his own interests; while invaders were overrunning the country.
Who was Ebed-Hepa? All that we know of him is told in these letters. Hepa was, however, the name of a Hittite and Mitannian goddess. It has, accordingly, been inferred that Ebed-Hepa belonged to that race. Ezekiel long afterward in speaking to Jerusalem said: “The Amorite was thy father and thy mother was a Hittite” (Ezek. 16:3, 45). If this first ruler of Jerusalem known to us was a Hittite, as seems probable, it would be a striking confirmation of Ezekiel’s statement. Another interesting question is: Who were the Habiri who were invading Palestine when these letters were written? The answer to this question is not certain. Four different views have been held:
1. They have been thought to be the same as the clan Heber which was afterward a part of the tribe of Asher, and which is also mentioned in connection with Malkiel in Gen. 46:17; Num. 26:45, and 1 Chron. 7:31. The objection to this view is that the Habiri seem far too powerful in these letters to be simply the ancestors of such a clan.
2. It has been held that the Habiri were a branch of the Hittites. This view is based upon the fact that among the tablets found by Winckler at Boghaz Koi a list of Hittite gods was headed “gods of the Habiri.” This is, however, not decisive, as the gods may have been Semitic gods, whom, after the fashion of antiquity, the Hittite scribe had identified with the deities of his own country.
3. It has been held that the Habiri were Hebrews, and that we have here contemporary records of their wars of conquest.
4. Some scholars maintain that it is impossible to tell who the Habiri were.
The writer is inclined to hold that the Habiri were Hebrews, though this view is not without difficulty. The indications of the book of Exodus point to Ramses II as the Pharaoh of the oppression and to Merneptah as the Pharaoh of the Exodus. These kings belonged to the nineteenth dynasty, while Amenophis IV, to whom Ebed-Hepa wrote his letters, belonged to the eighteenth. How then could Hebrews be already in Palestine struggling to conquer it? The view has been held by a number of scholars that the Hebrew conquest took place in two parts, one of which was under the eighteenth and the other under the nineteenth dynasty. The view is not without its difficulties, but it may prove to be true. If the Habiri were Hebrews, it seems necessary to suppose that it is true. Perhaps further discovery will throw more light upon it.
The following letter, found in 1892 at Tell el-Hesy (Lachish) in Palestine, belongs to the same period as the preceding letters.[487]
To the chief officer speak, saying: Pabi--at thy feet I prostrate myself. Thou shouldst know that Shiptibaal and Zimrida are conspiring together and Shiptibaal has said to Zimrida: “My father of the city Yarami has written to me: ‘Give me six bows and three daggers and three swords. If I go out against the land of the king and thou wilt be the breath of life to me, then I shall surely (?) be superior to it and shall subdue it.’ He who makes this plan is Pabu, so send him to me.” Now I have sent thee Raphiel. He will bring to the chief officer news of this matter.
Another letter from Taanach belongs to the same general period. It is one of four found by Sellin in 1903. It is as follows:[488]
To Ishtarwashur speak, saying, Ahijah[489]--may the lord of the gods protect thy life! Thou art my brother and love is in thy bowels and in my heart. When I was detained in Gurra a workman gave to me two knives and a lance and two baskets (?) for nothing. As the lance was broken, he will repair it and send it by the hand of Buritpi. Again: is there lamentation over thy cities, or hast thou indeed put thyself in possession of them? Over my head is one who is over the cities. Now let us see whether he will do good to thee. If his countenance is favorable there will be great destruction. Further: let Ilurabi enter Rahab and either send my man to thy presence or give him protection.
This letter is chiefly interesting for the name Aḫi-ya-mi, which is probably the Babylonian equivalent of Ahijah or Ahi-Yahweh. If this is so, and, while not certain, there is considerable collateral evidence in its favor,[490] the divine name, Yahweh (Jehovah), was already known in Palestine.
Another phrase in this letter which has recalled to some a Biblical phrase is “the lord of the gods.” This has been compared with Baal-berith (i. e., lord of the covenant), Judges 9:4, who is later called El-berith (god of the covenant), Judges 9:46. Such a comparison is, however, somewhat fanciful.