Dissertation - Ancient Babylonia and the Hebrew Bible Full Edition

Undergraduate Dissertation HSA040X300Y
Ancient Babylonia and the Hebrew Bible: a critical analysis of Ancient Mesopotamian cultural and religious influences on the formation of Hebrew scripture.
Jonathan Campbell
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Ancient Babylonia and the Hebrew Bible: a critical analysis
of Ancient Mesopotamian cultural and religious influences
on the formation of Hebrew scripture
Jonathan Campbell
Presented as part of the requirement for the degree of
Bachelor of Arts at the University of Roehampton
April, 2012

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Declaration
This dissertation is the product of my own work. I agree that it may be made available for
reference and photocopying at discretion of the University.
Jonathan Campbell
Jonathan Campbell
27th
April 2012

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Abstract
In this essay I explore the fascinating world of ancient Mesopotamia,
particularly focusing on ancient Babylonian religion and culture.
Recent archaeological excavations revealed that there were many
similarities between ancient Babylonian and Hebrew culture. The
main focus of this project is to analyse how much of an influence this
ancient culture actually had on the transcription of the Hebrew Bible
and to pull out passages from the Hebrew Bible and compare them
to Babylonian parallels. My task will be to try and defend the validity
of the Hebrew Bible in the light of these recent archaeological
findings.
I would like to thank Professor Geoffrey Walker for the excellent
service he provided for me, as well as for the University of
Roehampton, for all his enthusiastic help with this topic and for
igniting this fascination of ancient Mesopotamian culture within me.

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Ancient Mesopotamia:
Ancient Babylonia and the Hebrew Bible: a
critical analysis of Ancient Mesopotamian
cultural and religious influences on the
formation of Hebrew scripture.
i
Fig. 1

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Contents
CHAPTER ONE:
Introduction............................................................................... 7
CHAPTER TWO:
Ancient Babylonian Myths, Epics & Laws and how they relate to
the Hebrew Bible...................................................................... 10
i. The Creation Epic... 11
ii. The Epic of Gilgamesh... 13
iii. The law code of King Hammurabi... 16
CHAPTER THREE:
Potential Theological Issues...................................................... 21
CHAPTER FOUR:
Conclusion................................................................................. 31
Appendix................................................................................... 39
Bibliography.............................................................................. 42
ii
Fig. 2

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Contents of illustrations
All the artwork and visual aids used in this project
Figure 1: Stone carving of Gilgamesh...................................... 4
Figure 2: Babylonian Creation Epic........................................ 5
Figure 3: The Epic of Gilgamesh............................................ 39
Figure 4: The Stele of Hammurabi........................................ 39
Figure 5: The Enuma Elish..................................................... 39
Figure 6: The Bust of King Hammurabi................................ 40
Figure 7: The Atrahasis Epic.................................................. 40
Figure 8: The Cyrus Cylinder................................................ 40
Figure 9: The Colossal Winged Bull....................................... 41
Figure 10: Stone panel from the Palace of Tiglath-Pileser III.......... 41
Map 1: Ancient Mesopotamia – The Fertile Crescent............ 41

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CHAPTER I:
Introduction
The Hebrew Bible, otherwise known as the Tanak, is a library of many books put
together that tells us of the Hebrew people and their special relationship with their
God. The Tanak consists of three parts.
The first part is the Torah1 (also known as the Pentateuch), which in Hebrew
means the law. This section of the Tanak is where we hear of the creation of the
world and man and his fall from grace, the Ten Commandments and where we begin
to hear of the history of salvation that God has with his special people. The second
part of the Tanak is the Nevi’im2. This is a composition of books written mainly by
the Prophets. The final part is the Ketuvim3 which are all the other writings that
make up the remainder of the Tanak.
Within this essay I will be focusing solely on the Torah because firstly it would
be too long a piece of work analyse the entire Hebrew Bible and secondly: because
scholars such as David Carr have argued that “the most famous echoes of texts from
ancient empires are found at the very beginning of the Bible, in the primeval history
(Genesis 1 – 11), which tells stories about the whole earth and its people” (Carr 2010:
79). Within these five books of the Torah you can find a number of interesting
parallels with many Babylonian myths, epics, traditions, and culture. I will attempt
1 This part of the Tanak is made up of five books which are: Genesis (‫בראשית‬ / Bereshit), Exodus (‫שמות‬ / Shemot), Leviticus (‫ויקרא‬ /
Vayikra), Numbers (‫במדבר‬ / Bamidbar), and Deuteronomy (‫דברים‬ / Devarim).
2 The Nevi’im consists of twenty-one books which are as follows: Joshua (‫יהושע‬ / Y'hoshua), Judges (‫שופטים‬ / Shophtim), Samuel (I & II)
(‫שמואל‬ / Sh'muel), Kings (I & II) (‫מלכים‬ / M'lakhim), Isaiah (‫ישעיה‬ / Y'shayahu), Jeremiah (‫ירמיה‬ / Yir'mi'yahu), Ezekiel (‫יחזקאל‬ /
Y'khezqel), Hosea (‫הושע‬ / Hoshea), Joel (‫יואל‬ / Yo'el), Amos (‫עמוס‬ / Amos), Obadiah (‫עובדיה‬ / Ovadyah), Jonah (‫יונה‬ / Yonah), Micah (‫מיכה‬ /
Mikhah), Nahum (‫נחום‬ / Nakhum), Habakkuk (‫חבקוק‬ / Havakuk), Zephaniah (‫צפניה‬ / Ts'phanyah), Haggai (‫חגי‬ / Khagai), Zechariah (‫זכריה‬ /
Z'kharyah), and Malachi (‫מלאכי‬ / Mal'akhi).
3 The Ketuvim is made up of the remaining twelve books of the Tanak which go by the name of: Psalms (‫תהלים‬ / Tehillim), Proverbs (‫משלי‬ /
Mishlei), Job (‫איוב‬ / Iyov), Song of Songs (‫שיר‬ ‫השירים‬ / Shir Hashirim), Ruth (‫רות‬ / Rut), Lamentations (‫איכה‬ / Eikhah), Ecclesiastes (‫קהלת‬ /
Kohelet), Esther (‫אסתר‬ / Esther), Daniel (‫דניאל‬ / Dani'el), Ezra-Nehemiah (‫עזרא‬ ‫ונחמיה‬ / Ezra v'Nechemia), and Chronicles (I & II) (‫דברי‬
‫הימים‬ / Divrei Hayamim).

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to draw out a few examples from the Torah and compare them to their Babylonian
counterparts. It is well known that the Hebrew Bible was originally transmitted to
others orally and that it wasn’t originally in written form. However when the
Israelites were taken into captivity into Babylon under the great Emperor
Nebuchadnezzar II they started to transcribe all that they had originally only passed
on via word of mouth because their Jewish culture and religion was under threat
from this stronger and more powerful Babylonian culture. Hence as the Hebrew
Bible was probably written whilst the Jews were in Babylon it is not great surprise if
what they wrote contained Babylonian elements. I will mainly look at the Jewish
creation story, their laws and customs and their story of Noah and the great Flood
and compare them to similar Babylonian beliefs.
It is very likely that the authors of the Hebrew Bible were influenced by
Babylonian (as well as many other) cultures. The aim of this essay however is to see
whether or not this undermines the belief of those who take the Hebrew Bible to be
the infallible word of God. Christians and Jews alike both use the Hebrew Bible and
regard it as a sacred text. I will attempt to reconcile this dilemma and present an
argument that defends the validity and importance of the Torah in spite of these
parallels that appear and I will attempt to demonstrate how this shouldn’t pose a
threat to those who regard the Hebrew Bible as sacred.
First I will analyse three aspects of Babylonian culture that are similar to ideas
expressed in the Hebrew Bible. I will examine how closely they relate and will be
evaluating whether or not it’s fair to compare the two. In this essay I will only be
focusing on the Babylonian ideas of creation, their narratives of the great deluge and
the law code of King Hammurabi. There are more correlations between the two
cultures however I have decided to focus primarily on these three areas so I can look
at them in more detail because they are of such fundamental significance.

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Having done this I will discuss all the problems that this might cause for
people who use the Torah and whether or not this eradicates the possibility of their
being any truth in the Hebrew Bible. I will attempt to defend the Hebrew Bible as
best as I can, using scholars and theologians such as Harris, Heidel, and Mendenhall.
to help strengthen my defence of the Torahs validity.
As a practicing Christian myself, this topic is of special interest to me as I wish
to gain a greater understanding of the book that lies at the centre of Christianity as
the New Testament can only be fully understood in the light of the history of the
Jewish nation. I will be observing and analysing these myths, epics and laws that
threaten the validity of the Bible and I hope to be able to defend the Hebrew Bible
and show that despite these apparent parallels, the Bible is still of use to us today and
that these recent archaeological findings need not cause us to reject the deep moral
and ethical teachings inherent to both the Old and New Testament.
Therefore the aims of this essay are as follows:
 To firstly analyse the ancient Babylonian myths, epics and laws that are
similar to those that we find in the Hebrew Bible.
 To evaluate whether or not it is fair to say that the Hebrew Bible was
influenced by the Babylonians and to uncover all the possible problems
that this could cause for those who use the Hebrew Bible.
 And finally, to attempt to reconcile this fact of the Babylonian influence
with an argument that concludes that the Hebrew Bible is still both
important and valid and is not weakened in any way by this
information.
First and foremost therefore I will analyse the ancient Babylonian myths,
epics and laws that correlate to some of the passages that occur in the Torah.

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CHAPTER II:
Ancient Babylonian Myths, Epics & laws and
how they relate to the Hebrew Bible
Ancient Babylon was located on the banks of the Euphrates River in the heart of the
Fertile Crescent (Map: 1). Before highlighting the Ancient Babylonian myths, epics
and laws that relate to the Hebrew Bible I feel it’s important to first, very briefly,
summarise the history of all the different civilisations that occupied the Fertile
Crescent as those of the Jewish faith were not only influenced by the Babylonians
and the Babylonians themselves were also influenced by neighbouring civilisations
that also occupied Mesopotamia4.
The first known civilisation to settle in Mesopotamia was the Sumerians (3100
BC – 2300 BC). They were followed by a people known as the Akkadians (2334 BC –
2193 BC) who lived alongside the Sumerians for many years and adopted many
features of the Sumerian culture (for example: their cuneiform system of writing).
Around 2004 BC the Amorites invaded Sumer marking a time period known as the
Old Babylonian Period. After the death of the great King Hammurabi, the Babylonian
empire began to decline and was conquered by the Assyrians in 870 BC under King
Ashurnasirpal II. As their power declined a Chaldean people began to rise up and in
625 BC the Chaldean King Nabopolassar captured the city of Babylon and made it the
capital of his newly established empire. This event marks the beginning of the Neo-
Babylonian Empire. It was Nabopolassar’s son Nebuchadnezzar II who famously
took the Jews into captivity in Babylon. This empire was eventually conquered by the
Persian King Cyrus in 539 BC who freed the Jew’s from Babylon and allowed them to
4
Refer to Map 1 in the Appendix, page: 39 for a visual aid.

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return to their home land. King Cyrus’ empire was then overthrown two hundred
years later by the Greek emperor Alexander the Great.
All of these civilisations brought with them their own distinctive cultures but
they were also heavily influenced by one another. Many of the Sumerian God’s for
example were adopted by the Babylonians who simple renamed them. An example of
this is the Sumerian Sky God An who was simply adopted and renamed Anu by the
Babylonians.
This gives us an insight into the amount of different cultures that the Hebrew
people were exposed to and shows us that each different, distinct culture and
civilisation that lived in Mesopotamia still borrowed and were still influenced by
their neighbour’s belief systems. I will now move on to analyse solely the Babylonian
beliefs and practices that probably influenced the authors of the Hebrew Bible.
The Creation Epic
Both the Hebrews and Babylonians had an idea of how the universe came into being.
Their accounts of the world’s creation are quite different5, however the thing that
unites these two seemingly opposed accounts of creation is the description of the
universe before the gods initiated creation. Both cultures share the idea that the
world was a “vast watery chaos” (Harris 2007: 39) before creation took place.
Stephen Harris uses the ancient Babylonian creation epic called the Enuma Elish
(Fig. 5) and highlights the parallels between this description of the primal universe to
5 The Babylonians believed that creation was caused by the god’s Tiamet and Apsu act of procreation which brought into being the other
gods. Having done this the goddess Tiamat regrets having created these other gods and produces “a brood of monsters to destroy them”
(Mitchell 2004: 38). The god Marduk resisted Tiamat and defeated her thereupon cutting her into two half’s, one of which forming the
heavens and the other forming the earth and underworld. The Genesis account of creation on the other hand speaks of a monotheistic
God who creates the Heavens and Earth by himself in six days and on the seventh rests to admire his accomplishment.

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that of Genesis 1: 1 – 2, 6 – 96. Both accounts present this idea that the world was
created out of a formless watery chaos to which the gods (or God) gave order,
purpose and design.
Rolf Rendtorff argued that the Babylonian creation narrative was most
probably known in Israel. The Babylonian account tells us of how the god Marduk
defeated the goddess of chaos Tiamat. Rendtorff pointed out that “the Hebrew word
for the chaotic waters, těhôm, echoes the name of Tiamat, the chaotic monster”
(Perdue 2005: 313). However Rendtorff also pointed out that there are big
differences between the two accounts, for example “the god of Genesis does not fight”
(Perdue 2005: 313) and creation is caused simply by God’s word as opposed to the
Babylonian idea that the gods initiated creation by their act of procreation. I will
develop these points on the distinction of the Jewish beliefs in contrast to the
Babylonians later on.
The Atrahasis Epic (Fig. 7) is another epic that tells us of creation which again
contains similarities to the Torah. The Atrahasis Epic tells us how man was created
from a “combination of clay with blood” (Mitchell 2004: 26). Terence Mitchell
argued that this correlates to the Torah in two ways. One of which is the idea that
man was created from clay which is similar to the Hebrew belief that man was
formed from the earth and that it is to the earth that he/she shall return (Genesis 3:
197). The second correlation is the idea that blood implies life. In the Babylonian epic
this is what gave life to the clay. This idea can also be found in Leviticus where it
states that “the life of a creature is in the blood” (Leviticus 17: 11).
6 “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the
deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters ... And God said, "Let there be an expanse between the waters to separate water
from water." So God made the expanse and separated the water under the expanse from the water above it. And it was so. God called the
expanse "sky." And there was evening, and there was morning--the second day. And God said, "Let the water under the sky be gathered to
one place, and let dry ground appear." And it was so.”
7 “By the sweat of your brow you will eat your food until you return to the ground, since from it you were taken; for dust you are and to
dust you will return”

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However these small similarities do not provide enough evidence to draw the
conclusion that the transcription of the Hebrew Bible was influenced in any way by
Ancient Babylon. These similarities could have merely been coincidental and as
Rendtorff pointed out the Hebrew account is still vastly different. Therefore I will
now move on to other parallels that provide more convincing evidence. I will start by
looking at the famous Epic of Gilgamesh.
The Epic of Gilgamesh
The Gilgamesh Epic (Fig. 3) is the oldest piece of literature known to man. This epic
was not peculiar to the Babylonians as many of the other civilisations that occupied
the Fertile Crescent also inherited and passed on this epic. In 1872 George Smith
discovered a narrative within the Epic of Gilgamesh that changed the way many
people regarded the Hebrew Bible.
The Gilgamesh Epic is a story of the ancient Sumerian King of Uruk
Gilgamesh and his adventures with his companion Enkidu. The Akkadian version of
this Epic is made up of twelve cuneiform tablets and on the eleventh tablet there is a
narrative where we hear of Gilgamesh, who in search of eternal life, comes across a
man called Utnapishtim who was given the gift of immortality by the gods. As
Gilgamesh questions this man who has the gift that Gilgamesh desires Utnapishtim
tells him of a story that parallels very closely with the Great Deluge we hear of in
Genesis 6 – 9. Utnapishtim tells Gilgamesh that the gods sent a great flood to wipe
out the human race; however the god Ea8 had compassion for the human race and
instructed Utnapishtim to build an ark in order to survive the flood. On this ark
Utnapishtim brought animals of many kinds. This is almost identical to the story we
8 The Babylonian God Ea was known to the Sumerians as Enki.

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hear of Noah in the book of Genesis. The Gilgamesh Epic even tells us how
Utnapishtim sent out various birds in attempt to find land, two of which were a dove
and a raven just as it was for Noah in the Old Testament.
As this narrative predates the transcription of the Hebrew Bible it is likely that
the authors and redactors of the Hebrew Bible had some knowledge of this already
well known story. There are also many other stories of great floods being inflicted
upon mankind by the gods that weren’t derived from the Gilgamesh Epic, for
example: the Sumerian Atrahasis Epic. In this epic we hear of the God Enlil who is
woken from his slumber by the noise of the humans. In his anger he sends a flood to
wipe them out, followed by a series of plagues. Atrahasis however, survives, as he was
instructed by the God Enki to build a boat.
Therefore it is evident that this flood narrative was not solely related to the
Hebrew Bible but was a part of many other cultures that also lived in Mesopotamia.
The question now of most importance is who influenced who? Even though
the Hebrew Bible was written many years after the oldest version of this epic, the
story of Noah could still potentially be older. One could still easily argue that the
story of Noah was originally simply transmitted via word of mouth before any of the
Ancient Babylonian narratives were written down and then later put into writing.
Alexander Heidel looks at his problem and attempts to uncover as to which narrative
is dependent on the other. Heidel argued that there are three possibilities:
1. “The Babylonians borrowed from the Hebrew account …
2. The Hebrew account is dependent on the Babylonian …
3. [or they] both [descend] from a common original” (Heidel 1949: 260).
Heidel recognized that the “most widely accepted explanation today is the second”
(Heidel 1949: 261). The first explanation is mainly rejected because “the earliest

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known tablets of the Babylonian legend are, upon any view of the date of the Book
of Genesis, considerably older than the biblical narrative” (Heidel 1949: 260-1).
However Heidel highlights the fact that “priority of publication does not necessarily
imply priority of existence” (Heidel 1949: 261). What Heidel means by this is that
just because the Babylonians may have written the account down before the Hebrews
this doesn’t necessarily mean that the narrative originated from them. As it stands
now there is more evidence in favour of the second explanation but the evidence does
not entirely overrule the possibility of the first and third explanation. Therefore one
could still argue that the Biblical flood narrative is the original account and that all
the other accounts are mere copies of the version that we can read today in Genesis 6
– 9. As it stands, current evidence as to who was influenced by who remains
inconclusive.
Archibald Henry Sayce however disagrees and felt that the whole idea of the
flood “takes us back to the alluvial plain of Babylonia” (Heidel 1949: 261) because
the rivers there often overflowed and flooded the surrounding plains. Sayce argued
that such a flood would not be possible in the mountainous landscape of the Old
Testament. Professor Driver takes this idea even further arguing that the “very
essence of the Biblical narrative presupposes a country liable, like Babylonia, to
inundation; so that it cannot be doubted that the story was ‘indigenous in
Babylonia, and transplanted to Palestine’” (Heidel 1949: 261). Hence Driver
believed that this story of the flood was simply adopted by the Hebrews and did not
originate from them.
Sayce and Driver’s theory however overlooked an important aspect of both the
Babylonian and Hebrew accounts of the flood. In the Epic of Gilgamesh, Utnapishtim

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tells Gilgamesh how the gods sent down a “rain of blight”9 and how he “watched the
appearance of the weather ... [which was] awesome to behold” (Pritchard 1958: 68).
The book of Genesis likewise tells us how God said to Noah that “seven days from
now I will send rain on the earth for forty days and forty nights, and I will wipe
from the face of the earth every living creature I have made” (Genesis 7: 4). Both of
these accounts tell us how it was rain that caused the great flood, the flood had
nothing to do with the countries geological features. With this in mind what both
Sayce and Driver tried to argue is far from certain as both of these accounts speak of
how the flood was sent from above.
This brings us back to the unsolved question as to who exactly was influenced
by whom. Heidel came to the conclusion that “the available evidence tells us nothing
beyond the point that there is a genetic relationship between Genesis and the
Babylonian versions” (1949: 268). What Heidel meant by this was that they share
similar structures, i.e. that God/the gods sent a flood to wipe out humanity but that
this is the only similarity, other than this they are in fact quite different.
As the evidence remains inconclusive I will now move on the compare the law
code of Hammurabi to the Mosaic Covenant Code that we find in Exodus.
The Law Code of King Hammurabi
King Hammurabi (1810 – 1750 BC) took to the throne after the death of his father
Sin-Muballit in 1792 BC and reigned for forty two years. He died in 1750 BC and was
succeeded by his son Samsu-Iluna. King Hammurabi is most famous for his law code
which he enforced and had inscribed on a stele known as the Stele of Hammurabi
9 “Shamash had set me for a stated time:
‘When he who orders unease at night,
Will shower down a rain of blight,
Board thou the ship and batten up the entrance!’” (Pritchard 1958: 68)

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(Fig. 4). At the top of the column the sculptor portrays Hammurabi sitting down
receiving the laws from the Babylonian sun god Shamash.
Already here we can see a similarity between the Hebrew account of how
Moses received the law and that of how Hammurabi received his law code. The book
of Exodus tells us how Moses received the law from God on Mount Sinai straight
from the mouth of God similar to how Hammurabi claimed to have acquired his law
code.
It is interesting that both belief systems argue that their law comes from an
external greater force. This makes the people think that their belief system and their
laws and customs are superior over the others. This however is not what I will be
focusing on so I will move on and look at three (of the 282) laws from the
Hammurabic law code and compare them to similar Mosaic laws. There are in fact
more than just three parallel laws but to compare each one of the many Hammurabic
and Mosaic legal customs would be far to detailed a task.
Harris pointed out that both the Mosaic and Hammurabic legal codes “employ
the casuistic form: If such and such happens, then such and such will be the
punishment” (Harris 2007: 52). These laws of retaliation are known as lex talionis.
This idea of retaliation was very important for the Jews; Harris highlights how the
lex talionis was so important for them that it was mentioned in three of the five
books of the Torah10. Leviticus 24: 19 – 20 is very interesting in relation to this essay,
as the law you find in this part of the Torah is as follows: “If anyone injures his
neighbour, whatever he has done must be done to him: fracture for fracture, eye for
eye, tooth for tooth. As he has injured the other, so he is to be injured”. This is clearly
a law of retaliation but this idea of justice was not unique to the Hebrew Bible, the
10 Examples of the lex talionis can also be found in:
o Exodus 21: 23 – 25,
o Leviticus 24: 19 – 21, and
o Deuteronomy 19: 21.
4

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Babylonians also had a very similar law code, even using the same examples as
Leviticus 24: “If a seignior [nobleman] has destroyed the eye of a member of the
aristocracy, they shall destroy his eye. If he has broken another’s seignior’s bone,
they shall break his bone. . . .If a seignior has knocked out the tooth of a seignior of
his own rank, they shall knock out his own tooth” (Code of Hammurabi, Sections
196, 197 and 20011).
There are two evidential correlations here; the first is that they both share the
same view on justice. Their ideas of justice centre on the idea that if you are harmed
unjustly by another then you have the legal right to do harm to he or she who has
harmed you. Harris explained that “in both the Mosaic and Hammurabic codes, the
lex talionis serves to limit the degree of vengeance to which a wronged party is
legally entitled” (Harris 2007: 54).
The second correlation is the fact that they both use the same examples, an
eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth and a fracture for fracture. Both the Hebrew and
Babylonian laws use identical examples.
Once again we are faced with the question of who came up with the law first.
The evidence is again in favour of the ancient Babylonians as the Stele of
Hammurabi predates that of the Torah. However, before I come to a final conclusion
as to the original source I will compare more of the legal codes to illustrate further
how the two law codes have many similarities.
The law we find in Exodus 21: 1612 states that if someone kidnaps another then
they should be sentenced to death. This is exactly as it is for the code of Hammurabi:
section 14 states that “if a citizen kidnaps and sells a member of another citizen’s
household into slavery, then the sentence is death” (Mendenhall 2001: 25). Again we
11 Harris 2007: 53.
12 "Anyone who kidnaps another and either sells him or still has him when he is caught must be put to death”

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see here that this law is casuistic and both cultures deem it as a high offence and
believed it merits the death penalty. This law also shows us that both cultures
practiced capital punishment, and is further evidence of a clear similarity between
the two laws codes. Therefore this could potentially have been a practice that the
Hebrew people inherited from the Babylonians.
Another correlation can be found when we compare section 209 of the
Hammurabic code to the Mosaic Covenant code in Exodus 21: 22, again we will see
another great similarity. The Hammurabic law is as follows: “if one citizen beats the
daughter of another and causes here to miscarry, then the fine is six ounces of
silver” (Mendenhall 2001: 25) in comparison to “If men who are fighting hit a
pregnant woman and she gives birth prematurely but there is no serious injury, the
offender must be fined whatever the woman's husband demands and the court
allows” (Exodus 21: 22). As we can see both accounts argue that a mere fine is a
justified punishment for this crime. Hence again, as in the other three examples the
punishment that each law code prescribes for each particular crime is the same.
There far more parallels between the two different law codes and I have only
highlighted a few of many. What this suggests is that the Hebrew people were
probably influenced in some way by the Babylonians as their legal systems are very
similar. Michael Berenbaum and Fred Skolnik acknowledged the fact that “many of
these laws are indebted directly or indirectly to laws found in earlier cuneiform
collections” (Berenbaum & Skolnik 2007: 67) that predate the Hebrew Bible. It is
difficult to try and defend the Hebrew Bible in the light of this evidence however
Berenbaum and Skolnik also highlights the fact that even though there are
similarities there are also many distinguishing features of the Mosaic Covenant Code
compared with their Babylonian neighbours: “Though the legal corpus of the Book of
the Covenant emerges as an integral component of ancient Near Eastern law, there

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are still striking differences to be observed which are due not only to the different
composition of the societies, but also to the relative set of values within each society”
(Berenbaum & Skolnik 2007: 67 – 68).
Berenbaum and Skolnik pointed out that even though it is evident that the
Mosaic Law adopted and utilised some of the laws of the culture within which they
were living they still remained a distinct group of people with their own culture and
beliefs, I will develop this point more fully in the nest chapter.
So far I have just examined three examples within the Torah that correlate
closely to Ancient Babylonian culture. The task now is to decipher what theological
problems this could produce. As I explained, many people of more than one belief
system use the Bible and view it as the Word of God. Having just presented very
similar and older Babylonian teachings the predate the Hebrew Bible I will now
move on to examine the potential theological issues that this could raise and how
people who use the Hebrew Bible can defend its authenticity in the light of this
archaeological evidence.

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CHAPTER III:
Potential theological issues
The archaeological findings of recent years could be potentially damaging for people
who use the Hebrew Bible, particularly Jews and Christians. As Christians regard the
New Testament as a fulfilment of the Old Testament these archaeological findings
present less of a theological problem for Christian believers as they do for Jews. I will
look at the viewpoint of two types of Jewish thinkers: the orthodox, conservative
Jewish thinkers who uphold the tradition that the Torah was written solely by the
Prophet Moses after God’s divine intervention on Mount Sinai and the liberal,
reformed Jewish thinkers who are less inclined to believe that the Torah was written
solely by Moses. I am aware that this is a very generalised distinction to make and
that many people of the Jewish faith may not agree with this distinction and may
regard themselves as occupying an intermediate stance between these two groups.
However for the sake of clarity I will have to refine my analysis of the Jewish
theological implications to these two camps. I will begin by looking at the problems
the examples I presented in chapter two could present for orthodox Jews and
whether or not these problems are rectifiable.
Orthodox Jews believe that the Hebrew Bible is the literal Word of God
written by Moses. Thus, for them the words we read in the Torah are the very words
that God uttered to his people. To claim that these words were written by someone
who wasn’t Moses is one thing but to then claim that the authors of the Hebrew Bible
were influenced by non Jewish thinkers is quite another. This would be very serious
for them as I see no way for them to defend their beliefs in the light of the evidence
that archaeologists have discovered in recent years. The problem also resides in the

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fact that orthodox Jews often disassociate themselves from gentiles and pagans
because they believe that they are unclean and not of God and are often portrayed as
the unrighteous in the Old Testament. What I have discussed in this essay thus far
seems to imply that the very people whom the Jews seek not to imitate and are set
apart from could be the ones who have had a considerable influence on the creation
of the books that lie at the centre of their religion.
Chief Rabbi Jonathan Sacks13 argued that we need to look at the time within
which the Bible was written and at whom it was against. Sacks argued that the
Mesopotamian flood narrative merely served the purpose of showing the immense
forces of nature and of the great wrath of the gods who didn’t like humans very
much, whereas the Biblical narrative retells the flood narrative arguing that it was
sent by God because of mankind’s immorality. In doing so Sacks argued that the
narrative becomes “moralised”. This, in Sacks’ view, is part of the Bibles programme,
to give a narrative that originally had no moral significance a moral centre, to take a
polytheistic idea and make it a monotheistic one that directs our minds towards a
single rational God instead of a pantheon of many gods.
This defence however would be one that a liberal Jewish thinker would
present as it is clear that in saying this Sacks has a accepted the fact that the Torah
was most probably written many years after the Prophet Moses met God on Mount
Sinai. What then, if at all, could an orthodox Jew say in order to justify his/her belief
that the Torah is distinct and original in spite of the arguments against this belief?
The only defence I can see that the orthodox Jews could argue in this situation is the
same argument that Heidel presented when analysing the Epic of Gilgamesh where
he argued that: “priority of publication does not necessarily imply priority of
13BBC Radio 4 Podcast: A History of the World in 100 Objects: Podcast 016 Flood Tablet, 8th February 2010. Check the Bibliography (page
43) for more details.

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existence” (Heidel 1949: 261). As I have said before, even though the evidence we
have today tells us that the Babylonian myths, epics and laws are older, this is not
proof that the ideas originated from them. An orthodox Jew could argue that even
though the evidence we have today in museums that the Babylonian narratives are
older does not serve as categorical proof that they are. There are multiple
possibilities; there could be older Jewish records of these myths, epics and laws that
are yet to be discovered by archaeologists or one could also argue that the narratives
belonged to the Jews but the Babylonians inherited them and wrote them down
before the Jewish people, in which case the ideas originated from them. This is
something we can’t overrule even if it may seem like an unlikely explanation. This is
the very problem with inconclusive evidence, that one can draw from it whatever
conclusion you desire.
From another perspective it could be argued that the more accounts of similar
events the better. The very fact that there are so many narratives of a great flood
could in fact strengthen the validity of the Bible as it shows that it is likely that there
was a great flood in the past, the only thing we have to do in this modern age is pick
which description seems to be most true. The very fact that there were many
accounts of this flood could work in favour of the Hebrew Bible instead of being in
opposition to it because it could be seen as evidence that the narrative wasn’t a mere
human fabrication. Of course as it stands now we don’t have any conclusive evidence
in order for us to say whether or not it was a myth, legend or an historical event but
the fact that there is more than one version of the same event works more in favour
for its validity and truth.
Heidel didn’t deny the considerable influence the Babylonians had on the
Jews. However he didn’t believe that this was a problem as Heidel argued that the
Jewish faith and culture was still very distinct and had many qualities that

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differentiated it from the Babylonian religions and culture. For example Heidel
argued that “the main Babylonian flood legend, in particular, is steeped in ...
polytheism” (Heidel 1949: 268), a pantheon of Mesopotamian gods of whom are
divided in their counsel. Heidel went further arguing that “in the Babylonian
accounts the moral or ethical motive is completely absent” (Heidel 1949: 268) as
opposed to the deluge we hear in Genesis which is unquestionably a moral
judgement. This ties in again with what Sacks argued. Heidel argued that there is a
mere genetic relationship between the two accounts, i.e. that the structure/skeleton
is the same but the “flesh and blood and, above all the animating spirit are
different” (Heidel 1949: 269). What Heidel meant by this metaphor was that they
share a similar format however the way in which the narrative is told and the
purpose behind the two different narratives is very different. Heidel came to the
conclusion that: “Irrespective of whether or not the Hebrew account is to some
degree dependant on the Babylonian material ... this piece of biblical literature was
‘written for our learning’ (Rom. 15: 4), in order to rouse the conscience of the world
and to give hope and comfort to the God-fearing” (Heidel 1949: 269). In other
words Heidel is arguing that it doesn’t matter whether or not the Hebrew account of
the flood was influenced by the Babylonian one, what is important is what this
version tells us of their God Yahweh (‫.)יהוה‬
If one looks at the Old Testament from this perspective then the examples
mentioned earlier don’t seem to pose as much of a threat to the validity of the Torah.
The Jews naturally believed their religion surpassed that of the Babylonians, so one
could argue that they intentionally took a narrative known to the Babylonians and
used it to demonstrate how their God was greater. It also could have been used to
demonstrate how monotheism is greater (in the eyes of the Hebrews) than
polytheism. Monotheism is a very important aspect of the Jewish faith and they are

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very opposed to polytheistic religious ideas. It could be argued that they took all
these Mesopotamian polytheistic ideas and gave them a monotheistic centre with a
greater moral meaning, presenting a stronger, more powerful, benevolent and
rational God as opposed to a pantheon of chaotic gods all acting in opposition to one
another.
The same can be argued about both accounts of creation. The Babylonian
account portrays humans as a nuisance to the gods, whereas the Hebrew account
speaks of a God who took the time to create humans and not only that but to create
them in his own likeness and image and even gave them dominion over all the other
creatures that God had created on Earth14. Rendtorff made a similar argument in
defence of the Hebrew Bible, like Heidel, Rendtorff didn’t deny the influence that the
surrounding cultures had on the Hebrew Bible, instead he argued that in the Hebrew
Bible “many elements of divergent cultural and religious backgrounds have been
brought together, and finally all of them have been incorporated into a wide and
complex image of the one sovereign God” (Perdue 2005: 313). It almost seems as if
Rendtorff is arguing that it is good that the Torah contains elements of other cultures
as these, he argues, have been brought together to direct our mind to the idea of a
God who is sovereign over all. Rendtorff develops this point further, he argues that
God “incorporates the ‘chaotic’ elements” (Perdue 2005: 313) into his design and
gives them structure and order. First God creates light and incorporates the chaotic
elements of darkness as a “counter-element” (Perdue 2005: 313), and gives it its
name: night15. God does the same with the waters which were originally “formless
and empty” (Genesis 1: 2), He gives it order, separating it from land and naming it
14 Genesis 1: 26: “Then God said, "Let us make man in our image, in our likeness, and let them rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of
the air, over the livestock, over all the earth, and over all the creatures that move along the ground".
15 Genesis 1: 5: “the darkness he called Night”.

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the sea16. Rendtorff argued that by doing this God effectively made the chaotic
elements an integral part of his creation.
One could take this idea of God’s incorporation of the chaotic elements into
his creation further. As I mentioned earlier the Babylonian account of creation tells
us of how the god Marduk overcame and defeated the goddess of chaos Tiamat.
However, here we see a God who not only has the power to overcome chaos but also
has the ability to give it order and make it an integral part of His creation. This could
have been a ploy used to demonstrate the supreme sovereignty of the Hebrew God in
comparison to the Babylonian as well as all the other Mesopotamian gods.
Furthermore Rendtorff points out that the “celestial bodies, sun, moon, and
stars” (Perdue 2005: 314) are hardly mentioned in Genesis and they are given very
limited functions. Rendtorff argued that the “sun and moon played an important
role in many religions in the Ancient Near East, and the Hebrew Bible is fully
aware of that” (Perdue 2005: 314) and that Genesis purposely treats these highly
esteemed celestial bodies like any other part of creation. Rendtorff called this
“demythologization” (Perdue 2005: 314), were we are divested of mythological and
legendary ideas in order to help us gain a greater understanding of a God who has a
much greater theological and moral purpose than any of the Babylonian gods.
As we are on the topic of the biblical creation narrative I think it is good to
mention at this point the fact that chapters one and two of the book of Genesis
contain two different accounts of creation. Does this mean that the Bible is
contradicting itself? Surely those who put the Bible together must have known this.
16 Genesis 1: 6 – 10: “And God said, "Let there be an expanse between the waters to separate water from water." So God made the
expanse and separated the water under the expanse from the water above it. And it was so. God called the expanse "sky." And there was
evening, and there was morning--the second day. And God said, "Let the water under the sky be gathered to one place, and let dry ground
appear." And it was so. God called the dry ground "land," and the gathered waters he called "seas." And God saw that it was good”

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Graf-Wellhausen17 came up with the theory that “the Torah is a literary patchwork
in which at least four originally separate documents and/or oral traditions ... have
been stitched together to form the present text” (Harris 2007: 89). This apparent
contradiction could well have been to show the reader that the account of creation
was not literal and that one should not take the word at face value but instead
uncover the message it intended to convey. Of course this goes against the idea that
Moses wrote the Pentateuch but it seems that in order to defend the Pentateuch’s
authenticity one must reject this theory. Of course I previously discussed ways in
which the orthodox Jews might defend themselves against such accusations but the
only credible defence it seems they could rely on is too weak, Moses may have written
a small portion of the Pentateuch but it is highly unlikely that he wrote the whole
thing.
The same can be argued for the story of Noah. Even though there may be
other accounts that seem to contradict it, one must not take the account at face value
and regard it as historical but instead look at the idea it was intended to convey,
which like Rabbi Jonathan Sacks argued, was a story with a moral centre as opposed
to the Babylonian account which was merely a story of the gods deciding to send a
flood due to the annoyance that mankind had caused them.
I now need to discuss the issue of the parallels between the Hammurabic and
Mosaic Law codes. This is indeed serious because the Law is of the height of
importance to the Jews and is purported to have been given to then directly from
God via the Prophet Moses and the entire Torah is dedicated to this divine law code.
Berenbaum and Skolnik defended the Mosaic Law code arguing that even though it
17 Julius Graf and Karl Heinrich Wellhausen introduced the four documentary hypotheses in order to try and explain the constant
repetitions, anachronisms and contradictions in the Torah. They held the view that Torah was composed of independent narratives that
were later joined by a series of redactors. In their studies they found that there were probably four different sources that contributed to
the Torah. Graf-Wellhausen assigned names to each source; the Yahwist source, the Elohist source, the Deuteronomist source, and the
Priestly source (Harris 2007: 86 – 95).

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did evidently contain aspects of the Hammurabic law code that it was still very
different. Berenbaum and Skolnik argued that the Hammurabic Law code (as well as
the other legal systems in ancient Mesopotamia) was merely created for economic
and functional reasons rather than moral ones; he also pointed out that all the
legislation in Mesopotamian countries was down to the monarch whom they believed
the gods had appointed to fulfil such a role. The Hebrew people however saw the law
“as the expression of the will of a single God, who is the sole source and sanction of
law, and all of life is ultimately bound up with this will” (Berenbaum & Skolnik
2007: 68), for Berenbaum and Skolnik this explains why the Mosaic Law code has
moral, cultural and ethical ordinances embedded within it, something which
differentiates their law codes to that of their Mesopotamian neighbours. The Mosaic
Law code is regarded by those of the Jewish faith as an instruction as to how one
should live your life in a morally justified way as opposed to a legal system which was
merely formulated to make sure society was just in its decisions and ran efficiently
and productively.
Harris also pointed out that “the Mosaic code introduces a more humane
element” (Harris 2007: 54). For example the Mosaic Law code recognizes the slave’s
humanity and even grants them freedom as compensation if they were unjustly
injured at all during their employment (Exodus 21: 26 – 2718). This is very different
to how slaves were viewed by other Mesopotamian cultures as they saw slaves as the
physical property of the owner who could do with them as he or she pleased. This
could be due to the fact that the Hebrew people themselves were captives in Babylon
18 "If a man hits a manservant or maidservant in the eye and destroys it, he must let the servant go free to compensate for the eye. And if
he knocks out the tooth of a manservant or maidservant, he must let the servant go free to compensate for the tooth”

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and slaves in Egypt, something they are constantly called to remember throughout
the Tanak19.
What is evident is that many biblical scholars hold the view that the Hebrew
Bible has utilised many aspects of Babylonian as well as many other cultures.
However the authors and redactors of the Hebrew Bible have not merely copied what
others have said, they have taken well known myths, traditions and laws and have
given them a moral core, they have effectively taken simple theological ideas and
turned them into more complex, intellectual ones. For this reason these
archaeological finding of recent years shouldn’t cause one to regard the Hebrew Bible
with sceptical eyes. There is a problem however for those who take what they read in
the Torah at face value, this is one thing that is clear after considering these
Babylonian paralleling narratives.
19 “you must not infringe the rights of the foreigner ... remember that you were once a slave in Egypt and that Yahweh your God redeemed
you from that. That I why I am giving you this order” Deuteronomy 24: 17 – 18.

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CHAPTER IV:
Conclusion
Of the many parallels between the Babylonian ideas and those we find in the Torah I
focused solely on three areas; their ideas of creation, the great deluge and their law
codes and I explained in chapter two how there were many correlations between the
two cultures. This raised many issues for religious people who use the Torah and
regard it as the direct word of God (Yahweh). It is clear that for orthodox Jews who
uphold a very traditional view of the Bible that these archaeological findings can be
very damaging and the evidence available is more in favour of the theory that the
ideas originated from the Babylonians. However, as I discussed earlier one could still
defend the Bible on the grounds that it was originally transmitted orally. This is a
weak defence, one which most, if not all scholars on the Old Testament would not
take. The general theory accepted today is that the authors and redactors of the
Hebrew Bible used the Babylonian sources but radically changed them. This is
evident when you look at both ideas of creation, it is very likely that the Hebrew Bible
utilised Babylonian ideas of the origin and cosmology of the universe, however the
Hebrew account of creation is very different to the Babylonian one. Again with the
famous flood epic, of which there are many accounts, we saw the Hebrew one (with
which the Prophet Noah is at its centre) is steeped in morality and the flood is
portrayed as the result of mankind’s immoral ways whereas the other flood accounts
don’t relate in any way to mankind’s wrongdoings but are instead the actions of a
pantheon of gods who are irrational and divided in their decisions. Carr arrived to a
similar conclusion. Carr looked at the whole of the Old Testament, not just the Torah,
and looked at all the parallels one can find there as well. Carr came to the conclusion

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that the authors and redactors of the Hebrew Bible “re-framed non-biblical
traditions in light of their particular values” furthermore Carr argued that “we see
ancient Israelite authors building freely on and yet radically adapting more ancient
literary traditions from elsewhere” (Carr 2010: 88).
Benjamin Foster however highlighted some philologists such as Hermann
Gunkel and Heinrich Zimmern (to name a few) who put forward the idea known as
“Pan-Babylonianism” (Hinnells 2009: 207). What they (as well as other philologists
whom Foster mentions) individually argued was that “Israel was essentially
Babylonian in origin” (Hinnells 2009: 207) and that all the ideas the Jews associated
with their faith essentially originate from the Babylonians. This view however is most
widely rejected.
Alternatively W. F. Albright argued that the Mesopotamian religions were a
mere preparation for the greater and more profound Judaic one which he then
argued was in preparation for Christianity (Hinnells 2009: 208).
What is clear then is that it is most likely (some would argue definitely) that
these Mesopotamian ideas were known to the authors of the Torah and the ideas
were used by them but radically transformed. The main differences we see between
the Hebrew Bible and the Mesopotamian religions are that the Hebrew accounts
have a moral and ethical meaning and that the God who is central to the Torah is a
monotheistic one as opposed to the Mesopotamian polytheist pantheon of gods.
These are two clear themes that the Torah contains and it is evident that these
polytheistic ideas that contained no moral or ethical significance whatsoever were
used and adjusted to communicate a new message: you must be moral and ethical in
your day to day life and you must love and serve the one God and reject all other
gods.

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George Mendenhall also analysed the parallels between Babylonian and
Hebrew religion and culture, the conclusion he came to is very different to the one I
have come to in this essay. He agreed that there were very close parallels between the
two cultures however he argued that there was hardly any contact between the
Babylonians and Hebrews until 586 BC, by which time the biblical narratives and
traditions were already well established. Instead Mendenhall argued that both
distinct cultures “independently inherited and preserved many elements of the
more-archaic Amorite culture” (Mendenhall 2001: 25). This is a very valid point and
one that cannot be overlooked in this essay. What this means is that it was not the
Babylonians who influenced the Jews but the older civilisations that also occupied
Mesopotamia such as the Amorites. This doesn’t however take away from the fact
that the material in the Hebrew Bible was borrowed and modified from non-Jewish
cultures; this point has not been called into question. However this doesn’t rule out
the possibility that the Jews inherited Babylonian ideas because we know that in 586
BC they were captives in Babylon and it is most likely that they inherited elements of
the Babylonian way of life.
What is clear thus far is that it was not only the Babylonians who had an
influence on the Hebrew Bible and that the Jews most likely utilised the
Mesopotamian ideas but radically changed them. These similarities are not however
only found in the Torah. As I mentioned earlier Carr analysed the whole of the Old
Testament and observed many correlation between biblical passages and texts from
other, non-Jewish cultures. For example Carr argued that the poetry that expresses
passionate love between the lover and the beloved found in Song of Songs
traditionally associated with King Solomon, which the Jews and Christian
traditionally see as God’s expressing his immense love for His people, is similar to
ancient Egyptian love poetry. Harris also observed connections between ancient

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Egyptian and Hebrew cosmology. In the ancient Egyptian city of Memphis there
developed the idea that the Egyptian god Ptah created the world merely by thinking
it into existence and “fashioning it by the power of his word” (Harris 2007: 60). This
idea of it being the Word of God that created the universe is also found in the Jewish
religion. Genesis also tells us how it was the Word (Logos / λόγος) of God that caused
creation.
Nicholas Wyatt looked at similar correlations to the Ugarit religions. He
focused on the “Ugaritian goddess Athirat, and her Israelite counterpart Asherah”
(Hinnells 2009: 154). Wyatt argued that this goddess was originally a consort of
Yahweh who then later evolved into the figure we hear of in the book of Wisdom
where Wisdom is personified as a woman. This is a very interesting and controversial
point because not only does it compare the Hebrew religion to a pagan one, as I have
also been doing, but Wyatt is also claiming that the Judaic religion was originally
polytheistic, like the religions of their Mesopotamian neighbours. This idea is not
peculiar to Wyatt either because we find in the Hebrew Bible many names for God
such as: Yahweh (‫,)יהוה‬ Adonái (‫,)יהוה‬ El Shaddai (‫אל‬ ‫,)שדי‬ and Elohim (‫יא‬‫ֹל‬‫ה‬ִ‫י‬‫א‬), to
name a few. Perhaps these could have been different gods who were later fused
together but this is a theory that I will not be examining further.
Carr also looked at the book Ecclesiastes (also known as Qohelet) and
observed in particular chapter 9 verses 7 – 9 where it reads: “Go, eat your food with
gladness, and drink your wine with a joyful heart, for it is now that God favours
what you do. Always be clothed in white, and always anoint your head with oil.
Enjoy life with your wife, whom you love, all the days of this meaningless life that
God has given you under the sun--all your meaningless days. For this is your lot in
life and in your toilsome labour under the sun”. Interestingly this idea of how one
should live their lives can also be found in the Epic of Gilgamesh that I referred to

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earlier. As we know King Gilgamesh was in search of immortality. During his quest
he encountered a bar maid by the name of Siduri. At his point of the Epic, Gilgamesh
feels dejected as his quest for immortality seems fruitless. Siduri however tries to
encourage him and urges him to enjoy each day, very similarly to what it says in
Ecclesiastes. The dialogue between Gilgamesh and Siduri is found on the tenth tablet
of the old Babylonian version of the epic, just before the tablet where we hear the
story of Utnapishtim and the great deluge. Siduri words are as such:
“Gilgamesh, whither rovest thou?
The life thou pursuest thou shalt not find.
When the gods created mankind,
Death for mankind they set aside,
Life in their own hands retaining.
Thou, Gilgamesh, let full be thy belly,
Make thou merry by day and by night.
Of each day make thou a feast of rejoicing,
Day and night dance thou and play!
Let thy garments be sparkling fresh,
Thy head be washed; bathe thou in water.
Pay heed to the little one that holds on to thy hand,
Let thy spouse delight in thy bosom!
For this is the task of [ mankind ] !” (Pritchard 1958: 64).
The similarities between the two texts is clear and Carr came to the conclusion that
the author of Ecclesiastes “drew on this part of the ancient epic of Gilgamesh” (Carr
2010: 76).

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What is clear then is that these parallels are not only peculiar to the
Pentateuch and that the influence of these ancient Mesopotamian texts can be found
elsewhere in the Hebrew Bible. Of course as I mentioned before this evidence merely
means that it is most probable that the authors and redactors of the Hebrew Bible
used these ideas when putting together their Bible however one can still reject the
evidence at hand and still argue that the ideas expressed in the Hebrew Bible are the
original ones and all the others stem from this. I however do not uphold this view,
the evidence that I have presented in this essay is, in my view, far to convincing to
still uphold this view. However as a practicing Christian myself this theory at first can
be shocking as it seems to imply that the Hebrew Bible is merely a retelling of older
stories that have been given a moral twist. Can one still argue that the Old Testament
is the word or message of God if it has a pagan source? My response to this having
considered all the evidence that I have examined is that it is. From a Christian
perspective I don’t believe that this should pose any threat, Christ himself used
examples and drew from the culture around him when using parables in order to
help his followers understand the deeper message of what he argued he was sent to
do. Theists often argue that God, or whatever name they use to refer to the creator(s)
of the world is beyond our human comprehension and that that to even try to
understand God and his ways is impossible. Saint Augustine of Hippo (354 – 430)
argued a similar case when trying to understand the Christian doctrine of the Trinity.
Whilst composing his treatise de Trinitate he came across a boy on the
Mediterranean shore that was scooping the water from the sea into his hands and
emptying it into a hole he had dug in the sand. When Augustine asked him what he
was trying to achieve the young boy replied that he was attempting to empty the
entire ocean into his small hole. This is obviously absurd and impossible, but the
more Augustine thought about it the more he could see himself as doing the same

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thing as this boy when trying to understand the very nature of God. This revelation
led Augustine to realise that our understanding of God is very limited and to try and
describe Him with our understanding is just the same as trying to empty an ocean
into a small, hand dug pit. Augustine came to the conclusion that “our knowledge of
God is accommodated to our capacity ... God is perfectly aware of the limitations
placed upon human nature – which after all, is itself a divine creation. Knowing
our limits ... God both discloses divine truths and enters into our world in forms
that are tempered to our limited abilities and competencies” (McGrath 2007: 244).
If we take this stance when analysing the Hebrew Bible then one could be able
to accept that the authors and redactors used narratives, laws and customs from the
cultures that surrounded them. Like Augustine’s example these narratives that
appear in Hebrew and Mesopotamian religions may have been tools used to help the
reader understand the message that they were intended to convey.
Therefore a Christian thinker could argue that God used these narratives that
we already have an understanding of in order to help us understand his will, and that
the authors, who were believed to have been divinely inspired by God, had to draw
from their surroundings in order to make sense of what they were trying to convey.
The importance then is not so much the historical accuracy of the Biblical accounts
but in the message it was written to communicate. I don’t for one second deny that
the Bible does contain some historical truths and I don’t argue that the entire book is
simply a collection of parables with meanings we need to decipher. For example the
accounts of the Jewish exile to Babylon and of their emancipation from Babylonian
rule after King Cyrus’s invasion of Babylon are historically accurate. The Bible then is
a book written for interpretation, this is why institutions such as the Roman Catholic
Church and the Church of England have a body of leaders and theologians whose job
it is to accurately interpret the word of God. Hence from a Christian view point this

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evidence should not shake their faith, they should know that with narratives such as
Noah and the great flood, what is important is not whether or not it actually
happened but the moral of the narrative. Of course there are some things that
Christian believers would have to take to be true, the Exodus of the Jews for example,
or the anointing of King David or (in the New Testament) Christ’s death and
resurrection. But the examples that I have looked at shouldn’t undermine Christian
thinking. The same applies to the covenant code in comparison to the law code of
Hammurabi because here we can see, as with the other examples, the Jews taking
something and radically changing it to convey a new and very different message.
But what about those of the Jewish faith? The topic of this essay is in some
sense of more importance for Jewish thinkers than Christian ones because the Jews
don’t have a New Testament. As before I feel there is a need to distinguish two types
of Jewish thinkers, an orthodox Jew and a liberal, reformed Jew. As I said earlier an
orthodox Jew could not agree that parts of the Hebrew Bible are actually Babylonian
(as well as many other Mesopotamian civilisations) in origin. For them their Bible is
the original and is the source. Of course the evidence we have today strongly suggests
otherwise however it doesn’t necessarily serve as proof. So an orthodox Jew could
argue that the Hebrew Bible is older and predates the Mesopotamian religions, even
though this viewpoint is mostly rejected nowadays. A liberal, reformed Jew however
can take a similar stance to that of the Christian. We saw earlier that Chief Jonathan
Rabbi Sacks, a Jewish religious leader even argued that you should look at the
meaning of the text and he himself agreed that narratives such as Noah and the great
flood were probably taken from older Mesopotamian sources.
Therefore what is clear is if you accept the theory that some of the ideas
expressed in the Hebrew Bible were drawn or influenced by other religions and
cultures, that this shouldn’t cause one to have a crisis of faith. They should know that

Jonathan Campbell
CAM09289758 Page 38
what is important is the message that the author of the Hebrew Bible intended to
communicate, in the words of Alexander Heidel:
“Irrespective of whether or not the Hebrew account is to some degree dependant on
Babylonian material ... this piece of biblical literature was ‘written for our learning’
(Rom. 15: 4), in order to rouse the conscience of the world and to give hope and
comfort to the God-fearing”
- Heidel 1949: 269

Jonathan Campbell
CAM09289758 Page 39
Appendix
Gallery of Images
iii iv
v
Fig. 3
Figure 3 (left)
The Epic of Gilgamesh
A photograph of the eleventh
tablet of the Epic of Gilgamesh
as it is displayed in the British
Museum in London, England. It
is on this tablet that George
Smith discovered the Babylonian
flood narrative that paralleled
with the narrative of Noah and
the great flood that we find in
the Genesis 6 – 9.
Fig. 4
Figure 4 (right)
The Stele of Hammurabi
This stele lists the 282 laws of King Hammurabi, many of
which correlate to the biblical covenant code that God
makes with the prophet Moses on Mount Sinai in the
book of Exodus. It is currently displayed in the Louvre
museum in Paris, France.
Figure 5 (left)
The Enuma Elish
This is a tablet that contains
part of the Babylonian
creation epic where we here
of how the gods created the
world out of a watery chaos
similar to how the Hebrews
believe that the world, prior
to creation was a formless
watery void.
Fig. 5
iii
This is a photograph from my own personal collection

Jonathan Campbell
CAM09289758 Page 40
vi
vii
Figure 6 (left, above)
The Bust of King Hammurabi
King Hammurabi, famous for the law
code that he established in ancient
Babylonia, was the sixth king of
Babylon. He reigned from 1792 BC to
1750 BC.
Figure 7 (left, below)
The Atrahasis Epic
On this cuneiform tablet we find a
narrative of a wise man called
Atrahasis who was instructed by Enki
to build an ark to survive a flood that
was to be sent by the enraged gods.
This story not only echoes the famous
deluge account in the Epic of
Gilgamesh but also the narrative we
can read in Genesis 6 – 9 where the
Prophet Noah does the same.
Figure 8 (below)
The Cyrus Cylinder
This cylinder is a record of all the
people King Cyrus freed from Babylon,
the Hebrew people being one of those.
It was during their time in Babylon
however that scholars believe they
started to write the Hebrew Bible.
Fig. 7
Fig. 6
Fig. 8
v
vii

Jonathan Campbell
CAM09289758 Page 41
viii
ix
Figure 10 (above)
Stone panel from the Palace of
Tiglath-Pileser III (744–727 BC).
This hybrid figure is a creature with
a birds head and human body.
Found in Tiglath-Pileser III’s palace.
The tree that it is tending too was
believed in Near Eastern lore to be
the tree of life that bore godlike
immortality to those who ate of its
fruit. This is similar to the Genesis
creation narrative where God plants
a tree of knowledge of good and evil
in the middle of the Garden of Eden
that is forbidden to eat.
Figure 9 (left):
The Colossal Winged Bull
This statue is an Assyrian figure that
was believed to provide magical
protection for king Sargon II’s
palace. This figure bears a
resemblance to the biblical
cherubim that God appointed to
protect the Garden of Eden. We also
hear of the cherubim in Ezekiel 1: 4
– 28 and 10: 1 – 22.
Fig. 9
ix
vii
Map 1
Fig. 10
This is a photograph from my own personal collection

Jonathan Campbell
CAM09289758 Page 42
Bibliography
Books
 The Holy Bible, NIV (New International Version) (all quotes taken from:
http://www.blueletterbible.org).
 World Mythology (Factopedia). (2011). Bath: Parragon Book Service Ltd.
 Berenbaum, M., Skolnik, F. (2007). Encyclopaedia Judaica, 2nd ed. Detroit:
Gale.
 Carr, D., M. (2010). An Introduction to the Old Testament – Sacred texts and
Imperial Contexts of the Hebrew Bible. Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell.
 Harris, S., L. (2007). Understanding the Bible, (7th edition). New York:
McGraw-Hill.
 Heidel, A. (1949). The Epic of Gilgamesh and Old Testament Parallels.
Chicago: The University of Chicago Press.
 Hinnells, J., R. (2009). The Penguin Handbook of Ancient Religions (Penguin
Reference Library). London: Penguin Publishing.
 McGrath, A., E. (2007) Christian Theology – An Introduction 4th Ed. Oxford:
Blackwell Publishing.
 Mendenhall, G., E. (2001) Ancient Israel’s Faith and History – An
Introduction to the Bible in Context, London: Westminster John Knox Press.
 Mitchell, T., C. (2004). The Bible in the British Museum: interpreting the
evidence. London: The British Museum Press.
 Perdue, L., G. (2005). The Blackwell Companion to the Hebrew Bible. Oxford:
Blackwell Publishing.
 Pritchard, J., B. (1958). The Ancient Near East: an anthology of texts and
pictures. London: Oxford University Press.

Jonathan Campbell
CAM09289758 Page 43
 Pritchard, J., B. (1958). Archaeology and the Old Testament. London: Oxford
University Press.
 Reeve, J., F. (2008). The British Museum – Visitor’s Guide: World Religions
– Self-Guided Tours. London: The British Museum Press.
 Wiltshire, K. (2005). Pocket Timeline of Ancient Mesopotamia. London: The
British Museum Press.
Podcasts
 BBC Radio 4 Podcast: A History of the World in 100 Objects: Podcast 016
Flood Tablet, 8th February 2010. Available on iTunes:
http://itunes.apple.com/gb/podcast/history-world-in-100-
objects/id351096296.
 Professor John Harris: The Epic of Gilgamesh Podcast, 21st July 2011.
Available on iTunes: http://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/epic-of-
gilgamesh/id419636166.
Websites
 Biblical quotes all taken from: http://www.blueletterbible.org.
 Information on King Hammurabi: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hammurabi.
Endnotes
Origin of all the art work used in this project.
i Fig 1: A stone carving of the legendary Mesopotamian King of Uruk: Gilgamesh.
Gilgamesh is most famous for his adventures in the Epic of Gilgamesh. This
particular stone cutting can be found in the Louvre, Paris. The image was obtained

Jonathan Campbell
CAM09289758 Page 44
from: http://www.livius.org/fa-fn/flood/flood3-t-gilgamesh.html on 24.03.12 at
00:00.
ii Fig. 2: This is Babylonian cuneiform tablet where one can find the Babylonia
creation epic. This particular tablet was found by an archaeologist in King
Ashurbanipal’s (reigned 669-631 BC) library and can be seen today in the British
Museum, London. (This is a photograph from my own personal collection).
iii Fig: 5: The Enuma Elish. The image was found on
http://www.darkstar1.co.uk/ASPM.html on 25.04.12 at 00:13.
iv Fig. 4: The Stele of Hammurabi. The image was found on
http://www.flashcardmachine.com/later-mesopot-andegyptianart.html on 26.03.12
at 15:23.
v Fig. 7: The Atrahasis Epic. The image was obtained from
http://www.livius.org/as-at/atrahasis/atrahasis.html on 17.04.12 at 10:27.
vi Fig 6: The Bust of King Hammurabi. The image was obtained from
http://fineartamerica.com/featured/hammurabi-d-1750-bc-granger.html on
04.04.12 at 12:15.
vii Fig. 8: The Cyrus Cylinder. The image was obtained from
http://www.livius.org/ba-bd/babylon/babylonia.html on 24.04.12 at 18:00.
viii Map: 1: Map of Ancient Mesopotamian – The Fertile Crescent. Babylon is located
on the banks of the Euphrates River. The image was obtained from
http://bftaxhelp.files.wordpress.com/2009/02/mesopotamia2.jpg on 25.04.12 at
01:01.
ix Fig 10: Stone panel from the Palace of Tiglath-Pileser III (744–727 BC). The
image obtained from
http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2181/2439470881_4b7e8ed05b.jpg on 25.04.12 at
00:32.

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