The Enuma Elish Osiris

Two understand how the gods influenced our hero, Gilgamesh, one must first look at the various ways the gods meddled into his life. The Epic of Gilgamesh is a tale of a half-mortal man whose quest to break his own boredom turns into a tale of friendship, immortality, and kingship. However, his tale would not have been able to happen if it was not for the influence of the various Sumerian deities. After the people of Uruk complained to the gods about Gilgamesh’s child-like behavior, the goddess Aruru creates the man that will become Gilgamesh’s closest friend, Enkidu. Enkidu was created as an equal to the king so that Gilgamesh would have a way to occupy his time. Unfortunately, after the two friends defeated the giant Humbaba, a terrible demon creature, the god Enlil becomes enraged, but despite Enlil’s best effort, he is unable to punish the two.

To begin the comparison of the two myths, one must look at both the similarities and the differences. To write the myth both poets need help from the Gods, however, the Gods just appear to Hesiod, thus making the Gods in control and the Gods are asked to help by Ovid, thus putting

In Greek and Egyptian mythologies, there is a supreme God. In Greek tradition this was Zeus, “Zeus was now King of all the gods and lived on Mount Olympus.” (Corsar, Reid Rooney, and Smith 9) In Egyptian mythology, this position was first held by Osiris, and the other deities herald him by saying “He lives, the King of Upper and Lower Egypt, beloved of Ra, living forever! Heir of Geb, Osiris, beloved of the gods, Osiris, given life, endurance, joy, health, all happiness, like Ra!” (Kaster 81) After being murdered by Set, he became ruler of the Netherworld, and was replaced as King of Upper and Lower Egypt, by his son, Horus. The idea of a supreme deity is common in both Greek and Egyptian traditions.

Though there are many differences between the Hebrew God and middle-eastern beliefs of the divine, Gilgamesh also depicts some similarities. Sumerian gods respond to prayers from the Uruk citizens that Gilgamesh is an unjust ruler by creating Enkidu, the

The Enuma Elish is a Babylonian creation story comprised of seven tablets. It was thought to be used during celebrations and ceremonies in 12th century B.C. The story focuses on many Gods, primarily Tiamat and Marduk. The title, Enuma Elish means “when on high” in old Babylonian.

Almost every culture on earth has a creation myth. Most if not all of these myths borrow from the core theme of a God-centered creation as contained in the book of Genesis chapter one. According to Van Over (11), a good number of these creation stories show a similarity in the point of their origin. Rumor has it that some of these myths have emanated from actual historical occurrences or events. All creation myths emerge from one ancient source and only diverge when it comes to their timing and the surrounding cultural circumstances. The variations in the myths come as a result of the differences in time and cultural circumstances. Aside from the two causes of variation, in general all creation myths show a basic outline and they also share some basic elements.

The story mainly focuses on the character Gilgamesh and this wild man created by the gods, Enkidu in which Gilgamesh and Enkidu later become good friends. Together they go upon quests to defeat

In the typical life of an Egyptian citizen, one was constantly being influenced by their gods and goddesses because of his or her belief in a polytheistic religion. The gods and goddesses were believed to have power over the forces and elements over nature, and myths about them explained the connection they had between their

Mythology is the study of the language used to express experiences with and understandings of the “absolute reality.” There are four main functions that make up and are the foundation of mythology: Each of these functions plays a major role in categorizing the ideas and characters in their respective groups or section. To name these four functions there is the Mystical function which is also known as the sacred or universal function. The next function is the cosmological function or metaphor (character) function. Then comes the social or profane (personal function) which is one of the main functions that is involved in the idea of mythology. The last of the four functions is the pedagogical function or the moral function of

The most popular creation myth, in present day is the “one god” myth. It existed yet, had a brief life and it was in the minority. Here Ptah was the closest thing to monotheism that the ancients had. This is a popular theme in Memphite theology, but it was present in parts of Egypt. Ptah supposedly had all that is manifest in thought and then created them with his Word (Baines, 1991). It is also said that the “one god” is and the other god names are used to personify an extension of the “one god” (Ancient Egyptian Religion pg. 2 and 3). Ptah creates the Ennead with thought and word. This monotheism was not very widespread and it did not last long.

Looking back, we can see glimpses of the lives of those who lived in the Ancient Near East, known as the ANE, through their stories and myths that have survived over centuries of time. Many of these stories contain unique elements that make each one personal to the civilization that they belong to, but there are common themes and ideas that are virtually shared between the traditional stories stemming from this region of the world. In fact, these parallels even extend into Old Testament literature; laced within the stories that we’ve come to know and love. It is not surprising that the Old Testament contains similarities found within ANE tradition, seeing that

The first story is a tale named Gilgamesh, which is about a man named Gilgamesh or also know in Uruk as king. Gilgamesh was no ordinary man; he was two-thirds god and one-third man. Even though Gilgamesh was not only beautiful and strong, but behind the king's doors he was raping women that were either married or locked eyes on each other or overworking his servants, and

Most creation myths are mostly stories about the creation of the world. Also a lot of these creation stories are engraved and written within the paramids making them “Pyramid Texts.” Lastly, These Myths involves some type of god or gods that created the earth and what it is today. These two are similar to Enuma Elish because they both have something to do with the creation of the world and how the world has come to be as we know it.

Immortality, monstrosity, infamy, catastrophe, might, and courage are all aspects of the epic legends of Beowulf and Gilgamesh. Though they subsisted in two utterly different historical eras, these epic heroes have numerous similarities and differences. For example, while they were booth deemed epic heroes, their mortalities were not equal. Beowulf had superhuman qualities such as having the strength of thirty men, but was born a mortal man. On the contrary, Gilgamesh was a demigod as he was born two-thirds god and one-third human by Ninsun, the goddess of dreams and cows. This is only one of the various instances of similarities and differences of these two epic idols.

The first books of Gilgamesh establish the leader as a brave and proud warrior, highlighting his triumph over external struggles. Gilgamesh begins the epic a tyrannical leader, a man of such great strength and sexual prowess that he challenges the gods. His people are miserable, as they are forced to be subjected to Gilgamesh raping their women and dominating over them politically and through brute force in various physical exhibitions of strength he arranges. The gods create Enkidu to challenge Gilgamesh, but Gilgamesh even bests Enkidu in his most impressive physical feat to date.