... the origins of Judaism, some of which led,
eventually, to the origins of Christianity:

Disbelievers/doubters, seekers, and christians
should be enlightened regarding the nature of
the dependence on religion and worship, the
similarities to later-developed ideas of Judaism
and Christianity, and the wellspring of super-
stition from which many of the Old Testament
myths were derived from the fertile foundations
present in Mesopotamian cultures, as evidenced
via a wide range of religions, many similar to,
most prior to, and some coexistent with, the
spread of Judaism, a factor used as a leverage
point, along with many other factors, much later,
for the development and spread of Christianity:

- - -

Introduction
http://www.britannica.com/eb/article?eu=119916
Excerpt: "Beliefs and practices of the Sumerians
and Akkadians, and their successors, the Baby-
lonians and Assyrians, who inhabited ancient
Mesopotamia (modern Iraq) in the millennia before
the Christian era.

These religious beliefs and practices form a single
stream of tradition. Sumerian in origin, it was
added to and subtly modified by the Akkadians
(Semites who emigrated into Mesopotamia from
the west at the end of the 4th millennium BC),
whose own beliefs were in large measure assim-
ilated to, and integrated with, those of their new
environment.

... As the only available intellectual framework
that could provide a comprehensive understanding
of the forces governing existence and also guid-
ance for right conduct in life, religion ineluctably
conditioned all aspects of ancient Mesopotamian
civilization.

It yielded the forms in which that civilization's
social, economic, legal, political, and military
institutions were, and are, to be understood,
and it provided the significant symbols for
poetry and art.

In many ways it even influenced peoples and
cultures outside Mesopotamia, such as the
Elamites to the east, the Hurrians and Hittites
to the north, and the Aramaeans and Israelites
to the west.

- - -

Historical Development
http://www.britannica.com/eb/article?eu=119916&tocid=68259#68259.toc
Excerpt: "... a third stage, characterized by a growing
emphasis on personal religion involving concepts of
sin and forgiveness and by a change of the earlier
democratic divine polity into an absolute monarchical
structure dominated by the god of the national state
--to the point of pious abstention from all human
initiative, in absolute faith and reliance on divine
intervention--characterizes the 2nd and 1st millennia
BC. ..."

- - -

The Literary Legacy: Myth and Epic
http://www.britannica.com/eb/article?eu=119916&tocid=68262#68262.toc
Excerpt: "... Mesopotamian literature originated with
the Sumerians, whose earliest known written records
are from the middle of the 4th millennium BC. It
constitutes the oldest known literature in the world;
moreover, inner criteria indicate that a long oral-literary
tradition preceded, and probably coexisted with, the
setting down of its songs and stories in writing. ...

That praise is of the essence of hymns, for instance,
is shown by the fact that over and over again the
encomiast, the official praiser, whose task it was to
sing these hymns, closed with the standing phrase:
'O [the name of a deity or human hero], thy praise
is sweet.' ...

The lamentation genre was the province of a separate
professional, the elegist. It contained dirges for the
dying gods of the fertility cults and laments for temples
and cities that had been destroyed and desecrated.

The laments for temples--which, as far as is known,
go back no earlier than to the 3rd dynasty of Ur--were
used to recall the beauties of the lost temple as a kind
of inducement to persuade the god and the owner of
the temple to restore it.

Penitential psalms lament private illnesses and misfor-
tunes and seek to evoke the pity of the deity addressed
and thus to gain divine aid. ...

- - -

Myths
http://www.britannica.com/eb/article?eu=119916&tocid=68264#68264.toc
Excerpt: "... 'Inanna's Descent," relates how the god-
dess Inanna (Lady of the Date Clusters) set her heart
on ruling the netherworld and tried to depose her older
sister, the queen of the netherworld, Ereshkigal (Lady
of the Greater Earth).

Her attempt failed, and she was killed and changed into
a piece of rotting meat in the netherworld. It took all the
ingenuity of Enki (Lord of Sweet Waters in the Earth)
to bring Inanna back to life, and even then she was
released only on condition that she furnish a substitute
to take her place. ...

Most likely all of these myths have backgrounds in
fertility cults and concern the disappearance of nature's
fertility with the onset of the dry season or with the
underground storage of food. ...

Another Sumerian myth, the 'Eridu Genesis,' tells of the
creation of man and animals, of the building of the first
cities, and of the flood. ..."

- - -

Eridu Genesis
http://www.britannica.com/eb/article?eu=33472
"In Mesopotamian religious literature, ancient Sumerian
epic primarily concerned with the creation of the world,
the building of cities, and the flood.

According to the epic, after the universe was created
out of the primeval sea and the gods were given birth,
the deities in turn fashioned man from clay to cultivate
the ground, care for flocks, and perpetuate the worship
of the gods.

Cities were soon built and kingship was instituted on
Earth. For some reason, however, the gods determined
to destroy mankind with a flood. Enki (Akkadian Ea),
who did not agree with the decree, revealed it to
Ziusudra (Utnapishtim), a man well known for his
humility and obedience.

Ziusudra did as Enki commanded him and built a huge
boat, in which he successfully rode out the flood.

Afterward, he prostrated himself before the gods
An (Anu) and Enlil (Bel), and, as a reward for living
a godly life, Ziusudra was given immortality."

- - -

Gilgamesh
http://www.britannica.com/eb/article?eu=37553
Excerpt: "... The Gilgamesh of the poems and of the
epic tablets was probably the Gilgamesh who ruled
at Uruk in southern Mesopotamia sometime during
the first half of the 3rd millennium BC and who was
thus a contemporary of Agga, ruler of Kish; Gilgamesh
of Uruk was also mentioned in the Sumerian list of
kings as reigning after the flood. There is, however,
no historical evidence for the exploits narrated in
poems and epic. ..."

- - -

Middle Eastern Religion - Views of Man and Society
http://www.britannica.com/eb/article?eu=119914&tocid=68347#68347.toc
Excerpt: "The lack of hard-and-fast barriers between
gods and men left room for hybridizing. The aristo-
cracy, in particular, claimed some divine form of
ancestry.

Gilgamesh, a mortal king who ruled Uruk in Meso-
potamia, was, according to the Gilgamesh epic, born
of the goddess Ninsun, even as among the Greeks
Achilles was accepted as the son of the goddess
Thetis.

Sometimes kings claimed to have two divine parents.
King Keret, whose epic was found at Ugarit, claimed
to be the son of El, the head of the pantheon, and of
Asherah, El's wife.

Every Egyptian pharaoh was hailed as 'the son of Re'
(the sun god). This does not, however, imply the
absence of a human father. The concept was one of
paternity at two levels; qualitative superiority emanated
from the notion of divine paternity, but one's position
in society came from the human husband of one's
mother. ..."

- - -

Akkadian Literature and Myths
http://www.britannica.com/eb/article?eu=119916&tocid=68266#68266.toc
Excerpt: "... Also important is an Old Babylonian 'Myth
of Atrahasis,' which, in motif, shows a relationship with
the account of the creation of man to relieve the gods of
toil in the 'Enki and Ninmah' myth, and with a Sumerian
account of the Flood in the 'Eridu Genesis.'

The Atrahasis myth, however, treats these themes with
noticeable originality and remarkable depth. It relates,
first, how the gods originally had to toil for a living, how
they rebelled and went on strike, how Enki suggested
that one of their number--the god We, apparently the
ringleader who 'had the idea'--be killed and mankind
created from clay mixed with his flesh and blood, so
that the toil of the gods could be laid on man and the
gods left to go free.

But after Enki and the birth goddess Nintur (another
name for Ninmah) had created man, man multiplied
at such a rate that the din he made kept Enlil sleepless.

At first Enlil had Namtar, the god of death, cause a
plague to diminish mankind's numbers, but the wise
Atrahasis, at the advice of Enki, had man concentrate
all worship and offerings on Namtar.

Namtar, embarrassed at hurting people who showed
such love and affection for him, stayed his hand. Next
Enlil had Adad, the god of rains, hold back the rains
and thus cause a famine, but, because of the same
stratagem, Adad was embarrassed and released the
rains.

After this, Enlil planned a famine by divine group action
that would not be vulnerable as the earlier actions by
individual gods had been. Anu and Adad were to guard
the heavens, he himself earth, and Enki the waters under-
ground and the sea so that no gift of nature could come
through to man.

The ensuing famine was terrible. By the seventh year
one house consumed the other and people began eating
their own children. At that point Enki--accidentally he
maintained--let through a wealth of fish from the sea
and so saved man.

With this, however, Enlil's patience was at an end and
he thought of the Flood as a means to get rid of human-
ity once and for all. Enki, however, warned Atrahasis
and had him build a boat in which he saved himself, his
family, and all animals.

After the flood had abated and the ship was grounded,
Atrahasis sacrificed, and the hungry gods much
chastened, gathered around the offering. Only Enlil was
unrelenting until Enki upbraided him for killing innocent
and guilty alike and--there is a gap in the text--suggested
other means to keep human numbers down.

In consultation with the birth goddess Nintur, Enki
then developed a scheme of birth control by inventing
the barren woman, the demon Pashittu who kills
children at birth, and the various classes of priestesses
to whom giving birth was taboo.

The myth uses the motif of the protest of the gods
against their hard toil and the creation of man to
relieve it, which was depicted earlier in the Sumerian
myth of 'Enki and Ninmah,' and also the motif of
the Flood, which occurred in the 'Eridu Genesis.'

The import of these motifs here is, however, new:
they bring out the basic precariousness of man's
existence; man's usefulness to the gods will not
protect him unless he takes care not to annoy them,
however innocently. He must stay within bounds;
there are limits set for his self-expression. ...

- - -

Akkadian Literature - Epics
http://www.britannica.com/eb/article?eu=119916&tocid=68268#68268.toc
Excerpt: " ... The Akkadian Epic of Gilgamesh seems
to have been composed in Old Babylonian times ... The
Gilgamesh epic is perhaps the most moving work in an-
cient Mesopotamian literature, with its sharp contrast
of values: the warrior's disdain of death and danger,
which informs the early parts of the epic, and the haunt-
ing fear that drives Gilgamesh in the later parts.

Other Akkadian epics that deserve to be mentioned are
the Etana epic, which tells how Etana, the first king,
was carried up to heaven on the back of an eagle to ob-
tain the plant of birth so that his son could be born. ...
born. ...

Also important are the epic tales about Sargon of Akkad,
one of which, the birth legend, tells of his abandonment
in a casket on the river by his mother--much as the Bible
tells that Moses was abandoned--and his discovery by an
orchardman, who raised him as his son. ..."

- - -

Demons
http://www.britannica.com/eb/article?eu=119916&tocid=68271#68271.toc
Excerpt: "... Demons played little or no role in the
myths or lists of the Mesopotamian pantheon. Their
domain was that of incantations. Mostly, they were
depicted as outlaws; the demoness Lamashtu, for
instance, was hurled from heaven by her father An
because of her wickedness. The demons attacked
man by causing all kinds of diseases and were, as
a rule, viewed as wind and storm beings. ..."

- - -

Man: His Origin, Nature, and Destiny
http://www.britannica.com/eb/article?eu=119916&tocid=68272#68272.toc
Excerpt: "... Man's nature, then, is part clay (earthly)
and part god (divine). The divine aspect, however,
is not that of a living god but rather that of a slain,
powerless divinity.

The Atrahasis story relates that the etemmu (ghost)
of the slain god was left in man's flesh and thus
became part of man. It is this originally divine part
of man, his etemmu, that was believed to survive
at his death and to give him a shadowy afterlife in
the netherworld.

No other trace of a notion of divine essence in man
is discernible; in fact, man by himself was viewed as
being utterly powerless to act effectively or to suc-
ceed in anything. For anything he might wish to do
or achieve, man needed the help of a personal god
or goddess, some deity in the pantheon who for
one reason or other had taken an interest in him
and helped and protected him, for 'Without his
personal god a man eats not.'

About man's destiny all sources agree. However
man may have come into being, he was meant to
toil in order to provide food, clothing, housing,
and service for the gods, so that they, relieved
of all manual labour, could live the life of a gov-
erning upper class, a landed nobility. In the
scheme of existence man was thus never an
end, always just a means. ..."

- - -

Sacred Places
http://www.britannica.com/eb/article?eu=119916&tocid=68278#68278.toc
Excerpt: "... Mesopotamian worshipers might
worship in open-air sanctuaries, chapels in private
houses, or small separate chapels located in the
residential quarters of town, but the sacred place
par excellence was the temple.

Archaeology has traced the temple back to the
earliest periods of settlement, and though the
very early temple plans still pose many unsolved
problems, it is clear that from the Early Dynastic
period onward the temple was what the Sumerian
(e) and Akkadian (bitum) terms for it indicate; i.e.,
the temple was the god's house or dwelling. ...

The function of the temple, as of all of the other
sacred places in ancient Mesopotamia, was primarily
to ensure the god's presence and to provide a place
where he could be approached.

The providing of housing, food, and service for the
god achieved the first of these purposes. His presence
was also assured by a suitable embodiment--the cult
statue, and, for certain rites, the body of the ruler.

To achieve the second purpose, greeting gifts, praise
hymns as introduction to petitions, and other actions
were used to induce the god to receive the petitioner
and to listen to, and accept, his prayers. ..."

- - -

Magical Arts / Witchcraft
http://www.britannica.com/eb/article?eu=119916&tocid=68279#68279.toc
Excerpt: "In the ancient Mesopotamian view, gods
and humans shared one world. The gods lived
among men on their great estates (the temples),
ruled, upheld law and order for humans, and
fought their wars.

In general, knowing and carrying out the will of the
gods was not a matter for doubt: they wanted the
practice of their cult performed faultlessly and work
on their estates done willingly and well, and they
disapproved, in greater or lesser degree, of breaches
of the moral and legal order.

On occasion, however, humans might well be un-
certain: did a god want his temple rebuilt or did he
not? In all such cases and others like them, the
Mesopotamians sought direct answers from the
gods through divination, or, conversely, the gods
might take the initiative and convey specific wishes
through dreams, signs, or portents. ...

Witchcraft was apparently at all times considered
a crime punishable by death. Frequently, however,
it probably was difficult to identify the witch in
individual cases, or even to be sure that a given
evil was the result of witchcraft rather than of other
causes.

In such cases, the expert in white magic, the asipu
or masmasu, was able to help both in diagnosing
the cause of the evil and in performing the appro-
priate rituals and incantation to fight it off.

In earlier times the activities of the magicians seem
generally to have been directed against the lawless
demons who attacked humans and caused all kinds
of diseases.

In the later half of the 2nd, and all through the 1st
millennium, however, the fear of man-made evils
grew, and witchcraft vied with the demons as the
chief source of all ills. ...

- - -

Conclusion
http://www.britannica.com/eb/article?eu=119916&tocid=68281#68281.toc
"A religious development covering four millennia
such as one finds in ancient Mesopotamian religions
is obviously of interest in and of itself.

The tendencies that lead from a central concern with
salvation from famine to a concern with salvation
from attack, and finally to salvation from a sense
of personal guilt, with the attendant deepening and
enriching of the concept of the divine, invites close
study.

So also do the many moving and profound expres-
sions of religious faith in the hymns, laments, and
prayers of these religions.

As one of the earliest religious systems in history to
structure, and be itself structured by, the complexities
of a high civilization, Mesopotamian religions are of
significant interest to historians, historians of religion,
and theologians.

As a source from which religious insights, attitudes,
and problems flowed into all of Western tradition,
Mesopotamian religions are of lasting and great
interest beyond themselves."

- - -