Reading akkadian PRayeRs & Hymns An Introduction

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READING AKKADIAN PRAYERS AND HYMNS: AN INTRODUCTION
Sommerfeld, 364), thunderstorms (so Abusch, 544), or canal digging (so
Oshima). With the advent of Hammurabi in the early eighteenth century BCE and
the meteoric rise of Babylon as a political and cultural power, Marduk was elevated
to a position among the high gods of the pantheon. This is clearly evidenced
by the opening lines of the Code of Hammurabi as well as by Marduk’s
growing popularity as the theophoric element in personal names. 4 Although he
was not made the head of the pantheon in the OB period, Marduk’s prominence
was secured at this time and his cult spread to several other cities.
Marduk’s rise to the head of the pantheon is probably first officially recognized
during the reign of Nebuchadnezzar I (1125–1104 BCE), who unified post-
Kassite Babylonia and recovered Marduk’s statue from the Elamites, who had
carried it off a generation earlier. 5 Mythologically speaking, Marduk’s rise is
recounted in the Enūma eliš, which may date to this period (though the dating of
Enūma eliš continues to elicit debate). In this well-known myth the gods send
Marduk to defeat the raging Tiamat and her minions. As a reward for this heroic
exploit, the gods crown him king of the gods (see IV 28 and V 110). After Marduk
creates the cosmos and forms humanity, the gods build him a temple, Esagil,
and a ziggurat, Etemenanki, in Babylon. The myth concludes with a long section
in which the gods pronounce Marduk’s fifty names. The founding of Babylon in
this myth was clearly intended to replace the former central sanctuary of Mesopotamia,
Nippur, the seat of Enlil. Giving Marduk fifty names was a piece of
theological revisionism to position Marduk as the replacement of Enlil (whose
divine number was 50). 6
Throughout the first millennium, Marduk was honored as the chief god of
the Mesopotamian pantheon, even recognized as such by the Assyrians in their
royal inscriptions. This prominence was celebrated in an unparalleled manner
during the Neo-Babylonian empire and later employed politically by the Persians
to legitimize their conquest of Babylon in 539 BCE (see The Cyrus Cylinder 7 ).
Although the cult of Marduk suffered a major set back when Alexander failed to
rebuild Marduk’s destroyed temple complex, Marduk (Bel) was still revered in
the Hellenistic and Parthian periods.
4 Sommerfeld has shown that the use of Marduk as a theophoric element in personal names skyrocketed
between the early and late OB periods, so much so that he thinks it likely that nearly
every family had a member bearing a name formed on Marduk (“Marduk,” 364).
5 See W. G. Lambert, “The Reign of Nebuchadnezzar I: A Turning Point in the History of Ancient
Mesopotamian Religion,” in The Seed of Wisdom: Essays in Honour of T. J. Meeks (ed. Stewart
McCullough; Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1964), 3–13.
6 A similar attempt is probably attested in the god list AN = d Anum, where Marduk is given fifty
names (some of which are different from those in Enūma eliš). See Richard L. Litke, A Reconstruction
of the Assyro-Babylonian God-Lists, AN : d an-nu-um and AN : anu ša amēli (Texts from the
Babylonian Collection 3; New Haven: Yale Babylonian Collection, 1998), 89–95, esp. 89, note to
185, and Lambert, 4.
7 For an edition, see Hanspeter Schaudig, Die Inschriften Nabonids von Babylon und Kyros’ des
Großen samt den in ihrem Umfeld entstandenen Tendenzschriften: Textausgabe und Grammatik
(AOAT 256; Münster: Ugarit-Verlag, 2001), 550–56. For a translation, see COS 2.124:314–16.