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Babylonian Mythology
Paragons of Polytheism
The purpose of this essay is to compare and contrast Roman and Greek mythology with Babylonian mythology.
In his book The Portable Atheist: Essential Readings for the Non-Believer, Christopher Hitchens makes the following observation, "By all means let us agree that we are pattern-seeking mammals and that, ow-ing to our restless intelligence and inquisitiveness, we will still prefer a conspir-acy theory to no explanation at all. Religion was our first attempt at philosophy, just as alchemy was our first attempt at chemistry and astrology our first attempt to make sense of the movements of the heavens (12)."
Thusly, it should come as no surprise that when one juxtaposes different religions and/or mythologies within the objective framework of science (and/or anthropology and/or sociology) certain fundamental commonalities emerge. That is to say because humans are innately similar -- pattern seeking, restlessly intelligent, etc. -- we have throughout our history created religions and mythologies, or more crudely put "conspiracy theories," that are also innately similar in their scope and breadth. Roman and Greek mythology are really, at the macro-level, no different than Babylonian mythology. The difference between these mythologies only lies in their respective literal details, i.e. what God's are responsible for what phenomenon or physical reality.
To unpack this notion that the aforementioned mythologies are similar at the macro-level and different at the micro-level, it would be important for one to first examine the relationship between the structures of a society (government, language, law, etc.)...
In looking at Babylonian mythology it is clear that the polytheistic interpretation of the physical universe is the product of a decentralized and fractured society, a society of individuals who have shared creation myths, proto-scientific thoughts, and compelling narratives over the ages. This sharing of stories, thoughts and ideas over time served as a filtering process for the many myths that comprise what survived of Babylonian mythology. That is only the popular stories and, perhaps, the useful stories became imbedded into Babylonian culture while those stories that were deemed unpopular and/or useless were rejected. The evolution of these stories and myths happened organically and, as mentioned, gradually over time.
The same can be said for Roman and Greek Mythology. The myths were not originally codified by a governing body or a papacy; they evolved over time and were part of a long-standing, oral tradition before anyone ever wrote them down. One point of distinction should be made regarding the Romans, and that is that after the republic fell and Caesar took power the empire moved in the direction of an autocracy, not only in terms of government, but also in terms of religion. This shifted the roman people's focus from the Gods and the republic to a single, divinely endowed emperor. The result of this paradigm shift from plurality, in terms of government and religion, to singularity may help explain the burgeoning of the three monotheistic religions (Judaism had been around, but Christianity was conceived during this cultural transition).
So it's true that Babylonian mythology and…
Works Cited
Hitchens, Christopher. The Portable Atheist: Essential Readings for the Non-Believer.
New York: Da Capo Press, 2007. Print.
King, Leonard, W. Babylonian Religion and Mythology. New York: Nabu Press, 2010.
Print.
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