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Egypt
• Nile: World’s longest river
• Herodotus: Egypt=“gift of the Nile”
• Overflowed on regular, annual basis:– Fertile land– Sense of order
• Egypt protected by desert & sea
• From about 3100 BCE, for 3000 yrs.
Mesopotamia
• Tigris and Euphrates Rivers—Fertile Crescent
• Mesopotamia=“the land between the two rivers”
• Overflow unpredictable– Sense of instability
• Exposed plains– Open to invasion
Mesopotamia
• Beginning with Sumer, about 3500 BCE
• First cities: Uruk, Ur, Kish, Nippur, Lagash
• Unlike Egypt, Mesopotamia was a series of civilizations
Hebrews
• Tribal people who migrated from Fertile Crescent to Canaan (Israel) after 2000 BCE
• After 1700 BCE migrated to Egypt, and enslaved
• Around 1300 BCE returned to Canaan (the “Exodus”)
Egypt: God & Creation
• At beginning of time, Nile produced mound of silt and sun god emerged from it
• this sun god (Amon, Re, Aten) gave birth to the other gods (19)
• Amon gives ankh (“life”)
Egypt: God & Creation
• Akhentaten’s Reform (30): monotheism
• The power of the sun’s rays: in 1.17 the rays end in hands
• marked by a change in the visual arts, movement toward realism
Mesopotamia: God & Creation
• Man created through violence & strife
• Apsu (sweet waters) and Tiamat (bitter waters) give birth to Lahmu and Lahamu (Note: As in Egypt, silt precipitates)
• Anshar and Kishar (horizon of sky and earth) give birth to Anu (god of sky) who gives birth to Ea (wisdom).
Mesopotamia: God & Creation
• Tiamat prepares for war.• Marduk is Supreme Commader to fight
Tiamat (bitter waters). • Upon slaying Tiamat, Marduk splits open
Tiamat’s body to make sky and earth. • Marduk makes man as a work of
“cosummate art” for the “faithful service” of the gods.
Hebrews: God & Creation
• Supreme Creator, who existed before the physical world, with ethical charge (47): ethical monotheism (48)
Genesis
• Genesis 1: God created “man” last. God created “man” male and female: put them over the earth to subdue/master it.
• Genesis 2: God creates man first (out of the soil), then the garden, the animals, then the woman.
Egypt: Isis & Osiris
• Isis—Osiris Set (Osiris’ evil brother): chopped Osiris into pieces and threw in Nile
• Isis: puts Osiris back together again and brings him back to life
• Horus: revenge on Set—becomes ruler of Egypt
Myth of Isis & Osiris
• Pharaohs associated with Horus, the avenging son of Isis & Osiris
• The myth supported a belief in resurrection of the dead—not only for the pharaoh but for commoners as well
Mesopotamia: Epic of Gilgamesh
• Gilgamesh, 2/3 god and 1/3 man, has lost his best friend Enkidu.
• Gilgamesh is heartbroken, and he also fears his own death, so goes on a journey to his father Utnapishtim, who has eternal life, to see if he can gain it too.
Epic of Gilgamesh (2)
• First he needs to seek out the permission of Man-Scorpion to pass through the mountain
• He hangs out with Siduri, maker of wine, for a while, then eventually reaches Utnapishtim, who informs Gilgamesh that all is impermanent.
Epic of Gilgamesh (3)
• Gilgamesh asks Utnapishtim how he got everlasting life, and Utnapishtim relates the story of the flood and how he managed to survive and save mankind.
• Gilgamesh goes with Urshanabi the Ferryman to check out the plant that brings everlasting youth, but in the end a serpent snatches it away.
Hebrews: Morality & Afterlife
• Ten commandments: the consequences for bad behavior are not in an afterlife but in this life and in future generations—see 49; See also Jeremiah on 51.
• “eye for eye, tooth for tooth” (49)
• responsibility to enemies (49)
Egypt: Gov/Society
• Union of Upper and Lower Egypt shown on Palette of Narmer (22-23).
• Narmer was the first pharaoh. Pharaoh: “great house”
• Theocracy: pharaoh ruled in the name of the sun god
• Pharaoh identified with Horus and symbolized by the falcon
Egypt: Gov/Society
• Land was sacred: ruled by the pharaohs in the name of the gods—worked by the peasants and slaves.
• System: theocratic socialism: harvest shared by community
Egypt: Gov/Society
• Authority went from the pharaoh to the husband of the pharaoh’s daughter—thus sometimes sons would marry their sisters in order to get the thrown. (Property passed through women)
Egypt: Social Structure
• Pharaoh
• Vizier: top bureaucratic official
• Merchants traders, builders, scribes (middle class)
• Peasants
• Slaves: unfree: captured enemies, criminals, debtors
Hebrews: Gov/Society
• after 2000 BCE : Abraham: covenant: “I will be your God; you will be my people”
• Chosen People
• Abraham, Isaac, Jacob (aka Israel=“soldier of God”)
Hebrews
• After 1700 BCE: into Egypt
• C. 1300 BCE Moses leads out of Egypt to Canaan, but Canaan is occupied
• Samuel, Saul, and David battle the Canaanites; David conquers them
Hebrews: Gov/Society
• 960-920 BCE—Solomon establishes Jerusalem, builds a temple for the Ark of the Covenant (50)
• Israel divided North and South– North: Israel– South: Judah
Babylonian Captivity
• Nebuchadnezza invades Jerusalem, takes Hebrews (Jews) into captivity in Babylon (586-538 BCE)
• Book of Job probablywritten during this time
Hebrews
• 538 BCE: return from captivity
• Jews later ruled by Persians, Greeks, and—after a short independence—by the Romans
• 70 CE: Temple destroyed again, this time by Romans after Jewish revolt
• 1948 CE: state of Israel established