Reading akkadian PRayeRs & Hymns An Introduction Edited by Alan Lenzi Ancient Near East Monographs – Monografías sobre el Antiguo Cercano Oriente Society of Biblical Literature Centro de Estudios de Historia del Antiguo Oriente (UCA) Reading akkadian PRayeRs and Hymns http://avaxhome.ws/blogs/ChrisRedfield ancient near east monographs General Editors ehud Ben Zvi Roxana Flammini Editorial Board michael H. Floyd Jose galan erhard s. gerstenberger steven W. Holloway alan Lenzi martti nissinen santiago Rostom maderna graciela gestoso singer Juan manuel Tebes number 3 Reading akkadian PRayeRs and Hymns an introduction Reading akkadian PRayeRs and Hymns an introduction edited by alan Lenzi society of Biblical Literature atlanta Copyright © 2011 by the society of Biblical Literature all rights reserved. no part of this work may be reproduced or published in print form except with permission from the publisher. individuals are free to copy, distribute, and transmit the work in whole or in part by electronic means or by means of any informa- tion or retrieval system under the following conditions: (1) they must include with the work notice of ownership of the copyright by the society of Biblical Literature; (2) they may not use the work for commercial purposes; and (3) they may not alter, transform, or build upon the work. Requests for permission should be addressed in writing to the Rights and Permissions Office, society of Biblical Literature, 825 Houston mill Road, atlanta, ga 30329, Usa. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Reading akkadian prayers and hymns : an introduction / edited by alan Lenzi. p. cm. — (society of Biblical Literature ancient near east monographs ; v. 3) english and akkadian. includes bibliographical references and index. isBn 978-1-58983-595-5 (paper binding : alk. paper) — isBn 978-1-58983-596-2 (electronic format) 1. assyro-Babylonian religion — Prayers and devotions. 2. Hymns, akkadian. 3. akkadian language — Readers. i. Lenzi, alan. BL1620.a33 2011 299’.2—dc23 2011024929 Table of Contents Acknowledgments..............................................................................................................vii About This Book.................................................................................................................ix Abbreviations....................................................................................................................xix INTRODUCTION...................................................................................................................1 Prayers and Hymns from a Religious Studies Perspective................................................2 Prayers and Hymns in a General Mesopotamian Perspective..........................................8 An Introduction to Particular Classes of Mesopotamian Prayer ...................................23 Incantation-Prayers.....................................................................................................24 Shuillas....................................................................................................................24 Namburbis...............................................................................................................36 Dingirshadibbas.......................................................................................................40 Ershaḫungas................................................................................................................43 Ikribus.........................................................................................................................46 Tamitus and Other Queries......................................................................................... 49 Letter-Prayers (“Gottesbriefe”)....................................................................................53 Royal Prayers..............................................................................................................55 Hymns.........................................................................................................................56 The Comparative Use of Mesopotamian Prayers in Biblical Scholarship .....................61 OLD BABYLONIAN TEXTS................................................................................................69 Prayers of the Diviner An OB Prayer To the Gods of the Night .....................................................71 An OB Ikribu-Like Prayer to Shamash and Adad.....................................85 Others An OB Letter-Prayer to Ninmug................................................................105 An OB Royal Hymn to Ishtar.....................................................................111 STANDARD BABYLONIAN TEXTS..................................................................................131 Incantation-Prayers Ghosts of My Family 1 ................................................................................133 Girra 2............................................................................................................145 Gods of the Night 1 .....................................................................................157 Ishtar 24 ........................................................................................................169 Nusku 12 .......................................................................................................179 Salt..................................................................................................................189 Shamash 73...................................................................................................197 v Shuillas 𒌋𒁹𒁹 Anu 1 .............................................................................................................217 𒌋𒁹𒁹𒁹 Ea 1a ..............................................................................................................227 𒌋𒐼 Gula 1a ..........................................................................................................243 𒌋𒐊 Ishtar 2: “The Great Ishtar Prayer”...........................................................257 𒌋𒐋 Marduk 4.......................................................................................................291 𒌋𒐌 Marduk 2 .......................................................................................................313 𒌋𒐍 Nabu 1 ...........................................................................................................325 𒌋𒑆 Nergal 2.........................................................................................................339 𒌋𒌋 Nisaba 1.........................................................................................................351 𒌋𒌋𒁹 Shamash 1.....................................................................................................367 𒌋𒌋𒁹𒁹 Sin 1...............................................................................................................385 Namburbis 𒌋𒌋𒁹𒁹𒁹 Ea, Shamash, and Asalluḫi 1 .....................................................................403 𒌋𒌋𒐼 Shamash 25...................................................................................................421 Dingirshadibbas 𒌋𒌋𒐊 To Personal Deities......................................................................................431 Others 𒌋𒌋𒐋 An Ershaḫunga to Any God........................................................................447 𒌋𒌋𒐌 A Tamitu to Shamash and Adad ...............................................................465 𒌋𒌋𒐍 A NB Royal Prayer to Nabu .......................................................................475 𒌋𒌋𒑆 A Hymn to Marduk: Ludlul bēl nēmeqi I 1–40.........................................483 Contributors.....................................................................................................................503 Index................................................................................................................................505 vi Acknowledgments Several people deserve a word of thanks for their role in the production of this book. I first and foremost want to thank all of the contributors for signing on to this project and working hard to bring it to completion. Among the con- tributors, I especially wish to thank Christopher Frechette, Duane Smith, and Anna Zernecke. Christopher was a constant source of information, conversation, and encouragement. This book has greatly benefited from his sage advice and scholarly knowledge. Duane lent his programming expertise to the project, mak- ing the transformation of Unicode to cuneiform as painless as one could hope. He saved me many, many hours of tedious work. Anna graciously took on the review of biblical scholarship for the general introduction rather late in the pro- ject, allowing me extra time to focus on editorial tasks. That section is no doubt the better for her having written it. I also wish to extend my heartfelt apprecia- tion to several people, including some of the above, who read drafts of my con- tributions to this volume and offered their suggestions and critical feedback: Tzvi Abusch, Jeffrey Cooley, Christopher Frechette, Eugene McGarry, Seth Sand- ers, Duane Smith, and Niek Veldhuis. When I did not follow their suggestions, I did so only after much deliberation, in full knowledge that I alone must take responsibility for my work. Monica Schutzman and the Interlibrary Loan staff at the University of the Pacific were a tremendous support throughout the duration of this project. Getting obscure Assyriological works into the Central Valley is their speciality. Leigh Andersen from the Society of Biblical Literature editorial staff was a patient guide as I laid out the complicated pages of this volume. And finally, I wish to thank my family for allowing me to work ridiculous hours every day of the week during the final months of this project. They are always a source of comfort, joy, and diversion. Alan Lenzi Stockton, CA March 18, 2011 vii About This Book ALAN LENZI This book is a pedagogical tool intended to increase reading fluency for sec- ond or third semester Akkadian students by way of annotated readings. It is equally an introduction to Akkadian prayers and hymns from ancient Mesopo- tamia: selected classes, their vocabulary and phraseology, and to some extent their ritual uses. Finally, the introductory material in this book exposes readers to theoretical and critical perspectives that will be useful in the study of other ancient religious texts. More advanced students of Akkadian may therefore find something profitable here as well. The idea for this book was inspired by tools developed in Biblical and Clas- sical Studies in which lexical and grammatical help is printed on the same page as the ancient text to be read.1 This arrangement cuts out the time-consuming process of looking up words and allows the intermediate student to cement their basic grammatical knowledge and expand their vocabulary through extensive reading. There is currently nothing like this available for Akkadian. As many students will attest, academic books are often quite expensive, tak- ing important tools out of the reach of economically-challenged students and/or those who may be without access to a well-stocked academic research library. It is gratifying therefore to make this volume available free of charge through the SBL’s electronic open-access Ancient Near East Monograph series. If the reader finds this tool useful, please feel free to share it with others. Because prayers and hymns—but especially prayers—display stereotyped forms and utilize a manageable core of vocabulary, selecting texts from this body of material seemed a perfect choice for this kind of book. But selecting prayers and hymns also serves educational interests beyond Akkadian fluency for the book’s targeted audiences. For Assyriological students, learning the forms and vocabulary of prayers and hymns as well as something about the addressees 1 See, e.g., Peter Jones, Reading Ovid: Stories from the Metamorphoses (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007); Ehud Ben Zvi, Maxine Hancock, and Richard A. Beinert, Readings in Biblical Hebrew: An Intermediate Textbook (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1993); and Richard J. Goodrich and David Diewert, A Summer Greek Reader: A Workbook for Maintaining Your Biblical Greek (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2001). ix