1. The Anunnaki and the Engineering of Man
What, then, emerges
from these texts concerning the creation of mankind, if one adopts
their “secular paradigm” of interpretation, and their assumption of
the existence of a hidden elite? Here the crucial tablet is the
8th tablet. The O’Briens begin by
noting that even in the book of Genesis there is a residue of the
Sumerian idea that mankind was created to be a worker-serf for the
gods, for he was created and placed in the Garden of Eden for the
purpose of tilling and keeping it.291 This is an
important point, for it implies that the account in Genesis chapter
two is a heavily edited text, since it omits crucial details of the
earlier cuneiform version, if indeed the cuneiform formed any sort
of basis for the Genesis account.
The O’Briens then
cite the relevant portion from the Kharsag tablets detailing the
creation of mankind (and note the differences in translational
style between them and Stephanie Dalley); Enki has the floor, and
is addressing the other “gods”:
“What are we accusing them of? Their work was very heavy, and caused them much distress [... ... ...] while Belet-ili, the creator of life, is present. Let her create a ‘lullu’ — a man, and let the man do the work, and carry the burden of the toil of the lordlings...“While Belet-ili,292 the creator of life, is here, let her create offspring, and when they become men, let them bear the toil of their lordlings.”They sent for Ma-mi, the creator of life, and told her: “You are the biological expert,293 the creatress of Mankind, we want you now to create a lullu so that he may undertake the tasks assigned by Enlil, and so relieve the toil of the lordlings.”In reply, the Lady of Creation said to the (Anunnaki), “It is not possible, for me to make these things on my own; Enki has the skills I need. As he can purify everything [or everybody], let him prepare the material that I need.”We now reach difficulties in the interpretation. The text continues by Enki proposing to make a purifying bath on three separate days, roughly a week apart in which he wishes all the lordlings to be dipped for cleansing. Then he requires that one lordling be slaughtered, and that Nintu should mix “clay” from his flesh and blood. The verbatim text is as follows.Enki opened his mouth
And addressed the great gods
“On the first, seventh, and fifteenth day of the month
I will make a purifying bath.
Let one god be slaughtered
So that all the gods may be cleansed in a dipping.
From his flesh and blood
Let Nintu mix clay,
That god and man
May be thoroughly mixed in the clay
[... ... ... ...].294
Thus, even on a
standard sort of “academic translation,” mankind emerges as two
things:
1. a creature deliberately created or invented for the specific function of being a laborer, a serf, for the “gods”; and,
2. a creature that is a chimera, a hybrid of two different creatures: (a) the gods, and (b) some presumably pre-existing terrestrial hominid.
But it is precisely
here, in this passage, that the O’Briens assert that the
translational “paradigm error” occurs to obscure what is really
taking place:
As with the translations of the early chapters of Genesis, something has gone wildly wrong! From what has preceded, the reader will appreciate that the great (Anunnaki) were not such ninnies, or such scoundrels, as to murder one of their own people and then require Ninlil to mix “clay” from his flesh and blood. Nor, later, to spit on the mixture in the hope of producing a hybrid from man and lordling! In any case, how does man take part in the hybridization?We are satisfied that the authors of Atra-Hasis have produced the best translation possible from the Akkadian text. The fault must have lain with the Akkadian scribes who misinterpreted the original texts. Now, the question is — can we, with the material supplied, provide a more realistic account?295
The fault in this one
instance, in other words, was not in the modern scholarly
translations, but rather in a mistranslation original to the
Akkadian, or, as one scholar of Sumerian grammar aptly quipped,
“One may say that we see Sumerian through an Akkadian glass
darkly.”296
So how do the
O’Briens apply their more secular approach to uncover what they
believe to have been an original scribal
mistranslation?
In the first place, the translation of the term ri-im-ka is suspect. The root word rimku does, indeed, mean “washing,” but need not imply a bath. The word can also mean “pouring out,” and in that context could be translated as “draught”; and it is more likely that all the lordlings would be given (blood) purifying draughts on the first, seventh, and fifteenth days of the month before one was chosen for the experiment, than that they would be given weekly baths.In the second place, it is not necessary to slaughter someone in order to obtain their purified blood. Thirdly, a mixture of flesh and blood does not make clay. But it could make what we, today, would call a culture. And out of the right kind of culture, it is possible to produce a hybrid of two individuals — it is now standard practice in the production of test-tube babies. Moreover, in the text that follows, the “clay” that Nintu mixed was placed into the wombs of foster mothers, who in due course produced the hybrid babies. What, then, was this clay that Nintu mixed?It was something which, when mixed with “spittle,” produced a culture which could be put into wombs to grow into embryos. The Akkadian term for spittle was ru-tu or ru-u-tu; and if this were, originally, loaned from the Sumerian, it could have meant a “conception escape.” And an escape of “semen” is almost indistinguishable from “spittle.”297The 8th Kharsag Tablet, Obverse298The 8th Kharsag Tablet, Reverse299
