The Babylonian Conception of Heaven and Hell/Food and Water of Life in the Babylonian Paradise
Food of Life and Water of Life in the Babylonian Paradise.
The epic fragments discovered at Tell el Amarna relate how Adapa was summoned before the throne of Anu, god of heaven, to answer for a deed of violence committed against the bird Zu, i.e., the incarnation of the South wind. Anu's wrath being appeased he commanded a feast to be prepared for Adapa and festal raiment and oil for anointing to be given him. Garments and oil he accepted, but meat and drink he refused, for Ea had warned him: "When thou comest into the presence of Anu food of death will be offered thee, eat not thereof! Water of death will be offered thee, drink not thereof!" But lo! it was indeed food of life and water of life! Anu was filled with amazement. He had purposed that the man to whom his creator had revealed the inmost things of heaven and earth (i.e., had bestowed on him the highest wisdom) should receive also the gift of immortality. By his refusal Adapa had defrauded himself of this gift. Therefore Anu commanded, "Take him and bring him back to his earth."
In this narrative food of life and water of life are supposed to be in the palace of the god of heaven. This also is a similar conception to that of Olympus and the Elysian Fields, for among the Greeks the source of the Olympian nectar and ambrosia was to be sought in the Paradise on the Western Ocean. Food of life and water of life were found also in the Babylonian Paradise "at the mouth of the rivers," in Eridu and on the Island of the Blessed. We have already told how Gilgamesh obtained healing by means of the water of the fountain of life and of the magic food on the Island of the Blessed, and how he found the magic plant of immortality. Obviously also, the divine baker and cup-bearer has not, in the mind of the narrator, to do with common food and drink, but with the Babylonian equivalents of nectar and ambrosia. The plant of life also, is occasionally mentioned elsewhere. "Delicate as the plant of life may his royal shepherdhood be," says the Assyrian king Rammanirari III., and Asarhaddon expresses the wish "that his royal rule may be favourable to the well-being of mankind, as is the plant of life." Frequent mention is made of the water of life, especially in the worship of Ea and Marduk, and the story of Adapa shows that this water was used for drinking and not merely for sprinkling and lustration. In the "Journey of Istar through Hades" express mention is made of drinking the water of life at the despatching of Uddushunamir, the messenger of the gods:
in mourning garb clothed, with hair (?) dishevelled.
Samas stepped before Sin, his father, wee[ping],
before Ea the king his tears to pour forth:
Istar has gone down into the Underworld and has not returned thence."
After he has told how all generation on earth has been suspended because of this journey in Hades, it continues :
created Uddushunamir, the servant of the gods;
"Hail! Uddushunamir, turn thy face to the gate of the land without return,
the seven gates of the land without return, may they open before thee,
may Erishkigal see thee and welcome thee joyfully.
When her heart shall be calmed and her spirit cheered,
then conjure her in the name of the great gods.
Raise thou thy heads high, turn thy thoughts to the place of the spring (?), (and say):
"Hail! lady, may the spring (?) give me of its waters, thereof will I drink."'"
Later, indeed, when the desire of the messenger has perforce been granted, the goddess of Hades says to her servant Namtar, "Sprinkle the goddess Istar with the water of life and send her away."
According to the exorcisms "holy water" was to be found "at the mouth of the rivers," i.e., at the entrance to the Island of the Blessed on the shores of which was also the fountain of healing. The Euphrates and Tigris themselves were considered as sacred streams at the sources of which, as an historical inscription testifies, sacrifices were offered, and on the banks of which ceremonial ablutions were performed. Ea and his son Marduk were the lords of the water of life. At Ea's command the Underworld was forced to reveal its spring of the water of life, and elsewhere we read: " Go, my son Marduk, take the . . . one . . . fetch water from the mouth of the two streams, into this water put thy pure spell, and consecrate it with thy pure spell, sprinkle [with the same water] man, the child of his god." Another passage runs: " Pure water [. . .], water of the Euphrates, that in the [. . .] place, water that is well hidden in the ocean, the pure mouth of Ea has purified it, the sons of the deep, the seven, they have made the water pure, clear and sparkling." According to a ritual text edited for the Assyrian royal worship the priest, clad in linen of Eridu, meets the king on the threshold of the "house of purification" and greets him in words that recall the blessing of Aaron!
Damkina, queen of the deep, illumine thee with her countenance,
Marduk, the mighty overseer of the Igigi (heavenly spirits), exalt thy head."
Then the priest continued: "Their deeds endure on earth who take the holy message of Ea for their guide; the great gods of heaven come to his side, in the great sanctuaries of heaven and earth they come to his side; those chambers are pure and shining; in Ea's clear and shining water bathe the Anunaki, the great gods themselves purify their faces in it." Side by side with Ea, his son Marduk has command of the sacred water. In his temple was a holy fountain and frequent mention is made of Marduk's "vessel of purification," and of the "vessel of the decree of fate." This water may well have been represented at the great festival of the decree of fate, and it may be assumed that the vessel on wall sculptures and seal cylinders carried by winged genii to the tree of life represents the vessel of the water of life, and the fruit of the tree the corresponding food of life.