Sin in the height of heaven is magnified.”[29]
4. Tammuz
There is a fascination about the life of Tammuz not experienced in the contemplation of the other gods of Babylonia. He seems to be presented to us just as though he were a man.
Our first paragraph may describe him as a resident of one of the ancient cities of southern Babylonia. The city of his residence was Eridu on the banks of the Euphrates. His official title is that of sun-god and his occupation is to care for the growth of plants. The name of his father was Ea, the lord of the city of Eridu, whose duties consisted in governing the waters of the river on whose shore the city rested. Tammuz had a mother, whose name was Davkina, the mistress of the vine. Tammuz also had a sister Belili whose calling was, like that of Tammuz her brother, the care of plant growth. Tammuz also had a bride, the famous and treacherous Ištar, the goddess of love, represented by the evening star; she was mistress of the neighbouring city of Erech, a little to the north-west, and on the other side of the Euphrates. The life of Tammuz at Eridu was romantic and his days ended in tragedy. There is a little poem, giving a picture of his home. There was a garden, a holy place, abundantly shaded with profuse leafage of trees whose roots went down deep into the waters over which Ea presided. His couch was hung under the rich foliage of the vine which his mother tended. There Tammuz dwelt and there was his shrine. His dwelling of foliage in his youthful days was symbolic of the domain in which the virtue of his power was to be exercised. His real home was in heaven, for from heaven the virtue of plant-growth proceeds with the heat of the sun. But his connection with heaven had been forgotten, except in reminiscence found in legend. In the legend of Adapa, for instance, we find a hint of it. Tammuz and his companion Gišzida are seen mounting up to heaven where they receive stations as door-keepers in the gate of Anu’s house; in heaven they properly belong.
The descent of Tammuz to the lower world implies that he died, but the accounts have not made a direct statement of how he died, or what was the cause of his death. Perhaps we may conceive of the event of his death as having taken place at Eridu before the service of lamentation had developed into a cult honored at the court of Sargon of Akkad, where a temple was built for Tammuz after northern Babylonia had gained the ascendency over southern Babylonia. The literal cause of his death was that he was not capable of making plant-growth a continuous process. The power of the heat of the sun as the summer advanced was superior to the virtue which Tammuz possessed over plant-life. The fierce heat of the summer caused vegetation to take a paler hue; then the germs of decay entered; slowly and surely the face of the land was assuming the same state that existed before the power of Tammuz appeared to quicken the blade of grass and the fruit-bud of the early spring. So Tammuz was banished to the lower world. Romantically his entrance to the abode of the dead was due to the hand which Ištar had in the events of his life. She had many lovers, and she betrayed them all. Her betrayal in the case of Tammuz consisted in not aiding him in her sphere as great mother in the production of life on earth. Had she supplemented his effort and made the earth continue to bear and bring forth, counteracting the effect of the deadly heat of the summer solstice and the destructive wind of the south, the gardens and the fruit orchards over whose productiveness Tammuz presided would have enjoyed perennial fruitage, and Gilgameš would never have had to take up the sad accusation against Ištar:
“Tammuz, the spouse of thy youth,
Thou compellest to weep year after year.”[30]
Also there had never gone up the song of lamentation:
“He went down to meet the nether world,
He has sated himself. Šamaš caused him to perish