Let Zu not come among the gods thy sons.”
In all this we cannot but be reminded of the pride and ambition of Lucifer, who said in his heart: “I will ascend into heaven, I will exalt my throne about the stars of God, I will be like the Most High”; of his overthrow by the archangel Michael; and of his punishment—perpetual exclusion from the companionship of the angels and saints, and from the beatific presence of God in heaven, and his condemnation for ever to hell, his abode of suffering for ever more.
We may here leave these legends, overwhelmed as they are with mythological fables, and with more satisfaction turn to other plainer words and more prosaic facts.
THE TOWER OF BABEL AND THE CONFUSION OF TONGUES.
One of the most striking events narrated by Moses is the attempt of the descendants of Noe to build a lofty tower at Babel; how the attempt displeased God, and how in his anger he confounded their speech, so that they could no longer understand one another. Thus their attempt was defeated, and they were scattered from that place abroad upon the face of all countries (Genesis xi. 1-9).
In none of the Greek writers who epitomize Berosus or make extracts from his History of Babylon do we find any intimation of, or reference to, this event. Berosus seems to have been entirely silent on it. For years nothing relating to it had come to light in all the searching of inscriptions of any kind. But lately Mr. George Smith, with his usual good fortune, has come across several small fragments of a tablet which evidently gave the whole history. The fragments are small, and the inscriptions brief and more mutilated than usual. But we catch the sense. The gods in heaven are angry because of the sin of men on earth—the place specially mentioned is Babylon; there a strong place or tower which men all the day are building. “To their strong place in the night God entirely made an end.” “In his anger” “he confounded their speech,” “their counsel was confused.” “He set his face to scatter them abroad.”
Even should no additional portions of this text be recovered,
these remarkable fragments will attest that the memory of the event narrated in Genesis was long preserved, as well it might be, at Babylon. It had its place in their national traditions. Should the full text be ever restored, it may likewise be seen that this is the very subject meant by those frequent representations seen on Babylonian cylinders, where men are depicted, after a very absurd and conventional style, busily employed in building some circular or cylindrical structure.
THE DELUGE.
We have inverted the Scriptural and chronological order of events in speaking of the Tower of Babel before treating of the Deluge. We did so, however, in order to be able to treat this latter important subject more at length. The Deluge was, as we have said, the subject of the fragmentary inscription the discovery of which led Mr. Smith into this special line of research. By singular good fortune this is the inscription which has been most fully recovered. Of the two hundred and ninety lines it contained, there is not one of which some words are not legible. By far the greater portions of the lines are perfect. This arises from the fact that in the library of Assurbanipal there were three copies, at least, of this legend, which seems to have been very popular. The lacunæ or missing portions of one it has been generally easy to supply or fill up from the recovered portions of the others. The inscription filled the eleventh tablet in a series of twelve, which Mr. Smith calls “The Legends of Izdubar.”