In
my previous email, There is a Limit to Evil Actions, I described “humans being like clouds of flies
swarming to do violent and evil things.” For the exiles from Judea
living in Babylon in the 6th and 5th centuries BCE, “swarming
like flies” had a special meaning. They were familiar with a famous
Babylonian myth called the Epic of Gilgamesh. It was
very popular and part of public celebrations that they would have seen
annually. The history of
the Babylonian story begins with five Sumerian poems dating from the Third
Dynasty of Ur (c. 2100 BCE).[i] It was being told three
hundred years before Abraham was born.
It
also contains a “Flood Story.” In this story, the flood happened
because the “council of gods” simply decided to destroy mankind for no
particular reason. They swore each other to secrecy and didn’t want people to
know what was going to happen. But Ea, the god who
made humans, warned a man from Shuruppak (a city on the Euphrates River).
Ea also gave the man specific instructions about how to build
an enormous boat, that was sealed with pitch.
When
the man finished the boat, animals, some people, and the man and his family entered
it. Suddenly, a mighty force was unleased. Winds
and water destroyed all life on earth. The gods were completely surprised by
what they saw and realized they had no power over it.
The gods
were frightened by the flood,
and retreated, ascending to the heaven of Anu.
The gods were cowering like dogs, crouching by the outer wall.
Ishtar shrieked like a woman in childbirth,
the sweet-voiced Mistress of the Gods wailed . . .
the gods humbly sat
weeping, sobbing with grief(?),
their lips burning, parched with thirst.
The
storm lasted for six days and seven nights. When it stopped a raven was sent
out and did not return. Then the man allowed the animals and people to leave
the boat. He also sacrificed a sheep.
The gods smelled the
savor,
the gods smelled the sweet savor,
and collected like flies over a (sheep) sacrifice.
Instead
of sharing the sacrifice, the gods swarmed like flies over it, eating
as much as each god could get. What did they do after flood? There were more arguments,
quarrels and mutual recriminations among the gods!
In the Bible story humans
acted like the Babylonian gods!
As
time passed, people lost the connection of Bible stories to this Babylonian
story, as well as others that are clearly hinted at in Bible stories. The Epic
of Gilgamesh is completely silent on the matter of why the gods decided to
cause the flood. The uncertainty about the moral aspects of the Great Flood
in the pagan myths is not accidental. Although the gods often encouraged
ethical behavior, it was not their exclusive or even primary interest. Their
primary interest was themselves.[ii]
The
Hebrew Bible leaves no doubt as to God’s motivation. He is not a remote deity,
inactive and ineffective. After creating the world, He did not remove Himself
from humanity and leave man to his own devices. This God Bible established a
universal moral standard through His actions -- the TOV Standard.
The highest values of the God in the Bible are related to the ways humans treat
other humans.
God expects all humans to
protect human lives,
preserve human lives,
make human lives more functional,
and increase the
quality of life for humans.
In
the Hebrew Bible, individual acts that do these things are called acts
of TZEDAQAH.
The
opposite of TOV (good) is RAH (evil) – acts that
destroy lives, harm lives, make lives less functional, and decrease the quality
of life. In the Bible’s Flood Story, the entire population of the earth became
like clouds of swarming flies doing evil to each other. The flood
happened because of what people were doing to each other.
God spotted acts
of TZEDAQAH Noah was doing.
That’s why God saved
him and his family.
Below
are two important lessons we learn from the Bible’s Flood Story:
Even though the society
was actively engaged in evil,
God continued to search
for anyone doing acts of TZEDAQAH.
An individual cannot
undermine the moral basis of society
without endangering the
very existence of civilization.
The
Flood in the Bible, at first appears to be divine retribution against the
entire society, but what appears to be collective retribution on the
part of God is, in the final analysis, really divine retribution
against each guilty individual. [iii]
Choose
Life by Doing Acts of TZEDAQAH,
Jim
Myers
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