Re: All of creation in Six and Seven

Glen's speculations upon "six" and "seven" in a Semitic religious
context goes even deeper - to a Sumerian one.

The earliest cosmologies all saw the creation of the cosmos as a
result of a "hieros gamos" or sacred marriage, a balance between a
masculine and a feminine principle in which the offspring were
differentiated as a progression bringing the world into completion.

For instance we find in Sumerian the feminine Tiamat balanced with
the masculine Abzu as the primary divinities. Tiamat is in fact
an "Akkadianisation" of a Sumerian name *Ti = Life, *Ama = Mother.
Tiamat (the *-T was a feminine ending in Akkadian), thus is "The
mother of all living", a title in the Bible reserved for Hawah
(Eve). Tiamat is in fact found in the opening verses of
Genesis, "In the beginning God created heaven and earth and darkness
was on the face of the deeps". The word for Deeps, in Canaanite-
Hebrew was *Tehowm, which is derived from the earlier Sumerian
*Tiama.

*Abzu also is Sumerian, as it related to the "Watery Deeps" from the
Sumerian *A, or *Ab = Water, or Semen and *Zu = Deeps, far. The
Abzu was the name of the watery marshes which surrounded the hill on
which the world's first city was built. This city; Eridu, had a
temple contained within it, built upon a spring (or Abzu), vitally
important in an environment where the rainfall is less than 5 inches
annually. The whole temple was called the Abzu, and was sacred to
the Sumerian God Enki (more on him later), whose other name Ea was
Sumerian for "House of Water" from Sumerian *E = House, and *A =
water. It has been suggested that the Greek (and modern English
word) Abyss, comes from the Sumerian Abzu.

Tiamat was thus seen as the salty depths of the ocean, and Abzu as
the fresh underground waters. The Sumerians believed that these
waters met and mingled at the site where creation occurred. This
was supposedly the Sumerian homeland, Dilmun, an island located with
Bahrein. Bahrein, whose name to this day means "Twin Waters" gets
its name from the springs of the Arabian aquifer which come up
offshore, mingling fresh and salty water in a "sacred marriage"
together in the Persian Gulf.

The chief place where Fresh and Salt water met and mingled was where
the waters of the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers emptied into the
Persian Gulf, at the site of Eridu itself. It was here that the
rivers would drop their load of silt, creasing marshy islands. This
was the second generation of the Gods, brother and sister, known as
Lahm and Lahmu (words meaning "the hairy" or "the muddy one"). In
later Sumerian and Akkadian times, Lahm was the gate-keeper of the
temple of the Abzu.

The third generation of the Gods, were considered the children of
the Hiros Gamos of Lahm and his wife, they were Anshar and Kishar,
in otherwords, the direction "Up" and "Down". Anshar comes from the
Sumerian *An or *Anu = Sky and *Shar = Pivot, Axle. Anshar in fact
referred to the North Celestial Pole, the Sky Pivot around which all
stars in the Northern Hemisphere were seen to revolve. Kishar from
*Ki = Earth, was the South Celestial Pole, not visible in Sumeria,
believed to be below the horizon (seen here as down).

Again another Hieros Gamos was believed to occur between Up and Down
at the line of the Horizon. This "mating created their son and
daughter, the fourth generation of Gods, Anu, the Sky, and Ki, the
Earth. Although later generations of Sumerians portrayed these
beings as anthropomorphic, this was a later development. Originally
these were portrayed as not "God of the Sky" but quite simply "The
Sky". The Hieros Gamos between Anu and Ki created the Anunaki
(Sumerian for "Gods", literally "the heavens and the earth" of the
opening verses of Genesis).

The son and daughter of Anu and Ki, that separated the embrace of
his father and mother was Enlil and his sister-wife, Ninlil. Enlil
comes from the Sumerian *En = (mistranslated as) Lord, and *Lil =
Air. *Nin = Mistress, Lady. It was believed that Lord and Lady Air
pushed the sky up and the earth down (Separating the firmament of
the heavens above from that below as in Genesis again). Enlil was a
storm-God, associated with the stormy weather of the north-west.
Ninlil was the "South Wind" that blew dust-storms off the Arabian
desert (as in Iraq even today). This Southerly wind was disliked by
the Sumerians, such that it was believed that Ninlil was the queen
of sickness and curses, mother of Nergal - God of the plague and of
death. In Akkadian Ninlil became Lilitu, in Hebrew Lilith, the
queen of the night who brings nightmares (or wet dreams), known in
the book of Job as the screach-owl.

These fifth generation divinities were the chiefs and parents of the
sixth generation - the Igigi, Gods responsible to keep the creation
working effectively. This creation was specific to the place of
Eridu, the site from which the Sumerians believed "kingship
descended from heaven".

How this creation occurred is explained in a mythic cycle called
Enki and Ninhursag. Ninhursag whose name means "Lady of the
Mountain" from Sumerian Nin and *Hursag = Mountain, was one of the
many titles given to Ki, the Earth. The cycle tells of how Enki
fertilised the dry stony earth with his waters (i.e. Semen) to give
birth to Ninsar (Sumerian *Sar = Greenery, Garden). Ninhursag left,
and after another sacred marriage with Lady Greenery; Ninsar, a
third goddess, Ninkurra, (Sumerian *Kur = underground, *Ra = Flood)
was born. To Ninkurra, Enki fathered yet another daughter Utta, the
Spider, the weaver of patterns. When Utta too fell under Enki's
spell, she turned to Ninhursag for help and Ninhursag advised her to
take Enki's semen from her womb and plant it in the earth.
Immediately she did, and eight plants began to grow. Enki greedily
consumed the fruit of all eight, and he fell sick, in eight places
in his body. Ninhursag comes and nurses her wayward husband back to
health, through giving birth to seven gods responsible for healing
seven parts of his body. Finally sick in his side or rib (Sumeritan
*Ti = Rib, or Life, Ninhursag gives bith to Ninti (Lady Rib, or Lady
Life, who finally cures the God who had fallen ill by eating of the
sacred fruit of the tree of Life). Thus was Eve (Sumerian Ninti)
created from the Rib of the God of Water. It is interesting how Ea
of Mesopotamia became the Yah of Ebla, Ya'a of Ugarit, Yaw of the
Philistines, Yahu of the Jews of Elephanite and Yahweh of Israel.
In the retelling rather than being made from the rib of Ea/Yah, she
becomes made from a rib by Yah/Yahweh.

There is another very early Sumerian story of how these six
generations of Gods created the Sumerian Day of Rest, known as the
Sa-ba-ududa, from the Sumerian *sa = name, *ba = share, portion,
rations, or wages, *ududa = day of lying down. It tells how the
sixth generation of Gods went on strike, putting down their tools
and demanding to be let off the onerous job of keeping the Creation
Working, on the Sa-ba-ududa, the rest day in which workers were to
be paid their rations. This created a crisis for the greater
Anunaki who met in counsel to decide what should be done. Enki,
Lord Ea, the God of the Abzu, mixes the Red Earth with Blood to make
humankind, charged with the responsibility of keeping the creation
going.

Sumerian Sa-ba-ududa, in Akkadian became Sabbatu, the "Seventh" day,
or day of rest (the Biblical Sabbath). Thus the Semitic word for
seven actually has a Sumerian source. This sacred source of the day
of rest, entered the Bible as "the seventh day of creation", and
thus is the source of the number seven throughout the Middle East, a
wander-word which finishes up in Proto-Indo-European as the source
for the number seven.

Comments anyone?

Regards

John