Ancient Babylonian Religion in Jewish Babylonian Life of Late Antiquity: Continuities and Transformations

• In Event: Identities and Borders in Ancient Judaism

Abstract

Sporadic discussion has arisen over the last 30 years regarding the continuities of ancient Mesopotamian culture into Late Antiquity, spearheaded by Stephanie Dalley and Markham Geller. The approach has been to seek “cultural survivals,” features of ancient culture that persist in Classical and Late Antiquity, from the waning of cuneiform writing in Hellenistic times through Sassanian control. On the other hand, scholars of these periods, often in Jewish, Christian, Greco-Roman, or Iranian disciplines, will indicate ancient forebears of specific cultural items when they appear, pointing out their ancient origin. Little work has been done on bridging these perspectives in order to understand the largely polytheistic Babylonian culture through this time period in relation to its ancient heritage, even as it changed via Greek and Iranian contact and immigration. In fact, among scholars of ancient Judaism there is disagreement about the import and impact of polytheistic religion on rabbinic figures of the Babylonian Talmud. And, the areas in which scholars have begun investigating issues of cultural and religious interaction, including Elman, Secunda, and Mokhtarian, are primarily in regards to Sassanian Zoroastrianism.

This paper aims to frame this issue in greater agreement with Geoffrey Herman’s understanding of a more interconnected cultural and religious Babylonia in Late Antiquity. I address one specific feature of ancient Babylonian cultural heritage –understandings about the high gods, Bēl and Nabȗ – from multiple Jewish, Christian, and Gnostic perspectives. The use of evidence from non-polytheistic sources is required in lieu of direct textual sources, but also supplies interesting angles toward understanding Babylonian polytheists and their neighbors. After laying out what is known regarding Bēl and Nabȗ in Late Babylonian religion in Babylonia and the wider region, I present a passage from the Babylonian Talmud about major temples of the 3rd century CE across the ancient Near East and discuss a similar tradition that is found in the later Jewish and Mandean magical bowls, and within the Syriac Christian work, DOCTRINE OF ADDAI (5th-7th centuries CE). Through these comparisons, I achieve a better understanding of the relationships between Babylonian Jewry and polytheistic groups and ideas in Talmudic times.

Author

• David Danzig, New York University, Institute for the Study of the Ancient World