The Seven Tablets of Creation: The Enuma Elish

This is an afterword in which King seeks to explain the influence Near Eastern ancient religious belief and practices had on the Jewish faith and, through the Hebrew Bible, upon modern-day religious believers. He writes, “Not known to many, the religions of the Ancient Near East had left big influences on our world” (217). King asserts:

The discovery and publication of ancient Near Eastern literature has shed much light upon the religious beliefs and practices of earliest civilizations. It has also generated much discussion about the relationship of Mesopotamian and Egyptian religion to that of the Old Testament. Indeed many scholars view the similarities […] as proof that the Old Testament writers borrowed from or adapted the literary corpus of Israel’s Near Eastern neighbors. As a result, Old Testament religion is treated as essentially one more primitive religion among many, although slightly more advanced in the evolutionary stage of development (217).

King disputes this idea, saying, “This article will summarize the primary features of ancient Near Eastern religion, contrast them with the Old Testament, and offer another explanation for the similarities between the biblical and non-biblical religions” (219).

To demonstrate the distinctions between Judaism and ancient Near East faiths, King first points out that the Jews alone were monotheistic.