SOURCE:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nVybMa6kXcI?si=PQzIDWDGvQ130u9O

The story of Noah's Ark first appeared between the 10th and 6th centuries BC in compositions that became part of the Jewish Torah and the Old Testament.

At least several hundreds of years before this account, scholars from the ancient Sumerian civilization authored a remarkably similar account of the flood.

In the Sumerian flood story, a hero builds an ark to preserve the species of the Earth from a great deluge that is sent by the gods. This tale appears in the epics of Atrahasis and Gilgamesh which are up to 1,000 years older bringing the veracity of the later biblical account into question.

The Sumerian civilization emerged from what is now called Iraq in 4,000 BC. Still, before the Jewish Noah, it was also known as Akad, Assyria, and Babylon based on various city-states that achieved dominance in the region.

The geographical region is most commonly referred to as Mesopotamia - between 3,500 BC and 3,000 BC the Sumerians developed what may be the oldest form of writing likely older than Egyptian hieroglyphs called the cuneiform script which they carved into clay tablets - it is on these tablets that they recorded their story of the deluge.

The Sumerians worshiped a diverse Pantheon of gods of which a supreme triad or trinity ruled over a myriad of lesser deities.

Anu was the supreme sky God, Enlil presided over the Earth, and Enki dwelt in the ocean below.

In the Sumerian flood story, these Gods sent the deluge to wipe out mankind.

The Gods warn the story's protagonist to build an ark and preserve the beasts of the wild he was called Ziusudra, Atrahasis, or Utanapishtim depending on the era.

Generally, the name changes reflect the evolving language of the region rather than changes to the story.

The story only changed significantly in the Old Testament version to reflect the beliefs and traditions of the Hebrew people. For example, one God instead of many (see the definition of the "Elohim".

The Sumerian account begins with the creation of mankind and follows the events that led to their destruction by the supreme triad of Gods in the deluge.

It is preserved in its most complete form in the Epic of Atrahasis but also appears in the Epic of Gilgamesh.

The Epic states that the gods lived on earth before the time of man the supreme triad had ordered the less powerful Gods to work the land maintain the temples and grow food. Eventually, these lesser deities rebelled and refused to do any more work.

The Supreme Triad was sympathetic and ordered the mother goddess Mammi (Ninmah) to create humans to do the work instead.

Humans were fashioned out of clay and to give them reason and an immortal soul, the intelligent young God Gesh-tue was sacrificed, and his blood was mixed with the clay.

Gesh-tue happened to be the leader of the rebels meaning the first humans shared his deceitful and pugnacious nature.

As the human population grew the Gods began to regret their decision - the noises made by the throngs of people disturbed the gods' sleep and the Earth God Enlil attempted to cull the population by sending plague, famine, and drought when his efforts failed, he sent the deluge to destroy mankind.

The other Gods pledged to keep Enil's plan a secret but the clever Enki decided to warn one of his followers.

Atrahasis was told to build a boat and to take onboard all living things. When the flood came, Atrahasis, his family, and the species of the earth survived. After 7 days, the boat came to rest on Mount Nimush and Atrahasis released a dove a swallow, and a raven to search for land.

The Gods recognized the imprudence of their actions for they were starving without humans to produce their food and when Atrahasis made them an offering, they swarmed to the scent. Atrahasis was blessed with immortality and settled far away from the next generation of humans on a remote island.

Enlil was angry with Ea or Enki for betraying his trust, but he soon realized Ea's wisdom. A new batch of humans was created with several deliberate flaws -

To control overpopulation, humans were made to suffer from stillbirth and infant mortality. Some women were also made to be priestesses or nuns who refrained from sexual activity and most importantly, the angel of death was unleashed drastically reducing the human lifespan.

This explanation for the evils of the world is an important and clever part of the Sumerian flood story because it solves the problem of evil inherent to more recent religions.

What follows are direct quotes from the stories of Atrahasis and Noah to illustrate their profound similarity these quotes come from the Epic of Atrahasis, the Epic of Gilgamesh, and the Old Testament.

ATRAHASIS: "The boat you will build her dimensions all shall be equal: her length and breadth shall be the same, cover her with a roof, like the ocean below. (Atrahasis speaking "Three myriads of pitch I poured in a furnace"

NOAH: "Make thee an ark of gopherwood; rooms shalt thou make in the ark, and shalt pitch it within and without with pitch. The length of the ark shall be 300 cubits, the breadth of it 50 cubits, and the height of it 30 cubits"

ATRAHASIS: "Take on board the boat all living things seed"

NOAH: "To keep seed alive upon the face of all the Earth"

ATRAHASIS: "I sent on board all my kith and kin, the beasts of the field, the creatures of the wild, and members of every skill and craft"

NOAH: "Thou shalt come into the ark, thou, and thy sons, and thy wife, and thy sons wives with thee. And of every living thing of all flesh two of every sort shalt thou bring into the ark"

ATRAHASIS: "For six days and seven nights there blew the wind, the downpour, the gale, the Deluge, it flattened the land.

NOAH: "And it came to pass after seven days, that the Waters of the flood were upon the earth. And the rain was upon the Earth forty days and forty nights"

ATRAHASIS: "It is I who give birth, these people are mine! And now like fish, they fill the ocean"

NOAH: "And, behold, I even I, do bring a flood of waters upon the Earth, to destroy all flesh, wherein is the breath of life, from under heaven; and everything that is in the Earth shall die"

ATRAHASIS: "On the mountain of Nimush the boat ran ground"

NOAH: "And the Ark rested in the seventh month on the 17th day of the month, upon the Mountains of Ararat"

ATRAHASIS: "I brought out a dove, I let it loose: off went the dove but then it returned, there was no place to land so it came back to me. I brought out a swallow [same result]. I brought out a raven it saw the waters receding, finding food, bowing and bobbing, but it did not come back to me"

NOAH: "He sent forth a raven, which went forth to and fro until the waters were dried up from off the Earth. Also, he sent forth a dove from him, to see if the waters were abated from off the face of the ground. But the dove found no rest for the soul of her foot [...] again he sent forth the dove out of the Ark [...] and lo, in her mouth was an olive leaf plucked off.

ATRAHASIS: "I brought out an offering, and to the four winds, made a sacrifice ."

NOAH: "Noah built an altar unto the Lord and took of every clean beast and every clean fowl and offered burnt offerings on the altar"

ATRAHASIS: "The gods did smell the savor sweet, the gods gathered round like flies around the man making sacrifice."

NOAH: "And the LORD smelled a sweet savor and the LORD said in his heart, I will not again curse the ground any more for man's sake"

ATRAHASIS: "He touched our foreheads, standing between us to bless us"

NOAH: "God blessed Noah and his sons"

ATRAHASIS: "You, birth goddess, creator of destinies, establish death for All Peoples."

NOAH: "My spirit shall not always strive with man for that he also is flesh: yet his days shall be 120 years."

Despite the striking similarity between the Sumerian and biblical flood myths, there are several small differences - details such as:

1. The reason for Mankind's destruction
2. The number of days the flood lasted
3. The name of the mountain
4. The types of birds sent from the ark and
5. The ark's dimensions, are all slightly different.

However, the major events are identical and in some places, the Noah authors appear to have lifted entire phrases from the Sumerian story.

Some of the differences between the stories appear to have been necessary to adapt it to the Jewish religion, for example, the Abrahamic God is omnipotent so he couldn't have starved without humans to provide for him although he still savored the sweet smell of the offering.

Other changes reflect different Notions of Heaven. For example, Atrahasis was blessed and granted immortality while Noah was blessed and allowed to live longer than his descendants before going to Heaven.

Furthermore, the Sumerian religion was polytheistic with the God that warned atrasis being different from the God that brought the Deluge. This aspect of the story could not be reproduced in the biblical version.

Genetic studies show that the Hebrew peoples originated in an area known as the fertile crescent which principally includes Mesopotamia as well as Northern Egypt, Syria, and Israel.

Indeed Abraham the proposed ancestor of all Jews was born in the Sumerian city of Ur, [/b]thus it is likely that the founders of Judaism were familiar with the specifics of the Sumerian religion including the story of Atrahasis.

It is common for religious stories and traditions to be borrowed from earlier accounts, for example, supernatural myths about Jesus [b]may have their origins in earlier beliefs about Osiris, Horus, Sol Invictus, Mithras, and Dionysus.

Likewise, it appears that the Hebrew people made the Epic of Atrahasis compatible with the beliefs and ideals of their religion.

Successful religions presumably do this because developing new myths would be less believable to populations that already have their own myths.

To survive and prosper, a new religion must borrow and modify rather than invent. It must show why the old myth actually means something different.

The Hebrew people would have been familiar with the story of the great flood and it would have been more credible to make a few alterations to the story than to claim there was no flood at all.

The similarities and necessary alterations to the Sumerian flood story that appear in the Bible version make it almost indisputable that the latter plagiarized the former, in other words, the Sumerian flood story is the original version of Noah's Ark and without the former, the latter may never have existed.

What are your thoughts?

Do you agree with the above information, that the story of the Great Flood was copied from the Epic of Atrahasis?

Later on in this thread, I will share with a translation of the Epic of Atrahasis so that you can read it for yourself.

Cheers!

Another Noah's Ark attack again. What a mad obsession.

Logically speaking, if the Noah's flood story was true, then there should be several extra biblical accounts proceeding the story.

Moses wrote full details regarding the flood that happened thousands of years before Moses himself was born. Several other civilizations before Moses, who have either witnessed the flood or had stories about the flood would definitely have their own similar records.

To confirm Moses' account, the stories are supposed to be similar but Moses stories should provide greater details and clarity.

Your submission does not invalidate the Moses account. It rather validates it.