Leviathan
Zspider
at least once as a sea serpent. The other Bible references seem
sorta ambiguous to me. I'm interested in the stories Leviathan
occurs in and any underlying symbolism.
Thanks, Michael Robison
Romauld
: Is Leviathan specific to the Bible? The Bible refers to Leviathan
: at least once as a sea serpent. The other Bible references seem
: sorta ambiguous to me. I'm interested in the stories Leviathan
: occurs in and any underlying symbolism.
----------------> Epic of Gilgamesh. And so on.
~R
--
Romauld - romauld at necrotheque dot dcu
"I'm a very dangerous man when I don't know what I'm doing!"
- The Doctor (wearing Tom Baker's body)
Chris Siren
>Recently, a script from Zspider arrived, in which they said:
>
>: Is Leviathan specific to the Bible? The Bible refers to Leviathan
>: at least once as a sea serpent. The other Bible references seem
>: sorta ambiguous to me. I'm interested in the stories Leviathan
>: occurs in and any underlying symbolism.
>
>----------------> Epic of Gilgamesh. And so on.
>
>~R
>
>
>
She's not in the Epic of Gilgamesh.
Neither are any of her analogs.
Ltn (Lotan), is however in the Ugaritic texts of Ras Sharmah
- the Canaanite myth cycle. Lotan/Leviathan appears as one
of the followers (or possibly another name of) Yam - the
Canaanite god of sea and rivers, who is destroyed by Baal in
a seasonal myth cycle.
She is somewhat analogous to the Babylonian mother/ocean/chaos
goddess/dragon Tiamat - which is about as close to Gilgamesh
as she gets - unless you make the leap that Samuel Noah Kramer
does and declare Kur (the underworld) to also be a similar
creature, in which case Enki fights Kur in one of the episodic
Gilgamesh fragments - not in the Epic.
Tiamat, you'll have encountered in the Enuma Elish - the
Babylonian Epic of Creation.
Leviathan pops up in company with Behemoth - (whose
Arabic analog is Bahamut) and is somewhat similar to the
other great Biblical beast - Rahab
Chris Siren
Romauld
: She is somewhat analogous to the Babylonian mother/ocean/chaos
: goddess/dragon Tiamat - which is about as close to Gilgamesh
: as she gets - unless you make the leap that Samuel Noah Kramer
: does and declare Kur (the underworld) to also be a similar
: creature, in which case Enki fights Kur in one of the episodic
: Gilgamesh fragments - not in the Epic.
:
: Tiamat, you'll have encountered in the Enuma Elish - the
: Babylonian Epic of Creation.
damn, sorry; yes, Enuma Elish. Wrong Babylonian.
But Tiamat was the reference I was making. thanks,
Larry Caldwell
> Ltn (Lotan), is however in the Ugaritic texts of Ras Sharmah
> - the Canaanite myth cycle. Lotan/Leviathan appears as one
> of the followers (or possibly another name of) Yam - the
> Canaanite god of sea and rivers, who is destroyed by Baal in
> a seasonal myth cycle.
Interesting. I had always dismissed Leviathan as a sailor's tale. There
were certainly some big beasties in the sea in early historic times.
Nile crocodiles grew to immense sizes and swam the entire eastern
Mediterranean. Its range extended into southern Canaan. A big male
could reach 6 meters in length, pretty spooky if you were in a bronze age
boat.
There was also the occasional pod of whales, though it is pretty clear
that ancient writers distinguished between whales and Leviathan.