Gilgamesh, He's complicated and oh so human!
Gilgamesh was the first hero epic ever written. He was a tyrant, he was a rapist, he was brash and people hated him so much that they prayed to the God's for deliverance. Sounds like an anti-hero, by today's standards, right? Especially when one considers that the king was the one they looked to for how one was to act. He was everything wrong with what a king was supposed to be.
Modern day hero's are firefighters, champions of the people, standing up for what is right and facing danger and possibly death. What the Gods send to Gilgamesh, is Enkidu. A beast man, who stands up to Gilgamesh in trying to stop his misdeeds. Enkidu has a lot of the traits that we consider heroic today. Enkidu has Gilgamesh's strength, compassion, and a sense of what is right. The duality of the story is that the beast man helps to tame Gilgamesh, while Enkidu becomes less beastly.
The Epic of Gilgamesh has everything. Adventure, love and friendship, tragedy, the elixir for eternal life, irony, and redemption. While by our standards, Gilgamesh was not very heroic, for ancient peoples: he was strong, he wrestled and killed Gods, he brought prosperity from the cedar forests, he tamed nature and himself. He was bigger than the obstacles and uncertainties that nature threw at them.
When the duo kill the Bull of Heaven, the Gods punish them by giving Enkidu a slow and deadly disease. This devastates Gilgamesh to the point he wont bury Enkidu and waits for life to return until a maggot falls out. Here is where we see the beginning of the redemption of Gilgamesh. The once strong king, who laughed at death, is now terrified of it. He becomes timid and goes on a journey to get eternal life. He learns humility, persuasion and receives and loses the elixir of eternal life.
The culmination is what he brings back from his journey. Gilgamesh learns there was a flood that wiped out almost the whole population, but the Gods agree to never wipe out humans again. What the journey teaches him is that while he will not live forever, what he passes down to the inhabitants of the city will live forever. Not a reprieve from death, and yet all these years later, we read his story. Gilgamesh will live as long as humankind is here to read his story.
In Ancient days, the Gods lashed out and followed their own whims. Loyalty to a certain God did not mean you were safe. The same as it was with nature and the whims of the river and floods.
This is actually one of my favorite stories, perhaps because of the many dualities throughout the story. It shows a lot of sophistication and spotlights what was the Mesopotamian ideal, to be happy with life for life's sake. You have food, clothes, family and of course, beer! Many years later, the quote will change to eat, drink, and be merry. To me, Gilgamesh was very human. He gave into his wants and as he matured, with the help of a good friend, he learned the things that have real value.
Modern day hero's are firefighters, champions of the people, standing up for what is right and facing danger and possibly death. What the Gods send to Gilgamesh, is Enkidu. A beast man, who stands up to Gilgamesh in trying to stop his misdeeds. Enkidu has a lot of the traits that we consider heroic today. Enkidu has Gilgamesh's strength, compassion, and a sense of what is right. The duality of the story is that the beast man helps to tame Gilgamesh, while Enkidu becomes less beastly.
The Epic of Gilgamesh has everything. Adventure, love and friendship, tragedy, the elixir for eternal life, irony, and redemption. While by our standards, Gilgamesh was not very heroic, for ancient peoples: he was strong, he wrestled and killed Gods, he brought prosperity from the cedar forests, he tamed nature and himself. He was bigger than the obstacles and uncertainties that nature threw at them.
When the duo kill the Bull of Heaven, the Gods punish them by giving Enkidu a slow and deadly disease. This devastates Gilgamesh to the point he wont bury Enkidu and waits for life to return until a maggot falls out. Here is where we see the beginning of the redemption of Gilgamesh. The once strong king, who laughed at death, is now terrified of it. He becomes timid and goes on a journey to get eternal life. He learns humility, persuasion and receives and loses the elixir of eternal life.
The culmination is what he brings back from his journey. Gilgamesh learns there was a flood that wiped out almost the whole population, but the Gods agree to never wipe out humans again. What the journey teaches him is that while he will not live forever, what he passes down to the inhabitants of the city will live forever. Not a reprieve from death, and yet all these years later, we read his story. Gilgamesh will live as long as humankind is here to read his story.
In Ancient days, the Gods lashed out and followed their own whims. Loyalty to a certain God did not mean you were safe. The same as it was with nature and the whims of the river and floods.
This is actually one of my favorite stories, perhaps because of the many dualities throughout the story. It shows a lot of sophistication and spotlights what was the Mesopotamian ideal, to be happy with life for life's sake. You have food, clothes, family and of course, beer! Many years later, the quote will change to eat, drink, and be merry. To me, Gilgamesh was very human. He gave into his wants and as he matured, with the help of a good friend, he learned the things that have real value.
It's interesting how Gilgamesh was considered a anti-hero at the beginning of the story. I agree that Gilgamesh sounded like an anti-hero when he started out as a tyrant at the beginning of the story. While he was courageous, he did not show any kindness towards anyone until Enkidu was created. Without him, Gilgamesh would continue to be a ruthless king without kindness and wisdom, which is better than self-centered attainments including power and strength. It is one of the extraordinary stories that teaches us about having a good friend who acts as our guidance to look out for each other and about the search for the meaning of life since we only live once. I realized how difficult life would be with the loss of a kind friend or a loved one and how it is difficult to deal with the loss. Just like with Gilgamesh, he mourned over the loss of his best friend, his brother, who he loved. His legacy lives on to remember all of the accomplishments the two friends have done. As you mentioned, Gilgamesh became more human and a better king to his people thanks to Enkidu.
ReplyDeleteThank you so much for your response, Karina. I agree that his redeeming came from Enkidu. I can imagine how deeply we would feel also if we lost someone so close to us. I think it is one of the great points that makes the story so relatable to us. Not many have studied this story, and prefer the Greek ones, and yet there is so much here in this writing!
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