The Babylonian Genesis by Alexander Heidel

The Babylonian Genesis by Alexander Heidel is a lovely little scholarly book that was written in the early 40s. He combines all previously published accounts of the Babylonian creation myths. He explains the archaeological discoveries of the stories, as well as their historical backgrounds. He looks at the influence from the Summerian myths as well as comparing them to Christian myths. Unlike his book that compares Gilgamesh with the Christian flood story, here he finds very little influence or interaction between the two stories. An argument that I was surprised to see but was totally convincing. He gives great detail of the exact Hebrew used in different parts of the old testament, particularly in regards to the idea of creation out of nothing, and shows where all the similarities and the differences lie between the stories. The biggest difference being that the Babylonians has a pantheon of gods working together, and killing one another, to bring about the start of the universe. A similarity that he did not dwell on was that in both stories the humans were created to serve the gods. (Perhaps because this is a universal theme). I did like the Babylonian idea that humans were created out of the blood of a dead god. A god giving up his life so that humans might live, has Christian overtones, but these were not evident till much later. The similarities that Heidel discusses look at the pattern in which the world was created, particularly the 7 sections pattern, he offeres a helpful comparison between the two. Which unfortunatly I can't manage into a proper table for LJ.

He also had a long and interesting argument that Tiamat was not actually a dragon. (so there Tracy Hickman and Margeret Weis). Rather he systematically takes those parts that have been interpreted that way and shows that they do not have to logically lead to the conclusion that she was a dragon. Rather he sees her as a Goddess with a womanly form. I have to say I found it all fascinating. It was a very small book, only 150 pages, but all very interesting, thoughtful and well argued.

A Question for London folks

So after a nice conversation with British Gas they told me that it was "totaly normal" to be paying over a Hundred pounds a month in electricity bills to them. I'm a bit shocked as this four times as high as our bills in the US, even when we were running an air conditioner! Is this right? We also got a notice about switching to a different provider. Is another provider likely to be any better?
The only advice of British gas was to use the washing machine between 12 and 7 am!