Is there a common conception behind the “lights” of the Priestly redactors, the “flaming wheels” of the Ionian philosophers, and the “lamps” of the Mesopotamian commentators?
The new year and Akitu festivals in Babylonia were celebrated in the spring, during which the high priest of Marduk’s Esagil temple would read the Babylonian creation story, Enuma Elish. This narrative tells how the young god Marduk became king of the gods by saving them from Tiamat and her army of monsters.
Enuma Elish describes the Babylonian god Marduk’s plans for a city with a single tower that will serve as his seat of power and as the nexus of all gods. The story of Babel responds to this myth by having YHWH disrupt the construction and decentralize Babylon.
In the ancient world, as now, indiscriminate violence and mass killing in war is explained as a struggle to defend “our” way of life against those who threaten to destroy it.
