Wisdom in Akkadian Literature: Expression, Instruction, Dialogue.

• Author: Foster, Benjamin R.

A study of wisdom in Akkadian literature is to be welcomed on many counts. The harvest of interpretive studies of Akkadian literature is still meager; so much basic work remains to be undertaken. The texts referred to as "wisdom literature" are available in excellent editions, so discussion can go beyond philological and text critical problems. The texts themselves are replete with human interest and of sufficient variety to satisfy almost any taste in reading. Thus Denning-Bolle's work can at the outset break new ground and go in many directions.

After a brief introduction, the second chapter is called "Survey of Secondary Literature." This consists of sometimes lengthy summaries of books and articles on ancient Near Eastern (including Biblical) wisdom, with emphasis on publications since 1960. Her conclusion is that scholars do not agree on what wisdom implies nor what texts should be considered wisdom texts (a term some regard as a literary genre, others as a style or mode, others as a traditional label). So much epitomizing in such detail seemed to this reader tedious and unproductive. Any student of Mesopotamian wisdom will be familiar with W. G. Lambert's Babylonian Wisdom Literature (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1960). One therefore scarcely needs one page of Denning-Bolle summarizing page 1 of Lambert, not to mention summaries of passages in other works that are themselves summaries (p. 27). The contents of this chapter could well have been compressed into a few paragraphs with bibliographical references, especially since the conclusion is self-evident.

In chapter three, "The Notion of 'Wisdom' in Ancient Mesopotamia," the author collects terms for wisdom and quotes a variety of passages in the style of a dictionary article. There is a discussion of Ea/Enki, without reference to the dissertation of H. Gaiter, Der Gott Ea/Enki in der akkadischen Uberlieferung (Graz: Karl-Franzens-Universitat, 1981). Her treatment (p. 41) of Enuma Elis I 94ff. is no improvement over traditional renderings; her proposal that irtibu erbetta hasis u ini kima suatu ibarra gimreti contains a result clause ("Each of his four ears grew large / and (his) eyes likewise, to see everything") implies that Marduk sees with his ears. There is discussion of the Marduk-Ea incantation type (pp. 41-43), then remarks on Atrahasis. Instead of documenting Atrahasis' wisdom, the author cites only the passage (II ii 42-47) where Atrahasis vomits, remarking that this depicts him...