The Ancient Dragon of Babylonia©
Ancient Church of God
Founders of Theistic Satanism 2018
Digital Filed Copyright 2018
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Special Thanks to the University of Pennsylvania.
Tiamat is a personification of the primordial sea from which the gods were first created. She is also the main adversary of Marduk in the Enūma Eliš
To examine this fully, we will lean on several experts in the Sumerian Field as in Robert Wynter U of Pennsylvania who holds both a Masters in Philology and a Masters in Archeology. (pen name used).
Aside from our Sanga Board Member Tom Erik Raspotnik who holds a Masters of Near Eastern Theology from Michigan State University. Dr. Allen Blackmon of the University of South Africa Near Eastern Studies (retired).
FURTHER READING
Written forms: dti-amat, ti-amat, dtam-tum, ti-àm-tim, ta-à-wa-ti
Normalised forms: Tiamat, Tiāmat, Tiʼamat, Thalatta (Greek).
I was once confused by the belief in the Dragon named Tiamat, and simple examination of the facts provided a important reveal and her important role but not a role which could be included in a curriculum which could or would include Satan or Theistic Satanism. In formulating a religion around this character in Babylon would produce the religion creating a “Cult Church” and not a credible religion tied to Theistic Satanism but more a Sumerian Religion.
Name and Spellings
The name Tiamat is un-contracted form of the word tâmtu, meaning "sea". The long vowel â is contracted from the short vowels I and a.
The word is in the "absolute state," a noun form that is equivalent to the vocative (a grammatical case which directly invokes or addresses a person or deity; literally the name means "O, sea!").
Tiamat's exact functions as a goddess are difficult to establish.
As her name indicates (see below), she was a deification of the primordial sea. Our best source of information for Tiamat is the myth Enūma Eliš TT , and in fact, there are only a handful of references to her outside of it. Making her name suspect as to only part of Babylonian Teachings.
Enūma Eliš TT begins with a description of the two primeval seas, the salt sea Tiamat and the sweet sea Abzu TT , mingling their waters together to create the gods (for recent translations of the story see Foster 2005: 436-486 and Lambert 2013).
In the following battle between Abzu TT and Ea, Tiamat attempts to appease Abzu TT and stop the conflict.
But when she is later pressured by the lower gods to revenge him, she herself becomes the main antagonist of the story, creating an army of monsters led by her new consort, Qingu. She is ultimately defeated by Marduk, who incapacitates her with his "Evil Wind" and then kills her with an arrow. Marduk splits her in two, creating heaven and earth from her body, the Tigris and Euphrates from her eyes, mist from her spittle, mountains from her breasts and so on. While an interesting story indeed, this story is not much older than Early Akad where a distinct other story comes into play with Marduk the Son of Enki not playing a part in human creation.
An interesting story indeed and historically relevant it does not supersede a system of origins and beliefs, there are people out there in the Occult who often try to frame this story as being of Leviathan which is also a separate Hebrew construct. But in today's world people even worship a God called the Flying Spaghetti Monster in jest so I am sure people can call Satan whatever despite being highly inaccurate in historical references.
Throughout the epic, there are differing descriptions of Tiamat: she appears both as a body of water, as a human figure, and as having a tail (Tablet V, line 59). These varying descriptions are ultimately reconciled as Marduk turns her limbs into geographical features.
A great version of a creation tale, however it is preceded by an more accurate tale from thousands of years prior during the Ubaid Period.
Divine Genealogy and Syncretisms
In Enūma Eliš TT , Tiamat is the mother of all the gods (Tablet I, line 4). Together with Abzu TT she creates Lahmu and Lahamu, who in turn beget Anšar and Kišar. While acknowledged as a Creator God, there are stories which predate this connection.
Though one cannot point to a syncretism as such, there are several models for Tiamat in the earlier mythology.
Katz (2011: 18f) argues that the figure of Tiamat unites two strands of tradition attached to the sea. The first is the motherly figure of Namma, who is also referred to as a primeval ocean from which the gods were created.
There was no cult or even temple complex or religion dedicated directly to Tiamat, but the battle between Tiamat and Marduk played an important role in the New Year's festival TT in Babylon. The Enūma Eliš TT was recited on its fourth day, and some argue that the festival included a symbolic reenactment of the mythological battle (see the discussion in Lambert 2013: 461f).
The oldest attestation of Tiamat is an Old Akkadian incantation (Westenholz 1974: 102), though there are few other references to her until the first millenium BCE (see Lambert 2013: 237). After the composition of the Enūma Eliš TT , Tiamat is found in a number of theological commentary works, but the largest body of evidence of these seem to rely on the epic (e.g. SAA 3.39, r. 1-3). Tiamat is also mentioned by Berossus, writing in the 3rd century BCE (Breucker 2011: 648f). But no Sumerian text origins exist.
The other is the figure of the sea as a monstrous adversary, like the Levantine god Yamm (see also Jacobsen 1968: 107). Another important influence for the figure of Tiamat is Anzu, a mythical bird defeated by Ninurta, indeed the battle between Marduk and Tiamat has a number of parallels to the battle between Ninurta and Anzu (Lambert 1986).
Going backwards to Levantine or Leviathan again is suspect directional as one is a male, and Tiamat is distinctly a female, did some God perform a sex change? We know Sumerian as a language has both male and female dialects that rise from the different dialects at the time period. But lets examine Levantine from the Jewish Dictionary references.
a person who lives in or comes from the Levant, making this a suspect connection, so lets try the Jewish Dictionary for Leviathan.
RESULTS
Names of gigantic beasts or monsters described in Job xl. The former is from a root denoting "coil," "twist"; the latter is the plural form of "behemah"="beast."
SOURCED
Ever since Bochart ("Hierozoicon," iii. 705), "behemoth" has been taken to denote the hippopotamus; and Jablonski, to make it correspond exactly with that animal, compared an Egyptian form, "p-ehe-mu" (= "water-ox"), which, however, does not exist. The Biblical description contains mythical elements, and the conclusion is justified that these monsters were not real, though the hippopotamus may have furnished in the main the data for the description.
Only of a unique being, and not of a common hippopotamus, could the words of Job xl. 19 have been used: "He is the first [A. V. "chief"] of the ways of God [comp. Prov. viii. 22]; he that made him maketh sport with him" (as the Septuagint reads, πεποιημένον ἐγκαταπαιζέσΘαι; A. V. "He that made him can make his sword to approach unto him"; comp. Ps. civ. 26); or "The mountains bring him forth food; where all the beasts of the field do play" (Job xl. 20).
Obviously behemoth is represented as the primeval beast, the king of all the animals of the dry land, while leviathan is the king of all those of the water, both alike unconquerable by man (ib. xl. 14, xli. 17-26). Gunkel ("Schöpfung und Chaos," p. 62) suggests that behemoth and leviathan were the two primeval monsters corresponding to Tiamat (= "the abyss"; comp. Hebr. "tehom") and Kingu (= Aramaic "'akna" = serpent") of Babylonian mythology. Some commentators find also in Isa. xxx. 6 ("bahamot negeb" = "beasts of the south") a reference to the hippopotamus; others again, in Ps. lxxiii. 22 ("I am as behemoth [="beasts"; A. V. "a beast"] before thee"); but neither interpretation has a substantial foundation.
It is likely that the leviathan and the behemoth were originally referred to in Hab. ii. 15: "the destruction of the behemoth [A. V. "beasts"] shall make them afraid" (comp. LXX., "thee" instead of "them").
These haggadot concerning the leviathan are interpreted as allegories by all the commentators with the exception of some ultraconservatives like Baḥya ben Asher ("Shulḥan Arba'," ch. iv., p. 9, col. 3).
According to Maimonides, the banquet is an allusion to the spiritual enjoyment of the intellect (commentary on Sanh. i.).
The name, he says, is derived from 
(" to join," "to unite"), and designates an imaginary monster in which are combined the most various animals ("Moreh," iii., ch. xxiii.). In the cabalistic literature the "piercing leviathan" and the "crooked leviathan" (Isa. xxvii. 1), upon which the haggadah concerning the hunting of the animal is based, are interpreted as referring to Satan-Samael and his spouse Lilith ("'Emeḳ ha-Melek," p. 130a), while Ḳimḥi, Abravanel, and others consider the expressions to be allusions to the destruction of the powers which are hostile to the Jews (comp. Manasseh ben Israel, "Nishmat Ḥayyim," p. 48; see also Kohut, "Aruch Completum," s. v. "Leviathan," for other references, and his essay in "Z. D. M. G." vol. xxi., p. 590, for the parallels in Persian literature).
(" to join," "to unite"), and designates an imaginary monster in which are combined the most various animals ("Moreh," iii., ch. xxiii.). In the cabalistic literature the "piercing leviathan" and the "crooked leviathan" (Isa. xxvii. 1), upon which the haggadah concerning the hunting of the animal is based, are interpreted as referring to Satan-Samael and his spouse Lilith ("'Emeḳ ha-Melek," p. 130a), while Ḳimḥi, Abravanel, and others consider the expressions to be allusions to the destruction of the powers which are hostile to the Jews (comp. Manasseh ben Israel, "Nishmat Ḥayyim," p. 48; see also Kohut, "Aruch Completum," s. v. "Leviathan," for other references, and his essay in "Z. D. M. G." vol. xxi., p. 590, for the parallels in Persian literature).
The haggadic sayings obtained a hold on the imagination of the poets, who introduced allusions to the banquet of the leviathan into the liturgy. However the connection in this lore is suspect, as it is developed with wrong characters, as the Serpent of the Garden of Edin (Eden) was not married to a Lillitu, and Lillith appearing as a different characterization which is shown in earlier works. Also in finality Satan is male, as is Leviathan-and-behemoth, so taking this character and changes sex would be a miracle indeed.
In some forms being pushed forward in Theistic Satanism, it would make a person wonder how a he becomes a she and both being of the ocean or sea, there is no previous connection. Is Leviathan then Tiamat, not at all its a corruption, that the early Hebrews pushed forth of the Leviathan and later connected it to Tiamat via Babylonian Lore to make the God seem more connected however, why would someone if the Hebrews.
REFERENCES
The commentaries of Dillmann, Delitzsch, and others on Job;
- Gunkel, Schöpfung und Chaos, Göttingen, 1895;
- Eisenmenger, Entdecktes Judenthum, ii. 296 et seq., 873 et seq.;
- Weber, System der Altsynagogalen Theologie, 1880, p. 195;
- Hastings, Dict. Bible;
- Cheyne and Black, Encyc. Bibl.
Finally, the Serpent of the Garden and Tiamat while UFO and Conspiracy Theorists tend to put them together, it is not historically accurate, nor is Tiamat Satan, she does not transform into a male at the convenience of the writer providing this information or the corruption. The wife of the Garden Serpent is availed her to clear this misconception of information.
NINGISHZIDA
His wife is Azimua[4] and also Geshtinanna,[5] while his sister is Amashilama, end of story to the Conspiracy Theorists. Source Oxford Corpus of Sumerian Theological Studies. So again tying Tiamat and Ningishzida together in nothing more than folklore.
Ancient Hebrews did not all read the Kabbalah and even today few Jew delve in magical lore, and while certain sects dispute Satan he is certainly not a she. And Satan is certainly not a Hippopotamus! Thanks again. Relating Hippopotamus creatures to Theistic Satanism is strange and could be something that is reminiscent of a Hippopotamus Cult. Who is Satan is is something we explore in other teachings all based on sourcing from academia.
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