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Sargon seems to have owed his elevation two generations later to revenge taken for this victory by the city folk; but Sargon's son, Sennacherib, in his turn, found priestly domination intolerable, and, in an effort to crush it for ever, wrecked Babylon and terrorized the central home of Semitic cult, the great sacerdotal establishment of Bel-Marduk.
The two phases of the ideogram used in his name the sceptre and the stylus are thus united in the personage of Nusku precisely as in Nabu. On the other hand, the manner in which Ashurbanabal speaks of him reflects the mythological aspect of Nusku. In the religious literature Nusku is the messenger of Bel-Marduk, who conveys the message of the latter to Ea.
Nabonidus was defeated finally at Opis in June 538; Sippara fell, and Cyrus' general appearing before Babylon itself received it without a struggle at the hands of the disaffected priests of Bel-Marduk.
In the great fight of the gods against the monster Tiâmat, it would appear that, according to one version at least, Anshar sends Anu, Ea, and finally Bel-Marduk, in turn to destroy the monster. He appears, therefore, to have exercised a kind of supremacy over the gods.
Jahveh might have remained unperceived behind the veil of the sanctuary had not his altar been illuminated by lights from other shrines. In the early days of the empire, Rome was fully aware of the glamour of Amon, of the star of Ormuzd, Brahm's cerulean lotos and the rainbow heights of Bel-Marduk. But in the splendour of Jove all these were opaque. Jupiter, always imposing, was grandiose then.
Before Bel, then, the other gods faded as the Elohim did before Jahveh, with the possible difference that there were more to fade sixty-five thousand, Assurnatsipal, in an inscription, declared. Over that army Bel-Marduk acquired the title, perhaps significant, of Bel-Kissat, Lord of Hosts. Yet it was less as a usurper than as an absorber that the ascension was achieved.
Bel is introduced in the inscription in question immediately after Ashur, and one is therefore inclined to suspect that Sargon's archaeological knowledge fails him at this point in speaking of the old Bel, whereas he really meant to invoke the protection of Bel-Marduk as the chief god of his most important possession next to Assyria.
Brahma, Ormuzd, Amon-Râ, Bel-Marduk, Jehovah, Zeus, Jupiter, and many lesser deities parade before us in defile. Prejudice, intolerance, tolerance even are lacking from this book, as they were from "Imperial Purple." "The Lords of the Ghostland" is neither reverent nor irreverent, it is unreverent. Mr.
There seems to be no reason to question, therefore, that even when Tiglathpileser I. applies to Bel titles that certainly belong to the older Bel, such as 'father of the gods, 'king of all the Anunnaki, 'who fixes the decrees of heaven and earth, he means Marduk, a proof for which may be seen in the epithet bêl matâti, 'lord of lands, which follows upon these designations and which, as we saw, is a factor in the evolution of Marduk into Bel-Marduk.
As for the fire-god Gibil, with whom Nusku is identified, we have merely a reference to a month of the year sacred to the servant of Gibil in a passage of the inscriptions of Sargon. Bel-Marduk.
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