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As is shown by the Maklu petitions, there may come, in the course of the evolution of religion, a stage in which it is recognised that the individual worshipper may petition the gods for deliverance from the evil which afflicts them.
A curious illustration of the importance attributed to such repetition is furnished by the eighth and last tablet of the 'Maklu' series. It consists of seven divisions, each beginning with a repetition of the headlines of the various sections of the preceding seven tablets; and only after the headlines of each of the tablets have been exhausted, does the real incantation begin.
It covered no less than nine tablets. Two others bear names that are almost synonymous, "Shurpu" and "Maklu," both signifying 'burning, and so called from the chief topic dealt with in them, the burning of images of the sorcerers, and the incantations to be recited in connection with this symbolical act.
When, therefore, we come across a ritual as the "Maklu" series, written exclusively in the phonetic style, and giving evidence of being in part a metrical composition, we are justified in assuming this to have been the original form.
Robertson Smith, Religion of the Semites, p. 352. Grimm, Deutsche Mythologie, i. 508-596. Tylor, Primitive Culture, ii. 383 seq. See also the article "Hestia" in Roscher's Ausführliches Lexikon der Griechischen und Römischen Mythologie. 'Maklu' series, ii. ll. 1-17. A reference to the sacred action of the fire in the burnt offerings.
If, now, such words, and the symbolical actions which are described and implied, were all that these Maklu tablets contained, it might be argued that these counter-spells were pure pieces of magic.
This eighth tablet contains therefore a kind of summary of all the others, the purpose of which is to gather together all the power and influence of the seven others. The 'Maklu' ritual deals so largely with the fire-god that a specimen from another series, to illustrate the position of Ea and Marduk in the incantations, seems called for.
Evidently, then, such addresses to Shamash are to be viewed in no other light than the exaltation of Nusku in the 'Maklu' series, and which we have found were in many cases elaborate, beautiful in diction, and elevated in thought.
In the 'Maklu' tablets we find that the writers of the tablets are, or anticipate that they may be, the victims of spells. The inscriptions themselves may be regarded, and by some authorities are described, as counter-charms or counter-spells. They do in fact include, though they cannot be said to consist of, counter-spells.
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