Mandean Book of the Zodiac (1)

Text
The Mandean Book of the Zodiac of Sasanian origins, Asfar/ Sfar Malwašia (= SM) bears rich testimony to many astrological doctrines widespread wherever hellenistic astrology held currency, and in some areas, preserved long after the Graeco-Roman period. The extraordinary longevity of the acceptance of astral influence as a law of the cosmos and the fluidity of the cultural transmission of forms of this belief is demonstrated by the fact that originally Mesopotamian elements may be traced in a work such as the SM.

The SM is a compilation from various sources of astrological and divinatory content and arranged in two major parts. The major Babylonian sources for the origins of SM are the great compilation of celestial omens Enūma Anu Enlil and its hemerological companion entitled Iqqur īpuš. The last five chapters of Part 1 of the Mandean book collect various omens which may be described as meteorological, astral, and at the end, a few “terrestrial” omens similar to those of the Babylonian series Šumma ālu. A number of omens from this section have ancestors from Tablet 7 of this series of “daily life” omens in which, for example the voice (rigmu) or noise (ikkilu) of a house is ominous. SM refers to the murmurring of fire, similar to tablets 91-93 of Šumma ālu which have fire omens and an omen in which a torch light makes noise. SM’s omen for a door squeaking can be compared with Šumma ālu tablet 5.46-65 and the omen from the cawing of a crow has well-attested parallels in the same series, e.g. the omen protasis “If a crow caws plaintively at the right of a man”. The divinatory elements referring to celestial phenomena, such as the lunar eclipse omens of part 1, ch. 18, trace back to the Mesopotamian tradition of celestial divination, the earliest attested texts of which date from the second millennium BCE in Old Babylonian collections of lunar eclipse omens. In addition to the celestial omens, the hemerological omens of Iqqur īpuš give predictions for phenomena occurring or activities undertaken in the twelve months of the year. The principle of this hemerological tradition is not only embedded in SM, but some sections contain what appear to be partial translations from the Akkadian, supporting the possibility of a direct transmission.

Other parallels worthy of mention are to be found in the omens of Enūma Anu Enlil as well as Iqqur īpuš concerning the subjects rain, lightning, thunder, and earthquake. The fairly lengthy section on lunar eclipse omens in SM (Drower 1949: 128-134) also bears the traces of lunar eclipse material known from these Babylonian compendiums. SM, however, gives lunar eclipses only by month, followed by a section in which the time of the eclipse is of interest, such as: “If the moon is in eclipse in the month Nisan, turbulent folk will make raids at the end of the year … “ and “If the moon be eclipsed in Nisan from eventide, two kings will not agree amongst themselves and will fight … “. As in most of the lunar eclipse omens of Enūma Anu Enlil, whether the eclipse is full or partial is never indicated, but neither is the day of the month given or other eclipse phenomena, which are included in the Babylonian series. It must be noted that even when protasis and apodosis do not closely parallel one another between the Babylonian omen series and SM, a general similarity in the subjects and phraseology of apodoses reflects acquaintance with more than simply the idea of these omens, but the omens in their actual written form. For example, SM has predictions such as “pregnant women will not carry their unborn to term,” “the poor will become rich, the rich poor”, both well attested in the cuneiform corpus. Also in ch. 18 are omens for eclipses when the moon is in the various signs of the zodiac. This finds a parallel in a Persian period cuneiform text (BM 36746) which is not derived from Enūma Anu Enlil, given the presence of the zodiac. These aspects of Babylonian religious and intellectual culture came to be incorporated within late antique Mandaic texts probably as a result of Mandean contact with a living albeit atenuated Babylonian scribal culture during the first century CE and later.

Sources (list of abbreviations)
BM 36746
Šumma ālu 5.46-65
Šumma ālu 91-93

Bibliography

Francesca Rochberg

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