Atrahasis: An Alien Flood Story

About this episode

The episode explores the Atrahasis epic and its alternative account of the Great Flood.

Send a text What if the story of Noah's flood was derived from a much older tale where the gods destroyed humanity not because of sin, but because humans were too noisy? The Atrahasis, an epic inscribed on clay tablets dating back to 1650 B.C., reveals a startlingly different motivation behind the Great Flood than what most of us learned in religious education. Discovered in the forgotten Library of Ashurbanipal among the ruins of ancient Nineveh, this Mesopotamian text describes how the god...

People in this episode

Hosts: Joseph Landry, L. Sheldon Oldford

Topics covered

• flood stories
• ancient texts
• Mesopotamian mythology
• religious narratives
• humanity's origins

Keywords

• Atrahasis
• Noah's flood
• ancient Mesopotamia
• flood narrative
• mythology
• humanity
• gods

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: Library of Ashurbanipal

Books & works: Atrahasis

Places: Nineveh

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