Prophecy, Gastronomic Ghosts, and Oracular Flatulence: On the Substance of Spirit in Ancient Israel and Mesopotamia

Abstract

In this contribution, I contend that the divine “spirit, wind” was conceived as moist, wet, and vaporous in nature in ancient Israel and Mesopotamia. I adduce support for this view from biological reality and from a number of biblical and cuneiform texts that associate the spirit with water or depict it behaving like a liquid. I submit further that since the ancients believed that a divine spirit animated living bodies, they conceived it as capable of conveying divine missives by way of wind emanating from the body, either from the mouth as prophecy (in Israel and Mesopotamia) or as flatus (Mesopotamia). The inclusion of the latter reveals that the process was understood as gastric in nature, a view that finds parallels in the Septuagint and other Greek texts. Thus, this study offers new perspectives on the materiality of spirit and the phenomenology of prophecy and divination in ancient Israel and Mesopotamia.

1. Animating Spirit of Living Beings as Divine in Nature

Akkadian and biblical sources are in agreement in seeing the spirit that animates a human as divine in origin. However, the two conceptions of spirit are not identical. In Mesopotamia, the šāru “spirit, wind” was considered numinous and possessed personhood,4 and so it could be invoked as a witness in treaties.5 Its divine nature is apparent in that it could take the divine determinative (i.e., ^dIM.MEŠ). Since the atmospheric šāru “wind” was divine in origin, it naturally became the object of divinatory interpretations. A few protases from the series Enūma Anu Enlil (tablet 49) demonstrate: [DIŠ IM.KUR.R]A surriš [ZI-ma] rādu [DU] “[if the eas]t wind rises quickly and a cloudburst occurs” (l. 4); [DIŠ IM KU]R.RA ina GI₆ [lā] sadir abūbu N[U “[if the e]ast [wind] does not blow constantly in the night” (l. 5); DIŠ meḫe IM.U₁₈.LU ZI-am ŠUB KUR M[AR.TU^KI] “if a violent storm rises in the south, the fall of A[murru (will occur)]” (l. 20); and DIŠ meḫe IM.KUR.RA ZI-am ŠUB KUR [URI^KI] “if a violent storm rises in the east, the fall of [Akkad (will occur)]” (l. 22) (Gehlken 2012, pp. 205–6, 208–9).

Ritual professionals also summoned the šāru sibitti “seven winds” in performative spells.6 See, for example, the series Šurpu (Reiner 1958, p. 17), which contains numerous incantations against curses: šārū (IM.MEŠ) sibitti lizīqunimma lipaṭṭiru māmīssu “let the seven winds blow and release his curse” (ii 166). Elsewhere the exorcist series Udug-ḫul identifies the winds as demons and the deluge:

ūmū uppûṭu šārī lemnūtu šunu

     They are clouded-over days and evil winds,

ūmū ša lemutti (ḪUL-ti) umḫulu āmeruti šunu

     They are seen to be storms which are evil, an ill-wind,

ūmū ša lemutti (ḪUL-ti) umḫulu alik maḫri šunu

     They are storms which are evil, an ill-wind at the forefront,

abūbu ša ina māti (KUR) iṣṣanundu šunu

     They are the flood which always whirls in the land.

(v 76–78, 82, Geller 2007, pp. 121–22, 210–11)

The same series describes how these evil spirits ina ṣēri kīma šāri iziqqū “blow in through the door-pivot like wind” (iv 75; v 15; ix 111), and it reports the god Nusku saying of them: ištu qereb šamê (AN) kīma šāri ana māti ittebuni šunu “they have risen like wind from the midst of heaven against the land” (Udug-ḫul xvi 44, Geller 2007, pp. 112, 179, 205, 253).7

Since these demonic winds could bring illness by entering into a person, one incantation calls for a šāru “wind” to depart a patient’s body: ṣī šārum ṣī šārum ṣī šārum māri ili ṣī šārum nuḫuš nišī ina qaqqadim ṣī šārum ina īnim ṣī šārum… ina šuburrim ṣī šārum “leave wind, leave wind, leave wind, son of the god, leave wind, prosperity of the people, leave wind from the head, leave wind from the eye… leave wind from the anus.”8 We find this in magico-medical diagnoses as well: šārummi šāru šāruma ilū (DINGIR.MEŠ) atta šāru ša birīt zê u šināti atta tuṣīʾama itti ilū (DINGIR.MEŠ) aḫūka (ŠEŠ.MEŠ) nadīat kussāka “O wind, wind, you are the wind of the gods; you are the wind that is between the feces and the urine. (If) you come out, your throne will be set down with the gods your brothers” (Scurlock and Andersen 2005, p. 124).

In mythological texts, the winds take on cosmological significance. In the Atrahasis Epic, the šāru erbettu “four winds” pull the chariot of the god Adad as he storms through the sky (l. 122).9 In Enuma elish, Marduk creates the “four winds” to seize Tiamat before killing her (iv 42). Shortly afterwards, we hear that ezzūti šāri karšaša iṣānuma innesil libbašama pâša ušpalki “evil winds filled her stomach, her inside became stopped up, she opened wide her mouth” (iv 100).

The gods too possessed šārū “spirits.” Simo Parpola has drawn attention to the evidence from a literary text in which a man proclaims: “O Nabû, where is… your pleasant breath/spirit (šārku ṭābu) which wafts and goes over the weak ones (devoted) to you.” He also cites several Assyrian personal names like Šār-ilāni-ilāʾī, i.e., “The Spirit of God is My God,” Ṭāb-šār-^dAššur “Good is the Spirit of Assur,” Ṭāb-šār-^dIštar “Good is the Spirit of Ishtar,” and Ṭāb-šār-^dNabû “Good is the Spirit of Nabû” (Parpola 1997, p. lxxxvii, n. 69). To these we may add Zi-qa-IM-DINGIR-i[a] “Waft-Towards-Me-Spirit-of-My-God.”10 Indeed, texts frequently describe the šāru “breath/spirit” of the gods as ṭābu “sweet” and enlivening, and so ša izzīqaššu šār ili išammuḫ ga[pnu] “the fruit tree thrives on which a god’s breath/spirit blew.”11 Elsewhere we hear of a scribe ša ina šāršunu ṭābi ittallakuma “who lives by their (Bēl and Nabu’s) sweet breath/spirit.”12

Closely associated with šāru is the eṭemmu (GIDIM). Often it refers to a “spirit of the dead, ghost,”13 but the Atrahasis Epic complicates matters. In this myth, the mother goddess Nintu creates the first humans from clay mixed with the blood of a slain god. Afterwards, the narrator reports:

aḫriātiš ūmī uppa išmū

   Forever after, they heard the heartbeat,

ina šīr ilī eṭemmu ibši

   With the flesh of the gods there was spirit,

balṭa ittašu ušedišuma

   It made known the living-being its sign,

aššu lā mušši eṭemmu ibši

   For the sake of never forgetting, there was spirit (i 227–30).

Here the heartbeat of a human is an ittu “sign” of its aliveness, but one that when ceased, marks its mortality.14 Since the spirit of the deceased god gave life to the new being, its animating force is divine in origin.15 In texts from Boghazköi, the term eṭemmu can even take the divine determinative (i.e., ^dGIDIM).16 Gods too are said to possess an eṭemmu. One tablet refers to the primordial god Enmesharra as crying from his underworld abode: eṭemmu (GIDIM) ša ^dEnmešarra qemânni qemânni iltanassi “the ghost of Enmesharra keeps crying, ‘He is burning me, he is burning me.’”17 Another identifies the spirits of various gods with wild animals of the steppe.18 The wispy nature of the eṭemmu is confirmed by it use with the verb edēpu, used for relating the “blowing away” of both spirits and bodily gas.19 We see the former in a description of those who have died, but did not receive a proper burial: lu eṭemmu ša ina ṣēri nadûma šārušu (IM) lā edpu šumšu lā zakru “whether it is the ghost of (someone) who was cast out (i.e., not buried) on the plain, whose spirit has not left the body (lit. not blown away), whose name is not called (in a memorial ritual).”20 Formulae for releasing a spirit similarly state: edēpu ša GIDIM (eṭemmu) “to blow away, said of a ghost” or šāršu idip “his spirit has blown away.”21

Evil spirits, referred to as both šārū and eṭemmū, also can inflate a body, as one man complains: šār limuttim īdipannima eṭem ridâti irteneddianni “an evil spirit blew into me, a persecuting ghost persecutes me!”22 One incantatory recipe for treating a ghost-induced illness reads:

[If a person]’s [in]sides are continually bloated (and) his [intestines continually make noise] like an išq[ippu]-bird, [th]at [person] is sick with pent-up wind (IM = šāru) (and) ṣētu. [If his] attack [is prolonged], [‘hand’ of gh]ost (GIDIM = eṭemmu): ‘cures a thousand,’ azallu, [‘white plant’], [allā]nu-oak, aktam, ankinūte, [flax seed], [imbû] tâmti, myrrh, wax, [aprušu] [(and) swee]t [oil]. You mix (them) together. You [continually] rub (it) [on him] in oil.23

Also relevant to the discussion of divine winds/spirits is the Akkadian zaqīqu. It can denote a “demon” or “ghost,” but also the god of dreams, hence the dream omen series known as ^dZaqīqu/^dZiqīqu.24 The name of this god derives from the root zâqu meaning “blow, drift, waft,” and the verb occurs in reference to winds, storms, demons, ghosts, and the breath of gods.25 One source describes them as genderless: ul zikarū šunu ul sinnišāti šunu šunu zaqīqū muttašrabbiṭūti “they are neither male nor female, they are zaqīqū moving about.”26 An incantation to exorcise the baby-killing demon Lamashtu states that she is kīma nalši ša kakkabī kīma zaqīqi ša apāti “like dew of the stars, like a zaqīqi of the windows” (see Farber 2014, pp. 164–65). In the Epic of Gilgamesh, we also read that Gilgamesh utukku ša Enkidu kî zaqīqi ultu erṣeti ittaṣâ “brought up the shade of Enkidu from the underworld like a zaqīqu” (xi 84). Elsewhere evil zaqīqū come out of their graves to receive funerary offerings and libations. Sometimes a zaqīqu can be a manifestation of a deity.27 A Neo-Assyrian text reports that the god Nabû answered Assurbanipal by way of a zaqīqu.28 Others pray to various zaqīqū for guidance. A series of omens based on human speech and behavior known as Šumma kataduggû begins: [en]um[a] ilū (DINGIR.MEŠ) rabûtum (GAL.MEŠ) ša amēlūti zaqīqša ana illilūti šaknū (ĜAR-nu) u kataduggûša (KA.TA.DU₁₁.GA-ša) ana riteddêša ukinnu “[wh]e[n] the great gods destined the zaqīqu of humankind for executive power and provided their utterance to guide them constantly” (see Böck 2000, pp. 130–31). The identification of the zaqīqu with wind is clear from its Sumerian name LÍL “wind,” which naturally lead to the identification that “the north wind (IM) is Ninlil (^dNIN.LÍL), lord (EN) of the zaqīqū.”29 Moreover, a number of lexical lists equate the zaqīqu with šāru “wind.”30

The synonym list Malku (Hruša 2010, pp. 372–74) also identifies šāru with imḫullu, mānitu, meḫû, mēre, šaparziqqu, šeḫû, ziqīqu, and ziqziqqu, and various other types of winds and storms, some of which have supernatural qualities (iii 183–201). For instance, the imḫullu, meḫû, and ziqīqu can be demons that bring disease and which one can invoke against others.31 The imḫullu occurs in a list of evil winds along with the ašamšūtu “dust storm,” šuruppû “cold wind,” and ziqziqqu “draft of wind.”32 These are not merely atmospheric phenomena. The ašamšūtu can refer to a gastric problem: ašamšūtu ša libbišu līṣamma “may the ‘dust storm’ leave his stomach.”33 The šuruppû can describe feverish chills brought on by demons: namtaru ašakku šuruppû tānēḫi ṣabtuš lā idû “whether the namtaru-demon, the ašakku-demon, chill, or exhaustion have seized him without his knowing.”34 The ziqziqqu elsewhere is likened to the lips of the child-snatching demon Lamashtu.35 Such prooftexts could easily be multiplied, but they should suffice to demonstrate the perceived existence of divine spirits that have the capacity to enter and animate the human body and to affect its entrails. These examples also illustrate the rather blurry taxonomic boundaries that distinguish winds, spirits, ghosts, demons, and gods in Mesopotamia.36

In the Hebrew Bible, רוּחַ is not divine in itself, but is a manifestation of the divine presence. Consequently, the spirit that animates a living being is considered divine in nature. See, for example, the Psalmist’s description of Yahweh’s power:

Hide your face, they are frightened,

   Take away their spirit (רוּחַ), they perish,

   And they return to dust.

Send your spirit (רוּחַ), they are created,

   And you renew the face of the soil (Ps 104:29–30).37

Also illustrating the divine nature of the animating force is the aforementioned creation account in which God blows the נִשְׁמַת חַיִּים “breath of life” into the first human’s nose (Gen 2:7; cf. רוּחַ חַיִּים in Gen 6:17).38 Zechariah’s oracle also declares of Yahweh: וְיֹצֵר רוּחַ־אָדָם בְּקִרְבּוֹ “and he formed the spirit of man within him” (Zech 12:1). Job too states that רוּחַ אֱלוֹהַּ בְּאַפִּי “the spirit of God is in my nose” (Job 27:3). Elihu similarly asserts: אָכֵן רוּחַ־הִיא בֶאֱנוֹשׁ וְנִשְׁמַת שַׁדַּי תְּבִינֵם “therefore it is the spirit in man, the breath of Shaddai that makes them understand” (Job 32:8); and he tells Job: רוּחַ־אֵל עָשָׂתְנִי וְנִשְׁמַת שַׁדַּי תְּחַיֵּנִי “the spirit of El made me, and the breath of Shaddai makes me live” (Job 33:4). Ezekiel’s famous prophecy concerning the dry bones predicts: “I will cause a spirit (רוּחַ) to enter you, and you shall live” (Ezek 37:5). Here the prophet explicitly describes the bones as יְבֵשׁוֹת מְאֹד “exceedingly dry,” implying that Yahweh’s spirit will bring them moisture (Ezek 37:2; 37:4). Indeed, “moist bones” indicate robust health (Job 21:24). Moreover, the prophecy begins when the רוּח יְהוָה “spirit of Yahweh” takes him to the valley (Ezek 37:1), where he sees that there is no רוּחַ “breath” in the bones (Ezek 37:8). Yahweh then commands him to prophecy to הָרוּחַ “the breath” by summoning it from the אַרְבַּע רוּחוֹת “four winds” (Ezek 37:9).

2. Spirit as Moist or Wet

To my knowledge, Akkadian texts do not refer to šāru “spirit, wind” directly as wet or a liquid, but when used in an atmospheric sense, a šāru “wind” could of course include rain. Thus one prayer praises Marduk: [muša]znin nalši ina ṣerret šamāmi […] x šāri tīk mê elu qarbāti “he rains down dew from the udders of heaven, and wind […] and showers of water upon the fields.”39 Furthermore, as noted above, the synonym list Malku equates the šāru with a number of rain storms.

Though cuneiform sources do not identify šāru as “spirit” directly with moisture, a number of sources demonstrate that the association did exist. The idiom tabāku napišta “to “pour out life” (i.e., to die) is especially relevant since napištu also can mean “breath.”40 In the Epic of Gilgamesh, we also hear: šittu kīma imbari inappuš elīšu “sleep, like a fog, was breathing upon him” (xi 214). The “breathing” (napāšu) of “fog” (imbaru) is particularly pertinent, because the Sumerian term for “fog” (i.e., IM.DUGUD) shows that it was considered a type of wind, lit. “heavy wind.” Attesting to its wet nature is the fact that it is often paired with nalšu “dew” or the verb zanānu “rain.”41 The series Šurpu says of demons: ina šamê (AN) u erṣeti (KI) kīma imbari izannunu ṣīdānu iš[akkanu] “they rain down (disease) in heaven and earth like a fog, causing vertigo” (Šurpu vii 15, Reiner 1958, p. 36). A prayer found on a tablet describing a Bīt Rimki ritual reads: kīma qutri litelli šamê kīma imbari (IM.DUGUD) liniʾa irtašu (GABA) “may he depart up to the heavens like fog, turn its breast away like fog” (Weir 1936, pp. 587, 590, l. 5).42 After Marduk kills Tiamat in Enuma elish, we are told that he gathered her sea-foam and made it into clouds. Afterwards tebī šāri [š]uznunu kaṣāṣa šuqtur imbari (IM.DUGU) kamar imtiša uʿaddīma ramanuš ušaḫiz qāssu “the raging of the winds, the raining of a downpour, the rolling of fog, the collecting of her spittle, he appointed for himself and took them in his hand” (v 47–52). One similarly finds the verb reḫû “pour over” used in reference to sleep and various demon-induced diseases.43 In Ludlul bēl nēmeqi, the sufferer moans: šitti lā ṭābtu rēḫâ ṣalā[li] kīma qutru immalû šamê uštar[īq] “my unpleasant sleep, the slumber (which had) been poured (over me), he has sent away just like fog (which) filled the heavens” (iii 76–77, Oshima 2014, p. 99).44 Yet, the verb reḫû also occurs in reference to the alû-demon, who attacks a person by “pouring over” (reḫû) him and then riding him like a boat (Udug-ḫul viii 10, 15).45 The Sumerian name for the baby-snatching demon Lamashtu (i.e., ^dDÌM.A = ^dkama-duru₅) has suggested to Andrew George (2018, p. 154) that it is “a demon of a damp nature and clammy feel.”

It is also germane that cuneiform sources report the use of liquids as media of divine agency. Hittites practiced fish divination (ichthyomancy) and Mesopotamia performed oil and water divination (lecanomancy) (see Lefèvre-Novaro and Mouton 2008; Pettinato 1966). At Mari, there is a good deal of evidence for drinking liquids to induce prophecies.46 Martti Nissinen has drawn attention to cuneiform references to water as a supernatural medium connected to oath taking and to a number of relevant practices in the Greek world including obtaining oracles at sacred springs, interpreting the babbling of brooks and springs as divine messages, and the drinking of water and inhaling of water vapor to affect ecstatic and divinely possessed mantic states (Nissinen 2014, pp. 33–39).47 If spirit was indeed viewed as a vapor, then water would appear to be a fitting medium to access it as it represents a technique familiar to students of Near Eastern rituals of power known as the “law of similarity” in which like produces like. The most obvious cases involve the execration of one’s enemies by destroying images of them, but one also could point to the account of Moses healing the people’s snakebites by producing a bronze serpent (Num 21:4–9). The same may be said of the exorcist’s evocation of winds and clouds as a means of dispelling the vaporous demons.48

In the Hebrew Bible, prophets often describe the divine spirit as a liquid when describing the full force of its arrival or bestowal. See, for example, Isaiah’s prophecy concerning God’s wrath: רוּחוֹ כְּנַחַל שׁוֹטֵף “his spirit will be like a raging torrent” (Isa 30:28). Elsewhere he warns that the land will be abandoned עַד־יֵעָרֶה עָלֵינוּ רוּחַ מִמָּרוֹם “until a spirit from on high is poured down upon us,” transforming wilderness into farmland (Isa 32:15). The connection between liquid and spirit is made even more apparent when he prophesies: כִּי אֶצָּק־מַיִם עַל־צָמֵא וְנֹזְלִים עַל־יַבָּשָׁה אֶצֹּק רוּחִי עַל־זַרְעֶךָ וּבִרְכָתִי עַל־צֶאֱצָאֶיךָ “just as I pour water upon thirsty (soil) and rain down upon dry land, so will I pour out my spirit upon your seed, and my blessing upon your offspring” (Isa 44:3). Isaiah also predicts that Yahweh מָסַךְ בְּקִרְבָּהּ רוּחַ עִוְעִים “will mix within her a spirit of distortion” that will lead Egypt astray like a tottering, vomiting drunkard (Isa 19:14). The verb מָסַךְ usually refers to the mixing of strong drinks, which ties it to its intended effect. We also find this in Isaiah’s prophecy that war will come to Zion in which he proclaims that the people will stagger, but not from liquor, because כִּי־נָסַךְ עֲלֵיכֶם יְהוָה רוּחַ תַּרְדֵּמָה “Yahweh has poured upon you a spirit of deep sleep” (Isa 29:10).49 Ezekiel similarly reports Yahweh’s promise: וְלֹא־אַסְתִּיר עוֹד פָּנַי מֵהֶם אֲשֶׁר שָׁפַכְתִּי אֶת־רוּחִי עַל־בֵּית יִשְׂרָאֵל “I will never again hide my face from them, for I will pour out my spirit upon the house of Israel” (Ezek 39:29). Zechariah also promises: וְשָׁפַכְתִּי עַל־בֵּית דָּוִיד וְעַל יוֹשֵׁב יְרוּשָׁלִַם רוּחַ חֵן וְתַחֲנוּנִים “and I will pour down upon the house of David and upon the inhabitant of Jerusalem a spirit of grace and favor” (Zech 12:10). Joel’s famous prophecy is equally pertinent: אֶשְׁפּוֹךְ אֶת־רוּחִי עַל־כָּל־בָּשָׂר וְנִבְּאוּ בְּנֵיכֶם וּבְנוֹתֵיכֶם זִקְנֵיכֶם חֲלֹמוֹת יַחֲלֹמוּן בַּחוּרֵיכֶם חֶזְיֹנוֹת יִרְאוּ “I shall pour out my spirit upon all flesh, and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, your old men shall dream dreams, your young men will see revelations” (Joel 3:1). Therefore, when prophets describe the divine spirit coming bounteously, they do so as a liquid.50 I submit that these are not merely metaphorical descriptions, but reflect the perceived materiality of spirit, one perhaps also attested at Ugarit in Anat’s murderous threat against Aqhat: tṣi km rḥ npšh km iṯl brlth km qṭr baph “let his life depart like a wind, his life force like spittle, like a spirit from his nose” (CAT 1.18 iv 24–26).

3. Spirit as a Source of Divine Messages

The spirit as a source of divine messages is obvious in the mythological traditions when gods speak objects into existence, such as the aforecited four winds in Enuma elish. However, one also finds it in the magical corpora. Indeed, one incantation calls upon Marduk to kušud kaššāptu ina šāri pīka “capture the sorceress with your breath (lit. ‘wind of your mouth’).”51 Another describes the power of Marduk’s pronouncements by identifying them with the water expelled when he speaks: šipat balāṭu kummu imat balāṭu kummu “the ‘incantation of life’ belongs to you, the ‘spittle of life’ belongs to you” (Udug-ḫul ii 44–45, Geller 2007, pp. 98, 195).

Babylonians and Assyrians also observed the divine spirit operating as a medium for divine messages in the mortal realm. They reasoned that, since the spirit that animates humans is divine in origin, any wind that comes from a person might be deemed to possess divine import. Akkadian evidence is abundant and derives from incantatory, medical, and divinatory compendia that depict various spirits as entering and inhabiting human entrails. The perceived possibilities for obtaining omens from the human body are not unlike those attached to the practice of extispicy in which animal organs similarly serve as vehicles for divine missives. Even some medical diagnoses attribute a person’s burps and flatulence to the “hand” of a ghost or god.52 We hear ina pīšu šāra igiššu “if a man always belches forth wind from his mouth”; šāru ina šuburrišu ittanaṣâ u ugašši “(if) he frequently breaks wind and belches”; and ina pīšu igdiša ina šuburrišu uštēšira “(if) he belched through his mouth, emitted (wind) through his anus.”53 Another protasis reads: šāru ina libbišu kīma ša DÚR.GIG uštarʾab “if flatus (lit. šāru ‘wind’) rumbles in his belly as if it were an intestinal disorder.”54 Sometimes this wind is identified with a demon. We hear of ša eṭimmaša ina pî lā kuteššu “(the Ardāt-lilî-demon) whose ghost cannot be belched forth from the mouth (of the patient).”55 Other texts interpret the flatus of animals as omens. Hence the following divinatory protases: [šumma] immeru ina ṭeḫīka iṣrit “if the (sacrificial) lamb breaks wind when you approach”; [šumma immeru] ištu naksu 2-šu 3-šu [iṣrit] “if the sheep breaks wind two or three times after it has been slaughtered”; šumma immeru ištu naksu iṣrut “if the sheep breaks wind when it is slaughtered”;56 and šumma immerum ištu ṭabḫu urḫuzu issi rigmum ša maruštim ina bīt (É) awīlum ibašši “if after killing the sheep, its larynx utters a cry: there will be a complaint of hardship in the house of the person concerned” (Nougayrol 1967, p. 33). The ancillary esoteric extispicy series Mutābiltu also sees divine meaning in whether the animal’s lungs, gall bladder, and coils of the colon are inflated or not with “wind” (šāru).57

While biblical texts contain no references to flatus, it was obvious to the Israelites that speaking required רוּחַ. This is why useless talk is sometimes referred to as “windy words,” i.e., speech that is nothing but wind (Job 6:26; 16:3). Naturally, when a person was believed to be a prophet, his or her words were described as compelled by the רוּחַ of Yahweh as numerous texts testify (Num 11:29; Judg 3:10; 6:34; 11:29; 13:25; 1 Sam 10:10; 19:20; 1 Kgs 22:22–24; Isa 61:1; Ezek 2:2; 11:5; Mic 3:8; Job 32:18).

Moreover, the sound of wind also can mark the divine presence and serve as a divine portent. Famously, the first humans recognize Yahweh’s presence in Eden when they hear אֶת־קוֹל יְהוָה אֱלֹהִים מִתְהַלֵּךְ בַּגָּן לְרוּחַ הַיּוֹם “the sound of Yahweh-God moving in the garden at the wind of the day” (Gen 3:8). When David seeks an oracle from Yahweh concerning whether to battle the Philistines at the Valley of the Rephaim, Yahweh tells him to station himself behind them by the baka trees and wait to hear the wind: וִיהִי בְּשָׁמְעֲךָ [כְּשָׁמְעֲךָ] אֶת־קוֹל צְעָדָה בְּרָאשֵׁי הַבְּכָאִים אָז תֶּחֱרָץ כִּי אָז יָצָא יְהוָה לְפָנֶיךָ לְהַכּוֹת בְּמַחֲנֵה פְלִשְׁתִּים “and when you hear the sound of marching in the tops of the baka-trees, then be decisive for then Yahweh is going out before you to smite the camp of the Philistines” (2 Sam 5:24).58 The Psalmist too characterizes the wind as executing Yahweh’s command (Ps 104:4; 148:8). Indeed, Yahweh appears from a סְעָרָה “tempest” at the end of the book of Job (Job 38:1).59 Yahweh’s harangue against the false prophets of Israel makes it clear that a סְעָרָה can come with גֶּשֶׁם שׁוֹטֵף “torrential rain” (Ezek 13:11; 13:13).

4. Prophecy as a Gastric Process in the Mediterranean World

Additional support for the notion that prophecy was understood as a gastric phenomenon comes from a bit farther west. We first find it in Hesiod’s Theogony, in which the Olympian muses tell the shepherding poet:

Field-dwelling shepherds, ignoble disgraces, mere bellies (γαστέρες): we know how to say many false things similar to genuine ones, but we know, when we wish, how to proclaim true things.

(26–28, Most 2006, p. 5).

In their treatment of this line, Joshua Katz and Katharina Volk draw attention to the γαστήρ “belly” as a source of prophetic voices in Greek literature. Sometimes rendered “seers” or “ventriloquists,” the practitioners of this form of prophecy were called ἐγγαστρίμυθοι and ἐγγαστριμάντεις, terms that identify the stomach as a vehicle for mantic knowledge (Pelliccia 1995, pp. 72–73). As they observe, “although the term ἐγγαστρίμυθοι could be used of the possessed person, it appears to denote even more often the spirit believed to reside in, and speak from, that person’s belly” (Katz and Volk 2000, p. 124). Apparently, the practitioners interpreted the sounds produced by the stomach. Indeed, Classicists have long observed a close relationship between the γαστήρ “stomach” and the θυμός “spirit, breath.”(See, e.g., (Svenbro 1976, pp. 50–59; Nagy 1979, p. 261, n. 4; 1990, pp. 44–45, 274–75).) One finds references to omens derived from stomach sounds in a wide variety of Greek texts.60 Moreover, as in Mesopotamia, Greek writers understood the potential for flatus to have divinatory import.61 In the Homeric Hymn to Hermes, a sneeze omen and day-old infant fart omen provide parodic elements, but they draw on widespread beliefs.62 The Septuagint and Josephus’ (Ant. 6.14.2–4) use of ἐγγαστρίμυθοι to render the “necromancer” of Endor (1 Sam 28:3) also reveals that practitioners of gastromancy were perceived as capable of communicating with the dead. This association explains the Septuagint’s treatment of the ghosts and spirits that מְצַפְצְפִים “chirp” and מַהְגִּים “moan” (verbs also used for birds) in Yahweh’s reprimand (Isa 8:19):63 ζητήσατε τοὺς ἀπὸ τῆς γῆς φωνοῦντας καὶ τοὺς ἐγγαστριμύθους, τοὺς κενολογοῦντας οἳ ἐκ τῆς κοιλίας φωνοῦσιν “seek those who utter sounds from the earth and the ventriloquists, the babblers who utter sounds out of their bellies” (Isa 8:19). A ghost is similarly said to chirp (צִפְצֵף) in Isa 29:4.64 Note too that the sound that the stomach makes in the aforecited Mesopotamian treatment for the ghost-induced illness is likened to a išqippu-bird.65 Lev 20:27 implies that some people have an אוֹב “ghost” in them that allows them to be a medium, and here too the Septuagint renders אוֹב as ἐγγαστρίμυϑος (see Tropper 1989, pp. 189–201). It is worth observing that biblical references to gastric prophecy in the Masoretic text and the Septuagint appear primarily in pejorative contexts, suggesting that this method for obtaining oracles was deemed illicit in some circles.66 Nevertheless, this was apparently just one of several means by which one accessed divine knowledge.

Moreover, Sofía Tovar and Anastasia Maravela-Solbakk have shown that the Septuagint’s use of ἐγγαστρίμυθοι for “necromancers” would prove to have a large influence on later Jewish and Christian authors who used it exclusively with this meaning (Tovar and Maravela-Solbakk 2001). Conversely, Greek writers unfamiliar with the Septuagint continued to use ἐγγαστρίμυθοι and ἐγγαστριμάντεις only for inspired prophets and mantics who divine omens based on stomach sounds. Coupled with the evidence for divinatory flatus and the connection between these ritualists and necromancy, the evidence from Greek texts matches well that from cuneiform sources and the Hebrew Bible. In the light of the evidence amassed herein, Katz’s pondering whether “at least some people in the Ancient Near East practised the same kind of abdominal prophecy that we know from our Greek sources,” appears prophetic (J. T. Katz 1999, pp. 125–26).

5. Conclusions

The combined evidence indicates that the Israelites conceived of the divine spirit as moist, vaporous, or wet in nature. Thus, when coming bounteously, the prophets describe it as a pouring liquid or flood. Such references indicate that the watery nature of spirit could be conveyed in degrees. While the vaporous materiality of spirit is a perception grounded in biological reality (i.e., speaking produces spittle), it is likely that the understanding of water as a source of life and purifying agent contributed to its perceived vitality (see similarly Nissinen 2014). Israelite cosmological beliefs also may have encouraged an association between the divine spirit and water, because the creation of spray is implicit when the spirit of God hovers over the primordial waters (Gen 1:2).67 Indeed, in both Israelite and Mesopotamian cosmology the sky is created literally from the primordial waters. A commentary to Enuma elish encapsulates this well by translating šamê “heavens” by way of noṭariqon as ša mê^MEŠ “of water” (see Livingstone 1986, p. 32, l. 6).68 In the biblical account, God places the רָקִיעַ “firmament” that he creates to separate the upper and lower waters in the very “midst of the waters” (Gen 1:6).69 Therefore the sky, winds, and heavenly waters share origins, forms, and cosmological space. This conception provides background for the Psalmist who glorifies Yahweh by paralleling the two spaces: “praise him, O highest heavens, and the water that is above the heavens” (Ps 148:4). Jeremiah similarly equates the celestial waters with the sky and wind: לְקוֹל תִּתּוֹ הֲמוֹן מַיִם בַּשָּׁמַיִם וַיַּעֲלֶה נְשִׂאִים מִקְצֵה אֶרֶץ [הָאָרֶץ] בְּרָקִים לַמָּטָר עָשָׂה וַיּוֹצֵא רוּחַ מֵאֹצְרֹתָיו “for the sound he is giving is a roar of waters in the heavens, he causes vapors to rise from the end of the earth, he makes lightning for the rain, and wind goes out from his storehouses” (Jer 10:13). Note too that the sound of the cherubim’s wings, which elsewhere are identified with divine winds, resembles the cosmic waters (Ezek 1:24) (see Noegel 2017). Thus Israelite cosmology also informs the conception of the divine spirit as watery in nature. This suggests that the law of similarity may lie behind references to Yahweh blowing his divine breath to control the sea. We hear this when David prays: וַיֵּרָאוּ אֲפִקֵי יָם יִגָּלוּ מֹסְדוֹת תֵּבֵל בְּגַעֲרַת יְהוָה מִנִּשְׁמַת רוּחַ אַפּוֹ “the channels of the sea were seen, the foundations of the world were revealed, by the blast of Yahweh from the breath of the wind of his nose” (2 Sam 22:16). Of course, the exodus and Moses’ song at the sea record a similar act: וּבְרוּחַ אַפֶּיךָ נֶעֶרְמוּ מַיִם נִצְּבוּ כְמוֹ־נֵד נֹזְלִים קָפְאוּ תְהֹמֹת בְּלֶב־יָם “with the wind of your nose, waters piled up, they stood flowing like a heap, the deeps congealed in the heart of the sea” (Exod 15:8). Like the exorcists of Mesopotamia and Moses with the bronze serpent, Yahweh employs like against like.

Since I have touched upon the watery nature of divine breath, it is worth observing that liquid from one’s mouth also was deemed inherently powerful. In Mesopotamia, the spittle of an angry god, demon, human, or animal was considered poisonous.70 An incantation from the series Šurpu reports the actions of demons against their victim: elīšu īširuma imtu umtallûšu “they have pounced straight upon him and filled him with (their) saliva/poison” (vii 22) (see Reiner 1958, p. 36). The numinous nature of spittle made it an object of focus in a number of omens. See, for example: [šumma tamīt têrti ana bārî ina šitassīšu ruʾātīšu išallu têrtu lu]mmuna[t] “[if he is spraying his spittle while reading the oracle query to the diviner: the oracle is] bad” (Šumma ālu, Tablet 84, l. 30).71 Another from the same series explains: DIŠ NA UḪ₂-su KI ŠUB-ma ana [(…) x-šu BAR-at mimmušu ZAH₂ utta] “if a man throws his spittle on the ground and [it is divided] on/to [his … he will find his lost property”] (Schmidtchen 2021, p. 197, 11’). In the incantation series Maqlû, the performer accuses a witch of having ruʾtī ilqû šārtī imlusū “taken my spittle, plucked out my hair” (i 132), and so possessing aspects of his identity that she can use to bewitch him (see Abusch 2015, pp. 2–53). Another diagnosis reads: šumma amēlu illâtušu illakama… amēlu šuātu kašip “if a man’s saliva drools, that man is bewitched.”72 An incantation against jaundice likens divine spittle to rain: izannan kīma šamê elliāt ^dNergal ellêtušu kīma šēlibim līri[qu] ina awurriqānim “Nergal’s spittle pours down like rain, may his spittle become as yellow as a fox through jaundice” (see Landsberger and Jacobsen 1955, p. 14, n. 7). Saliva also serves as an ingredient in a number of magico-medical treatments.73 In the Atrahasis Epic, the narrator describes the creation of the first human as a process that involved the great Igigi gods who ruʾtam iddû elu ṭiṭṭi “spat upon the clay” (pp. 233–34). In Egypt too, spittle had cosmological significance, because the creator god Atum created the first divine progenitors by sneezing out the god Shu, i.e., “Wind,” and spitting out Tefnut, i.e., “Moisture.”74 Consequently, spittle possessed both positive and negative magical applications.75 The Hebrew Bible does not refer to spittle in any divinatory or magical sense, but if an unclean person spits upon someone who is ritually clean, that person becomes polluted and requires ritual cleansing (Lev 15:8). An association of sialorrhea with bewitchment explains why David feigns madness before king Achish of Gath by allowing his saliva to drool down his beard (1 Sam 21:14–15). Elsewhere spitting constitutes a performative gesture of humiliation (Num 12:14; Deut 25:9; Isa 50:6; Job 30:10), though Job uses the idiom “to swallow one’s spittle” as a euphemism for death in a way that is akin to “drawing one’s last breath” (Job 7:19). In the New Testament, Jesus famously heals people with his saliva (Mark 7:33; 8:23; John 9:6).76 The text in John also involves clay and evokes God’s creation of humans as found in the Atrahasis Epic and texts from Qumran (see Frayer-Griggs 2013). Therefore throughout the ancient Near East the cosmological power connected to the vaporous nature of the spirit also applied to spittle, perceived as breath in its wettest form.77

The wet materiality of spirit naturally also explains the interpretation of gastric noises as omens in the cuneiform materials and the Septuagint’s understanding of some prophetic techniques as gastromancy. Since the vaporous wind that animates a body was understood as divine in origin, sounds produced by bodily wind bore a potential to convey divine messages. Consequently, the ancients understood some forms of prophecy to be a gastric experience. While the examples from the Septuagint usually occur in pejorative contexts,78 the fact that gastromancy was practiced in the wider Mediterranean world offers additional support for this view. Indeed, the Babylonian Talmud records an account of a prostitute who interprets her נְשָׁמָה “flatulence” (lit. “breath”) as a בַּת קוֹל “divine communication,” a lesser form of prophecy (Abodah Zarah 17a; cf. Yoma 9b).79 It also mentions sneezing (a euphemism for breaking wind) during prayer as a סִימָן רַע “bad omen” (Berakhot 24b).

While Mesopotamian polytheism did not allow for a single divine spirit, the notion that humans were created by combining the blood and spirit of a slain god, and the spit of the Igigi gods suggests the concomitant possibility that the prophets of Mari and Assyria similarly believed that divine spirits compelled their speeches, as Parpola has argued.80 Though Parpola does not discuss it, perhaps the best evidence for this connection is the god of dreams ^dZiqīqu who gives his name to the series of dream omens. His very being embodies “spirit” while also conveying divine messages to dreamers. In fact, the beginning of the omen series invokes him as ÉN ^dZiqīqu, ziqīqu, ^dMA.MÚ DINGIR ša [šunāte] “Lord Ziqīqu, spirit, Mamu, god of dreams” (tablet 1, obv., col. i, l. 1).81 Since the lexical tradition identifies ^dZiqīqu as both the son and daughter of Shamash, he appears to have been viewed like the genderless zaqīqū referenced above.82 Yet, a ziqīqu also resides in humans, suggesting to A. Leo Oppenheim that the term sometimes corresponds “to what one might call ‘inspiration’” (Oppenheim 1956, p. 235).

If we are correct in seeing the various Mesopotamian spirits as corresponding to the divine רוּחַ that compels Israelite prophecy, then we might also ask whether forms of Babylonian and Assyrian divination were viewed as operating similarly. Practitioners certainly viewed the spirits of the gods—especially Shamash and Adad (but also the stars and constellations)—as manipulating the process and rendering decisions by way of extispicy and various other divinatory methods. We know this, because they offered prayers to them before initiating the process, (See, e.g., Starr 1996; Lambert 2007) but did they perceive the act of interpretation as also motivated by divine spirits? I submit that the answer to this question is yes, but the evidence is indirect. It derives from the ritual preparations undertaken by diviners before performing their divinations. Elsewhere I have remarked:

The prayers and rituals that diviners perform to purify themselves similarly show that divination crossed cosmic boundaries. This makes the media of divination an interstitial space in which diviners engage divinity. The moment of engagement marked a separation from the temporal domain of the mundane and what Graham Cunningham has called “an elision with the divine world.”

(Noegel 2019, p. 33, citing Cunningham 1998)

Implicit in this elision, I aver, is also an interacting with, and partaking of the divine spirit. Indeed, one prayer performed before extispicies calls upon the god to descend and enter the diviner’s space: turradam takkal tuššab ina kussî tadīan dīnam “you will descend, you will eat, you will sit on a throne (and) you will render judgment” (ll. 29–30).83 Such prayers make it clear that it is the gods and not the diviner who actively render the judgment. The diviner relies upon the gods to offer a reliable reading: ina têrti eppušu ina puḫād akarrabu kittam šuknān “in the extispicy I am performing, in the lamb I am offering, you may place the truth” (ll. 22–24, Cooley 2011, pp. 78–82). Another text from Mari makes explicit the gods’ perceived presence during divination: annītam LÚ.MEŠ āpilū iqbû u ina têretim ittanazzaz “this (is what) the prophets said and he (Adad) always is present at (the performance of) the extispicies.”84 Diviners drawing interpretations via other forms of divination must have perceived their exegesis as similarly inspired by the divine.85 Perhaps they viewed themselves as divine embodiments or agents like the exorcists who expelled demons by identifying themselves as the god in charge of the spell. In Udug-ḫul iii 59–62, the exorcist’s chant morphs him with the god Ea: tâšu ellu ana têya iškun pīšu ellu ana pīya iškun imas[su elletu] ana imtīya iškun “he superimposed his pure spell upon my spell, he superimposed his pure mouth upon my mouth, he superimposed [his pure] spittle upon my spittle” (Geller 2007, pp. 103, 198). In the performative spells known as “Marduk’s Address to the Demons,” each line of the spell begins “I am Asarluḫi (i.e., Marduk).” One line is particularly important in this context as it continues ša pī[t]û sattakki muḫalliq ṣīni u raggi “who ex[p]lains cuneiform writing and destroys the criminal and wicked” (B l. 11, Lambert 1954–1956, pp. 315–16). Here Marduk, embodied in the performer, receives credit for the process of exegesis.86 Such references strongly suggest that augurs, like prophets and exorcists, understood the performance and interpretation of their divinations as manipulated by divine spirits. Divination that involved liquids or wind, like lecanomancy, the dream god ^dZiqīqu, or the reading of smoke or meteorological phenomena likely heightened the perception of divine interaction during the performance.