Mesopotamian Gods Vs Greek Gods Essay
When a civilization bestows itself with a religion, the religion serves an essential purpose in the civilization, the religion as a tool is based to explain the world around the inhabitants of the civilization, for example, in early Mesopotamia, with the Sumerians whose religion was based of the environment. Similarly, the Greeks developed their religion to explain the everyday occurrences of nature and, more explicitly, human nature. The grecian gods were more developed, but the main purpose of the religion was still to explain the world around them, albeit, more technical and elaborated than the Mesopotamian gods. The Greek and Sumerian gods served a purpose of pre-scientific explanation, a way to explain the unexplainable in a time before
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The Greeks gave the gods personalities that were more human, the gods were depicted in stories that showed them capable of falling prey to hubris. This gave the Greeks a way to sympathize with the gods, also, a more apt way to explain phenomena. With these gods who could feel anger, and bestow their wrath upon the unsuspecting world, the Greeks found a way to explain simple occurrences with stories. The story of Hades and Persephone works adeptly in the explanation of this, the Greeks explained the changing of the seasons as Persephone’s mother, Demeter, the goddess of the harvest, draining the plants out of life whenever she cannot see Persephone who is kept in the underworld as Hades’ nonconsensual wife. Or, even simpler, the Greeks explained the lightning in the sky as a depiction of Zeus’, the god of Lightning, anger. The Sumerians had a much more straightforward approach. The Mesopotamian rivers where the Sumerians were based around were unpredictable and volatile in nature, the Sumerians based their gods off of these unpredictable river patterns and created pernicious gods. These gods were volatile in nature, just like the land around them, the Sumerians explained the forces around them, like a simple science, by explaining the phenomena and occurrences
The Greeks gave the gods personalities that were more human, the gods were depicted in stories that showed them capable of falling prey to hubris. This gave the Greeks a way to sympathize with the gods, also, a more apt way to explain phenomena. With these gods who could feel anger, and bestow their wrath upon the unsuspecting world, the Greeks found a way to explain simple occurrences with stories. The story of Hades and Persephone works adeptly in the explanation of this, the Greeks explained the changing of the seasons as Persephone’s mother, Demeter, the goddess of the harvest, draining the plants out of life whenever she cannot see Persephone who is kept in the underworld as Hades’ nonconsensual wife. Or, even simpler, the Greeks explained the lightning in the sky as a depiction of Zeus’, the god of Lightning, anger. The Sumerians had a much more straightforward approach. The Mesopotamian rivers where the Sumerians were based around were unpredictable and volatile in nature, the Sumerians based their gods off of these unpredictable river patterns and created pernicious gods. These gods were volatile in nature, just like the land around them, the Sumerians explained the forces around them, like a simple science, by explaining the phenomena and occurrences