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HENRI FRANKFORT MRS H. A. FRANKFORT JOHN A. WILSON THORKILD JACOBSEN Before Philosophy A study of the primitive myths, beliefs, and speculations of Egypt and Mesopotamia, out of which grew the religions and philosophies of the later world 95c Before philosophy, in the strict sense of abstract, critical, and methodical thought, came into being, man’s speculations, when they turned to the perennial problems of self and the universe, were ex- ptessed in myths. These myths are not mere stories, nor do they merely disguise an abstract truth. They represent a peculiar form of concrete thought, which should be analysed before the attempt is made to understand the mind of Ancient Man, his moral and religious preoccupations. The authors, who have concentrated on the two oldest civilizations known — those of Egypt and Mesopotamia — have not shirked the first task. Just because they aimed at a deeper understanding of the Egyptian and Mesopotamian points of view in matters of life and death, the function of the State, and the nature of the phenomenal world, they have taken the problem of myth seriously. They have discussed the emergence of Greek philosophy in order to stress the gulf which separates the habits of thought of the Greeks from those of their predecessors. For a complete list of books available please write to Penguin Books whose address appears on the back of the title page PELICAN BOOKS A198 BEFORE PHILOSOPHY BEFORE PHILOSOPHY THE INTELLECTUAL ADVENTOURE OF ANCIENT MAN AN ESSAY ON SPECULATIVE THOUGHT IN THE ANCIENT NEAR EAST BY H.AND H.A. FRANKFORT. JOHN A.WILSON THORKILD JACOBSEN PENGUIN BOOKS Penguin Books Ltd, Harmondsworth, Middlesex U.S. A.: Penguin Books Inc., 3300 Clipper Mill Road, Baltimore 11, Md AUSTRALIA: Penguin Books Pty Ltd, 726 Whitehorse Road, Mitcham, Victoria AN ORIENTAL INSTITUTE ESSAY Origina) Edition The Intellectual Adventure of Ancient Man first published by The University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 1946 Published in Pelican Books March 1949 Reprinted 1951, 1954, 1959 Made and printed in Great Britain by Hazell Watson & Viney Ltd Aylesbury and Slough CONTENTS PREFACE INTRODUCTION By H. and H. A. Frankfort MYTH AND REALITY II EGYPT By John A. Wilson If THE NATURE OF THE UNIVERSE 39 71 III THE FUNCTION OF THE STATE 103 IV THE VALUES OF LIFE MESOPOTAMIA By Thorkild Jacobsen THE COSMOS AS A STATE 137 THE FUNCTION OF THE STATE 200 VII THE GOOD LIFE 217 CONCLUSION By H. and H. A. Frankfort VIII THE EMANCIPATION OF THOUGHT FROM MYTH 237 INDEX 265 PREFACE Tuts book is an attempt to understand the view which the ancient peoples of Egypt and Mesopotamia took of the world in which they lived. They were the most civilized people of their time; and they have left us a rich and varied literature which has been deciphered to a large extent during the last hundred years. But the modern reader, confronted with the translations, will in most cases feel that the deeper meaning eludes him. This is true even of many texts dealing with the norms of human behaviour — the so-called ‘wisdom literature’ of which the books of Proverbs and Ecclesiastes in the O/d Testament are familiar examples. It is certainly true of the great official inscriptions in which rulers define their task or record their achievements. And it is most conspicuously true of those writings which claim to elucidate the nature of the universe. For these assume throughout the form of myths, and the med- ley of tales about gods seem to lack a common viewpoint altogether. Yet nothing is more misleading (though nothing is more common) than a piecemeal interpretation of myths, based on the tacit assumption that the Ancients were preoccupied with problems very similar to ours, and that their myths represent a charming but immature way of answering them. We have tried to show in our first chapter that such an assumption simply ignores the gulf which separates our habits of thought, our modes of experience, from those remote civilizations, even in cases where man faced perennial problems: the problem of man in nature, the problem of fate, the problem of death. We have attempted to penetrate into this alien world of ‘mythopoeic’ — myth-making — thought and to analyse its peculiar logic, its imaginative and its emotional character. The reader may find this first chapter the most difficult to follow and he may prefer to read it after the main sections of the book, in which the myths and beliefs of Egyptians and Mesopotamians are concretely described. 8 PREFACE In the last chapter we have described how the Hebrews te- duced the mythical element in their religion to a minimum, and how the Greeks evolved critical from mythopoeic thought. This chapter has given rise, among some reviewers of our American edition, to the misconception that we sing the praise of rationalism or equate religion with superstition. We may state, then, emphatically that we are fully aware of the creative function of myth as a living cultural force, and one which sus- tains in greater or lesser degree all religious or metaphysical thought. In any case it should be clear that we have conceived of myth throughout as a matter of high seriousness. At the end of each chapter appear Nofes referring profes- sional readers to our sources, and Selected Readings for those unfamiliar with our subject. The translations of ancient texts in each chapter are made by the respective authors except where their source is indicated in the notes; but Mrs H. A. Groenewegen Frankfort is responsible for the poetical render- ings of the translations from Sumerian and Akkadian in Chapters Y-VII.