Ziggurat

Background

The name ziggurat derives from the Akkadian ziqqurratu, generally interpreted to mean "that which rises high" or "summit." Akkadian was a Semitic language spoken in ancient Mesopotamia (the region of present-day Iraq).

The peoples of Mesopotamia regarded the dwelling place of the gods as a high place near the heavens. They therefore built their temples atop raised earthen platforms, and this practice developed into the ziggurat. Because stone was scarce in the region, builders filled the core with sun-dried mud brick and faced the exterior with kiln-fired brick bonded with bitumen (a natural asphalt-based adhesive). Unlike the Egyptian pyramids, ziggurats contain no interior burial chambers; their distinguishing feature is the temple placed at the summit.

Development

• Late fourth millennium BC: An early form, in which temples were erected on raised platforms, appeared in Sumerian cities such as Uruk.
• Twenty-first century BC: Ur-Nammu, king of the Third Dynasty of Ur, built the Ziggurat of Ur, dedicated to the moon god Nanna. It is regarded as the best-preserved ziggurat today. Ur is commonly identified with Ur of the Chaldees, recorded as the hometown of Abraham.
• Around the thirteenth century BC: The ziggurat of Chogha Zanbil was built in Elam (present-day southwestern Iran).
• Seventh to sixth centuries BC: Nabopolassar and Nebuchadnezzar II of the Neo-Babylonian Empire rebuilt Etemenanki, the ziggurat of Babylon, on a grand scale. The name Etemenanki means "House of the Foundation of Heaven and Earth," and the structure was dedicated to Marduk, the chief god of Babylon. The fifth-century BC Greek historian Herodotus recorded that Babylon had a multistoried tower.
• Fourth century BC and later: Alexander the Great is reported to have attempted to rebuild Etemenanki, but the project was never completed, and the structure subsequently fell into ruin.

Impact and Influence

The modern archaeological excavation of ziggurats also influenced biblical studies. The British archaeologist Leonard Woolley excavated Ur in the 1920s and 1930s, and investigations confirmed that only the foundations of Etemenanki survive.

The account of the Tower of Babel in Genesis 11 sets the scene in "a plain in the land of Shinar" and records that the people built a tower using brick and bitumen: "they had brick for stone, and slime had they for morter" (Genesis 11:3). Because this description corresponds to Mesopotamian brick construction, and the phrase "whose top may reach unto heaven" (Genesis 11:4) accords with the religious significance of the ziggurat, many scholars and Bible commentaries regard the ziggurat, and Etemenanki in particular, as the background to the Tower of Babel account. Some scholars also connect the "ladder" of Jacob's Ladder (Genesis 28:12) with the stairways of the ziggurat.

Assessment

Views differ on the relationship between the ziggurat and the Tower of Babel. Conservative evangelicals, who read the biblical account as historical, often present the ziggurat as archaeological evidence illustrating the historical background of the Tower of Babel. By contrast, those who read Genesis 11 as a theological narrative critiquing Babylonian imperial religion and human pride emphasize that the ziggurat was the concrete object of that critique. The general scholarly assessment, however, is that there is no archaeological basis for identifying any particular ziggurat as the Tower of Babel itself.

In Korean churches, pictures or photographs of ziggurats commonly accompany explanations of the Tower of Babel account, chiefly in Sunday school curricula, Bible study materials, and Holy Land resources.