It caught my attention for a particular reason, but let me tell you what it is first.
From the Sumerians, we have the earliest instances of recorded history dating back to 3500 BC. The Sumerian King List is an ancient manuscript that records the names, reigns, and cities of Sumerian kings. It's believed to have been written around 2100 BC.
Here's what I found fascinating. First it says that the kingship "descended from heaven." This alone would not be all that surprising, since many ancient cultures claimed divine rights for their kings. However, what I read next was surprising.
In the Sumerian king list, history is divided into two major sections. The first section contained kings whose reigns lasted for tens of thousands of years. This, again, while unusual, might be accounted for by simple exaggeration or myth. It's not uncommon in ancient history for details to be inflated to glorify royalty. However, what I spotted next was incredibly surprising. I'll let you read it for yourself. It says:
"After the flood had swept over, and the kingship had descended from heaven, the kingship was in Kish"
The Sumerian King List, as translated by Thorkild Jacobsen, 1939
It speaks of a flood that swept over the land. Okay… That's familiar, right? I kept reading, wondering what I'd find. As it listed king after king post-flood, I noticed a gradual change in the number of years that each king reigned. After the flood, the length of time that the kings reigned gradually reduced. Since most kings reign until their death, this seems to imply that life expectancy was reduced over time if the list is to be trusted.
One of the world's most ancient written records, apart from the Bible, claims:
While the specific details contained in the Sumerian King's List are very different from what is in the Bible, it's hard to ignore the glaring similarities.
There are basically two possible explanations for why these similarities exist. First, the atheist would say that the Bible's stories are myths and are copied from a previous myth in the Sumerian records. That's a compelling theory until you realize that the phenomenon of flood stories in ancient cultures is not unique to Sumer. Here are some examples of other cultures that have ancient narrative heritages that contain flood stories.
All of the previous five shared at least some geographical connection through a continental landmass. However, the next groups were isolated from that continent for many thousands of years.
It's amazing that the story of a great flood appears throughout the world even in cultures that have been divided from each other for so many generations, it's hard to imagine. This is where the atheist theory of borrowed mythology breaks down. At what point did the Native Americans borrow mythology from the Sumerians? When did the Australian Aboriginals borrow from the Greeks? It doesn't make sense.
Occam's razor is sharp in this case. It seems much more reasonable to me that a flood happened early in human history and it's being remembered down through the generations. It was such a cataclysmic flood that cultures couldn't forget it, even after so many generations.
In almost all of the non-biblical flood stories:
Clearly, not all of the details are identical in every flood story, but they are similar enough to teach a very simple set of concepts throughout the world. There is a higher power that stands above the world. He judges human behavior. There are consequences for evil. Evil leads to judgment.
It's like an imprinted memory to keep human behavior within certain parameters, one that, despite time, cannot be forgotten.
For those with a Christian perspective, like me, you can see why our enemy, the devil, would want the world to forget the flood. The flood is a lesson that shows God will not allow human behavior to become too corrupt without punishment. But the memory of a worldwide flood has a more powerful use than even that.
Missionaries have been able to use these long-remembered cultural traditions, like the flood story, to build upon when sharing the gospel.
For example, Isobel Kuhn, Fraser McLuskey, and William Marcus Young leveraged local legends about a great flood to facilitate significant evangelism among these communities. Remembered flood stories have also been leveraged in mission work with the Hopi, various peoples in India, and Polynesian groups. This culture's flood story was a foundation for sharing Christ.
These stories are like little time capsules that have been laid in the dirt of deep memory, only to be opened when the gospel finally arrived. Down through the ages, the evil in the world has not been able to scrub the memory of God's greatest temporal judgment poured out on the earth. What an amazing epic that persists until it is used to introduce the people God loves to the Son He gave for their salvation.
I think there is a hint in this passage from Genesis.
And God said, "This is the sign of the covenant I am making between me and you and every living creature with you, a covenant for all generations to come: I have set my rainbow in the clouds, and it will be the sign of the covenant between me and the earth. Whenever I bring clouds over the earth, and the rainbow appears in the clouds, I will remember my covenant between me and you and all living creatures of every kind. Never again will the waters become a flood to destroy all life. Whenever the rainbow appears in the clouds, I will see it and remember the everlasting covenant between God and all living creatures of every kind on the earth."
Genesis 9:12-16 (NIV)
Is it possible that the world can't forget the flood because God promised to always remember? Is it possible that cultural memories of the flood might actually be a faint echo of God's influence on the memories of those who live in his protected world? I think it's possible, but only God Himself knows.
References and Further Reading
Excelente artículo lo disfrute mucho y manifiesta que nuestra fé es en base a una persuasión convincente y comprobable.
Good article, gives confidence in God's written Word when the modern world disparages it.
Good article, well researched and footnoted. Thank you for the work.