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Compare Gudea Cylinders A xxix 10 and Daniel 4:10

Ancient Near East, Sumerian · Hebrew Bible

Summary

Mesopotamian tradition places the world tree at the center of the world, reaching heaven and shading every land. Daniel echoes that tradition in Nebuchadnezzar’s dream, then has God cut the tree down to humble the Babylonian king in his own imagery.

Passages

Gudea Cylinders A xxix 10

Ancient Near East, Sumerian · The Building of Ningirsu's Temple

7 Its lofty battlements, where the doves rest, 8 are like Eridu upon its terrace, 9 where the princess sits. 10 Eninnu offers rest to the doves: 11 it is a sheltering tree of wide branches and pleasant shade, 12 where swallows and other birds chirp loudly; 13 it is like Enlil's Ekur 14 when a festival is celebrated within it. 15 The temple's great awesomeness settles upon the land, 16 and its praise reaches to the highlands; 17 the awesomeness of Eninnu 18 covers all lands like a garment.

2125 BCE (scholarly estimate) Read in the Gudea Cylinders

Daniel 4:10

Hebrew Bible

9 saying, “Belteshazzar, chief of the magicians, in whom I know there to be a spirit of the holy gods and whom no mystery baffles, consider my dream that I saw and set forth its interpretation! 10 Here are the visions of my mind while I was on my bed. “While I was watching, there was a tree in the middle of the land. It was enormously tall. 11 The tree grew large and strong. Its top reached far into the sky; it could be seen from the borders of all the land. 12 Its foliage was attractive and its fruit plentiful; on it there was food enough for all. Under it the wild animals used to seek shade, and in its branches the birds of the sky used to nest. All creatures used to feed themselves from it. 13 “While I was watching in my mind’s visions on my bed, a holy sentinel came down from heaven.

200–101 BCE (scholarly estimate) Read in Daniel

References

... a tree in the midst of the earth: The location in the midst of the earth suggests that this is the cosmic tree, a widespread symbol in world religion and well known in the ancient Near East. Its cosmic character is more pronounced in the Old Greek, verse 8 ("The sun and moon dwelt in it and illumined the whole earth"), but the Greek text is not necessarily the more primitive for that reason. The most obvious and frequently cited parallel is found in Ezekiel 31, where the pharaoh is likened to a cedar of Lebanon, which "towered high and set its top among the clouds" (verse 10). The parallel is clearest in Ezekiel 31:6: "All the birds of the air made their nests in its boughs; under its branches all the beasts of the field brought forth their young." Also relevant is the allegory in Ezekiel 17:1-10, where the Davidic house is represented as a cedar of Lebanon, whose top is transplanted and becomes a vine ...

John J. Collins, Daniel: A Commentary on the Book of Daniel (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1993), 222–223.

References are not endorsements of their contents. Read each reference in full to understand its author's intentions in using these texts.

The Stone Basins, Shade Trees, and Awesomeness of Eninnu

Gudea Cylinders54 columns

Compare Gudea Cylinders A xxix 10 and Daniel 4:10

Summary

Passages

Gudea Cylinders A xxix 10

Daniel 4:10

References

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