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Summa Alu

Akkadian Omen Series

About this book
Chapter 104

1 If a man approaches an old woman (for sex) he will quarrel daily. 2 If a man is eating during intercourse, an attack [...] 3 If a man approaches a woman (for sex) while standing up, this activity is not good, the illness will afflict [him]. Alternatively, this man will suddenly collapse, afterward he will fall ill and the water of womanhood is neglected. 15 If a man gives into (his) manliness in captivity and while erect provokes the erection of (another) man: manliness is taken away from him, in distress he will see misfortune. 16 If a man is regularly engaged (in sexual activity) in the daytime of the afternoon: this man will have luck, happiness will be established for him. 17 If a man, a woman mounts him, this woman will take his manliness, for one month he will not have a personal god.⁠ 18 If a man speaks with a woman on a bed and he rises from the bed and acts in the way of a man (has an erection) this man, happiness and exultation will be established for him. Wherever he goes, he will find acceptance in every respect, he will always reach his goal.

Texts in conversation

Compare Summa Alu 104 and Alphabet of Ben Sira 1:33

Ancient Near East, Babylonian · Rabbinic

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Summary

The Summa Alu warns that if a woman takes the dominant role in sex, the man loses strength and guardian deity. Rabbinic tradition in the Alphabet of Ben Sira repeats this, showing that beliefs about reversed sexual roles continued into antiquity.

Passages

Summa Alu 104

Ancient Near East, Babylonian · Akkadian Omen Series
16 If a man is regularly engaged (in sexual activity) in the daytime of the afternoon: this man will have luck, happiness will be established for him. 17 If a man, a woman mounts him, this woman will take his manliness, for one month he will not have a personal god. 18 If a man speaks with a woman on a bed and he rises from the bed and acts in the way of a man (has an erection) this man, happiness and exultation will be established for him. Wherever he goes, he will find acceptance in every respect, he will always reach his goal.
2300 BCE (scholarly estimate) Read in Summa Alu

Alphabet of Ben Sira 1:33

Rabbinic · Midrash
33 He said to him, "The angels appointed for healing: Sanoy, Sansanoy, Semangalof. When the Holy Blessed One first created Adam alone, They said, (Genesis 2:18) 'It is not good for this Adam to be alone.' They created for him a wife from the earth, as Adam had been created, and called her Lilith. Immediately they began to argue. She said, 'I will not lie underneath.' He replied, 'I will not lie underneath you, only on top. You belong underneath, and I belong on top.' Lilith responded, 'We are equal to each other because we were both created from the earth.' But they would not listen to one another. When Lilith saw this, she pronounced the Ineffable Name and flew away into the air above the world. Adam stood in prayer before his Creator and said, 'Sovereign of the universe! The woman you gave me has run away from me.' Immediately, the Holy Blessed One sent these three angels to bring her back. The Holy Blessed One said to Adam, 'If she agrees to come back, good. If not, she must permit one hundred of her children to die every day.' They departed and pursued her, and overtook her in the midst of the sea, in the mighty waters where the Egyptians would later drown. They told her God's word, but she did not wish to return. The angels said, 'We shall drown you in the sea.' She said to them, 'Let me be. I was created only to cause illness to infants. I have dominion over them for eight days after birth if they are male, and if female, after birth for twenty days.' When the angels heard Lilith's words, they insisted on taking her. But she swore to them by the name of the living and eternal God, 'Whenever I see you or your names or your forms in an amulet, I will have no power over that infant.' She also agreed that one hundred of her children would die every day. Accordingly, every day one hundred demons die, and for the same reason, we write their names on the amulets of young children, and when she sees them, she remembers her oath, and the child is healed."
800–1000 CE (scholarly estimate) Read in the Alphabet of Ben Sira

References

"... If human sexuality is experienced as liminal, then the omens that consider occasions of sexual marginality can be considered doubly liminal. These body-related sex omens represent liminalities of two types. They deal with sexual interactions that take place on the boundaries of male and female bodies (omens 2, 3, 4, 12) and with the ominous import of body emissions (omens 6, 7, 8, 11(?), 17). The asymmetries of power and the binary construction of gender electrify the boundary between male and female bodies and constrain the way the erotic body is experienced and deployed ... A woman who is allowed to take a sexually dominant position is able to rob a man of his physical power. The sexual inversion of gender hierarchy deprives him of his vigor and his personal god, in essence, his drive to pursue his proper place in the world ..."
Ann Kessler Guinan, “Auguries of Hegemony: The Sex Omens of Mesopotamia,” Gender & History 9.3 (1997): 462–479.

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

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Summa Alu 104 and Alphabet of Ben Sira 1:33

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