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The Ugaritic text KTU summons dead kings called saviors from the underworld to attend a royal funeral. Isaiah 14 echoes this tradition, describing the spirits of dead kings rising from their thrones in the underworld to greet a fallen ruler.
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2500 BCE
1000+ CE
KTU 1.161
Cuneiform Texts from Ugarit
Ancient Near East
Order of service for the sacrifice(s) of the divine Winged Disc: You are invoked, O saviours of the underworld, you are summoned, O assembly of Didan. Invoked is Ulkan the saviour; invoked is Taruman the saviour. Invoked is Sidan-and-Radan; invoked is the eternal one, Thar. They have been invoked, the ancient saviours. You are invoked, O saviours of the underworld, you are summoned, assembly of Didan. Invoked is Ammithtamru the king and invoked as well is Niqmad the king.
Date: 2300 B.C.E. (based on scholarly estimates)
Isaiah 14:9
Hebrew Bible
8 The evergreens also rejoice over your demise, as do the cedars of Lebanon, singing, ‘Since you fell asleep, no woodsman comes up to chop us down!’ 9 Sheol below is stirred up about you, ready to meet you when you arrive. It rouses the spirits of the dead for you, all the former leaders of the earth; it makes all the former kings of the nations rise from their thrones. 10 All of them respond to you, saying: ‘You too have become weak like us! You have become just like us! 11 Your splendor has been brought down to Sheol, as well as the sound of your stringed instruments. You lie on a bed of maggots, with a blanket of worms over you.’
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Notes and References
“… Given the divine nature of the latter, we may now make much more sense of the problem that Og evidently posed for the biblical historiographers. They were dealing, not merely with some defunct kingship with possible sentimental echoes, but with a continuing theological reality. Og was one of the ancient gods of the land, who must somehow be neutralized. This is already clear from the significance of such passages as Isaiah 14:9, which is also attempting to devalue the Rephaim in its parodial treatment of the enemy king’s descent into the underworld. (The formal and cosmological links between Isaiah 14 and KTU 1.161 should also not be underestimated.) …”
Wyatt, Nicolas
The Archaeology of Myth: Papers on Old Testament Tradition
(p. 50) Equinox Publishing, 2010
* The use of references are not endorsements of their contents. Please read the entirety of the provided reference(s) to understand the author's full intentions regarding the use of these texts.
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