Texts in Conversation
Psalm 8's infant mouths may recall Ugaritic stories of hungry divine infants, turning an image of danger into praise that protects against God's enemies.
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2500 BCE
1000+ CE
KTU 1.23:60
Cuneiform Texts from Ugarit
Ancient Near East
From kissing came conception, from embracing, impregnation. He sat and counted five months for growth, ten for the full completion. Both of them crouched and gave birth. They bore the gracious gods, both gluttonous from birth, sucking at the nipples of the Lady’s breasts. Word was brought to El: The two wives of El have given birth! What have they borne? The two gracious gods! both gluttonous from birth, sucking at the nipples of the Lady’s breasts. A lip to the underworld, a lip to the heavens, and there entered into their mouths the birds of the air and the fish from the sea. And wandering abroad, piece by piece they put things from both their right and from their left into their mouths, and were not satisfied. O wives whom I have married,
Psalm 8:2
Hebrew Bible
2 From the mouths of children and nursing babies you have ordained praise on account of your adversaries, so that you might put an end to the vindictive enemy. 3 When I look up at the heavens, which your fingers made, and see the moon and the stars, which you set in place, 4 Of what importance is the human race, that you should notice them? Of what importance is mankind, that you should pay attention to them? 5 You made them a little less than the heavenly beings. You crowned mankind with honor and majesty. 6 you appoint them to rule over your creation; you have placed everything under their authority, 7 including all the sheep and cattle, as well as the wild animals, 8 the birds in the sky, the fish in the sea, and everything that moves through the currents of the seas.
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Notes and References
“... Helmer Ringgren proposes that here, as in Psalm 73:9, there is an allusion to the traditional myth as known also from the Ugaritic text, “The Rituals and Myths of the Goodly Gods” (KTU 1.23), also sometimes called the “Birth of the Beautiful Gods.” Called “suckers” (ynqm) like the enigmatic figures of Psalm 8:2, the children of the god El in 1.23 devour all the beasts of the known world and are remanded to the desert for seven or eight years until they are allowed into the sown region. The putative parallel with Psalm 8:2 involves three features: (i) the divine “suckers”; (ii) their appetite that threatens all animals; and (iii) the possible cosmogonic setting of this myth. Perhaps a related mythic version underlies these texts, and the beasts in verses 7–8 (MT 8–9) might be interpreted with this in mind: instead of the troublesome cosmic forces devouring all the animals of the world (as in KTU 1.23), they are given instead to humanity as their ruler (Psalm 8). ...”
* 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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