Was Enoch and Adapa the same person?

There seem to be a connection between the biblical patriarch Enoch & the Sumerian sage Adapa with some parallels in their myths.

Both the biblical Enoch & Sumerian Adapa were described as loyal servents who were taken up to heaven by the angels/Anunnaki where they were educated with wisdom & knowledge & then brought to meet the supreme sky god.

The Sumerian tablet titled "Adapa and the Food of Life" We learn from the myth that Adapa one of the sages who brought civilization to ancient Sumer is instructed in the ways of heaven by Enki/Ea (the Lord of the Sweet Waters, Magick, Arts, Crafts and Wisdom) who was also his father , Adapa being a demi-god with enhanced intelect was put incharge with the task of looking over the "South-Wind" by his father Enki which he accidently broke , this eventually caught the attention of the sky god Anu who finding out about Adapa was baffled by the demi-god , In the myth Enki told Adapa to ascend and meet the Skyfather Anu for judgement, Anu pleased with Adapa's integrity offer him Immortality where remembering the advice of Enki/Ea he refused the offer.

Lets take a look at a few Hebrew scriptures and their parallels with the Adapa myth:

"It was by faith that Enoch was taken up to heaven without dying--
he disappeared, because God took him." For before he was taken up, he was known as a person who pleased God."

- [Hebrews 11:5]

The road to Heaven he [Enki] made him [Adapa] take, and to Heaven he ascended.

- [Adapa and the Food of Life , 1400 B.C ]

"and the Lord called me with His own mouth, and said to me: 'Come hither, Enoch, and hear my word. and He made me rise up and approach the door:"

- [Book of Enoch , 300 B.C]

"When Adapa before Anu, the King, Drew near, and Anu saw him, he cried:" Come hither, Adapa.Why hast thou broken the wings Of the South Wind?"

- [Adapa and the Food of Life , 1400 B.C]

and the Lord said: "Hear my voice. And go, say to , who have sent thee "wherefore have ye left the high, holy, and eternal heaven, and lain with women, and defiled yourselves with the daughters of men and taken to yourselves wives, and done like the children of earth, and begotten giants (as your) sons?"

- [Book of Enoch , 300 B.C]

and Anu said..."Why has Ea revealed to impure mankind The heart of heaven and earth? A heart... has created within him, has made him a name? What can we do with him (Adapa)? Anu looked at him; he wondered at him.

- [Adapa and the Food of Life , 1400 B.C ]

"And all the kings of the sons of men came to Enoch when they heard of his wisdom, and they bowed down to him, And they assembled in all, one hundred and thirty kings and princes, and they made Enoch king over them and they were all under his power and command.

And Enoch taught them wisdom, knowledge, all the sons of men were greatly afraid of Enoch, and they feared to approach him on account of the Godlike awe that was seated upon his countenance; therefore no man could look at him, fearing he might be punished and die. an angel of the Lord then called unto Enoch from heaven, and wished to bring him up to heaven.

When at that time Enoch heard this he went and assembled all the inhabitants of the earth and he said to them, "I have been required to ascend into heaven, I therefore do not know the day of my going."

And now therefore I will teach you wisdom and knowledge and will give you instruction before I leave you, how to act upon earth whereby you may live; and he did so.

And he taught them wisdom and knowledge, and gave them instruction, and he reproved them, and he placed before them statutes.."

- [Book of Jashar]

He [Adappa] possessed intelligence (knowledge) . . . ,
His command like the command of Anu ...
He [the god Ea] granted him a wide ear to reveal the destiny of the land,
He granted him wisdom, but he did not grant him eternal life.
In those davs, in those years the wise man of Eridu,
Ea had created him as chief among men,
A wise man whose command none should oppose,
The prudent, the most wise among the Anunnaki was he,
Blameless, of clean hands, anointed, observer of the divine statutes.

- [Adapa and the Food of Life , 1400 B.C]

From my weak understanding, I had always thought that adapa came first. Adapa was one of the first successful humans created and blessed with the permission to live in edin (garden of eden). If the translations are correct from the sumerian tablets, that would place this myth well before the book of enoch.

It almost appears that a lot of our ancient mythology originates from the sumerian tablets. Wasn't adapa basically recreated as adam, as in adam and eve?

a reply to: ClovenSky

I'm not sure where & when the connection with Adapa & Adam started , I believe it was started by Sitchen.

But they argued that the moral of the story where Adapa refused to take immortality somehow correlated with the tree of life in the Garden of Eden.

a reply to: ancienthistorian


God took this guy and some others "up" because he wanted to demonstrate in a world gone mad or going mad that God would still honor obedience. As the story goes.

Yes I agree these two could be the same man although I wouldn't say that about comparisons of others that are made.

And remember this person was antediluvian? We can see his nephew or g-grandson Shem in post diluvian world.

originally posted by: ancienthistorian
a reply to: ClovenSky

I'm not sure where & when the connection with Adapa & Adam started , I believe it was started by Sitchen.

But they argued that the moral of the story where Adapa refused to take immortality somehow correlated with the tree of life in the Garden of Eden.

Remember here that Adapa may be calling him by his line. Like Shem was called Seth by the Egyptians, after his line separating him from the other two main lines, or after the line that had the right to be called after Seth rather than Cain.

a reply to: ancienthistorian

Where do you go for unbiased translations of the tablets? Are there any pure sources or do you have to start from scratch?

TYIA

Crystalinks : " Another searcher for eternal life was Adapa, a fisherman who gained wisdom from Ea, the god of water. The other gods were jealous of his knowledge and called him to heaven. Ea warned him not to drink or eat while there. Anu offered him the water of life and the bread of life because he thought that, since Adapa already knew too much, he might as well be a god. Adapa, however, refused and went back to Earth to die, thus losing for himself and for mankind the gift of immortal life. These legends somewhat resemble the Bible story of Adam and Eve. It is highly probable, in fact, that the ancient legends and myths of Mesopotamia supplied material that was reworked by the biblical authors "

I was unable to get a usable link, however the Crystalinks site will provide a 'search' and typing in Adapa, several sections appear. Sorry for the inconvenience.

i always wonder why people don't realize that of course many of the old Hebrew stories match Sumerian ones.
after all Abraham came from Ur of the Chaldeans, a city in Sumer, as did many of his relatives that traveled with him.
it only make sense that those stories were passed on and on until they became the stories of the Israelites.

originally posted by: ClovenSky
a reply to: ancienthistorian

Where do you go for unbiased translations of the tablets? Are there any pure sources or do you have to start from scratch?

TYIA

You just have to read the these myths for yourself , one website I like to visit is Sacred Texts they have a wide variety of ancient texts you can read.

For Sumerian Tablets you can visit The Electronic Text Corpus for Sumerian Literature they also have a search engine where you can look up words or phrases from Tablets.

For Greek mythology you can visit Theoi.com , The most earliest (oldest) ancient greek literature are the works of Hesiod & Homer (850-700 B.C). Then there are also the works of Plato & Herodotus (440-400 B.C) which has alot of info regarding ancient civilizations & tribes.

For ancient Hindu text you can read the The Vedas (1200 B.C) which also has many parallels with both Greek & Mesopotamian myths.

And if you just want to broaden your knowledge on ancient history you can visit the History files.

Although I have apps on my phone where I have access to these text at my finger tips.

originally posted by: hounddoghowlie
i always wonder why people don't realize that of course many of the old Hebrew stories match Sumerian ones.
after all Abraham came from Ur of the Chaldeans, a city in Sumer, as did many of his relatives that traveled with him.
it only make sense that those stories were passed on and on until they became the stories of the Israelites.

Most Hebrew stories arose after the Babylonian captivity, where Rabbis worked in Babylonian libraries.
Not to mention that Judaism arose from the Canaanite religion which was based almost entirely on the Babylonian religion (which was based entirely on the Sumerian religion.)

Harte

a reply to: Harte

Most Hebrew stories arose after the Babylonian captivity, where Rabbis worked in Babylonian libraries. Not to mention that Judaism arose from the Canaanite religion which was based almost entirely on the Babylonian religion (which was based entirely on the Sumerian religion.)

actually my understanding is that the books where completed during the captivity, from written and oral traditions from different independent Israelite communities.

i know how people frown on wiki's, but i like to use them cause their fast and also have references if you want to go further.plus i'm kinda lazy and don't like looking for everything that i half remember.
that said from the wiki.

]The majority of Biblical scholars believe that the written books were a product of the Babylonian captivity (c. 600 BCE), based on earlier written and oral traditions, which could only have arisen from separate communities within ancient Israel,[4] and that it was completed by the period of Achaemenid rule (c. 400 BCE).[5][6] The 1979 discovery of fragments of the Hebrew Bible (Priestly Blessing from the Book of Numbers) at Ketef Hinnom dating to the late 7th century BC, and thus to before the Babylonian captivity, is the oldest evidence of elements of the Torah which were current before the Babylonian exile. Torah

now i'm not going to go into all the models or what is said about the sources, only to say that again to my understanding the documentary hypothesis has fell into disfavor and more and more scholars are leaning towards written and oral sources those being Deuteronomic,and Priestly. there is also Non Priestly sources that are said to have been used.

so as i said abraham, his father, brother, nephew, their wives, slaves and others certainly carried their stories of their God with them on their travels and told them. which continued through the completion of the books. which happened during the captivity.

many scholars agree,based on earlier written and oral traditions, which could only have come from different communities in ancient Israel, and along with the oldest evidence of elements of the Torah which were current before the Babylonian exile. as per the wiki.

originally posted by: hounddoghowlie
a reply to: Harte

Most Hebrew stories arose after the Babylonian captivity, where Rabbis worked in Babylonian libraries. Not to mention that Judaism arose from the Canaanite religion which was based almost entirely on the Babylonian religion (which was based entirely on the Sumerian religion.)

actually my understanding is that the books where completed during the captivity, from written and oral traditions from different independent Israelite communities.

i know how people frown on wiki's, but i like to use them cause their fast and also have references if you want to go further.plus i'm kinda lazy and don't like looking for everything that i half remember.
that said from the wiki.

]The majority of Biblical scholars believe that the written books were a product of the Babylonian captivity (c. 600 BCE), based on earlier written and oral traditions, which could only have arisen from separate communities within ancient Israel,[4] and that it was completed by the period of Achaemenid rule (c. 400 BCE).[5][6] The 1979 discovery of fragments of the Hebrew Bible (Priestly Blessing from the Book of Numbers) at Ketef Hinnom dating to the late 7th century BC, and thus to before the Babylonian captivity, is the oldest evidence of elements of the Torah which were current before the Babylonian exile. Torah

now i'm not going to go into all the models or what is said about the sources, only to say that again to my understanding the documentary hypothesis has fell into disfavor and more and more scholars are leaning towards written and oral sources those being Deuteronomic,and Priestly. there is also Non Priestly sources that are said to have been used.

so as i said abraham, his father, brother, nephew, their wives, slaves and others certainly carried their stories of their God with them on their travels and told them. which continued through the completion of the books. which happened during the captivity.

many scholars agree,based on earlier written and oral traditions, which could only have come from different communities in ancient Israel, and along with the oldest evidence of elements of the Torah which were current before the Babylonian exile. as per the wiki.

Oral traditions stemmed from the Canaanite religion from whence Judaism arose.
Even after the captivity, there were a vast number of Hebrews that were worshipping the Canaanite gods. Or so says the Torah.

Harte

a reply to: Harte

quit trying to be right and go back and read what i said in my first post.

originally posted by: hounddoghowlie
a reply to: Harte

quit trying to be right and go back and read what i said in my first post.

Your first one, or your most recent one? LOL
I'm not trying to be right. I am right.
So are you, BTW. Our statements are not mutually exclusive.

Harte

a reply to: ancienthistorian

No, they are not the same. Adapa was a king who grew annoyed at the South Wind when it capsized his boat, so he caught the wind and broke its wing and the wind stopped blowing. When summoned to the high god, Adapa follows advice that tricks him out of the food of immortality.

The only similarities to Enoch is that they're both men and they both visited heaven. After that, the similarity ends.

And looking for hints in words is misleading - those are the words of translators; not of the original and some of the words may be a translator's English translation of a French translation of the Cuneiform (because the tablet is lost or missing and the only good record is in French.

originally posted by: Byrd
a reply to: ancienthistorian

No, they are not the same. Adapa was a king who grew annoyed at the South Wind when it capsized his boat, so he caught the wind and broke its wing and the wind stopped blowing. When summoned to the high god, Adapa follows advice that tricks him out of the food of immortality.

The only similarities to Enoch is that they're both men and they both visited heaven. After that, the similarity ends.

And looking for hints in words is misleading - those are the words of translators; not of the original and some of the words may be a translator's English translation of a French translation of the Cuneiform (because the tablet is lost or missing and the only good record is in French.

You're absolutely right , I do apologize for comparing biblical characters with mythical Sumerian deities. I guess I'm just trying to find links that aren't really there , Thank you for your criticism it means alot.