Essay Comparing Noah And Gilgamesh

In the flood stories of Noah and of Gilgamesh there are many similarities in the story, but also many differences that make them stand apart.
One of the most prominent similarities and differences in the two stories is about the boat that the two of them had to build. The first similarity is the way the two were told to build the boat, Noah was told by God to build it and Utnapishtim was told by Ea. Another similarity between them is reason for the flood, in both stories the gods were mad because they thought that the humans were being too loud and they got too wicked and needed them to be gone. One difference is the mostly in the Utnapishtim story where there is more than one god controlling different aspects of the flood, Adad was the lord of the storm and leading it, Nergal pulled out the dams of nether water, and Ninurta threw down the dikes and the seven judges of Hell. The second difference is the way both of them found out it was safe to leave the boat and go

One of the motifs is the number seven because it was how many levels was on the boat and how many days it took to build the boat in the Utnapishtim flood story. In the Noah flood story the number seven was present when God said that he will make it rain in seven days and on the seventh month of the seventh day the ark came to rest on the Ararat mountain. The next motif is the number three because in the story of Noah the number was for how many sons he has, which was Shem, Ham, and Japheth. In the Utnapishtim flood the number three was how many gods and goddesses were used to use make the flood and there was three birds that were sent out to see if it was safe to leave the ship. One difference in the motifs is the number six, the Utnapishtim story the number six was used for how many days and nights it rained. The Noah story six is not present and it uses the number 40 instead, 40 was for how many days and nights it rained on